Attached is a paper of mine on 2HenryIV that is currently in
          press at Ohio University Press as part of a two volume
          festschrift in honor of George Anastaplo (eds. William T.
          Braithwaite, Robert L. Stone, and John A. Murley); the theme of
          the festschrift is "The Practice of Theory," and it contains
          articles from the fields of philosophy, law, political science,
          and literature (in all of which Anastaplo has published).  The
          festschrift is of course copyrighted and will have a December
          1990 publication date.
 
 
                                      ABSTRACT
 
               In Henry IV, Part II, Shakespeare establishes a close
               structural relationship between Prince Hal and Prince John
               of Lancaster.  The plot, imagery, and thematic motifs of the
               play create a functional ethic of personal and political
               prudence within which Henry V's rejection of Falstaff and
               John's betrayal of the rebels at Gaultree are commendable
               and akin.  Although John and the rebels are of secondary
               importance to Hal and Falstaff, the play dramatically
               foreshadows the outcome of both plots.  Several minor images
               in the play link Falstaff with the rebels and Hal with John,
               while the major images of disease, time, and unfulfilled
               expectations form larger structural patterns among the major
               characters.  Henry IV, Falstaff, and the rebels are all old,
               guilty gluttons whose opportunistic appetites bring only
               sickness and death rather than fulfillment.  Hal and John
               defeat the expectations of their elders, passively curb the
               voracity of their adversaries, and impose a new code of
               moral justice upon the ravished land.
 
 
         
         Dr. Stanley D. McKenzie
         329 Beckwith Road
         West Henrietta, New York 14586
 
 
 
 
                    The Prudence and Kinship of Prince Hal and
 
                          John of Lancaster in 2 Henry IV
 
 
 
              George Anastaplo continually explores the concept of
         "Prudence" throughout his writings.1  In his musings on
         literature, Anastaplo dismisses "dramatic necessities" in favor
         of inquiring "why a man of a certain character acted thus and
         so," and posing the ubiquitous Anastaplo question, "What is the
         right thing for a man to do in this situation."2  Anastaplo
         concludes that "in order to be able to choose correctly, one must
         be prudent. . . .  Prudence tends to lead us to moderation, both
         personal and communal."3  Hence for Anastaplo, Odysseus prevails
         because "he is a prudent man able to restrain himself."4
              For a volume of essays in honor of George Anastaplo on the
         theme of "The Practice of Theory," it seems appropriate to apply
         his concept of prudence to the characters in one of Shakespeare's
         most complex history plays, 2 Henry IV.  Henry V's rejection of
         Falstaff remains the central critical subject of debate in this
         play.  Is this rejection the proper fate of an unregenerate
         reprobate, or does it expose the new king as another
         Machiavellian Lancastrian placing policy above human feelings?  A
         secondary but related problem concerns the manner in which Hal's
         younger brother, Prince John of Lancaster, defeats the rebels at
         Gaultree.  Critical response has overwhelmingly condemned John,
         and the concern articulated by Dr. Johnson has not been
         adequately resolved to this day:  "It cannot but raise some
         indignation to find this horrible violation of faith passed over
         thus slightly by the poet, without any note of censure or
         detestation."5  Despite Dr. Johnson's protestation, there is
         considerable evidence that an Elizabethan audience in 1598 would
         view both Hal's rejection of Falstaff and John's betrayal of the
         rebels as prudent actions to be approved.  Shakespeare enhances
         such a response through the structure and imagery of 2 Henry IV,
         which associate Hal with John and create an ethic within which
         the actions of these Lancastrian brothers are prudent,
         commendable and intrinsically akin.
              Modern scholarship generally acknowledges the political
         necessity for the rejection of Falstaff, but there is no
         consensus as to how we should feel about Hal's method of
         effecting it.  A. C. Bradley asserts that during the rejection
         speech the audience feels "a good deal of pain and some
         resentment,"6 while more recently Catherine M. Shaw writes,
         "Intellectual moral justification for the expulsion of Falstaff
         can be accepted as can the historical actuality, but the
         disquietude which greets the end of 2 Henry IV is not
         intellectual; it is emotional."7  During the last decade, much
         attention has been given to Hal's role-playing throughout the
         Henry IV plays, but again with sharp disagreement: does this
         play-acting prove Hal to be a hypocrite with no underlying
         sincerity nor ethical base?  Or is Hal admirably rehearsing for
         the day in which he will be forced to accept the burdens and
         responsibilities of "formal majesty" (V.ii.133),8 a role he does
         not desire, but which he is duty-bound to accept?9
              Whereas Hal's rejection of Falstaff is increasingly being
         justified by critics, albeit often reluctantly and even
         apologetically, his brother's actions at Gaultree continue to be
         roundly denounced.  Bradley is more damning than Dr. Johnson,
         referring to the Gaultree victory as a "detestable fraud," and
         describing John as "the brave, determined, loyal, cold-blooded,
         pitiless, unscrupulous son of a usurper."10  E. M. W. Tillyard
         and Lily B. Campbell each provide some defense for John, but with
         the collapse of a single-minded Elizabethan world view has come
         nearly unanimous critical condemnation of John.  These modern
         critics, however, have tended to ignore the fear of civil war
         ever-present throughout Elizabeth's reign.  After the Northern
         Rebellion of 1569, a long "Homilie against Disobedience and
         Wylfull Rebellion" (1571) was read in every church throughout
         England, affirming that the sin of rebellion violates the Ten
         Commandments and commits all of the seven deadly sins:
                     For he that nameth rebellion nameth not a
                     singular or one only sin, as is theft robbery
                     murder and such like, but he nameth the whole
                     puddle and sink of all sins against God and
                     man.11
         Elizabeth's propaganda machinery continually stressed that
         subjects had no right to judge their monarch (undoubtedly to
         discourage those inclined to do just that); to rebel against a
         bad king, with the notable exception of Richard III, was as
         sinful as to rebel against a good king.  The Elizabethans could
         view Henry IV as an evil man (albeit penitent) inasmuch as he
         acquired the crown through rebellion,12 but still as a good king
         in that he successfully crushed rebellions against him.  God
         permitted the rebellions as punishment, but the rebels themselves
         were committing the mortal sin of disobedience to their king and
         deserved no mercy.  That John's method of victory at Gaultree in
         2 Henry IV was consistent with Elizabethan policy of the 1590s
         can be seen in Lodowick Lloyd's The Stratagems of Jerusalem
         (1602) which recounts numerous examples of treachery being used
         to achieve peace and asserts that "all stratagems, victories, &
         good counsell cometh from the Lord."13  Paul Jorgenson attributes
         the growing Elizabethan acceptance of deceit and treachery in
         dealing with rebels to the Irish wars.  Faced with guerrillas who
         adeptly circumvented standard military efforts, the English for
         years had been resorting to treacherous policies, including the
         slaughter in 1580 of several hundred rebels who surrendered to
         Lord Grey at Smerwick.14  Although theoretically despising
         Machiavelli, the Elizabethans were increasingly aware that many
         of his tactics could strengthen the security of the realm.15
              Elizabethan perceptions of the historical John of Lancaster
         must also be taken into account when analyzing the events at
         Gaultree; Shakespeare has specifically altered his source
         materials in making John, rather than Westmoreland, the
         perpetrator of the deceit.  Critics have argued that this
         historical change, along with the antipathy between John and
         Falstaff, serves to portray John as a cold-blooded, political
         Lancastrian in contrast to his warm and generous brother Hal.16
         This thesis is dubious, however, considering that John becomes
         the famous Duke of Bedford, whose reputation among the
         Elizabethans was nearly as great as his brother's.  Shakespeare
         himself had previously portrayed Bedford in 3 Henry VI where at
         his death he is eulogized by Talbot and Burgundy as "valiant,"
         "Courageous," "Undaunted spirit," and
                     A brave soldier never couched lance,
                     A gentler heart did never sway in court.
