After Edward is framed by Hugo for stealing a woman’s pig, he is apprehended by the local constable. Edward’s instinct is to resist arrest, but Miles Hendon convinces him to submit to the law with this metaphor:
The King was inclined to rebel; but Hendon said to him in a low voice—
“Reflect, Sire—your laws are the wholesome breath of your own royalty; shall their source resist them, yet require the branches to respect them?”
Miles’s metaphor speaks to the relationship between the monarch and the law at this moment in history. Miles makes the wise choice to flatter Edward, whom he still does not know is actually the king, into quietly conforming to the law by referring to it as his “wholesome breath.” This choice of words speaks to Edward’s intimacy with and power over the law. Miles implies that it is the natural output of his will—that the law follows the King’s word as naturally as breath leaves his body.
Miles’ metaphor actually reflects the authoritarianism of the Crown in this period with reasonable accuracy. Henry VIII ruled as a more or less unchecked despot, often bending Parliament to his will, and his unrestrained access to power set a precedent for the monarchy under Edward, Mary, and Elizabeth.
