King John Compassion and Forgiveness Quotes

First of all, Arthur complains about how unfair it is that King John won't forgive him for something he didn't have any control over—being Geoffrey's son. Then, Arthur turns to Hubert and makes a plea for his affection. At this point, Hubert turns aside and reveals that he has to be careful to ignore Arthur's pleas: if he listens to Arthur, he'll start feeling pity and compassion, and he'll be unable to carry out the deed he promised King John he would carry out. Do Hubert's words say something about the power of compassion to prevent us from doing evil deeds?

Hubert starts by showing Arthur the warrant for the horrible act he intends to do. Then, Hubert turns aside to hide his face because he is weeping. It looks like compassion is starting to get the better of him. Then he asks Arthur if he can read the warrant. Why do you think he takes the trouble of showing the warrant to Arthur? Why doesn't he just go ahead and blind him? Is Hubert hoping from some reaction from Arthur—like forgiveness, for example? Or is he already subconsciously squirming for a way out of going through with the deed, making his actions here an attempt to buy time?

In these lines, we see Arthur using his presence of mind to try to resist Hubert, and prevent him from carrying out the deed. In his almost helpless situation, Arthur uses the only tool available to him: he appeals to Hubert's sense of compassion. Arthur seems to have hit on the key insight that being compassionate for others means understanding how they are feeling. Thus, Arthur wishes that Hubert had a "grain, a dust, a gnat, a wandering hair" in his eye, so he could imagine what horrible pain must result from something thousands of times worse (a hot iron poker). Of course, Hubert doesn't have anything in his eye; maybe what Arthur's really doing is trying to use his words to awaken Hubert's imagination to the suffering of others.