                                                    (III.ii.134-135)
         On his deathbed, Henry V named Bedford protector of the realm for
         the infant Henry VI, and even after assuming the regency of
         France, Bedford remained instrumental in keeping peace at home
         between his brother Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, and his uncle
         Henry Beaufort, Bishop of Winchester.  Holinshed calls Bedford "a
         man both politike in peace, and hardie in warre, and yet no more
         hardie than mercifull when he had the victorie."17  It seems
         likely that Shakespeare made John responsible for the events at
         Gaultree not to contrast him with Hal, but to use the future Duke
         of Bedford's reputation as a positive reflection upon the method
         of victory; the brother's responsibility also serves to associate
         Hal more directly with these events which preserve the crown for
         him.
              Henry V's rejection of Falstaff and John's betrayal of the
         rebels at Gaultree would be seen as essentially similar by a
         London audience in 1598 inasmuch as each manifests the triumph of
         order over disruptive forces threatening the security of the
         kingdom.  For the brothers to have acted differently would have
         constituted a shocking and dangerous display of irresponsibility
         by those with whom God had entrusted the welfare of the realm.
         This political prudence may still be emotionally unattractive,
         however, especially for a modern audience, if it is viewed as
         calculatedly Machiavellian and personally unprincipled.  The
         brilliance of Shakespeare's achievement within 2 Henry IV is the
         manner by which he reinforces the cold lessons of political
         reality through the artistic devices available to the dramatist,
         especially imagery and thematice structuring.  As the remainder
         of this paper will show, Shakespeare creates a functional ethos
         in the world of 2 Henry IV where voracious appetite and greedy
         expectations surfeit, while moderation triumphs in the course of
         time.18  Attuned to this ethos, Hal and John thrive and conform
         precisely to Anastaplo's definition of prudence as moderation and
         self-restraint which "may depend, ultimately, on a vital
         awareness of the nature of things."19
              Turning first to Shakespeare's dramatic shaping of the
         play's literal plot, when the newly crowned Henry V stands
         between Falstaff and the Lord Chief Justice and is forced to make
         a final irrevocable choice, his commitment to justice and
         rejection of disorder contradicts the previously expressed
         expectations of every major character in the play.20  Shakespeare
         nevertheless has carefully prepared for Hal's rejection of
         Falstaff throughout 2 Henry IV, and those who empathize with
         Falstaff's expectations will find little encouragement within the
         text itself.  The second scene of the play establishes the Lord
         Chief Justice and Falstaff as polar opposites; the Chief Justice
         does engage in battles of wit with Falstaff, but he also
         expresses his contempt with comments such as "the truth is, Sir
         John, you live in great infamy" (I.ii.138-139) and "Thou art a
         great fool" (II.i.195-196).  Prince Hal also treats Falstaff in
         this play with open contempt.  He says, "I do allow this wen to
         be as familiar with me as my dog" (II.ii.105-106), and claims
         that it is "profane" to spend time playing jokes on Falstaff
         (II.iv.368-369).  Except for one episode, Hal and Falstaff do not
         appear together until the final rejection scene, and the feeling
         that they are boon companions, established in Part I, is lost in
         Part II.
              At court, Warwick foreshadows Falstaff's rejection when
         he assures Henry IV that
                     The prince but studies his companions
                     Like a strange tongue, wherein, to gain the language,
                     'Tis needful that the most immodest word
                     Be looked upon and learned, which once attained,
                     Your highness knows, comes to no further use
                     But to be known and hated.  So, like gross terms,
                     The prince will in the perfectness of time
                     Cast off his followers. . . .
                                                    (IV.iv.68-75)
         Such a rationale seems dubious in today's addiction-conscious
         society, but it was commonplace in sixteenth century educational
         treatises.  On the other hand, Henry IV's prediction of his son's
         reign (IV.v.119-137) provides a horrifying description of
         England's fate if Henry V should not indeed cast out the "gross
         terms" he has learned.
              Even the comic Gloucestershire scenes prepare for Falstaff's
         rejection.  He traitorously misuses the king's press, receiving
         bribes from Moldy and Bullcalf, whom Shallow proclaims the best
         of the lot, to free them from impressment and taking in their
         place the decrepit Wart.21  Furthermore the relationship between
         Shallow and Falstaff parallels Falstaff's relationship with Hal;
         in each case one partner expects to use his fellow for his own
         advantage, while the other associates with the hanger-on solely
         for his own amusement.  Falstaff thus unwittingly anticipates his
         own rejection when he says of Shallow, "Either wise bearing or
         ignorant carriage is caught, as men take diseases, one of
         another.  Therefore let men take heed of their company"
         (V.i.78-80).  Immediately after the final reconciliation between
         Hal and Henry IV, Act V opens in Gloucestershire with Falstaff
         asking to be excused to leave; Shallow responds,
                     I will not excuse you.  You shall not be excused.
                     Excuses shall not be admitted.  There is no excuse
                     shall serve.  You shall not be excused.
                                                    (V.i.5-7)
              Falstaff is soon not to be excused in a less comic sense as
         well.  In the final Gloucestershire scene, Falstaff destroys any
         possible remaining sympathy for him when he learns that Hal is
         king and greedily cries out,
                     Let us take any man's horses; the laws of England are
                     at my commandment.  Blessed are they that have been
                     my friends, and woe to my Lord Chief Justice!
