KING. You will do so; you never will forget For what you are the noble Waywode's debtor; Who, for your wishes, perils his sure wealth, And, for your hopes, a child his heart adores, A friend so rare is to be rarely prized! Then when your hopes are crowned forget not ever The steps by which you mounted to the throne, Nor with your garments let your heart be changed! Think, that in Poland first you knew yourself, That this land gave you birth a second time. DEMETRIUS. I have been nurtured in adversity; And learned to reverence the beauteous bond Which links mankind with sympathies of love. KING. But now you enter on a realm where all-- Use, custom, morals--are untried and strange, In Poland here reigns freedom absolute; The king himself, although in pomp supreme, Must ofttime be the serf of his noblesse; But there the father's sacred power prevails, And in the subject finds a passive slave. DEMETRIUS. That glorious freedom which surrounds me here I will transplant into my native land, And turn these bond-serfs into glad-souled men; Not o'er the souls of slaves will I bear rule. KING. Do naught in haste; but by the time be led! Prince, ere we part, three lessons take from me, And truly follow them when thou art king. It is a king that gives them, old and tried, And they may prove of profit to thy youth. DEMETRIUS. Oh, share thy wisdom with me! Thou hast won The reverence of a free and mighty people; What must I do to earn so fair a prize? KING. You come from a strange land, Borne on the weapons of a foreign foe; This first felt wrong thou hast to wash away. Then bear thee like a genuine son of Moscow, With reverence due to all her usages. Keep promise with the Poles, and value them, For thou hast need of friends on thy new throne: The arm that placed thee there can hurl thee down. Esteem them honorably, yet ape them not; Strange customs thrive not in a foreign soil. And, whatsoe'er thou dost, revere thy mother-- You'll find a mother---- DEMETRIUS. Oh, my liege!