Curiosities of literature

THE LIBRARY

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THE UNIVERSITY

OF CALIFORNIA

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Ex Libris
C. K. OGDEN

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33

THE ''CHAN DOS CLASSICS."

CURIOSITIES OF LITERATURE.

BY

ISAAC DISKAELI.

a iEfto drtition,

EDITED, "WITH MEiMOIR AND NOTES,

BY HIS SOX,

THE EARL OF BEACONSFIELD.

IN THREE VOLUMES.
VOL. IIL

ilontion ajiti Xflu i>ovU:
FPvEDB RICK WAEXE AND CO.

X

V <

^^

to N don:

EUADEURY, AOSEW, & CO., PRINTERS, WniTEFEIABB,

CONTENTS OF VOLUME J IT.

Fioa

tOOAL DESCRIPTIONS . 1

MASQUES 4

OF DES MAIZEAUX, AND THE bGCUET IIISTOIIY OF ANTnONY COLLINS'd

MANUSCRIPTS 13

HISTORY OP NEW WORDS 23

THE PHILOSOPHY OP TROVER C3 32

CONFUSION OF WORDS 65

POLITICAL NICKNAMES SO

THE DOMESTIC LIFE OF A POET — SHENSTONE VINDIC.ATKD .... 90

SECRET HISTORY OF THE BUILDING OP BLENHEIM 102

SECRET niSTOKT OP SIR WALTER RAWLEIQH Ill

AN AUTHENTIC NARRATIVE OF THE LAST HOURS OF SIU WALTKi;

RAWLEIGU 124

LITERARY UNIONS 131

OF A BIOGRAPHY PAINTED 136

CAUSE AND PRETEXT l-ll

POLITICAL FORGERIES AND FICTIONS ,,144

EXPRESSION OF SUPPRESSED OPINION 150

lUTOCRAPHS 163

the history of writing-masters .... 167

the italian historians 177

op palaces built by ministers 186

"taxation no tyranny" 193

the book of death 200

history op the skeleton of death 206

the rival biographers of hetlin 215

of lexglet du fresnoy . . . , „ 221

the dictionary of trevoux 229

quadrio's account of english poetky 233

IV Contents.

PAGH

"political RELIGIONISil" 238

TOLERATION 245

APOLOGY FOn THE PARISIAN MASSACRK 255

PREDICTION . r . o ..,,,.».,.. r .. . 2C0

r-REAMS AT THE DAWN OF rUILOSOPIfY 280

ON PUCK THE COMMENTATOR 296

LiTERiRY FORGERIES 303

of literary filchers 316

op lord dacon at home 320

secret history of the death of queen elizabeth 328

james the first as a father and a husband 333

the man of one book 337

a bibliognoste 340

secret history of an elective monarchy 846

buildings in the metropolis, and residence in the couniky . s63

royal proclamations 371

true sources of secret histoi'.y 380

literary residences 394

whether allowable to ruin oneself ? 400

discoveries of secluded men 408

sentimental biography 414

literary parallels 425

the pearl bibles, and six thousand errata 427

view of a particular period op the state of religion in our

civil wars 423

Buckingham's political coquetry with the puritans .... 443

SIR EDWARD COKE's EXCEPTIONS AGAINST THE HIGH SHERIFF'S OATH 446
SECRET HISTORY OF CHARLES THE FIRST AND HIS FIRST PARLIA-
MENTS 443

THE RUMP 482

LIFE AND HABITS OP A LITK3ARY ANTIQUARY — OLDYS AND HIS

MANUSCRIPTS 493

IBDEX 613

CURIOSITIES OF LITERATURE.

LOCAL DESCRIPTIONS.

NoTniNa is more idle, and, what is less to be forgiven in a
writer, more tedious, than minute and lengthened descrip-
tions of localities ; where it is very doubtful whether tlie
writers themselves had formed any tolerable notion of the
])lace they describe, — it is certain their readers never can !
These descriptive passages, in which writers of imagination
so frequently indulge, are usually a glittering confusion of
unconnected things ; circumstances recollected from others,
or observed by themselves at different times ; the finest are
thrust in together. If a scene from nature, it is possible that
all the seasons of the year may bo jumbled together; or if a
castle or an apartment, its magnitude or its minuteness may
equally bewilder. Yet we find, even in works of celebrity,
whole pages of these general or these particular descriptive
sketches, which leave nothing behind but noun substantives
propped up by random ei)ithets. The old writers were quite
delighted to till up their voluminous pages with what was a
great saving of sense and thinking. In the Alaric of Scudery
sixteen pages, containing nearly five hundred verses, describe
a palace, commencing at the fa(^acle, and at length finishing
with the garden ; but his description, we may say, w^as much
better described by Boileau, whose good taste felt the
absurdity of this " abondance sterile," in overloading a work
with useless details,

Un auteur, quelquefois, trop pleiu de son oLjet,
Jamais sans rupuiser u'abauJonne un sujet.
S'il rencontre un palais il m'en depeint 'a face,
II me promcne aprus de terrasse en terrasse.
Ici s'offro un perron, la regne un corridor;
L^ ce balcon s'enferme en un balustre d'or ;
II compte les plafonds, les ronds, et les ovales—
Je saute vingt feuillets pour en trouver la fin;
Et je me sauve iX peine au travers du jardin !

VOL. in. B

2 Local Descriptions.

And then ho adfls so excellent a canon of crlticisnij tluit we
must not neglect it : —

Tout ce qii'on dit de trop est fade et rebutant ;
L' esprit rassasie le i"ejette a Tiustant,
Qui ue sait se borner, ne sut jamais ecrire.

We have a memorable instance of the inefficiency of local
descriptions in a very remarkable one b}'- a writer of tine
genius, composing with an extreme fondness of his subject,
and curiously anxious to send down to posterity the most
elaborate display of his own villa — this was the Laurcntininn
of Pliny. We cannot read his letter to Gallus, which the
English reader may in Melmoth's elegant version,* without
somewhat participating in the delight of the writer in
many of its details ; but we cannot with the writer form the
slightest conception of his villa, while he is leading us over
from apartment to apartment, and pointing to us the oppo-
site wing, with a " beyond this," and a " not far from
thence," and "to this apartment another of the same sort,"
&c. Yet, still, as we were in great want of a correct know-
ledge of a Roman villa, and as this must be the most so
possible, architects have frequently studied, and the learned
translated with extraordinary care, Pliny's Descrijition of Ins
Lcturentiniim. It became so favoui'ite an object, that emi-
nent architects have attempted to raise up this edifice once
more, by giving its plan and elevation; and this extraordinary
fact is the result — that not one of them but has given a
representation different from the other ! Montfaucon, a more
faithful antiquary, in his close translation of the description
of this villa, in comparing it witk Felibien's plan of the villa
itself, observes, " that the architect accommodated his edi-
fice to his translation, but that their notions are not the
same; unquestionably," he adds, " if ten skilful translators
were to perform their task separately, there would not be one
who agreed with another !"

If, then, on this subject of local descriptions, we find that it
is impossible to convey exact notions of a real existing scene,
what must we think of those which, in truth, describe scenes
which have no other existence than the confused makings-up
of an author's invention; where the more he details the more
\ic confuses ; and where the more particular he wishes to be,
the more indistinct the whole appears ?

♦ Book ii, lett. 17.

Local Dcscrijjtio/is. 3

Local descriptions, after a lew striking circumstances have
been selectcfl, admit of no lurther detail. It is not their
length, but their happiness, wliieh enters into our compi'ehen-
sion ; the imagination can only take in and keep together a
very few parts of a picture. Tlie pen must not intrude on
the province of the pencil, any more than the pencil must
attempt to perform what cannot in any shape be submitted to
the e3'e, though fully to the mind.

The great art, perhaps, of local description, is ratlier a
general than a particular view ; the details nmst be left to
the imagination ; it is suggestion rather than description.
There is an old Italian sonnet of this kind which I have often
read with delight ; and though I may not communicate the
same pleasure to the reader, 3'et the story of the writer is
most interesting, and the lady (for such she was) has the
highest claim to be ranked, like the lady of Evelyn, among
literary loives.

Francesca Tiirina BufaJinl lU Cilia cli Caslcllo, of noble
extraction, and devoted to literature, had a collection of her
poems published in 1G28. Slie frequent!}- interspersed little
domestic incidents of her female friend, her husband, her son,
her grandchildren ; and in one of these sonnets she has deli-
neated her loalace of San Giuslino, whose localities she
appears to liave enjoyed with intense delight in the company
of " her lord," whom she tenderl}'' associates with the scene.
There is a freshness and simplieitN'' in the description, which will
perhaps convey a clearer notion of the spot than even Pliny
could do in the voluminous description of liis villa. She tells
us what she found when brought to the house of her husband: —

Ampie sallc, ampie loggic, ampio cortile

E stauze ornate con genlil pitture,

Trovai giungendo, e nobili sculture

Di maniio I'atte, da scalpel noii vile.
Nobil giardin con un perpctuo Aprile

Di varij fior, di frutti, e di verdure,

Ombre soavi, acque a temprar I'arsure

E strade di bella non dissimile;
E non men forte cstel, che per fortezza

Ha il ponte, e i fianchi, e lo circonda intorno

Fosso profundo e di real larghezza.
Qui fei col mio Siguore dolce soggiorno

Con santo amor, con somma contentezza

Oude ne beuedico il mese e 'A giorno !

Wide halls, wide galleries, and an ample court,
Chambers adoru'd by pictures' sootliing cLarm,

13 w

4 Masques.

I found togetliei- blended ; noLle sculpture

In marble, polish'd by no chisel vile :

A noble garden, where a Lasting April

All-various flowers and fruits and verdure showers ;

Soft shades, and waters tempering the hot air ;

And undulating paths in equal beauty !