                                                    (V.iii.140-143)
         The new king, however, has already assured his brothers and the
         Chief Justice of his devotion to law and order.  Henry V must
         still confirm his choice when confronted by both the Chief
         Justice and Falstaff simultaneously, but Shakespeare has
         foreshadowed Hal's decision throughout the play.
              Henry V nevertheless finds the rejection difficult to make,
         and he at first attempts to have the Chief Justice get rid of
         Falstaff for him:  "My Lord Chief Justice, speak to that vain
         man" (V.v.44).  Falstaff persists, however, and the new king must
         deal with him personally.  Falstaff's fascinating character makes
         plausible Hal's wasting time with him.  His wit seduces
         characters and audience alike, and Hostess Quickly, whom Falstaff
         constantly swindles, chokes up when he leaves for the wars,
         crying, "Well, fare thee well.  I have known thee these
         twenty-nine years, come peascod-time, but an honester and
         truer-hearted man--well, fare thee well" (II.iv.389-391).
         Judgment must be passed, however, and an objective look at
         Falstaff leaves no choice but for the prudent and moderate man to
         reject him.
              Beginning with A. C. Bradley, the critics who claim that
         Shakespeare created such a genius of wit that he could not
         destroy him convincingly when the time came have themselves
         failed to distinguish between the genuinely witty Falstaff of
         Part I and the Falstaff in Part II whose wit is so often based on
         other people's miseries.22  Falstaff's entire environment has
         degenerated in Part II.  In Part I Mistress Quickly apparently
         had an honest husband, well loved by the prince (Part I,
         III.iii.98), and ran a respectable tavern, but in Part II she is
         a widow (II.i.82) and seems to be operating a brothel.  Doll
         Tearsheet and Pistol, new additions to the Eastcheap populace in
         Part II, are two of the grossest characters in any of
         Shakespeare's plays.  Immediately before Falstaff's rejection,
         Hostess Quickly and Doll Tearsheet are hauled away to prison for
         having, along with Pistol, beaten a man to death (V.iv.16-17).
         Although humorous, the voracious excesses of Falstaff and his
         companions have now become deadly.
              When Henry V does reject Falstaff, Prince John comments, "I
         like this fair proceeding of the king's" (V.v.9) and then
         accurately predicts Henry V's invasion of France.  Shakespeare's
         giving John the final words in the play (except for the "Epilogue
         [Spoken by a Dancer]") links John's moral approbation of Henry V
         with his own proceedings at Gaultree.  Although dramatically
         John's betrayal of the rebels is of secondary importance to Henry
         V's rejection of Falstaff, the betrayal is likewise foreshadowed
         through advance warnings that the truce may not be all it seems.
         Mowbray, for one, is uneasy throughout the negotiations:
                     There is a thing within my bosom tells me
                     That no conditions of our peace can stand.
                                                    (IV.i.181-182)
         Mowbray argues that the king must henceforth view everything they
         do with suspicion, and after both armies have presumably been
         dismissed, it is again Mowbray who suddenly feels ill while the
         others are drinking toasts.  Prince John also provides a hint of
         things to come when he reproaches the Archbishop for acting
         unlike a man of God in "Turning the word to sword and life to
         death" (IV.ii.10); it is likewise equally unnatural for John, a
         soldier and prince, to put up his sword and settle a rebellion
         with words.
              The outward events of the play significantly take no notice
         of the moral issues involved in John's dissembling.  Falstaff
         criticizes John's sobriety, but not his method of victory, and
         even the rebels go off to execution with minimal protest.
         Furthermore, no one in the royal family indicates that John's
         actions blemish Lancastrian honor.  In Part I, both King Henry IV
         and Hal had high praise for John's performance at Shrewsbury
         (V.iv.15-20), and Part II provides no evidence that Hal changes
         his mind about John, either before or after Gaultree; likewise
         the dying king, who has consistently chastised Hal for perceived
         moral shortcomings, welcomes John back from Gaultree without
         qualification.
              Although John's betrayal of the rebels is not foreshadowed
         as extensively as Hal's rejection of Falstaff, the literal plot
         level of 2 Henry IV does prepare for both events and associates
         them with each other through John's approbation of his brother's
         action.  Falstaff's defenders have argued that Shakespeare
         intends John's approval as a deprecation of Hal's character in
         that only someone as treacherous as John could approve of the new
         king's cold-hearted treatment of his former companion, but the
         symbolic or mythic elements and imagery patterns of the play also
         link Hal and John closely together and enhance the
         appropriateness of both men's actions.
              Falstaff's bulk enables him to embody several symbolic and
         mythic aspects, all requiring his rejection by the new king.  His
         roles as the Vice figure, the unregenerate "Old Man," the
         "Martlemas" beef and the Lord of Misrule or scapegoat sacrificed
         to regenerate the wasteland have been so well established23 that
         when Justice Silence sings of "lusty lads" eating "flesh" at
         "Shrovetide" (V.iii.17-36) shortly before Falstaff's rejection,
         we may well recall that Shrovetide's feasting precedes the barren
         "winter" Lent leading to death and rebirth at Easter.  Thus the
         model Christian king's "sacrifice" of the symbolic scapegoat of
         riot and waste promises not only a new spirit of self-restrained
         frugality and strict order, but also future glories for England.
         The psychoanalytical critics carry these symbolic aspects even
         further, claiming that Falstaff is a substitute father-figure for
         Hal and must, like the ritually slain kings of Frazer's The
         Golden Bough, be sacrificed before the land can regain its
         fertility under the rule of the young, virile son.  Hal's real
         father-king, Henry IV, acquired his crown through the deposition
         and murder of Richard II, and "under the guilt-ridden, infirm,
         old king, England itself has become diseased."24  Hal manifests
         parricidal tendencies toward his father throughout both parts of
         Henry IV, according to these critics, but these impulses are
         restricted to a displacement "killing" of the substitute father.
         Henry IV's natural death expiates the murder of Richard, but to
         renew England's strength, Henry V must bury his youthful vanities
         with the body of his father and sacrifice the spirit of excess
         and misrule by banishing his companions of those earlier,
         carefree days.
              Falstaff's symbolic qualities encompass greedy appetite and
         disorder in general and are associated with the rebels in the
         play, even though these secondary political figures lack the
         abundance of specific mythic overtones which make Falstaff so
         rich a character.  This association is made through imagery
         patterns which establish structural relationships among the major
         characters.25  In the rejection scene, Hal calls Falstaff
         "surfeit-swelled" (V.v.50) and tells him
                               the grave doth gape
                     For thee thrice wider than for other men.
