Adding to the previous blog post, I have thought to include Cranmer’s entire speech in the final scene of Henry VIII by Shakespeare. The archbishop is exclaiming upon the sight of the newly born Princess Elizabeth, with the king looking on, and I encourage you to envision Edward de Vere, Earl of Oxford expressing his own hopes for the future of the English throne. Is he giving Cranmer words of praise for the Scottish monarch who will succeed the Virgin Queen? Or might he be declaring, in rather bold language, that Elizabeth Tudor is destined to leave an heir — a royal son — of her own blood? I have emphasized lines that would seem to suggest the latter:
Let me speak, sir,
For heaven now bids me; and the words I utter
Let none think flattery, for they’ll find ’em truth.
This royal infant–heaven still move about her!–
Though in her cradle, yet now promises
Upon this land a thousand thousand blessings,
Which time shall bring to ripeness: she shall be–
But few now living can behold that goodness–
A pattern to all princes living with her,
And all that shall succeed: Saba was never
More covetous of wisdom and fair virtue
Than this pure soul shall be: all princely graces,
That mould up such a mighty piece as this is,
With all the virtues that attend the good,
Shall still be doubled on her: truth shall nurse her,
Holy and heavenly thoughts still counsel her:
She shall be loved and fear’d: her own shall bless her;
Her foes shake like a field of beaten corn,
And hang their heads with sorrow: good grows with her:
In her days every man shall eat in safety,
Under his own vine, what he plants; and sing
The merry songs of peace to all his neighbours:
God shall be truly known; and those about her
From her shall read the perfect ways of honour,
And by those claim their greatness, not by blood.
Nor shall this peace sleep with her: but as when
The bird of wonder dies, the maiden phoenix,
Her ashes new create another heir,
As great in admiration as herself;
So shall she leave her blessedness to one,*
When heaven shall call her from this cloud of darkness,
Who from the sacred ashes of her honour
Shall star-like rise, as great in fame as she was,
And so stand fix’d: peace, plenty, love, truth, terror,
That were the servants to this chosen infant,
Shall then be his, and like a vine grow to him:
Wherever the bright sun of heaven shall shine,
His honour and the greatness of his name
Shall be, and make new nations: he shall flourish,
And, like a mountain cedar, reach his branches
To all the plains about him: our children’s children
Shall see this, and bless heaven.
- The frequent uses of “one” in the Sonnets are allusions to the motto of Henry Wriothesley, Earl of Southampton: “One for All, All for One,” as suggested by line 144 of The Rape of Lucrece, dedicated to Southampton: “That one for all or all for one we gage.” Whether the Stratford man would have cared to imbed Southampton’s motto is open to question; but the Earl of Oxford, so highly conscious of such matters, could not have inserted those words without being fully aware of what he was doing. Oxford as “Shakespeare” was alert to the reverberations of each separate word.
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