Nor less the castled glory stands in force,

And bridged and flanked. And round its circuit wIuJs

The deepened moat, showing a regal size.

Here with my lord I cast my sweet sojourn,

"With holy love, and with supreme content ;

And hence I bless the month, and bless the day !

MASQUES.

It sometimes happens, in the histor^'^ of national amusements,
that a name survives while the thing itself is forgotten. This
has heen remarkahly the case with our court Masques, respect-
ing which our most eminent writers long ventured on so many-
false opinions, with a perfect ignorance of the nature of these
compositions, which combined all that was exquisite in the
imitative arts of poetry, painting, music, song, dancing, and
machinery, at a period when our public theatre was in its
rude infancy. Convinced of the miserable state of our repre-
sented drama, and not then possessing that more curious
knowledge of their domestic history which we delight to
explore, they were led into erroneous notions c<f one of the
most gorgeous, the most fascinating, and the most poetical
of dramatic amusements. Our present theatrical exhibitions
are, indeed, on a scale to which the twopenny audiences of
the barn playhouses of Shakspeare could never have strained
their sight ; and our picturesque and learned costume, with
the brilliant changes of our scenery, would have maddened
the "property-men" and the "tire-women" of the Globe or
the Ked Bull.* Shakspeare himself never beheld the true

* Sir Philip Sidney, in his "Defence of Poesy," 1595, alludes to the
custom of writing the supposed locality of each scene over the stage, and
asks, "What child is there that coming to a play, and seeing Thebes
written in great letters on an old door, doth believe that it is Thebes."
As late as the production of Davenant's Sie(/e of Jl/todcs {circa 1656),
this custom was continued, and is thus described in the printed edition of
the play : — "In the middle of the frieze was a compartment wherein was
written lihocJcs." In many instances the spectator was left to infer the
locality of the scene from the dialogue. — " Now," says Sidney, " you shall
Lave three ladies walke to gather flowers, and then we must believe the

Masques. 5

magical illusions of lii.s own drama?!, with " Enter the Kcd
Coat," and " Exit Hat and Cloalv," liclped out witli " painted
cloths;" or, as a bard of Charles the Second's time chants —

Look back and see
The strange vicissitudes of poctrie ;
Your aged fathers came to plays for wit,
And sat knee-deep in uut-shelis in the pit.

But while the public theatre continued long in this con-
tracted state, without scenes, without dresses, without an
orchestra, the court displayed seenical and dramatic exhi-
bitions with such costly magnificence, such inventive fancy,
and such mii'aculous art, that we may doubt if the combined
genius of Ben Jonson, Inigo Jones, and Lawes, or Ferobosct),
at an era most favourable to the arts of imagination, has been
equalled by the modern spectacle of the Opera.

But this circumstance had entirely escaped the knowledge
of our critics. The critic of a Masque must not only have
read it, but he must also have heard and have viewed it.
The only witnesses in this case are those letter-writers of the
day, who were then accustomed to communicate such domestic
intelligence to their absent friends : from such ample corre-
spondence I have often drawn some curious and sometimes
important information. It is amusing to notice the opinions
of some great critics, how from an original mis-statement
they have drawn an illegitimate opinion, and how one inherits
from the other the error which he propagates. Warburton
said on Masques, that " Shakspeare was an enemy to these
fuoleries, as appears by his writing none." This opinion was
among the many which tliat singular critic threw out as they
arose at the moment ; for Warburton forgot that Shakspeare
(•liaracteristically introduces one in the Tempest's most f;\n-
ciful scene.* Granger, who had not much time to study the
manners of the age whose personages he was so well acquainted

stage to be a garden. By and by we heave newes of shipwracke in the
same place ; tlien we are to blame if we accept it not for a rock." la
Jliddlcton's Vliaste Maid, 1G30, when the scene changes to a bed-room,
"a bed is thrust out upon the stage, Alwit's wife in it ;" which simple
process was effected by pushing it through the curtains tiiat hung across
the entrance to the stage, which at that time projected into the pit.

* The play of Pijramus and Thisbc, performed by the clowns in Shak-
speare's M idsnmmcv Nif/liCs Dream, is certainly constructed in burlesque
of characters in court Masques, which sometimes were as difficult to be
made comprehensible to an audi.ence as "the clowns of Athens" found
]yaU and Moonshine to be.

6 Masques.

with, in a note on IMilton's Masque, said that " these compo-
sitions were trilling and ])erplexed allegories, the persons of
\\-hich are lantastical to the last degree. Ben Jonson, in his
' Masque of Christmas,' has introduced ' Minced Pie,' and
' Bah}' Cake,' who act their parts in the drama.* But the
most ivrctclied performances of this kind could please hy the
lielp of music, machinery, and dancing." Granger blunders,
describing by two farcical characters a species of composition
of which farce was not the characteristic. Such personages
as he notices would enter into the Anti-masque, which was
a humorous parody of the more solemn Masque, and some-
times relieved it. Malone, whose fancy was not vivid, con-
demns Masques and the age of Masques, in which, he says,
echoing Granger's epithet, " the wretched taste of the times
found amusement." And lastly comes j\Ir. Todd, whom the
splendid fragment of the " Arcades," and the entire Masque,
which we have by heart, could not warm ; while his neu-
tralising criticism fixes him at the freezing point of the
thermometer. " This dramatic entertainment, performed
not without prodigious expense in machinery and decoration,
to ivliicli humour we certainly owe the entertainment of
'Arcades,' and the inimitable Mask of 'Comus.'" Camus,
however, is only a fine dramatic poem, retaining scarcely any
features of the Masque. The only modern critic who had
written with some research on this departed elegance of the
English drama was Warton, whose fancy responded to the
fascination of the fair3'-like magnificence and lyrical spirit of
the Masque. Warton had the taste to give a specimen from
" The Inner Temple Mask by William Browne," the pas-
toral poet, whose Addi-ess to Sleep, he observed, " reminds

* It is due to a great poet like Ben Jonson, that, without troubling
the reader to turn to his works, we should give his own description of tliesc
characters, to show that they were not the "perplexed allegories"
they arc asserted to be by Granger ; nor inappropriate to the Masque
of Chridmus, for which they were designed. Minced-Pie was habited
"like a fine cook's wife, drest neat, her man carrying a pie, dish, and
spoon." Baby-Cake was " drest like a boy, in a fine long coat, biggin-bib,
muckendcr (or liandkerchief), and a little dagger ; his usher bearing a great
cake, with a bean and a pease ;" the latter being indicative of those gene-
rally inserted in a Christmas cake, which, when cut into slices and dis-
tributed, indicated by the presence of the bean the person who should be
king ; the slice witii the pea doing the same for the queen. Neither of
these characters speak, but make part of the show to be described by
Father Christmas. Jonson's inventive talent was never more consincuourf
than in the concoction of court Masques.

Masques. 7

us of some Awourlte touches in Milton's Com us, to which it
perliaps gave birth." Yet even Warton was deficient in
that sort of research which only can discover the true nature
of these singular dramas.

Such was the state in which, some years ago, I found all
our knowledge of this once favourite amusement of our court,
our nobility, and our learned bodies of the four inns of court.
Some extensive researches, pursued among contemporary
manuscripts, cast a new light over this obscure child of fiancy
and magnificence. I could not think lightly of what Ben
Jonson has called " The Eloquenne of Masques;" entertain-
ments on which from three to five thousand pounds were
expended, and on more public occasions ten and twenty thou-
sand. To the aid of the poetry, composed by the finest
poets, came the most skilful musicians and the most elabo-
rate machinists ; 13en Jonson, and Inigo Jones,* and Lawes
blended into one piece their respective genius ; and Lord
Bacon, and AVhitelocke, and Selden, who sat in committees
for the last grand Masque pi-esented. to Charles the First,
invented the devices; composed the procession of the
Masquers and the Anti-Masquers ; while one took the care
of the dancing or the brawlers, and Whitelocke the music —
the sage AVhitelocke! who has chronicled his self-compla-
cency on this occasion, by claiming the invention of a
Coranfo, which for thirty years afterwards was the delight
of the nation, and was blessed by the name of " Whitelocke's
Coranto," and which was always called for, two or three
times over, whenever that great statesman " came to see a
i:)lay!"t So much personal honour was considered to be
involved in the conduct of a Masque, that even this com-
mittee of illustrious men was on the point of being broken
up by too serious a discussion concerning precedence ; and
the Masque had nearly not taken ])lace, till they hit on the
expedient of throwing dice to decide on their rank in the
procession ! On this jealousy of honour in the composition
of a Masque, I discovered, what hitherto had escaped the
knowledge, although not the curiosity, of literary inquirers —
the occasion of the memorable enmity between Ben Jonson

* The first employment of these two great men was upon The }rasqHe of
Blacl-ncfs, pciformctl at ^VhitL■hall on Twelt'lh-Night, 1003 ; and which
cost nearly 10,000/. of our present money.

t The music of Whitelocke's Coranto is presevveil in Hawkin-s's " Ilia*
4ory of ilusio." Mit;lit it be restored for the ladies as a waltz {

8 Masques.

and Inigo Jones, who had hitherto acted together with
brotherly affection ; " a circumstance," sa3's Gifford, to whom
I communicated it, " not a little important in the history of
our calumniated poet." The trivial cause, hut not so in its
consequences, was the poet prefixing his own name before
that of the architect on the title-page of a Masque, which
hitherto had only been annexed ;* so jealous was the great
architect of his part of the Masque, and so predominant his
power and name at court, that he considered his rights
invaded by the inferior claims of the poet! Jonson has
poured out the whole bitterness of his soul in two short
satires : still more unfortunately for the subject of these
satires, they provoked Inigo to sharpen his pen on rhyme ;
but it is edgelcss, and the blunt composition still lies in its
manuscript state.