                                                    (V.v.53-54)
         The images echo the Archbishop's reference to "our surfeiting and
         wanton hours" (IV.i.55) and Northumberland's claim that "my limbs
         . . . Are thrice themselves" (I.i.143-145).  Lord Bardolph says
         the rebel messenger from Shrewsbury "had stol'n / The horses he
         rode on" (I.i.57-58), while Falstaff cries, "Let us take any
         man's horses" (V.iii.140) upon learning that Hal is king, again
         linking him to the rebels.  Both Falstaff and the rebels indulge
         in self-deception, entertaining hopes for which they have little
         basis and which ultimately fail.  Falstaff continually deceives
         himself until the very end that Hal will still be his companion
         when king, while the rebels create false hopes in planning their
         campaign.  Hastings acknowledges that
                          our supplies live largely in the hope
                     Of great Northumberland,
                                                    (I.iii.12-13)
         and cautious Lord Bardolph asserts that they need to be certain
         of Northumberland's questionable support, since
                     Conjecture, expectation, and surmise
                     Of aids incertain should not be admitted.
                                                    (I.iii.23-24)
         Yet after these self-acknowledged dangers, the rebels
         immoderately decide to proceed regardless of Northumberland's
         support and by the end of the scene are trusting their hopes
         entirely to circumstances.
              Hal and John are likewise linked through the imagery of the
         play as they reverse the surfeits of their adversaries and return
         things to normal.  The rebellion is a flooding (IV.i.174) which
         John contains; when the "truce" is celebrated with drinks, the
         Archbishop gets high, "Believe me, I am passing light in spirit"
         (IV.ii.85), while John's drinking is highly restrained, according
         to the play's preeminent drinker (IV.iii.87-90).  Hal also stems
         a flood of excessive sanguinity when he becomes king:
                          The tide of blood in me
                     Hath proudly flowed in vanity till now.
                     Now doth it turn and ebb back to the sea,
                     Where it shall mingle with the state of floods
                     and flow henceforth in formal majesty.
                                                    (V.ii.129-133)
              Hal and John also meet their obligations, in contrast to the
         debt-ridden Falstaff (literally) and the rebels (morally).
         Thinking his father has died, Hal says,
                                         Thy due from me
                     Is tears and heavy sorrows of the blood,
                     Which nature, love and filial tenderness
                     Shall, O dear father, pay thee plenteously.26
                                                    (IV.v.36-39)
         The Archbishop accuses John of breaking faith, but the prince
         claims,
 
                                     I pawned thee none.
                     I promised you redress of these same grievances
                     Whereof you did complain, which, by mine honor,
                     I will perform with a most Christian care.
                                                    (IV.ii.113-116)
         John's punctiliousness contrasts with Northumberland's earlier
         argument to his wife that he must join the Archbishop's
         rebellion:
                                   my honor is at pawn,
                     And, but my going, nothing can redeem it.
                                                    (II.iii.7-8)
         Northumberland, however, once again fails to provide the support
         upon which the rebels are counting.
              Several minor thematic images thus link Hal and John
         together, as well as Falstaff with the rebels.  Disease, time,
         and unfulfilled expectations are the dominant (and most
         frequently analyzed27) images of 2 Henry IV, however, and these
         motifs create even larger structural relationships among the
         characters, in which the king is also grouped with Falstaff and
         the rebels in contrast to Hal and John.  Beginning with disease,
         Henry IV, unlike the fighting king of Part I, is ill throughout
         Part II and finally dies.  Whereas the bad news of Shrewsbury
         cures the crafty-sick Northumberland (I.i.137-139), the good news
         of Gaultree hastens the king's death (IV.iv.102-111).  Falstaff
         is preoccupied with everyone's diseases and is thoroughly sick
         himself, according to the analysis of his urine (I.ii.3-5); he
         even boasts, "I will turn diseases to commodity" (I.ii.251).
         Other characters in the play are likewise diseased.  Falstaff
         insinuates that Doll Tearsheet and Hostess Quickly have syphilis,
         while of the prospective recruits at Gloucestershire, the two
         best are "Moldy" and Bullcalf, who claims he has been plagued
         with a "whoreson cold" through Henry IV's entire reign
         (III.ii.183-187).  The Archbishop, leader of the rebels, sums it
         all up:
                                         We are all diseased,
                     And with our surfeiting and wanton hours,
                     Have brought ourselves into a burning fever,
                     And we must bleed for it.  Of which disease
                     Our late king, Richard, being infected, died.
                                                    (IV.i.54-58)
         This all-encompassing disease afflicts not only the people, but
         also the realm itself.  The Archbishop speaks of a "bleeding
         land" (I.i.207), and even the king admits his land is diseased:
                     Then you perceive the body of our kingdom
                     How foul it is, what rank diseases grow,
                     And with what danger, near the heart of it.
                                                    (III.i.38-40)
         All of England bears responsiblity for the murder of Richard II
         through the popular support given Bolingbroke; now the sickness
         in the land is exasperated by new rebellions led by the same
         guilty men who helped Henry IV acquire his crown in the first
         place.  Only Hal and John, too young to have participated in
         Richard's deposition, are healthy and free from the disease that
         afflicts England.
              England's disease was caused by events which occurred in the
         past, but still affect the present times.  Mowbray claims they
         all
                          feel the bruises of the days before
                     And suffer the condition of these times,
                                                    (IV.i.98-99)
         and the rebels constantly use time or the "times" as an excuse
         for their actions.  The Archbishop tells Westmoreland,
                     We see which way the stream of time doth run,
                     And are enforced from our most quiet there
                     By the rough torrent of occasion.
                                                    (IV.i.70-72)
         But Westmoreland relies upon the identical rationale when he
         responds to the Archbishop's claim that the times make them
         rebel:
                     Construe the times to their necessities.
                     And you shall say indeed, it is the time,
                     And not the king, that doth you injuries.
                                                    (IV.i.102-104)
         Warwick also claims the "Necessary form" of "the hatch and brood
         of time" enabled Richard II to prophesy correctly that
         Northumberland would revolt against Henry IV (III.i.80-92), and
         even the king wishes he could
                                     read the book of fate,
                     And see the revolution of the times . . .
                                                    (III.i.45-46)
         All these men, rebels and loyalists alike, are so caught up in
         capitalizing upon the present moment to further their worldly
         ambitions and have such a highly developed consciousness of
         time's power over them that they become indeed "time's subjects,"
         as Hastings claims (I.iii.110).
              Hal and John, however, do not subject their destinies to
         "the rough torrent of occasion" and never blame the times for
         their actions.  Being young, they are scarcely concerned with
         time, and each makes only two direct references to it in Part II.
         Hal, regretting his youthful imprudence, tells Poins, "Thus we
         play the fools with the time (II.ii.141), and when he learns that
         his father has been preparing for war while he has been playing
         tricks on Falstaff, he cries,
                     By heaven, Poins, I feel me much to blame,
                     so idly to profane the precious time.
