William Shakespeare: King Henry VI, First Part

ACT SECOND 5. SCENE V. The Tower of London. (continued)

MORTIMER.
True; and thou seest that I no issue have,
And that my fainting words do warrant death:
Thou art my heir; the rest I wish thee gather:
But yet be wary in thy studious care.

PLANTAGENET.
Thy grave admonishments prevail with me:
But yet, methinks, my father's execution
Was nothing less than bloody tyranny.

MORTIMER.
With silence, nephew, be thou politic:
Strong-fixed is the house of Lancaster,
And like a mountain not to be removed.
But now thy uncle is removing hence;
As princes do their courts, when they are cloy'd
With long continuance in a settled place.

PLANTAGENET.
O, uncle, would some part of my young years
Might but redeem the passage of your age!

MORTIMER.
Thou dost then wrong me, as that slaughterer doth
Which giveth many wounds when one will kill.
Mourn not, except thou sorrow for my good;
Only give order for my funeral:
And so farewell, and fair be all thy hopes,
And prosperous be thy life in peace and war!

[Dies.]

PLANTAGENET.
And peace, no war, befall thy parting soul!
In prison hast thou spent a pilgrimage,
And like a hermit overpass'd thy days.
Well, I will lock his counsel in my breast;
And what I do imagine let that rest.
Keepers, convey him hence; and I myself
Will see his burial better than his life.

[Exeunt Jailers, bearing out the body of Mortimer.]

Here dies the dusky torch of Mortimer,
Choked with ambition of the meaner sort:
And for those wrongs, those bitter injuries,
Which Somerset hath offer'd to my house,
I doubt not but with honour to redress;
And therefore haste I to the parliament,
Either to be restored to my blood,
Or make my ill the advantage of my good.

[Exit.]