While these researches had engaged my attention, appeared
Gifford's Memoirs of Ben Jonson. The characteristics of
Masques are there, for the first time, elaborately opened with
the clear and penetrating spirit of that ablest of our dramatic
critics. I feel rt like presumption to add to what has re-
ceived the finishing hand of a master ; but his jewel is locked
up in a chest, which I fear is too rarely opened, and he will
allow me to borrow something from its splendour. " The
Masque, as it attained its highest degree of excellence, ad-
mitted of dialogue, singing, and dancing ; these were not in-
dependent of one another, but combined, by the introduction
of some ingenious fable, into an harmonious whole. When
the i)lan was formed, the aid of the sister-arts was called in ;
for the essence of the Masque was pomp and glory. Move-
able scenery of the most costly and splendid kind was
lavished on the Masque ; the most celebrated masters were
employed on the songs and dances ; and all that the kingdom
afforded of vocal and instrumental excellence was employed
to embellish the cxhibition.t Thus magnificently constructed,
the Masque was not committed to ordinary performers. It

* This was Chlorklia, a Masque performed by the queen and her ladies
at court, on Shrovetide, 1C30 ; upon the title-page of which is printed
"the inventors — Ben Jonson, Inigo Jones." Jonson was, by reason of the
nflucnceof Inigo, deprived of employ at court ever after, supplanted by
otlier poets named by the architect, and among them Ileywood, Shirley,
and Davenant.

+ George Chapman's Mcmoruhle Maslce, performed at Whitehall, 1630,
by the gentlemen of the Middle Temple and Lincoln's Inn, cost the latter
Society nearly 2000^. for their share of the expenses.

Masques. 0

was composecl, as Lord Bacon says, for princes, and by
princes it was played.* Of these Masques, the skill with
which their ornaments were designed, and the inexpressible
grace with which they were executed, appear to have left a
vivid impression on the mind of Jonson. His genius awakes
at once, and all his faculties attune to sprightliness and plea-
sure. He makes his appearance, like his own Delight, ' ac-
companied with Grace, Love, Harmony, Revel, Sport, and
Laugliter.'

** In cinlous knot and mazes so

Tlie Spring at first was taught to go;

Ami Zcpliyr, when he came to woo

His Flora, had liis motions^ too;

And thus did Venus learn to lead

The Idalian brawls, and so to tread,

As if the wind, not she, did walk,

Nor press'd a flower, nor bow'd a stalk.

" But in what," says GIfford, "was the taste of the times
wretched? In poetry, painting, architecture, i\\QY have not
since been equalled ; and it ill becomes us to arraign the
taste of a period which possessed a cluster of writers of whom
the meanest wo\dd now be esteemed a prodigy." Malone did
not live to read this denouncement of his objection to these
Masques, as "bungling shows;" and which Warburton
treats as "fooleries;" Granger as "wretched performances;"
while Mr. Todd regards them merely as " the humour of the
times!"

Masques were often the private theatricals of the families
of our nobility, performed by the ladies and gentlemen at
their seats ; and were splendidly got up on certain occasions :
such as the celebration of a nuptial, or in compliment to some
great visitor. The Masque of Comus was composed by
Milton to celebrate the creation of Charles the First as
Prince of Wales ; a scene in this Masque presented both the
castle and the town of Ludlow, which proves, that although
our small public theatres had not yet displayed any of the
scenical illusions which long afterwards Davenant introduced,
these scenical effects existed in great perfection in the
Masques. The minute descriptions introduced by Thomas
Campion, in his " Memorable Masque," as it is called, will
convince us that the scenery must have been exquisite and

• Ben Jonson records the names of the noble ladies and gentlemen who
enacted his inventions at court.
"t" The figures and actions of dancers in Masques were called motions.

10 Masques.

fiiiiclful, and that the poet was always a watchful and anxious
))artner with tlie machinist, with whom sometimes, however,
he had a quarreh

Tlie subject of tliis very rare Masque was " The Night
and the Hours." It wouhl be tedious to describe the first
scene with the fondness with which the poet has dwelt on
it. It was a double valley ; one side, with dark clouds
lianging before it ; on the other, a green vale, with trees, and
nine golden ones of fifteen feet high ; from which grove, to-
wards " the State," or the seat of the king, was a broad descent
to the dancing-place : the bower of Flora was on the right,
the house of Night on the left ; between them a hill, hanging
like a clifF over the grove. The bower of Flora was spacious,
garnished with flowers and flowery branches, with lights
among them ; the house of Night ample and statel}^ v.'ith
black columns studded with golden stars ; within, nothing
but clouds and twinkling stars ; while about it were placed,
on wire, artificial bats and owls, continually moving. As
soon as the king entered the great hall, tlie hautboys, out of
the wood on the top of the hill, entertained the time, till
Flora and Zephyr were seen busily gathering flowers from the
bower, throwing them into baskets which two silvans held,
attired in changeable taffeta. The song is light as their
fingers, but the burden is charming : —

Now lialh Flora i-oLVd her bowers
To befriend tliis place with flowers;

Strow about ! strow about !
Divers, divers flowers afl'ect
For some private dear respect;

Strow about ! strow about !
But he's none of Flora's friend
That will not the rose commend ;

Strow about ! strow about !

I cannot quit this Masque, of which collectors know the
rarity, without preserving one of those Doric delicacies, of
which, perhaps, we have outlived the taste! It is a playful
dialogue between a Silvan and an Hour, while Night appears
in her house, with her long black hair spangled with gold,
amidst her Hours ; their faces black, and each bearing a
lighted black torch.

Silvan. Tell mo, f;enllc Hour of Night,

Wherein dost thou most dclii^ht?
Hour. Not in sleep !

Masques. 1 1

Silvan. 'Wherein then?

Hour. In the frolic view of men !

Silvan Lov'st thou music ?

Hour. Oh ! 'tis si\-cct I

Silvan. What's dancing ?

Hour. E'en tlie mirth of feel.

Silvan. Joy you in fairies and in elves ?

Hour. We are of that sort ourselves !

But, Silvan ! say, why do you lovo

Only to frequent the grove ?
Silvan. Life is fullest of content

When delight is innocent.
Hour. Pleasure must vary, not be long !

Come then, let's close, and end the song !

That the moveable scenery of these Masques forniecl as per-
fect a scenical illusion as any that our own age, with all its
perfection of decoration, has attained to, will not be denied
by those who have read the few Masques which have been
printed. They usually contrived a double division of the
scene ; one part was for some time concealed froni the spec-
tator, which produced surprise and variet3% Thus in the
Lord's Masque, at the marriage of the Palatine, the scene
was divided into two parts, from the roof to the floor ; the
lower part being first discovered, there appeared a wood in
perspective, the innermost part being of "releeve or whole
round," the rest painted. On the left a cave, and on the
right a thicket, from which issued Orpheus. At the back
part of the scene, at the sudden fall of a curtain, the upper
part broke on the spectators, a heaven of clouds of all hues ;
the stars suddenly vanished, the clouds dispersed ; an element
of artificial fire played about the house of Prometheus — a
bright and transparent cloud, reaching from the heavens to
the earth, whence the eight masquers descending with the
music of a full song ; and at the end of their descent the cloud
hroke in twain, and one part of it, as with a wind, was blown
athwart the scene. AVhile this cloud was vanishing, the
wood, being the under part of the scene, was insensibly
changing ; a perspective view opened, with porticoes on each
side, and female statues of silver, accompanied with orna-
ments of architecture, filling the end of the house of Prome-
theus, and seemed all of goldsmiths' work. The women of
Prometheus descended from their niches, till the anger of
Jupiter turned them again into statues. It is evident, too,
that the size of the proscenium, or stage, accorded with the
magnificence «f the scene ; for I find choruses described,

J 2 Masques.

"and changeable conversances of the song," in manner of an
echo, performed by more than forty dilferent voices and in-
struments in various parts of the scene. The architectural
decorations were the pride of Inigo Jones ; such could not be
trivial.

"I suppose," says the writer of this Masque, "few have
ever seen more neat artifice than Master Inigo Jones showed
in contriving their motion ; who, as all the rest of the work-
manship which belonged to the whole invention, showed ex-
traordinary industry and skill, which if it be not as lively
expressed in writing as it appeared in view, rob not him of
his due, but lay the blame on my want of right apprehending
his instructions, for the adoring of his art." Whether this
strong expression should be only adorning does not appear in
any errata ; but the feeling of admiration was fervent among
the spectators of that day, who were at least as much
astonished as they were delighted. Ben Jonson's prose
descriptions of scenes in his own exquisite Masques, as Gif-
ford observes, "are singularly bold and beautiful." In a
letter which I discovered, the writer of which had been pre-
sent at one of these Masques, and which GifTord has pre-
served,* the reader may see the great poet anxiously united
with Inigo Jones in working the machinery. Jonson, before
" a sacrifice could be performed, turned the globe of the earth,
standing behind the altar." In this globe "the sea was
expressed heightened with silver waves, which stood, or
rather hung (for no axle was seen to support it), and turning
softly, discovered the first Masque," t &c. This " turning
softly" producing a very magical effect, the great poet would
trust to no other hand but his own !