                                                    (II.iv.368-369)
         Attuned to the larger patterns of time which in due course will
         bring him to the crown, Hal views the present moment as a
         commodity for prudent use, but not a binding force.  Similarly,
         John does not attempt to construe the necessities of the moment
         into a defense for his deeds and indeed claims that the rebels
         are
                                          much too shallow,
                     to sound the bottom of the after-times.
                                                    (IV.ii.50-51)
         John's only other use of the word comes when he tells Falstaff
         after Gaultree,
                     These tardy tricks of yours will, on my life,
                     One time or other break some gallows' back.
                                                    (IV.iii.28-29)
         Not the vagrancies of time, John says, but Falstaff's own actions
         will destroy him.
              Falstaff is time's subject, however, in the sense that time
         brings old age and death.  Throughout Part II Falstaff tries to
         embody the eternal spirit of youth, but he cannot escape the fact
         that he has grown old and infirm, ever closer to paying the debt
         to God he managed to postpone at Shrewsbury.  Like Henry IV and
         the rebels, Falstaff too is a diseased prisoner of his own past.
         The king and the rebels remember Richard II, but Falstaff and
         Shallow recall the even earlier era when John of Gaunt ruled
         England during the declining years of Edward III; Falstaff closes
         the scene by saying, "Let time shape, and there an end"
         (III.ii.336-337).
              The time imagery of 2 Henry IV thus separates the major
         characters into two groups.  Henry IV, the Archbishop,
         Northumberland, the other rebels, and Falstaff, the would-be
         exploiters of time, are instead all time's subjects, old
         "fathers" (the Archbishop is a "reverend father") whose voracious
         appetites and expectations have have disrupted the established
         order.28  Henry IV robbed Richard of his crown with the help of
         the rebels who now attempt to rob it from him, while Falstaff
         robs the king's "crowns" or money.  These robberies create unpaid
         debts, and even though Henry IV claims he "purchased" the crown
         (IV.v.199), he can pay for it only with his life.  Purchasing is
         associated with death throughout the play, as when Shallow keeps
         asking the purchase price of animals while reminiscing about his
         youthful companions who have now grown old and died
         (III.ii.40-54).  Moldy and Bullcalf purchase their lives, but
         Feeble says, "We owe God a death" (III.ii.240), punning on
         "debt," and echoing Hal's words to Falstaff before Shrewsbury in
         Part I, "Why, thou owest God a death" (V.i.126).  Despite
         Falstaff's incessant borrowing on even that debt, in Part II the
         time for payment comes due, and all the old robbers are required
         to make a final reckoning.  Hal and John, however, the healthy
         young sons from a new generation, are free from the guilty debts
         of the past that haunt the diseased old men of England.  They do
         not blame the times, but accept the state of affairs created by
         their elders; they attune themselves to the natural order of
         their world, assume their proper duties and responsibilities, and
         set out to shape a new future.
              The final significant thematic motif connecting Henry IV,
         Falstaff, and the rebels is unfulfilled expectations.  The king
         expects to expiate his murder of Richard II through a journey to
         Jerusalem, where it was prophesied to him he would die; instead
         he dies at home in a room called Jerusalem.  He also expects his
         son to institute a reign of riot and says that Hal's premature
         taking of the crown "hast sealed up my expectation" (IV.v.103),
         but Henry V becomes "the mirror of all Christian kings" (Henry V,
         II.pro.6).  The rebels expect support from Northumberland which
         they do not receive, and the Archbishop expects to have God's
         help, only to hear John credit his own victory to God.  Mowbray
         does not think the peace can last, while his fellow rebels
         believe that the king will not chastise them after the truce; the
         peace does last, however, and John executes all the rebel
         leaders.  Falstaff expects to be the boon companion of Henry V,
         but he is not to command the laws of England.
              As with the disease imagery, unfulfilled expectations
         permeate 2 Henry IV at every level, beginning with Rumor who
         creates false expectations only to destroy them.29  Hostess
         Quickly expects not only to get paid by Falstaff, but even to
         marry him; Justice Shallow thinks he will use Falstaff for his
         own gain; after Henry IV dies, the Chief Justice expects
         punishment from Henry V, Warwick now thinks Hal will be a riotous
         king, and even Clarence dreads having to speak well of Falstaff,
         but all three are wrong; Hal realizes that no one expects him to
         weep over his father, but he later does, and the crown that seems
         to be the "best of gold" turns out to be the "worst of gold"
         (IV.v.160).  The very language of the play creates unfulfilled
         expectations through the use of oxymora ("wrathful dove or most
         magnanimous mouse"); images such as Hal's simile that the crown
         is
                     Like a rich armor worn in heat of day,
                     That scald'st with safety;
                                                    (IV.v.29-30)
         and even in set poetic passages such as the king's apostrophe to
         sleep (III.i.9-31) which comes to the ship-boy in a deafening
         storm, but is denied to a king despite all his material comforts.
         This speech is parodied earlier by Falstaff as he tells Doll
         Tearsheet and Mistress Quickly
                     how men of merit are sought after.  The undeserver
                     may sleep when the man of action is called on,
                                                    (II.iv.382-84)
          providing yet another linkage between the king and fat knight.30
              The theme of unfulfilled expectations is often developed
         through eating imagery, as in Henry IV's lament that fortune
                          either gives a stomach and no food--
                     Such are the poor, in health--or else a feast
                     And takes away the stomach--such are the rich
                     That have abundance and enjoy it not.
                                                    (IV.iv.105-108)
         Throughout the play, excessive "eating" leads not to contented
         satiation, but to surfeits and disease.  The Epilogue promises
         more of Falstaff, "If you be not too much cloyed with fat meat"
         (Epi.26-27), and even the prostitutes' syphilis is associated
         with gluttony::
                     Falstaff:  You make fat rascals, Mistress Doll.
                     Doll:  I make them?  Gluttony and diseases make, I
                          make them not.
                     Falstaff:  If the cook help to make the gluttony, you
                          help to make the diseases, Doll.  We catch of
                          you.
                                                    (II.iv.41-45)
              The images of voracious appetite, surfeits, disease, death,
         time, and unfulfilled expectations are all brought together in an
         early speech by the Archbishop which sets the tone for the entire
         play:
                     The commonwealth is sick of their own choice;
                     Their overgreedy love hath surfeited.
                     An habitation giddy and unsure
                     Hath he that buildeth on the vulgar heart.
                     O thou fond many, with what loud applause
                     didst thou beat heaven with blessing Bolingbroke,
                     Before he was what thou wouldst have him be!
                     And being how trimmed in thine own desires,
                     Thou, beastly feeder, art so full of him
                     That thou provok'st thyself to cast him up.
