our'd to nothing with perpetual motion._"

Ch. Just. "_Well be honest, be honest, and heaven bless your
expedition._"

_Falstaff_ indulges himself here in humourous exaggeration;--these passages
are not meant to be taken, nor are we to suppose that they were taken,
literally;--but if there was not a ground of truth, if _Falstaff_ had not
had such a degree of Military reputation as was capable of being thus
humourously amplified and exaggerated, the whole dialogue would have been
highly preposterous and absurd, and the acquiescing answer of the _Lord
Chief Justice_ singularly improper.--But upon the supposition of
_Falstaff_'s being considered, upon the whole, as a good and gallant
Officer, the answer is just, and corresponds with the acknowledgment which
had a little before been made, "_that his days service at Shrewsbury had
gilded over his night's exploit at Gads Hill.--You may thank the unquiet
time,_" says the Chief Justice, "_for your quiet o'erposting of that
action_"; agreeing with what _Falstaff_ says in another place;--"_Well, God
be thanked for these Rebels, they offend none but the virtuous; I laud
them, I praise them._"--Whether this be said in the true spirit of a
Soldier or not, I do not determine; it is surely not in that of a mere
Coward and Poltroon.

It will be needless to shew, which might be done from a variety of
particulars, that _Falstaff_ was known and had consideration at Court.
_Shallow_ cultivates him in the idea that _a friend at Court is better
than a penny in purse_: _Westmorland_ speaks to him in the tone of an
equal: Upon _Falstaff_'s telling him that he thought his lordship had been
already at Shrewsbury, _Westmorland_ replies,--"_Faith Sir John, 'tis more
than time that I were there, and you too; the King I can tell you looks
for us all; we must away all to night._"--"_Tut,_" says Falstaff, "_never
fear me, I am as vigilant as a cat to steal cream._"--He desires, in
another place, of my lord John of Lancaster, "_that when he goes to Court,
he may stand in his good report._" His intercourse and correspondence with
both these lords seem easy and familiar. "_Go,_" says he to the page,
"_bear this to my Lord of Lancaster, this to the Prince, this to the Earl
of Westmorland, and this_ (for he extended himself on all sides) _to old
Mrs. Ursula_," whom, it seems, the rogue ought to have married many years
before.--But these intimations are needless: We see him ourselves in the
_Roy