It seems, however, that as no Masque-writer equalled
Jonson, so no machinist rivalled Inigo Jones. 1 have some-
times caught a groan from some unfortunate poet, whose
beautiful fancies were spoilt by the bungling machinist. One
says, " The order of this scene was carefully and ingeniously
disposed, and as happily put in act (for the vwtions) by the
king's master carpenter;" but he adds, "the painters, I
must needs say (not to belie them), lent small colour to any,
to attribute much of the spirit of these tilings to their

* Memoirs of Jonson, p. 88.
+ See GifTord's Jonson, vol. \ii. p. 78. This performance was in tlie
Masrjue of Hymen, enacted at court in 1005, on the occasion of the
marriage cf the Earl of Essex to the dau'ditev of the Earl of Suflfolk,

Des MuizeaiLV, and Anthony Collins's Mamiscrijits. 13

pencil." Campion, in one of his Masques, describing where
the trees were gently to sink, &c., by an engine placed under
the stage, and in sinlcing were to open, and the masquers ap-
pear out at their tops, &c., adds this vindictive mar-
ginal note : " Either by the simplicity, neglir/ence, or con-
spiracy of the painter, the passing away of the trees was
somewhat hazarded, though the same day they had been
shown with much admiration, and w^ero left together to the
same night;" that is, they were worked right at the re-
liearsal, and failed in the representation, which must have
perplexed the nine masquers on the tops of these nine trees.
But such accidents were only vexations crossing the fancies
of the poet : they did not essentially injure the magnificence,
the pomp, and the fairy world opened to the spectators. So
little was the character of these Masques known, that all our
critics seemed to have fallen into repeated blunders, and used
the Masques as Campion suspected his painters to have done,
"either by simplicit}', negligence, or conspiracy." Hurd, a
cold systematic critic, thought he might safely prefer the
Masque in the Tempest, as " putting to shame all the
Masques of Jonson, not only in its construction, but in the
splendour of its show;" — "which," adds Gifford, "was
danced and sung by the ordinary performers to a couple of
fiddles, perhaps in the balcony of the stage." Such is the
fate of criticism without knowledge ! And now, to close our
Masques, let me apply the forcible style of Ben Jonson him-
self: "The glory of all these solemnities had perished like a
blaze, and gone out in the beholder's eyes ; so short-lived ara
the bodies of all things in comparison of their souls !"*

OF DES MAIZEAUX, AND THE SECRET HISTORY OF
ANTHONY COLLINS'S MANUSCRIPTS.

Des Maizeaux was an active literary man of his day,
whose connexions with Buyle, St. Evremond, Locke, and
Toland, and his name being set oft' by an F.K.S., have occa-
sioned the dictionary-biographers to place him prominently
among their "hommes illustres." Of his private history

* Splendour ultimately ruined these worlds ; they onded in gaudy
dresses and expensive machinery, but poetry was not associated with them.
The youtliful days of Louis XIV. raised them to ii height of costly luxu-
riance to sink them ever after in oblivion.

14 Des Maizeaiuv, and Anthony Collins' s Manuscripts.

nothing seems known. Having sometliing important to
communicate respecting one of his friends, a far greater cha-
racter, with whose fate he stands connected, even Des Mai-
zeaux becomes an object of our inquiry.

He was one of those French refugees whom political
madness or despair of intolerance had driven to our shores.
The proscription of Louis XIV., which supplied us with our
skilful workers in silk, also produced a race of the unem-
ployed, who proved not to be as exquisite in the handicraft
of book-making ; such were 3Iotfeikv, La Coste, Ozell, Du-
rand, and others. Our author had come over in that tender
state of youth, just in time to become half an Englishman:
and he was so ambidextrous in the languages of the two
great literary nations of Europe, that whenever he took up
his pen, it is evident by his manuscripts, which I have exa-
mined, that it was mere accident which determined liim to
write in French or in English. Composing without genius,
or even taste, without vivacity or force, the simplicity and
fluency of his stjde were sufficient for the purposes of a ready
dealer in all the oninuticd literarics ; literary anecdotes,
curious quotations, notices of obscure books, and all that
supellex which must enter into the history of literature,
without forming a history. These little things, which did so
well of themselves, without any connexion with anything
else, became trivial when they assumed the form of volumi-
nous minuteness ; and Des Maizeaux at length imagined that
nothing but anecdotes were necessary to compose the lives of
men of genius ! With this sort of talent he produced a
copious life of Bayle, in which he told everything he pos-
sibly could ; and nothing can be more tedious, and more
curious : for though it be a grievous fault to omit nothing,
and marks the writer to be deficient in the development of
character, and that sympathy which throws inspiration over
the vivifying page of biography, yet, to admit everything,
has this merit — that we are sure to find what we want !
Warburton poignantly describes our Des Maizeaux, in one of
those letters to Dr. Birch which he wrote in the fervid age
of study, and with the impatient vivacity of his genius,
'' Almost all the life-writers we have had before Toland and
Des Maizeaux are indeed strange, insipid creatures ; and yet
I had rather read the worst of them, than be obliged to go
through with this of Milton's, or the other's life of Boileau ;
where there is such a didl, heavy succession of long quota-

Dcs Maizcatu, and AntJiuitij Coll'ius^s Manuscripts. 15

tions of uninteresting passages, that it makes tlieir method
quite nauseous. But the verbose, tasteless Freuehmau seems
to lay it down as a prineiple, that every life must be a book,
— and, what is worse, it seems a book without a life ; for
what do we know of IBoileau after all his tedious stuff ?"

Des Maizeaux was much in the employ of the Dutch
booksellers, then the great monopolisers in the literary mart
of Europe. He supplied their " nouvclles litteraires" from
England ; but the work-sheet price was very mean in tho.^e
days. I have seen annual accounts of Dus Maizeaux settled
to a line for four or live pounds ; and yet he sent the " No-
velties" as fresh as the post could carry them ! He held a
confidential correspondence with these great Dutch book-
sellers, who consulted him in their distresses ; and he seems
rather to have relieved them than himself. -But if he got
only a few llorins at Rotterdam, the same '' nouvelles litte-
raires" sometimes secured him valuable friends at London ;
for in those days, which perhaps are returning on us, an
English author would olteu appeal to a foreign jouriud for
the commendation he might fail in obtaining at home ; and I
have discovered, in more cases than one, that, like other
smuggled commodities, the foreign article was often of home
maiuil'actor}' !

I give one of these curious bibliopolical distresses.
Sauzet, a bookseller at liotterdam, who judged too critically
for the repose of his authors, seems to have been always fond
of prcjeeting a new " Journal ;" tormented by the ideal ex-
cellence which he had conceived of such a work, it vexed him
that he coidd never fhid the workmen ! Once disappointed of
the assistance he expected from a writer of talents, he was
fain to put up with one he was a^^hamed of; but warily sti-
pulated on very singular terms. He confided this precious
literary secret to Des Maizeaux. 1 translate from his manu-
script letter.

" I send 3-ou, my dear Sir, four sheets of the continuation
of my journal, and I hope this second part will turn out
better than the former. The author thinks himself a very
able person ; but I must tell you frankly, that he is a man
without erudition, and without any critical discrimination ;
he writes pretty well, and turns passably what he says ; but
that is all ! Monsieur Van Elfen having failed in his pro-
mises to realise my hopes on this occasion, necessity compelled
me to have recourse to him ; but for six months only, and o;i

16 Des Min::caux, and Anthony Collins's Manuscripts.

condition that he should not, on any account whatever, allow
any one to Icnow tliat he is tlie author of the journal ; for his
name alone would be sufficient to make even a passable book
discreditable. As you are among my friends, I will confide
to you in secrecy the name of this author ; it is Mons. De
Limiers.* You see how much my interest is concerned that
the author should not be known !" This anecdote is gratui-
tously presented to the editors of certain reviews, as a ser-
viceable hint to enter into the same engagement with some
of their own writers : for it is usually the De Limiers who
expend their last puff in blowing their own name about the
town.

In England, Des Maizeaux, as a literary man, made himself
very useful to other men of letters, and particularly to persons
of rank : and he found patronage and a pension, — like his
talents, very moderate ! A friend to literary men, he lived
amongst them, from "Orator" Henley, up to Addison, Lord
Halifax, and Anthony Collins. I find a curious character of
our Des Maizeaux in the handwriting of Edward, Earl of
Oxford, to whose father (Pope's Earl of Oxford) and himself
the nation owes the Harleian treasures. His lordship is a
critic with high Tory principles, and high-church notions.
" This Des Maizeaux is a great man with those who are
pleased to be called Freethinlcers, particularly with Mr.
Anthony Collins, collects passages out of books for their
writings. His Life of Chillingworth is wrote to please that
set of men." The secret history I am to unfold relates to
Anthony Collins and Des Maizeaux. Some curious book-
lovers will be intei'ested in the personal history of an author
they are well acquainted with, yet which has hitherto
remained unknown. He tells his own story in a sort of
epistolary petition he addressed to a noble friend, charac-

* Van Ejfen was a Dutcli writer of some merit, and one of a literary-
knot of ingenious men, consisting of Sallengre, St. Ilyacinthe, Prosper
Marchand, &c., who carried on a smart review for tliose days, published
at the Hague under the title of "Journal Litteraire." They all com-
posed in French ; and Van Effen gave the first translations of our " Guar-
dian," "Robinson Crusoe," and the "Tale of a Tub," &c. He did some-
thing more, but not better ; he attempted to imitate the " Spectator," jn
Lis " Le Misanthrope," 1726, which exhibits a picture of the uninteresting
manners of a nation whom he could not make very lively.

De Limiers has had his name slipped into our biographical dictionaries,
An author cannot escape the fatality of the alphabet ; his numerous mis-
deeds are registered. It is said, that if he had not been so hungry, he
would have given proofs of possess'.ng some talent.

M

Des Maizeaux, and Anthony Collins's Manuscripts. 1 7

tcristic of an autlior, who cannot be deemed unpationised,
yet whose name, alter all his painful labours, might be
inserted in my "Calamities of Authors.''

In this letter he announces his intention of publishing a
Dictionary like Bayle ; having written the life of Bayle, the
next step was to become himself a Bayle ; so short is the
passage of literary delusion ! He had published, as a
specimen, the lives of Hales and Chillingworth. He
complains that his circumstances have not allowed him to
forward that work, nor digest the materials he had collected.

