The crown was then reduced to the lowest ebb of its authority; and the king, in a manner, stood single, and yet preserved his negative entire; but if the clergy and nobility had been on his part of the balance, it might reasonably be supposed, that the meeting of those estates at Blois had healed the breaches of the nation, and not forced him to the _ratio ultima regum_, which is never to be praised, nor is it here, but only excused as the last result of his necessity. As for the parallel betwixt the king of Navarre, and any other prince now living, what likeness the God of Nature, and the descent of virtues in the same channel have produced, is evident; I have only to say, that the nation certainly is happy, where the royal virtues of the progenitors are derived on their descendants.[14] In that scene, it is true, there is but one of the three estates mentioned; but the other two are virtually included; for the archbishop and cardinal are at the head of the deputies: And that the rest are mute persons every critic understands the reason, _ne quarta loqui persona laboret_. I am never willing to cumber the stage with many speakers, when I can reasonably avoid it, as here I might. And what if I had a mind to pass over the clergy and nobility of France in silence, and to excuse them from joining in so illegal, and so ungodly a decree? Am I tied in poetry to the strict rules of history? I have followed it in this play more closely than suited with the laws of the drama, and a great victory they will have, who shall discover to the world this wonderful secret, that I have not observed the unities of place and time; but are they better kept in the farce of the "Libertine destroyed?"[15] It was our common business here to draw the parallel of the times, and not to make an exact tragedy. For this once we were resolved to err with honest Shakespeare; neither can "Catiline" or "Sejanus," (written by the great master of our art,) stand excused, any more than we, from this exception; but if we must be criticised, some plays of our adversaries may be exposed, and let them reckon their gains when the dispute is ended. I am accused of ignorance, for speaking of the third estate, as not sitting in the same house with the other two. Let not those gentlemen mistake themselves; there are many things in plays to be accommodated to the country in which we live; I spoke to the understanding of an English audience. Our three estates now sit, and have long done so, in two houses; but our records bear witness, that they, according to the French custom, have sate in one; that is, the lords spiritual and temporal within the bar, and the commons without it. If that custom had been still continued here, it should have been so represented; but being otherwise, I was forced to write so as to be understood by our own countrymen. If these be errors, a bigger poet than either of us two has fallen into greater, and the proofs are ready, whenever the suit shall be recommenced.