                     So, so, thou common dog, didst thou disgorge
                     Thy glutton bosom of the royal Richard;
                     And now thou wouldst eat thy dead vomit up,
                     And howl'st to find it.  What trust is in these times?
                                                    (I.iii.87-100)
         In 2 Henry IV, greedy expectations are not fulfilled as desired,
         but instead surfeit.  Time is the ultimate betrayer, imprisoning
         men through past events and eventually defeating all desires
         through old age, disease, and death.
              Surfeit is the result of gluttony, the opposite of prudent
         moderation and self-restraint.31  Falstaff literally gorges
         himself with food and drink and tries to ingest everything else,
         including the very laws of England; Henry V calls the
         "surfeit-swelled" knight "The tutor and the feeder of my riots"
         (V.v.50, 62).  Henry IV hungered for Richard II's crown and dies
         repenting for the manner by which he became king.  Northumberland
         and the other rebels who originally helped Henry now try to take
         the crown for themselves and are executed for their efforts.  All
         of these men create expectations based upon lawlessly and
         gluttonously grabbing for things not belonging to them.  Their
         expectations either remain unfulfilled or they surfeit on what
         they have imprudently ingested, become sick and die.  England was
         jarred out of its naturally fertile state by Richard's misrule
         and his subsequent deposition and murder, but the men responsible
         continue trying to satiate their own opportunistic appetites and
         blame the times instead of their gluttony for the sickness they
         have caused.
              Those characters who do not grab, but instead prudently
         accept what life brings to them, live on successfully at the end
         of the play.  John, with typical restraint, foregoes a
         battlefield resolution and instead calmly lets the rebels fall
         into his clever trap, crediting God for the restoration of the
         peace.  The Chief Justice also accepts his anticipated fate
         without making elaborate plans for his own safety.  He does not
         expect Henry V to love him, but he is prepared "To welcome the
         condition of the time" (V.ii.11); this passive acceptance of
         destiny without regard to personal benefit leads to an
         affirmative reversal of his expectations as he is retained in his
         position and honored by the new king.  The most prudent
         non-grabber, of course, is Hal, whose only expectation is that he
         will be king.  When he tries to fulfill this expectation himself,
         however, taking the crown before it belongs to him, he has to
         give it back.  The last lesson Hal learns before becoming king is
         self-restraint and not to grab, but to wait prudently for things
         to descend to him in rightful order.
              When Henry IV awakes to find that Hal has taken his crown,
         he cries out, "See, sons, what things you are!" (IV.v.64),
         claiming that fathers who care for their sons are unnaturally
         "murdered for our pains" (IV.v.77).  When Hal again enters the
         room, the dying king continues:
                     Dost thou so hunger for mine empty chair
                     That thou wilt needs invest thee with my honors
                     Before thy hour be ripe? . . .
                     Thy life did manifest thou lov'dst me not,
                     And thou wilt have me die assured of it.
                     Thou hid'st a thousand daggers in thy thoughts,
                     Which thou has whetted on thy stony heart,
                     To stab at half an hour of my life.
                                                    (IV.v.94-108)
         Although the king is wrong in his assessment of Hal's parricidal
         motives, in this play the old "fathers"--secular, spiritual and
         sensual alike--give way to the young sons.  Hal and John both
         defeat the expectations of the old generation as they impose new
         codes of strict moral justice upon the forces of disorder.  Henry
         IV, Falstaff, Northumberland, and the Archbishop are time's
         subjects, the products of their pasts, while Hal and John
         represent the future and are not bound by either the deeds or
         expectations of the fathers.  Sons, however, must build the
         future upon an inheritance from the past; they must not grab for
         the possessions of the fathers until they naturally descend in
         proper order.  Henry IV's crown in due course comes to Hal, while
         the Chief Justice embodies the heritage of the deceased king.
         The Chief Justice is old, diseased, and time's subject; he does
         not grab, however, and so lives on temporarily bridging the past
         and the new era of Henry V, who tells him, "You shall be as a
         father to my youth" (V.ii.118).
              The plot, characterizations, mythic and symbolic elements,
         themes, and imagery of 2 Henry IV all work together to create a
         functional ethic of moderation and self-restraint in which
         gluttony surfeits, defeating the expectations of the glutton.
         Those who are attuned to this premise of personal and political
         prudence prosper, while those who defy it are destroyed.32  The
         last step in the education of Prince Hal is learning not to be a
         glutton; he voices this lesson when, as the newly crowned king,
         he speaks to Falstaff:
                     I know thee not, old man.  Fall to thy prayers.
                     How ill white hairs becomes a fool and jester!
                     I have long dreamt of such a kind of man,
                     So surfeit-swelled, so old, and so profane,
                     But, being awaked, I do despise my dream.
                     Make less thy body hence, and more thy grace.
                     Leave gormandizing.
                                                    (V.v.47-53)
         Although Saturn devoured his own children, Falstaff is not
         permitted to ingest his "Jove."33  To save the old glutton from
         temptation, Henry V provides him with a "competence of life"
         (V.v.66), and if Falstaff will be content with what he receives
         without grabbing for more, he will be given advancement.
              Henry V's rejection of Falstaff is akin to John's betrayal
         of the rebels at Gaultree inasmuch as both curb voracious
         appetites by exercising moderation and self-restraint.  The two
         Lancastrian brothers thematically are of similar  character and
         possess Anastaplo's "vital awareness of the nature of things" in
         the world that Shakespeare has created for them.  They
         recognize the death of the old order of things and accept the
         Machiavellian reality of the new order, but at the same time give
         legitimacy to this new order by immersing themselves in an ethos
         of natural succession.  Indeed, Hal and John essentially affirm a
         comic vision of generational renewal as opposed to the gluttonous
         tragic vision of their forefathers.  The functional ethic
         operating through the imagery and structure of 2 Henry IV impels
         us to accept and to approve the prudence of both Hal's and John's
         actions and to recognize their inherent thematic kinship.
 
         Rochester Institute of Technology
 
                                       NOTES
 
 
              1See especially Anastaplo's "American Constitutionalism and
         the Virtue of Prudence: Philadelphia, Paris, Washington,
         Gettysburg," in Abraham Lincoln, the Gettysburg Address, and
         American Constitutionalism, ed. Leo Paul S. de Alvarez (Irving,
         Texas: Univ. of Dallas Press, 1976), pp. 77-170.
              2Anastaplo, The Artist as Thinker: From Shakespeare to Joyce
         (Chicago: Swallow Press, 1983), p. 16.
              3The Artist as Thinker, p. 16.
              4The Artist as Thinker, p. 6.
              5Johnson on Shakespeare, ed. Walter Raleigh (London: Oxford
         Univ., 1959), p. 121.