A Work of that nature requires a steady ap[ilioation, free from the
cares and avocations incident to all persons obliged to seek for their main-
tenance. I have had the misfortune to be in the case of those persons, and
am now reduced to a pension on the Irish establishment, which, deducting
the tax of four shillings in the pound, and other charges, brings me in
about 40^. a year of our Knglish money.* This pension was granted to me
in 1710, and I owe it chiefly to the friendship of Mr. Addison, who was
then secretary to the Earl of Wharton, Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland. la
1711, 12, and 14, I was appointed one of the Commissioners of the Lottery
by the interest of Lord Halifax.

And this is all I ever received from the Government, thougli I had
some claim to the royal favour ; for in 1710, when the enemies to our con-
Btitutiou were contriving its ruin, I wrote a pamplilet entitled "Lethe,"
which was published in Holland, and afterwards translated into Euglisli,
and twice printed in London ; and being reprinted in Dublin, proved so
offensive to the ministry in Ireland, that it was burnt by the hands of the
hangman. But so it is, that after having showed on all occasions my zeal
for the royal family, and endeavoured to make myself serviceable to the
public by several books published ; after forty years' .s-tay in England, and
in an advanced age, I find myself and family destitute of a sufficient live-
lihood, and suffering from complaints in the head and impaired sight by
constant application to my studies.

I am confident, my loi-d, he adds, that if the queen, to whom I was
made known on occasion of Thuanus's French translation, were ac-
quainted with my present distress, she would be pleased to afford me
some relief. +

Among the confidential literary friends of Des Maizeaux,
he had the honour of ranking Anthony Collins, a great lover
of literature, and a man of fine genius, and who, in a
continued correspondence with our Des Maizeaux, treated

* I find that the nominal pension was Zs. Gd. per diem on the Irish
civil list, which amounts to above 03/. per annum. If a pension be
granted for reward, it seems a mockery that the income should be so
grievously reduced, mIucIi cruel custom slill prevails.

t This letter, or petition, was written in 1732, In 1743 he procured
his pension to be placed on his wife's life, and he died in 1745.

He was swirn in as gentleman cf his majesty's privy chamber in 1723
Sloapc M^'^S. 4289.

TOL. m. 0

V

18 Des Muizeaii.x, and Anthony Collins' s Mamiscriplg.

him as his friend, and employed him as his agent in his
hteraiT concerns. These, in the formation of an extensive
hbrary, were in a state of perpetual activity, and Collins was
such a true lover of his books, that he drew up the catalogue
with his own pen.* Anthony Collins wrote several well-
known works without prefixing his name ; but having pushed
too far his curious inquiries on some obscure and polemical
points, he incurred the odium of a frcetliinher, — a term
which then began to be in vogue, and which the French
adopted by translating it, in their way, a stronr/ tJunlev, or
esprit fort. Whatever tendency to "liberalise" the mind
from dogmas and creeds prevails in these works, the talents
and learning of Collins were of the first class. His morals
were immaculate, and his personal character independent ;
but the odium tJieoIor/icuvi of those days contrived every
means to stab in the dark, till the taste became hereditary
with some. I shall mention a fact of this cruel bigotr}-,
which occurred v.-ithin my own observation, on one of the
most polished men of the age. The late ]\Ir. Cumberland, in
the romance entitled his " Life," gave this extraordinary fact,
that Dr. Bentley, who so ably replied by his "liemarks,"
imder the name of Phileleutherus Lipsiensis, to CoUins's
" Discourse on Free-thinking," when, many years after, he
discovered him fallen into great distress, conceiving that by
liaving ruined Collins's character as a writer for ever, he had
been the occasion of his personal misery, he liberally
contributed to his maintenance. In vain I mentioned to that
elegant writer, who was not curious about facts, that this
person could never have been AntJioni/ Collins, who had
^hva^'s a plentiful fortune ; and when it was suggested to him
that this " A. Collins," as he printed it, must have been
Arthur Collins, the historical compiler, who was often in
])ecuniary difficulties, still he persisted in sending the lie
down to posterity, totidem verbis, without alteration in his
second edition, observing to a friend of mine, that " the stor}',
while it told well, might serve as a striking instance of his
great relative's generosity ; and that it should stand, because
it could do no harm to any but to Anthony Collins, whom he
considered as little short of an atheist." So much for this
pious fraud ! but be it recollected that this Anthony Collins
wiva the confidential friend of Locke, of whom Locke said, on

* Tlicre \i a priEk-d eittulogue of his library.

De.s Maizeaux, and Anthony Collms's Manuscripts. 19

his dying bed, thnt "Collins was a man whom he valued in
the first rank of those that he left behind him." And the
last words of Collins on his own death-bed were, that " he
was persuaded he was going to that place which God had
•designed for them that love him." The cause of true religion
will never be assisted by using such leaky vessels as
Cumberland's wilful calumnies, which in the end nmst run
out, and be found, like the present, mere empty llctions !

An extraordinary circumstance occurred on the death of
Anthony Collins. He left behind him a considerable number
of his own manuscripts, there was one collection formed into
eight octavo volumes ; and that they might be secured from
the conmion late of manuscripts, he bequeathed them all, and
confided them to the care of our Des Maizeaux. Tlie choice
of Collins reflects honour on the cbaracter of Des Maizeaux,
yet he proved unworthy of it ! He suffered himself to betray
his trust, practised on by the earnest desire of the widow,
and perhaps by the arts of a Mr. Tomlinson, who appears to
have been introduced into the family by the recommendation
of Dean Sykes, whom at length he supplanted, and whom the
widow, to save her rei)utation, was afterwards obliged to
discard.* In an unguarded moment he relinquished this
precious Icc/acy of the manuscripts, and a.ccc\)ted Jiff 1/ guineas
as a present. IJut if Des Maizeaux lost his honour in this
transaction, he was at heart an honest man, who had swerved
for a single moment ; his conscience was soon awakened, and
he experienced the most violent compunctions. It was in a
paroxysm of this natm-e that he addressed the following
letter to a mutual friend of the late Anthony Collins and
himself.

Sill, January 6, 1730.

I am very glatl to hear you are come to town, and as you are
my best friciul, now I have lost Mi-. CuUins, give me leave to open my
heart to you, aud to beg your assistance in an afluir which highly concerns
both Mr. Collins's (your friend) and my own honour and reputation. The
case, in few words, stands thus; — Mr. Collins by his last will and testa-
ment left me his manuscripts. Mr. Tomlinson, who first acquainted me
with it, told me that I\Irs. Collins should be glad to have them, and I made
them over to her ; whereupon she was pleased to present me with fifty
guineas. I desired her at the same time to take care they should be kept
safe and unhurt, which she promised to do. This was done the 25th of
last month. Jlr. Tomlinson, who managed all this aftair, was present.

• This information is from a note found among Des Maizer.ux's papers;
but its truth I have u-" Micaus to asc:rlain.

c2

20 Des Maizeaiix, mid Antliouy Co/lins's Mann scripts.

Now, having fuvllier considered that matter, I Cud that I hare done
a most wicked thiug. I am persuaded that I have betrayed the trust of
a person wlio, for twenty-six years, had given me continual instances of
his friendship and confidence. I am convinced that I have acted contrary
to the will and intention of my dear deceased friend ; showed a disregard
to the particular mark of esteem he gave me on that occasion ; in short,
that I have forfeited what is dearer to me than my own life — honour and
reputation.

These melancholy thoughts have made so great an impression upon
me, that I protest to you I can enjoy no rest ; they haunt me every-
where, day and night. I earnestly beseech you, sir, to represent my uji-
happy case to Mrs. Collins. I acted with all the simplicity and ujiright-
ness of my heart ; I considered that the MSS. would be as safe in ]\[rs.
CoUins's hands as in mine ; that she was no less obliged to preserve them
than myself ; and that, as the library was left to her, they might naturally
go along with it. Besides, I thought I could not too much comply with
the desire of a lady to whom I have so many obligations. But I see now
clearly that this is not fulfilling Mr. CoUins's will, and that the duties of
our conscience are superior to all other regards. But it is in her power
to forgive and mend what I have done imprudently, but with a good in-
tention. Her high sense of virtue and generosity will not, I am sure, let
her take any advantage of my weakness ; and the tender regard she has
for the memory of the best of men, and the tenderest of husbands, will
not suffer that his intentions should be frustrated, and that she should
be the instrument of violating what is most sacred. If our late friend had
designed that his ]\ISS. should remain in her hands, he would certainly
have left them to her by his last will and testament ; his acting otherwise
is an evident proof that it was not his intention.

All this I proposed to represent to her in the most respectful manner ;
but you will do it infinitely better than I can in this present distraction of
mind ; and I flatter myself that the mutual esteem and friendship whicli
has continued so many years between Jlr. Collins and you, will make you
readily embrace whatever tends to honour his memory.

I send you the fifty guineas I received, which I do now look upon as the
■wages of iniquity ; and I desire you to return them to Mrs. Collins, who,
as I hope it of her justice, equity, and regard to Mr. CoUins's intentions,
will be pleased to cjincel my paper.

I am, &c.,

P. Des Maizeatx.

The maimscripts wore never returned to Des Maizeaux ; for
seven years afterwards Mrs. Collins, who appears to have
been a very spirited lady, addressed to him the following
letter on the subject of a report, that she had permitted
transcripts of these ver}^ manuscripts to get abroad. This
occasioned an animated correspondence from both sides.

Sm, March 10, 173G 37.

