Do thou stand for my father, and examine me upon the
particulars of my life.
Shall I?
Content: this chair shall be my state, this dagger my sceptre,
and this cushion my crown.
And the fire of grace be not quite out of thee,
now shalt thou be moved.
Give me a cup of sack
to make my eyes look red, that it may be thought I have
wept; for I must speak in passion, and I will do it
in King Cambyses' vein.
Well, here is my leg.
And here is my speech. Stand aside, nobility.
Harry, I do not only marvel where thou spendest thy
time, but also how thou art accompanied: for though
the camomile, the more it is trodden on the faster
it grows, yet youth, the more it is wasted the
sooner it wears. -O Jesu, this is excellent sport, i' faith!
Weep not, sweet queen; for trickling tears are vain.
-O, the father, how he holds his countenance! -Thou art my son, I have
partly thy mother's word, partly my opinion, but chiefly a villanous trick of thine eye
and a foolish-hanging of thy nether lip, that doth warrant me.
If then thou be son to me, here lies the point;
why, being son to me, art thou so pointed at?
Shall the blessed sun of heaven prove a micher
and eat blackberries? A question not to be asked.
Shall the sun of England prove a thief and take purses?
A question to be asked. -O Jesu, he doth it as like one of these harlotry
players as ever I see! -Peace, good pint-pot; peace, good tickle-brain.
There is a thing, Harry, which thou hast often heard of and it is known
to many in our land by the name of pitch: this
pitch, as ancient writers do report, doth defile;
so doth the company thou keepest: for, Harry, now
I do not speak to thee in drink but in tears,
not in pleasure but in passion, not in words only, but in woes also:
and yet there is a virtuous man whom I
have often noted in thy company, but I know not his name.
What manner of man, an it like your majesty?
A goodly portly man, i' faith, and a corpulent;
of a cheerful look, a pleasing eye and a most noble carriage; and his age, as I think, some fifty,
or, by'r lady, inclining to three score; and
now I do remember me, his name is Falstaff:
if that man should be lewdly given, he deceiveth me; for, Harry,
I see virtue in that Falstaff: him keep with, the rest banish.
Dost thou speak like a king? Do thou stand for me,
and I'll play my father.
Depose me?
if thou dost it half so gravely, so
majestically, both in words and matter, hang me up by
the heels for a rabbit-sucker or a poulter's hare.
Well, here I am set.
And here I stand: the judge, my masters.
Now, Harry, whence come you?
My noble lord, from Eastcheap.
The complaints I hear of thee are grievous.
My lord, they are false: nay, I'll tickle ye for a young prince.
Swearest thou, ungracious boy? henceforth ne'er look
on me. Thou art violently carried away from grace:
there is a devil haunts thee in the likeness of an
old fat man; a tun of man is thy companion.
Why dost thou converse with this trunk of humours, that
bolting-hutch of beastliness, that swollen parcel
of dropsies, that huge bombard of sack, that stuffed
cloak-bag of guts, that roasted Manningtree ox with
the pudding in his belly, that reverend vice, that
grey iniquity, that father ruffian, that vanity in years?
Wherein is he good, but to taste sack and
drink it? Wherein neat and cleanly, but to carve a
capon and eat it? Wherein cunning, but in craft?
Wherein crafty, but in villany? Wherein villanous, but in all things? Wherein
worthy, but in nothing?
I would your grace would take me with you: whom means your grace?
That villanous abominable misleader of youth, Falstaff, that old white-bearded Satan.
My lord, the man I know.
I know thou dost.
But to say I know more harm in him than in myself,
were to say more than I know. That he is old, the
more the pity, his white hairs do witness it; but
that he is, saving your reverence, a whoremaster, that I utterly deny.
If sack and sugar be a fault,
then Heaven help the wicked! If to be old
and merry be a sin, then many an old host that I know is
damned: If to be fat be to be hated, then Pharaoh's
lean kine are to be loved. No, my good lord; banish
Peto, banish Bardolph, banish Poins:
but for sweet Jack Falstaff, kind Jack Falstaff, true Jack Falstaff, valiant Jack Falstaff, and therefore
more valiant, being, as he is, old Jack Falstaff,
banish not him thy Harry's company,
banish not him thy Harry's company:
banish plump Jack, and banish all
the world.
I do, I will.