              6"The Rejection of Falstaff," Oxford Lectures on Poetry
         (London: Macmillan, 1909), p. 251.
              7"The Tragic Substructure of the 'Henry IV' Plays,"
         Shakespeare Survey, 38 (1985), 65.
              8All references to Shakespeare's plays are from The Complete
         Signet Classic Shakespeare, ed. Sylvan Barnet et. al. (New York:
         Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1972).
              9See John W. Blanpied, Time and the Artist in Shakespeare's
         English Histories (Newark: Univ. of Delaware Press, 1983); Derick
         R. C. Marsh, "Hal and Hamlet: the Loneliness of Integrity," in
         Jonson and Shakespeare, ed. Ian Donaldson (Atlantic Highlands,
         N.J.: Humanities Press, 1983), pp. 18-33; John Alvis, "The Career
         of Henry Monmouth," in Shakespeare as Political Thinker, eds.
         John Alvis and Thomas G. West (Durham, N. C.: Carolina Academic
         Press, 1981), pp. 95-125; Harold Toliver, "Workable Fictions in
         the Henry IV Plays," University of Toronto Quarterly, 53 (1983),
         53-71.
             10Bradley, p. 256.
             11Cited by E. M. W. Tillyard, Shakespeare's History Plays
         (London: Chatto & Windus, 1959), p. 68.  Both Tillyard and Lily
         B. Campbell, Shakespeare's "Histories:" Mirrors of Elizabethan
         Policy (San Marino, Cal.: Huntington Library, 1958), pp. 216-217,
         discuss this homily against rebellion.  Campbell believes that
         Shakespeare's Henry IV plays specifically portray the 1569
         Northern Rebellion, and she is one of the few critics to
         acknowledge that John's "peace-making . . . would, I think, have
         seemed quite orthodox to the Elizabethan audience" (p. 226).
         More recently, in an attempt to counter the current critical fad
         of Tillyard-bashing, M. M. Reese, "'Tis My Picture; Refuse It
         Not," Shakespeare Quarterly, 36 (1985), 254-56, writes, "The
         contemporary [Elizabethan] conception of history expected it to
         be didactic to teach immediate lessons.  In the 1590s, under an
         aging and progressively erratic monarch, its duty was to
         emphasize the perils of disunity and secession" (pp. 255-6).
             12In 2 Henry IV the dying king confesses to his heir "By what
         bypaths and indirect crooked ways" (IV.v.184) he acquired the
         crown.
             13Sig. A2v; cited by Paul A. Jorgenson, "The 'Dastardly
         Treachery' of Prince John of Lancaster," PMLA 76 (1961), p. 490.
         Jorgenson cites several other sources from this period which
         affirm the same concept.
             14The six hundred men slain at Smerwick were Spanish and
         Italian mercenaries sent by the Pope to aid the Irish rebels.
         Presumably Lord Grey never promised life as a condition of the
         surrender, and Queen Elizabeth was upset only at Grey's sparing
         some of the officers for ransom.  This episode, however, was
         sensitive enough in 1598 that Spenser's spirited defense of Lord
         Grey in A View of the Present State of Ireland may have caused
         the difficulties encountered in getting the work published.
         Although registered with the Stationers on April 14, 1598, the
         work was not to be printed without further authority, and was not
         finally published until 1633 at Dublin.  See Alexander C. Judson,
         The Life of Edmund Spenser (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins, 1966), pp.
         89-92, 185-187.
             15See Coriolanus, written ten years after 2 Henry IV, where
         Volumnia urges her son to pretend to humble himself before the
         plebeians:
 
              I have heard you say,
              Honor and policy, like unsevered friends,
              I' th' war do grow together. . . .
              If it be honor in your wars to seem
              The same you are not, which for your best ends
              You adopt your policy, how is it less or worse
              That it shall hold companionship in peace
              With honor as in war. . . .
              Now, this no more dishonors you at all
              Than to take in a town with gentle words.
              Which else would put you to your fortune and
              The hazard of much blood.
              I would dissemble with my nature, where
              My fortunes and my friends at stake required
              I should do so in honor.
                             (III.ii.41-64)
         See McKenzie, "'Unshout the noise that banish'd Martius':
         Structural Paradox and Dissembling in Coriolanus," Shakespeare
         Studies 18 (1986), 189-204.
             16E.g. George J. Becker, Shakespeare's Histories (New York:
         Frederick Unger Pub., 1977), states that "the cold-blooded
         calculation of Prince John by contrast adds to Hal's stature" (p.
         53).
             17Raphael Holinshed, Chronicles of England, Scotland, and
         Ireland (London, 1808), III, 184.  Holinshed cites an impressive
         tribute to Bedford's valiancy by Louis XI, the son of the Dauphin
         (Charles VII) who had been Bedford's constant adversary.
         Tillyard claims that the Elizabethans believed that one source of
         the problems during Henry VI's reign was "the arrogance of the
         Duke of Bedford" which offended Burgundy, England's ally
         (Shakespeare's History Plays, p. 60). Bedford married Burgundy's
         sister, which cemented the alliance between the Lancastrian kings
         and the French duke until the lady's death in 1432.  Holinshed
         recounts that the two dukes were then estranged by "flattering
         taletellers," and an attempted reconciliation failed when neither
         would travel to the other's lodging: "Thus by the proud disdaine
         and enuious discord of these two high stomached princes, Bedford
         not minding to haue anie peere, and Burgognie not willing to
         abide anie superior, shortlie after England much lost . . ."
         (Holinshed, III, 181).  Unlike Tillyard, I do not believe this
         single episode stained Bedford's reputation among the
         Elizabethans.
             18John Danby, Shakespeare's Doctrine of Nature (London: Faber
         and Faber, 1949), pp. 95ff., distinguishes between "Appetite" and
         "Authority" in 2 Henry IV.  Traversi, Richard II to Henry V, sees
         the distinction being between those who act on passionate
         emotions and those who have the detached self-control of Hal and
         John, but which contains a certain moral loss and inhumanness.
         Holland, "Introduction," sees craving appetite set in opposition
         to a stoical acceptance of destiny.
             19Anastaplo, "American Constitutionalism and the Virtue of
         Prudence," p. 281.
             20Sherman H. Hawkins, "Virtue and Kingship in Shakespeare's
         Henry IV," English Literary Renaissance 5 (1975), 313-343,
         provides a detailed review of 16th Century treatises on the ideal
         education of a prince being in the cardinal virtues of justice,
         valor or fortitude, prudence, and temperance.  Hawkins argues
         that Hal learns primarily temperance and valor in Part I and
         justice and prudence in Part II.