I have thus long waited In expectation that you would ere this liave
called on Dean Sykcs, as Sir E. Lucy said you intended, that I might have
had sums satisfaction in relation to a very unjust reproach- viz., that I,

Des Mu'izcaiLV, mid Anthony CuUlns's Munuscripls. 21

or somebody that I had trusted, had hclrai/cd some of the transcripts, or
MSS., ot Mr. Collins iutu the Bishop of Loiidoirs hands. I cannot, there-
fore, since you have not been with the dean as was desired, but call on j'ou
in this manner, to know what authority you had for such a reflection ; or
on what grounds you went for saying that these transcripts are in the
Bishop of Loudon's hands. I am determined to trace out the grounds of
such a report ; and you can be no friend of mine, no friend of Mr. Collius,
no friend to common justice, if you refuse to ac4uaint me, what foundation
you had for such a charge. I desire a very speedy answer to this, who am,
Sir, Your servant,

Eliz. Collins.
To Mr. Des Malzeaux, at Ms lodfjlnrfs next door to the
Qualcrs burijin'j-(jround, Ilanovcr-strcct, out of Loii'j-Acre.

TO MRS. COLLINS.

March 14, 1737.

I had the honour of your letter of the 10th iust., and as I find thab
something has been misapi)rehended, I beg leave to set this matter right.

Being lately with some honourable persons, I told them it had been re-
ported that some of Mr. C.'s ilSS. were fallen into the hands of strangers,
and that I should be glad to receive from you such information as might
enable me to disprove that report. What occasioned this surmise, or
what particular JISS. wore meant, I was not able to discover ; so I was
left to my own conjectures, which, upon a serious consideration, induced
me to believe that it might relate to the MSS. in eight volumes in Svo, of
which there is a transcript. But as the original and the transcript are in
your possession, if you please, madam, to compare them together, you may
easily see whether they be both entire and perfect, or whether there be
anything wanting in either of them. By this means you will assure your-
self, and satisfy your friends, that several important pieces are safe in your
hands, and that the report is false and groundless. All this I take the
liberty to offer out of the singular respect I always professed for you,
and for the memory of Mr. Collins, to whom I have endeavoured to do
justice on all occasions, and particularly in the memoirs that have been
made use of in the General Dictionary; and I hope my tender concern for
bis reputation will further appear when I publish his life.

SiR^ April 6, 1737.

Jify ill state of health has hindered me from acknowledging sooner
the receipt of yours, from which I hoped for some satisfaction in relation
to your charge, in which I cannot but think myself very deeply concerned.
You tell me now, that you was left to your own conjectures what particular
MSS. were reported to have fallen into the hands of strangers, and that
upon a serious consideration you was induced to believe that it might relate
to the MSS. in eight vols. Svo, of which there was a transcript.

I must beg of you to satisfy me very explicitly who were the persons that
reported this to you, and from whom did you receive this information .'
You know that Mr. Collins left several ]\ISS. behind hira ; what grounds
Lad you for your conjecture that it related to the MSS. in eight vols.,
rather than to any other MSS. of which there was a transcript ? I bc^

22 Dcs Maizeanx, and Anthony Collins' s Manuscripts.

that you will be very plain, and tell me what strangers were named to
you ; and why you said the Bishop of London, if your informer said
stranger to you. I am so much concerned in this, that I must repeat it,
if you have the singular respect for Mr. Collins which you profess, that
you would help me to trace out this reproach, which is so abusive to. Sir,

Your servant,

Eliz. Collins.

to mrs. c0ll1k9.

I flattered mj-self that my last letter would have satisfied yon, but
I have the mortification to .see that my hopes were vain. Therefore I beg
leave once more to set this matter right. When I told you wliat had been
reported, I acted, as I thought, the part of a true friend, by acquainting
you that some of your MSS. had been purloined, in order that you might
examine a fact which to me appeared of the last consequence ; and I verily
believe that everybody in my case would have expected thanks for such a
friendly information. Cut instead of that I find myself represented as an
enemy, and challenged to produce proofs and witnesses of a thing dropt in
conversation, a hearsay, as if in those cases peop)le kept a register of what
they hear, and entered the names of the persons who spoke, the time,
])lace, &c., and had with them persons ready to witness the whole, &e. I
did own I never thought of such a thing, and whenever I happened to hear
that some of ray friends had some loss, I thought it my duty to acquaint
them with such rej^ort, that they might inquire into the matter, and see
whether there was any ground for it. But I never troubled myself with
the names of the persons w^ho spoke, as being a thing entirely needless and
unprofitable.

Give me leave further to observe, that you are in no ways concerned in
the matter, as you seem to be apprehensive you are. Suppose some i\It?S,
have been taken out of your library, who will say you ought to bear the
guilt of it ? What man in his senses, who has the honour to know you,
will say you gave your consent to such thing — that you was privy to it?
How can you then take upon yourself an action to which you was neither
privy and consenting ? Du not such things happen every day, and do the
losers think themselves injured or abused when they are talked of? Is it
impossible to be betrayed by a person v/e confided in ?

You call what I told you was a report, a surmise ; you call it, I say, an
information, and speak of informers as if there was a plot laid wherein
I received the information : I thought I had the honour to be better known
to you. Mr. Collins loved me and esteemed me for my integiity and
sincerity, of which he had several proofs ; how I have been drawn in
to injure him, to forfeit the good opinion he had of me, and which, were
be now alive, would deservedly expose me to his utmost contempt, is a
grief which I shall carry to the grave. It would be a sort of comfoi-t to
me, if those who have consented I should be drawn in were in some measure
tensible of the guilt towards so good, kind, and generous a mau.

Thus we find that, seven years after Des Maizeaux had
inconsiderately betrayed his sacred trust, his remorse was
fctill awake ; and the sincerity of his grief is attested by the
affecting stylo which describes it : the spirit of his departed

History of New Words. 23

friend seemed to be liovcrinq- about him, and, in liis imaginu-
tion, would haiuit him to tlie grave.

The nature ot" these manuseripts ; the cause of the earnest
desire of retaining them by the widow ; the evident unfriend-
liness of her conduct to Des Maizeaux ; and whether these
manuscripts, consisting of eight octavo volumes with their
transcripts, were destroyed, or are still existiiig, are all cir-
cumstances whicli my researche? have hitherto not ascer-
tained.

HISTORY OF NEW WORDS.

Neology, or the novelty of words and phrases, is an inno-
vation, whicli, with the opulence of our present language,
the Englisli philologor is most jealous to allow ; but we have
puritans or precisians of English, superstitiously nice ! The
fantastic coinage of affectation or caprice will cease to cir-
culate from its own alio}' ; but shall we reject the ore of fine
workmanship and solid weight ? There is no government
mint of words, and it is no statutable offence to invent a
felicitous or daring expression unauthorised by Mr. Todd !
When a man of genius, in the heat of his "pursuits or his
feelings, has thrown out a peculiar word, it probably conveyed
more yirecision or energ}' than any other established word,
otherwise he is but an ignorant pretender !

Julius Caesar, who, unlike other great captains, is authority
on words as well as about blows, wrote a large treatise on
"Analogy," in which that fine genius counselled to " avoitl
every unusual word as a rock!"* The cautious Quintilian,
as might be expected, opposes all innovation in language.
" If the new word is well received, small is the glory ; if
rejected, it raises laughter."t This only marks the penury
of his feelings in this species of adventure. The great legis-
lator of words, who lived when his own language was at its
acme, seems undecided, 3'et pleaded for this liberty. " Shall
that which the llomans allowed to Cajcilius and to Plautus
be refused to Yirgil and Yarius ?" The answer to the ques-
tion might not be favourable to the inquirer. AVhile a lan-
guage is forming, writers are applauded for extending its
limits; when established, for restricting themselves to them.
But this is to imagine that a perfect language can exist !

• AulusGcIliu,?, lib. i, c, 10, t Inatit. lib. i. c. 5.

24 Hidory of New Words.

The good sense and observation of Horace p(;rceived that
there may be occasions where necessity must become the
ujother oi' invented words : —

Si forte necesse est

Indiciis monstrare receutibus abdita lerum.

If you write of things abstruse or new,
Some of your own inventing may be used,
So it be seldom and discreetly done.

Roscommon,

Lat Horace's canon for deciding on the legaUty of the new
invenaon, or the standard by which it is to be tried, will not
serve to .'.ssist the inventor of words : —

licuit, semperque licebit,

Signatum pi'sseute nota pi'ocudere nummum.

This 'prcBsens nota, or public stamp, can never be affixed to
any new coinage of words : for many received at a season
have perished with it.f The privilege of stamping words is
reserved for their greatest enemy — Time itself! and the
inventor of a new word must never flatter himself that he
has secured the public adoption, for he must lie in his grave
before he can enter the dictionary.

In Willes' address to the reader, prefixed to the collection
of Voyages published in 1577, he finds fault with Eden's
translation from Peter Martyr, for using words that " smelt
too much of the Latine." We should scarcely have expected

* This verse was con-ected by Bentley procudere nummum, instead of
producere nomcn, which the critics agree is one of his happy conjectures.

t Henry Cockeram's curious little "English Dictionarie, or an Inter-
pretation of hard English words", 12nio, 1631, professes to give in its
first book "the choicest words themselves now in use, wherewith our
language is inriched and become so copious." Many have not survived,
Buch as the following : —

Acyrologicall . . An improper speech.
Adacted .... Driven in by force.
Blandiloquy . . . Flattering speecli.
Compaginate . . To set together that which is brokers.
Concessation . . Loytering.
Delitigate ... To scold, or chide vehemently.
Depalmate ... To give one a box on the ear.
Esuriate ... To hunger.
Strenuitie . . . Activity.
Curiously enough, this author notes some words as those "now out of
use, and onely used of some ancient writers," but which we nowcommonl3
use. Such are the following : —

Abandon . . To forsake or cast off.

Abate . . To make lesse, dimiuishj or take from.

