Your very worshipful and loving friends,
And by their vehement instigation,
In this just cause come I to move your Grace.
Rich. I cannot tell, if to depart in silence, 140
Or bitterly to speak in your reproof,
Best fitteth my degree or your condition:
If not to answer, you might haply think
Tongue-tied ambition, not replying, yielded 144
To bear the golden yoke of sovereignty,
Which fondly you would here impose on me;
If to reprove you for this suit of yours,
So season'd with your faithful love to me, 148
Then, on the other side, I check'd my friends.
Therefore, to speak, and to avoid the first,
And then, in speaking, not to incur the last,
Definitively thus I answer you. 152
Your love deserves my thanks; but my desert
Unmeritable shuns your high request.
First, if all obstacles were cut away,
And that my path were even to the crown, 156
As the ripe revenue and due of birth,
Yet so much is my poverty of spirit,
So mighty and so many my defects,
That I would rather hide me from my greatness, 160
Being a bark to brook no mighty sea,
Than in my greatness covet to be hid,
And in the vapour of my glory smother'd.
But, God be thank'd, there is no need of me; 164
And much I need to help you, were there need;
The royal tree hath left us royal fruit,
Which, mellow'd by the stealing hours of time,
Will well become the seat of majesty, 168
140–172 Cf. n.
142 condition: rank
143 haply: perhaps
148 season'd with: rendered palatable by
149 check'd: should rebuke
154 Unmeritable: undeserving
157 ripe revenue: ready inheritance
165 And . . . need; cf. n.