             21J. Dover Wilson, The Fortunes of Falstaff (New York:
         Macmillan, 1944), pp. 84-85, points out that this episode echoes
         Part I where Falstaff first recruited 150 men of means, who
         bought their release, then enlisted another 150 wretched
         "cankers" to fill the places.  Furthermore, he sent his troops
         into the thick of the battle at Shrewsbury so that all but three
         were killed, and he could pocket the victims' belongings and pay.
             22Derek Traversi, Shakespeare: From Richard II to Henry V
         (Stanford, Cal.: Stanford Univ., 1957), pp. 118-133, effectively
         demonstrates the distinction between the Falstaff of Part I and
         Part II.  See also Harry Levin, "Falstaff's Encore," Shakespeare
         Quarterly, 32 (1981), 5-17, and J. McLaverty, "No Abuse: The
         Prince and Falstaff in the Tavern Scenes of Henry IV,"
         Shakespeare Survey, 34 (1981), 105-110.
             23For studies of Falstaff as Vice, see Bernard Spivack,
         Shakespeare and the Allegory of Evil (New York: Columbia Univ.,
         1958), pp. 87-91, 203-204, and Walter Kaiser, Praisers of Folly:
         Erasmus, Rabelais, Shakespeare (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard Univ.,
         1963), pp. 195-208; Kaiser provides a list of other critical
         analyses of Falstaff as a Vice (p. 197n).  Falstaff as the "Old
         Man" in Paul's Epistle to the Ephesians, who must be cast off for
         renewal of spirit, is discussed by D. J. Palmer, "Casting off the
         Old Man: History and St. Paul in Henry IV," Critical Quarterly,
         12 (1970), 265-83, and by Robin Headlam Wells and Alison
         Birkinshaw, "Falstaff, Prince Hal and the New Song," Shakespeare
         Studies, 18 (1986), 103-113.
             24Philip Williams, "The Birth and Death of Falstaff
         Reconsidered," Shakespeare Quarterly, 8 (1957), p. 363; Williams
         provides one of the most convincing psychoanalytical analyses of
         this play.
             25Many of the following points were explored in an
         undergraduate thesis I wrote under the direction of Norman N.
         Holland, Jr. at M.I.T.  Professor Holland indicates an
         indebtedness to that original paper for several of the ideas he
         develops in his "Introduction" to 2 Henry IV in The Complete
         Signet Classic Shakespeare, pp. 678-685, and I take pleasure in
         acknowledging my indebtedness to him as teacher and scholar.
             26In Hal's initial soliloquy in Part I, he speaks of the day
         when he will "pay the debt I never promised, . . . Redeeming time
         when men think least I will" (I.ii.206-214).  Throughout Part I
         Hal takes upon himself other people's obligations, including
         Falstaff's "debts," and makes them good when his mettle proves
         current, not counterfeit, at Shrewsbury.
             27The images of time, disease, and/or unfulfilled
         expectations in 2 Henry IV have been analyzed by Clifford Leech,
         "The Unity of 2 Henry IV," Shakespeare Survey, 6 (1953), 16-24;
         Traversi, Richard II to Henry V, pp. 108-165; L. C. Knights, Some
         Shakespearean Themes (London: Chatto & Windus, 1959), pp. 45-64;
         R. J. Dorius, "A Little More than a Little," Shakespeare
         Quarterly, 11 (1960), 13-26; M. M. Reese, The Cease of Majesty: A
         Study of Shakespeare's History Plays (London: Edward Arnold,
         1961), pp. 116-118, 286-292; Kaiser, Praisers of Folly, pp.
         238-251; Holland, "Introduction," pp. 678-684; Edgar T. Schell,
         "Prince Hal's Second 'Reformation,'" Shakespeare Quarterly, 21
         (1970), 11-16; Becker, Shakespeare's Histories, pp. 51-65; Levin,
         "Falstaff's Encore," pp. xx-xx; and Blanpied, Time and the
         Artist, pp. 179-199.
             28Dain A. Trafton, "Shakespeare's Henry IV," Shakespeare as
         Political Thinker, eds. John Alvis and Thomas G. West (Durham, N.
         C.: Carolina Academic Press, 1981), pp. 83-94, analyzes Henry
         IV's view of "necessity" from Richard II through II Henry IV and
         argues that under Henry's reign the old men of England, including
         Falstaff, claim to be bound by the necessity of the times, but
         use this to justify their gluttonous desires and ambitions, hence
         contaminating the entire realm.
             29Richard Abrams, "Rumor's Reign in 2 Henry IV: The Scope of
         Personification," English Literary Renaissance, 16 (1986),
         467-495.  Abrams finds a close verbal relationship between
         Falstaff and the Archbishop: "As Falstaff's bellyful of tongues
         parodically subsumes the Archbishop's language gifts and the
         people's many-headed subversiveness, and as he re-established the
         spirit of Eastcheap riot in the peaceful Gloucestershire country
         side, so all the dissident elements of 'unquiet' or rebellion are
         gathered under one head and jointly dispatched" (p. 492).
             30Cited by Stephen Greenblatt, "Invisible bullets:
         Renaissance authority and its subversion, Henry IV and Henry V,"
         in Political Shakespeare: New Essays in Cultural Materialism,
         eds. Jonathan Dollimore and Alan Sinfield (Manchester: Manchester
         Univ. Press, 1985), pp. 40-41.  Greenblatt argues that the
         "structure of things [in 2 Henry IV is called by] the twinned
         names of time and necessity" (p. 35).
             31Dorius, "A Little More than a Little," argues that "what
         seems to set off the values of [Shakespeare's history plays] most
         markedly from those of the tragedies is the importance given by
         the histories to the virtues of prudence and economy;" Dorius
         defines the opposites of prudence and economy as "carelessness,
         excess, waste, and disease" (p. 13).
             32Greenblatt argues that "Shakespeare does not shrink from
         any of the felt nastiness implicit in this sorting out of the
         right people and the wrong people; . . . the founding of the
         modern State, like the founding of the modern prince, is shown to
         be based upon acts of calculation, intimidation, and deceit.  And
         the demonstration of these acts is rendered an entertainment for
         which an audience, subject to just this State, will pay money and
         applaud" ("Invisible bullets," p. 39).
             33Holland points out that "in the coronation scene, Falstaff
         calls out, 'My King! My Jove!' (thus identifying himself with
         Saturn, the Titan who devoured his own children)"
         ("Introduction," p. 681).  Earlier in the play, when Hal puts on
         a tavern drawer's leather apron to spy on Falstaff and Doll, whom
         he refers to as "Saturn and Venus" (II.iv.269), the prince
         compares himself to Jove taking the form of a bull (II.ii.173).
         Jove deposed his father-king Saturn as Hal now banishes his
         father-substitute Falstaff.