Pehr monologue — Lucky Pehr

I know you and your gang, counterfeiter! You call me, who foreswore my faith, the Defender of the Faith; you say that I, a bell-ringer's son, am of royal descent; that I am generous, who refused to grant the first humble petition presented since my coming to the throne! I know you, for your kind is to be found the world over. You live for thought and immortality, you say; but you are never seen when a thought is to be born; you are never felt when it comes to a question of immortality. But around heaped up dishes, in the sunlight of affluence and power, there you swarm, like fat meat flies, only to fly away that you may set black specks upon those who can let themselves be slain for both thought and immortality. Out of my sight, liar! I would have your head removed did I not see the shadow of a purpose in your presence. A poor ruler is forced by political considerations to do so many despicable things that he would die of shame did he not have an institution like you to dull his conscience continually. Go! I would be alone.