His tor ij of New Words. ^5

to find among them ponderouse, ^iorlenlouse, despicahic, ohse-
quious, homicide, imbibed, destructive, j^rodir/ioiis. The only
words he quotes, not thorouijlily naturalised, are dominators,
ditionaries, (subjects), solicitute (careful).

The Tatlcr, No. 230, introduces several polysyllables intro-
duced by military narrations, " which (he says), if they
attack us too frequently, we shall certainly put them to
flight, and cut oft" the rear;" every cue of them still keep
their ground.

Half the French words used affectedly by Melantha, in
Dryden's J/«r/'wye «-/a-il/b(?^, a sinnovations in our language,
are now in common use, naivete, foible, chagrin, grimace,
embarras, double entendre, equivoque, eclaircisscment, ridicule,
all these words, which she learns by heart to use occasionally,
are now in connnon use. A Dr. Kusscl called Psalm-singers
Ballad-singers, having found the Song of Solomon in an old
ti-anslation, the Ballad of Ballads, for which he is reproached
by his antagonist for not knowing that the signification of
words alters with time ; should I call him knave, he ought
not to be concerned at it, for the Apostle Paul is also called
a knave of Jesus Christ.*

Unquestionably, neology opens a wide door to innovation ;
scarcely has a century passed since our language was patched
up with Gallic idioms, as in the preceding century it was
piebald with Spanish, and with Italian, and even with Dutch.
The political intercourse of islanders with their neighbours
has ever influenced their language. In Elizabeth's reign
Italian phrasesf and Netherland words were imported ; in
James and Charles the S))anish framed the style of courtesy;
in Charles the Second the nation and the langungo were
equally Frenchified. Yet such are the sources from whence
we have often derived some of the wealth of our language !

* A most striking instance of the change of meaning iu a word is in the
jld law-term let — "without let or hindrance ;" meaning void of all oppo-
sition. Hence, " I will let you," meant " I will hinder you ;" and not as
n'c should now think, " I will give you free leave."

+ Shakspeare makes "Ancient Pistol" use a new-coined Italian word,
tirhen he speaks of being "better accommodated ;" to the great delight of
Justice Shallow, who exclaims, " It comes from accommodo — a good
phrase !" And Ben Jonson, in his " Tale of a Tub," ridicules luigo
Jones's love of two words he often used : —

If it conduce

To the design, whate'er is feasible,
I can express.

26 U'lsiory of Neiv f Fords.

There arc three foul corrupters of a Language : caprice,
affectation, and ignorance ! Such fashionable cant terms as
'"theatricals," and "musicals," invented by the flippant
Tophani, still survive among his confraternity of frivola/.
A lady eminent for the elegance of her taste, and of \vho;n
one of the best judges, the celebrated Miss Edgeworth,
observed to me, that she spoke the purest and most idiomatic
English she had ever heard, threw out an observation whicli
might be extended to a great deal of our present fashionable
vocabular3^ She is uow old enough, she said, to have lived
to hear the vulgarisms of her youth adopted in drawing-room
circles.* To hmch, now so familiar from the fairest lips, in
her 3'outh was only known in the servants' hall. An expres-
sion very rife of late among our young ladies, a nice uian,
whatever it may mean, whether that the man resemble apud-
dmg or something more nice, conveys the otfensive notion
that they are ready to eat him up ! AVhen I was a boy, it
was an age of hoii Ion ; this good tone mysteriously conveyed
a sublime idea of fashion ; the term, imported late in the
eighteenth centur}^ closed with it, Twaddle for a while suo-
ceeded hove ; but lore has recovered the supremacy. We
want another Swift to give a new edition of his " Polite
Conversation." A dictionarj'- of barbarisms too might be
collected from some wretched neologists, whose pens are now
at work ! Lord Chesterfield, in his exhortations to conform
to Johnson's Dictionary, was desirous, however, that the great
lexicographer should add as an appendix, "^ neological dic-
iionary, containing those polite, though perhaps not strictly
grammatical, words and phi-ases commonly used, and some-
times understood by the beau-monde."'f This last phrase was
doubtless a contribution ! Such a dictionary had already
appeared in the French language, drawn up by two caustic
critics, who in the Dietionnaire neologique aV iiiiage des beaux
J^sjjrKs du Steele collected together the numerous unlucky
inventions of affectation, with their modern authorities ! A
collection of the fine words and phrases, culled from some
very modern poetry, might show the real amount of the
favours bestowed on us.

• The term pluch, once only known to the prize-ring, has now got into
use in general conversation, and also into literature, as a tei'm indicative
of ready courage.

t Such terms as ^' patent to the imhVic'^ — "iiojvnci? condition" — "crass
behaviour," are the inventions of the last few years.

History of New Words. 27

The attempts of ncologists are, however, not necessarily to
be condemned ; and we may join with the commentators of
Aulus Gelhus, who have hxmented the loss of a chapter of
which the title only has descended to us. That chapter
would have demonstrated what happens to all languages, that
some neologisms, wliich at first are considered forced or inele-
gant, become sanctioned by use, and in time are quoted as
authority in the very language which, in their early stage,
they were imagined to have debased.

The true history of men's minds is found in their actions ;
their wants are indicated b}' their contrivances ; and certain
it is th?,t in highly cultivated ages we discover the most
refined intellects attempting keologisms.* It would be a
subject of great curiosit}' to trace the origin of many happy
expressions, when, and by whom created. Plato substituted
the term Frovidence iov fate ; and a new sj'stem of human
afi'airs arose from a single word. Cicero invented several ; to
tliis philosopher we owe the term of «?or«/ philosophy, which
before his time was called the philosophy of manners. But
on this subject we arc perhaps more interested by the modern
than by the ancient languages, Richardson, the painter of
the human heart, has coined some expressions to indicate its
little secret movements, which are admirable : that great
genius merited a higher education and more literary leisure
than the life of a printer could afford, jMontaigne created
some bold expressions, many of which have not survived him ;
his incuriosile, so opposite to curiosity, well describes that
state of negligence where we will not learn that of which we
are ignorant. With us the word incurious was described by
Heylin, IGot?, as an unusual word ; it has been appropriately
adopted by our best writers, although we still want
incuriosity. Cliarron invented etranrjete unsuccessfully, but
which, says a French critic, would be the true substantive of
the word etrange ; our Locke is the solitary instance produced
for " foreignness " for "remoteness or want of relation to
something." Malherbe borrowed from the Latin, insidiei/x,
securife, which have been received ; but a bolder word,
d^vouloir, by which he proposed to express cesser de vouloir,

* Sliakspeare lias a powerfully-composed liue in the speech of the Duko
of Burguinly, (Ilcnv)/ V. Act v. Sc. 2), when, describiug the fields ovej--
giown with weeds, he exclaims —

The coulter rusts,

That should deracinate such sarar/cry.

28 Ilisiory of Neiv Words.

has not. A term, however, expressive and precise. Corncille
happily introduced invaincu in a verse in the Cid,

Yous etes invaincu, mais non pas invincible.

Yet this created word by their great poet has not sanctioned
this fine distinction among the French, for we are told that
it is ahnost a sohtar}' instance. Balzac was a great inventor
of neologisms. Urbanite and feliciler were struck in his
mint. " Si le mot felicifer n'est pas franfaise, il le sera I'an-
nee qui vient ;" so confidently proud was the neologist, and
it prospered as well as tcrianiie, of which he ssljs, " Quand
I'usage aura muri parmi nous un mot de si mauvais gout, et
corrige Vamertume de la nouveaide qui s'y pent trouver, nous
nous y accoutumerons comme aux autres que nous avons
emprunte de la meme langue." Balzac was, however, too
sanguine in some other woi'ds ; for his cUlecter, his seriosite,
&c. still retain their "bitterness of novelty."

Menage invented a term of which an equivalent is wanting
in our language ; " J'ai 'i-Mt X'i'osateiw hVimxt'oXion del'italien
prosatore, pour dire un homme qui cerit en prose." To dis-
tinguish a prose from a verse writer, we o;2c<3 had " a proser."
Di'ayton uses it ; but this useful distinction has unluckily
degenerated, and the current sense is so daily urgent, that the
purer sense is irrecoverable.

When D'Albancourt was translating Lucian, he invented
in French the words indolence and indolent, to describe a mo-
mentary languor, rather than that habitual indolence in which
sense they are now accepted ; and in translating Tacitus, he
created the word turhulemment ; but it did not prosper any
more than tliat of teviporisemettf. Segrais invented the word
impardonnalle, wliich, after having been rejected, was revived,
and is equivalent to our expressive irrpardonahle. Moliere
ridiculed some neologisms of the Precicuses of his day ; but
we are too apt to ridicule that which is new, and which we often
adopt when it becomes old. Moliere laughed at the term
s'encanailler, to describe one who assumed the manners of a
blackguard ; the expressive word has remained in the lan-
guage. The meaning is disputed as well as the origin is lost
of some novel terms. This has happened to a v\'ord in daily
use — Fudfje ! It is a cant term not in Grose, and only traced
by Todd not higher than to Goldsmith. It is, however, no
invention of his. In a pamphlet, entitled " Remarks upon
the Navy," 1700, the term is declared to have been the name

History of New Words. 29

of a certain nautical personage who had lived in the lifetime
of the writer. " There was, sir, in our time, one Caplaiii
Fudje, commander of a mcrcliantman, who upon his return
from a voyage, how ill-fraught soever his ship was, always
brought home his owners a good cargo of lies ; so much that
now, aboard ship, the sailors, when they hear a great lie told,
cry out, ' You fudge it !' " It is singular that such an
obscure byword among sailors should have become one of the
most popular in our familiar style ; and not less, that rec(.'ntly
at the bar, in a court of law, its precise meaning perplexed
plaiiitilV and defendant and their counsel. I think it does not
signify mere lies, but bouncing lies, or rhodomontades.

