William Shakespeare: King Henry IV Part II

ACT I. 3. SCENE III. York. The Archbishop's palace.

[Enter the Archbishop, the Lords Hastings, Mowbray, Bardolph.]

ARCHBISHOP.
Thus have you heard our cause and known our means;
And, my most noble friends, I pray you all,
Speak plainly your opinions of our hopes:
And first, lord marshal, what say you to it?

MOWBRAY.
I well allow the occasion of our arms;
But gladly would be better satisfied
How in our means we should advance ourselves
To look with forehead bold and big enough
Upon the power and puissance of the king.

HASTINGS.
Our present musters grow upon the file
To five and twenty thousand men of choice;
And our supplies live largely in the hope
Of great Northumberland, whose bosom burns
With an incensed fire of injuries.

LORD BARDOLPH.
The question then, Lord Hastings, standeth thus:
Whether our present five and twenty thousand
May hold up head without Northumberland?

HASTINGS.
With him, we may.

LORD BARDOLPH.
Yea, marry, there 's the point:
But if without him we be thought too feeble,
My judgement is, we should not step too far
Till we had his assistance by the hand;
For in a theme so bloody-faced as this
Conjecture, expectation, and surmise
Of aids incertain should not be admitted.

ARCHBISHOP.
'Tis very true, Lord Bardolph; for indeed
It was young Hotspur's case at Shrewsbury.

LORD BARDOLPH.
It was, my lord; who lined himself with hope,
Eating the air on promise of supply,
Flattering himself in project of a power
Much smaller than the smallest of his thoughts:
And so, with great imagination
Proper to madmen, led his powers to death
And winking leap'd into destruction.

HASTINGS.
But, by your leave, it never yet did hurt
To lay down likelihoods and forms of hope.