Enter Arch-Bishop.

Gui. You have prevailed, I will not go to council. 
I have provoked my sovereign past a pardon,
It but remains to doubt if he dare kill me: 
Then if he dares but to be just, I die. 
’Tis too much odds against me; I’ll depart,
And finish greatness at some safer time.

Arch. By heaven, ’tis Harry’s plot to fright you hence, That, coward-like, you might forsake your friends.

Gui. The devil foretold it dying Malicorn.

Arch. Yes, some court-devil, no doubt: 
If you depart, consider, good my lord,
You are the master-spring that moves our fabric,
Which once removed, our motion is no more. 
Without your presence, which buoys up our hearts,
The League will sink beneath a royal name;
The inevitable yoke prepared for kings
Will soon be shaken off; things done, repealed;
And things undone, past future means to do.

Card. I know not; I begin to taste his reasons.

Arch. Nay, were the danger certain of your stay,
An act so mean would lose you all your friends,
And leave you single to the tyrant’s rage: 
Then better ’tis to hazard life alone,
Than life, and friends, and reputation too.

Gui. Since more I am confirmed, I’ll stand the shock. 
Where’er he dares to call, I dare to go. 
My friends are many, faithful, and united;
He will not venture on so rash a deed: 
And now, I wonder I should fear that force,
Which I have used to conquer and contemn.

  Enter MARMOUTIERE.

Arch. Your tempter comes, perhaps, to turn the scale, And warn you not to go.

Gui. O fear her not,
I will be there. [Exeunt Arch-Bishop and Cardinal.
What can she mean?—­repent? 
Or is it cast betwixt the king and her
To sound me? come what will, it warms my heart
With secret joy, which these my ominous statesmen
Left dead within me;—­ha! she turns away.

Mar. Do you not wonder at this visit, sir?

Gui. No, madam, I at last have gained the point Of mightiest minds, to wonder now at nothing.

Mar. Believe me, Guise, ’twere gallantly resolved,
If you could carry it on the inside too. 
Why came that sigh uncalled?  For love of me,
Partly, perhaps; but more for thirst of glory,
Which now again dilates itself in smiles,
As if you scorned that I should know your purpose.

Gui. I change, ’tis true, because I love you still;
Love you, O heaven, even in my own despite;
I tell you all, even at that very moment,
I know you straight betray me to the king.

Mar. O Guise, I never did; but, sir, I come To tell you, I must never see you more.

Gui. The king’s at Blois, and you have reason for it; Therefore, what am I to expect from pity,—­ From yours, I mean,—­when you behold me slain?