CARDINAL WOLSEY

This, and all else
This talking lord can lay upon my credit,
I answer is most false. The duke by law
Found his deserts: how innocent I was
From any private malice in his end,
His noble jury and foul cause can witness.
If I loved many words, lord, I should tell you
You have as little honesty as honour,
That in the way of loyalty and truth
Toward the king, my ever royal master,
Dare mate a sounder man than Surrey can be,
And all that love his follies.

SURREY

By my soul,
Your long coat, priest, protects you; thou
shouldst feel
My sword i' the life-blood of thee else. My lords,
Can ye endure to hear this arrogance?
And from this fellow? if we live thus tamely,
To be thus jaded by a piece of scarlet,
Farewell nobility; let his grace go forward,
And dare us with his cap like larks.

CARDINAL WOLSEY

All goodness
Is poison to thy stomach.

SURREY

Yes, that goodness
Of gleaning all the land's wealth into one,
Into your own hands, cardinal, by extortion;
The goodness of your intercepted packets
You writ to the pope against the king: your goodness,
Since you provoke me, shall be most notorious.
My Lord of Norfolk, as you are truly noble,
As you respect the common good, the state
Of our despised nobility, our issues,
Who, if he live, will scarce be gentlemen,
Produce the grand sum of his sins, the articles
Collected from his life. I'll startle you
Worse than the scaring bell, when the brown wench
Lay kissing in your arms, lord cardinal.

CARDINAL WOLSEY

How much, methinks, I could despise this man,
But that I am bound in charity against it!

NORFOLK

Those articles, my lord, are in the king's hand:
But, thus much, they are foul ones.

CARDINAL WOLSEY

So much fairer
And spotless shall mine innocence arise,
When the king knows my truth.

SURREY

This cannot save you:
I thank my memory, I yet remember
Some of these articles; and out they shall.
Now, if you can blush and cry 'guilty,' cardinal,
You'll show a little honesty.

CARDINAL WOLSEY

Speak on, sir;
I dare your worst objections: if I blush,
It is to see a nobleman want manners.

SURREY

I had rather want those than my head. Have at you!
First, that, without the king's assent or knowledge,
You wrought to be a legate; by which power
You maim'd the jurisdiction of all bishops.

NORFOLK

Then, that in all you writ to Rome, or else
To foreign princes, 'Ego et Rex meus'
Was still inscribed; in which you brought the king
To be your servant.