savagery

My duty to you both , on equal love ,
Great kings of France and England . That I have
labored
With all my wits , my pains , and strong endeavors
To bring your most imperial Majesties
Unto this bar and royal interview ,
Your Mightiness on both parts best can witness .
Since , then , my office hath so far prevailed
That face to face and royal eye to eye
You have congreeted , let it not disgrace me
If I demand before this royal view
What rub or what impediment there is
Why that the naked , poor , and mangled peace ,
Dear nurse of arts , plenties , and joyful births ,
Should not in this best garden of the world ,
Our fertile France , put up her lovely visage ?
Alas , she hath from France too long been chased ,
And all her husbandry doth lie on heaps ,
Corrupting in its own fertility .
Her vine , the merry cheerer of the heart ,
Unprunèd , dies . Her hedges , even-pleached ,
Like prisoners wildly overgrown with hair ,
Put forth disordered twigs . Her fallow leas
The darnel , hemlock , and rank fumitory
Doth root upon , while that the coulter rusts
That should deracinate such savagery .
The even mead , that erst brought sweetly forth
The freckled cowslip , burnet , and green clover ,
Wanting the scythe , withal uncorrected , rank ,
Conceives by idleness , and nothing teems
But hateful docks , rough thistles , kecksies , burrs ,
Losing both beauty and utility .
And all our vineyards , fallows , meads , and hedges ,
Defective in their natures , grow to wildness .
Even so our houses and ourselves and children
Have lost , or do not learn for want of time ,
The sciences that should become our country ,
But grow like savages , as soldiers will
That nothing do but meditate on blood ,
To swearing and stern looks , diffused attire ,
And everything that seems unnatural .
Which to reduce into our former favor
You are assembled , and my speech entreats
That I may know the let why gentle peace
Should not expel these inconveniences
And bless us with her former qualities .

Sir Richard , what think you ? You have beheld .
Or have you read or heard , or could you think ,
Or do you almost think , although you see ,
That you do see ? Could thought , without this object ,
Form such another ? This is the very top ,
The height , the crest , or crest unto the crest ,
Of murder’s arms . This is the bloodiest shame ,
The wildest savagery , the vilest stroke
That ever wall-eyed wrath or staring rage
Presented to the tears of soft remorse .