The Prologue opens with a sweeping image of national unity, deploying anaphora ('Now … Now … For now') to create a drumbeat of collective momentum. The youth of England are figured as a single body animated by honour, and the phrase 'silken dalliance in the wardrobe lies' neatly encapsulates the rejection of peacetime softness in favour of martial purpose. The commercial metaphor — 'They sell the pasture now to buy the horse' — grounds this idealism in economic reality, suggesting that the drive for glory has material as well as spiritual dimensions.Henry is introduced indirectly but powerfully as 'the mirror of all Christian kings,' a phrase that positions him as both exemplar and reflection of an ideal. The classical allusion to 'English Mercuries' with 'winged heels' elevates the English soldiers into mythological figures, while 'Expectation' personified as sitting in the air and concealing a sword beneath a glittering canopy of 'crowns imperial' fuses martial threat with regal promise in a single, compressed image.The address to England as a 'little body with a mighty heart' introduces the body politic motif that runs throughout the play. The conditional 'What mightst thou do … / Were all thy children kind and natural!' pivots...
Act II, Prologue
Scene Summary
The Chorus opens Act II by describing England's martial excitement: young men abandon luxury for armour, armourers prosper, and the nation rallies behind Henry, whom the Chorus calls 'the mirror of all Christian kings.' France, alarmed by England's preparations, resorts to bribery rather than open resistance, corrupting three English nobles — Richard Earl of Cambridge, Henry Lord Scroop of Masham, and Sir Thomas Grey — with French gold to assassinate Henry before he can sail.
The Chorus then performs its characteristic metatheatrical function, apologising for the stage's inability to represent vast distances and action simultaneously. It announces that the scene shifts from London to Southampton, where the conspiracy will be exposed, and promises eventually to carry the audience safely across the Channel to France.
"Now all the youth of England are on fire, And silken dalliance in the wardrobe lies:" — Chorus (2, Prologue)
"Following the mirror of all Christian kings, With winged heels, as English Mercuries." — Chorus (2, Prologue)
"For now sits Expectation in the air, And hides a sword from hilts unto the point With crowns imperial, crowns and coronets," — Chorus (2, Prologue)
"O England! model to thy inward greatness, Like little body with a mighty heart," — Chorus (2, Prologue)
"Have, for the gilt of France,--O guilt indeed!" — Chorus (2, Prologue)
"And by their hands this grace of kings must die, If hell and treason hold their promises," — Chorus (2, Prologue)
"And bring you back, charming the narrow seas To give you gentle pass; for, if we may, We'll not offend one stomach with our play." — Chorus (2, Prologue)
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