There arc two remarkable French words created by the
Abbe de Saint Pierre, who passed his meritorious life in the
contemplation of political morality and universal benevolence
— hienfaisance and cjloriole. He invented r/loriole as a con-
temptuous diminutive of y/or/e; to describe that vanity of
some egotists, so proud of the small talents which they may
have received from nature or from accident. Bienfaisance
first a])peared in this sentence : " L'Ksprit de la vraic religion
et le principal but de I'evangile c'est la bienfaisance, c'cst-jl-
dire la pratique de la charite envers le prochain." This word
was so new, that in the moment of its creation this good man
explained its necessity and origin. Complaining that " the
word ' charity ' is abused by all sorts of Christians in tlie
persecution of their enemies, and even heretics affirm that
they are practising Christian charity' in persecuting other
heretics, I have sought for a term which might convey to us
a precise idea of doing good to our neighbours, and I can form
none more proper to make myself understood than the term
of hienfaisancc, good-doing. Let those who like, use it ; I
would only be understood, and it is not equivocal." The
happy word was at first criticised, but at length every kind
heart found it responded to its own feeling. Some verses froni
Voltaire, alluding to the political reveries of the good abbe,
notice the critical opposition ; yet the new word answered to
the great rule of Horace.

Certain 16gislatcur, dout la plume l\io<3nile

Fit tant de vains projets pour le bien du i>)onde,

Et qui depuis treute aiis ecrit pour dcs ingrats,

Vient de creer un mot qui manque a, Vaugelas :

Ce mot est Bienk.visance ; il me idait, il rassemble

Si le occur ea est cru, Lien dcs vcrlus cuscmblo.

so Hislory of New Words.

Petits gvammairicns, grands prccepteurs de sots,
Qui pescz la paivle et inesuroz Ics mots,
Pareille expression vons semble bazardce,
Mais I'univcrs entier doit en clierir Tidce!

The French revolutionists, in their rage for irinovation,
ahriost barbariscci the pure Frencli of the Augustan age of
their literature, as thej did many things which never before
occurred ; and sometimes experienced feelings as transitory as
they were strange. Their nomenclature was copious ; but
the revolutionary jargon often shows the danger and the
necessity of neologisms. They form an appendix to the
Academy Dictionary. Our plain English has served to en-
rich this odd mixture of philology and politics : Club, cluhisfe,
comife, jure, Juffe de jiciix, blend v^ith tlieir terrorisme, Ian-
tenier, a verb active, levee en masse, noyades, and the other
verb active, septemhriser, &e. The barbarous term deinora-
litiatlon is said to have been the invention of the horrid
capuchin Chabot ; and the remarkable expression of arriere
pensee belonged exclusively in its birth to the Jesuitic astute-
ness of the Abbe Sieyes, that political actor, who, in changing
sides, never required prompting in his new part !

A new word, the result of much consideration with its
author, or a term which, though unknown to the language,
conve^'s a collective assemblage of ideas b}' a fortunate desig-
nation, is a precious contribution of genius ; new words should
convey new ideas. Swift, living amidst a civil war of pam-
phlets, when certain writers were regularly employed by one
party to draw up replies to the other, created a term not to
iie found in our dictionaries, but which, b\'^ a single stroke,
characterises these hirelings ; he called them ansicer-johbcrs.
We have not dropped the fortunate expression from any
want of its use, but of perception in our lexicographers. The
celebrated Marquis of Lansdowne introduced a useful word,
which has of late been warmly adopted in France as well as
in England — to liberalise ; the noun has been drawn out of
the verb — for in the marquis's time that was onlj- an abstract
conception which is now a sect ; and to liberalise was theo-
retically introduced before the liberals arose.* It is curious
to observe that as an adjective it had formerly in our lan-

* The " Quarterly Pieview" recently marked tie word liberalise in
italics as a strange word, undoubtedly not aware of its origin. It has
Ikcu lately osod by I\Ir. Duijald Stewart, "to liberalise the views." —
Disjcrt. 2ud part., p. 133.

History of Neio Words. 81

guage a very opposito meaning to its recent one. It was
synonymous with "libertine or licentious;" we have "a
liberal villain" and "a most profane and liberal counsellor;"
we find one declaring "I have spoken too liberally." This
is unlucky for the liberals, who will not —

Give allowance to our libcval jests
Upon their persons —

Beaumoxt and Fletoher.

Dr. Priestley enij^loycd a forcible, but not an elegant term,
to mark the general information which had begun in his day;
this he frequently calls " the spread of knowledge." Burke
attempted to brand with a new name that set of pert, petu-
lant, sophistical sciolists, whose philosophy the French, since
their revolutionary period, have distinguished as pliilosopliism,
and the philosophers themselves as jyJtilusopJiis/es. lie would
have designated them as Iterators, but few exotic words will
circulate ; new woixls must be the coinage of our own lan-
guage to blend with the vernacular idiom. Many new words
are still wanted. Wc have no word by which we could trans-
late the ofium of the Latins, the diUettante of the Italians,
the alcmhique of the French, as an epithet to describe that
sublimated ingenuity which exhausts the mind, till, like the
fusion of the diamond, the intellect itself disappears. A phi-
losopher, in an extensive view of a subject in all its bearings,
may convey to us the result of his last considerations b}' the
coinage of a novel and signilicant expression, as this of Pro-
fessor Dugald Stewart — imlitieal 7'elif/ionism. Let me claim
the honour of one pure neologism. I ventured to introduce
the term of fatueu-land to describe our natale .wlum ; I
have liv?d to see it adopted by Lord Byron and by Mr.
Southcy, and the word is now common. A lady has oven
composed both the words and the air of a song on " Father-
land." This energetic expression may thei-efore be considered
IS authenticated ; and patriotism may stamp it with its glory
and its allection. FATU£it-LA>D is congenial with the lan-
guage in which we lind that other fine expression MOXiiEii-
TONGUE. The patriotic neologism originated with me in
Holland, when, in early life, it was my daily pursuit to turn
over the glorious history of its independence under the titlj
of Vaderlandsche Historie — the history of fatiieu-la>'d !

If wc acknowledge that the creation of some neologisms
may sometimes produce the beautiful, the revival of the deu'l

32 The Philosophy of Proverbs.

is the more authentic miracle ; for a new word must long re-
main doubtful, but an ancient word happily recovered rests
on a basis of permanent strength ; it has botli novelty and
authority. A collection of picturesque ivorcis, found among
our ancient writers, would constitute a precious supplement
to the history of our language. Far more expressive than
our term of executioner is their solemn one of the deatlisman ;
than our vagalond, their scatterling ; than our idiot or
lunatic, their moonling, — a word which, Mr. Gifford observes,
shoidd not have been suffered to grow obsolete. Herri?k
linely describes by the term pittering the peculiar shrill and
short cry of the grasshopper : the cr}"^ of the grasshopper is
pit! pit! pit! quickly repeated. Envy " f7i«A-i«_(7 the lustre"
of genius is a verb lost for us, but which gives a more precise
expression to the feeling than any other words which we
could use.

The late Dr. Boucher, in the prospectus of his proposed
Dictionary, did me the honour, then a 3'oung writer, to quote
an opinion I had formed earl}' in life of the purest source of
neolog}'-, which is in the revival of old ivords.

Words iLat wise Bacon or brave Rawleigli spake !

"VVe have lost many exquisite and picturesque expressions
through the dulness of our lexicographers, or by the deficiency
in that profounder study of our writers which their labours
require far more than they themselves know. The natural
graces of our language have been impoverished. The genius
that throws its prophetic eye over the language, and the
taste that must come from Heaven, no lexicographer ima-
gines are required to accompany him amidst a library of
old books !

THE PHILOSOPHY OF PROVEr.ES.

Tn antique furniture we sometimes discover a convenience
which long disuse had made us unacquainted with, and are
surprised by the aptness which we did not suspect was con-
cealed in its solid forms. We have found the labour of the
workmen to have been as admirable as the material itself,
which is still resisting the mouldering touch of time among
those modern inventions,elcgantand unsubstantial, which, often
put together wiUi un.^easoned wood, are apt to warp aud fly

The Pldloauphij of Proverbs. o3

tito plfcos wlieu brought into use. Wo have lountl how
scrcng-th coDriist* in the selection of materials, and that, when-
ever the substitute is not better than the original, we are
losing something in that test of experience, which all things
derive from duration.

Be this as it may ! I shall not unreasonably await for the
artists of our novelties to retrograde into massive greatness,
although I cannot avoid reminding thein how often they re-
vive the forgotten things of past times ! It is well known
that many of our novelties were in use by our ancestors ! In
the history of the human mind there is, indeed, a sort of
antique furniture which I collect, not merely for their anti-
quity, but for the sound condition in which I still find them,
and the compactness which they still show. Centuries have
not worm-eaten their solidity ! and the utility and dolight-
I'ulness which they still afford make them look as fresh and
as ingenious as any of our patent inventions.

By the title of the present article the reader has anti-
cipated the nature of the old furniture to which I allude. I
propose to give what, in the style of oui- times, may be called
the Philosophy of Proverbs— a topic which seems virgin.
The art of reading proverbs has not, indeed, always been ac-
quired even by some of their admirers ; but my observations,
like their subject, must be versatile and unconnected ; and I
must bespeak indidgence for an attempt to illustrate a very
curious branch of literature, rather not understood than quite
forgotten.

Proverbs have long been in disuse. " A man of fashion,"
observes Lord Chesterfield, " never has recourse to proverbs
and vulgar aphorisms;" and, since the time his lordship so
solemnly interdicted tlieir use, they appear to have withered
away under the ban of his anathema. His lordship was
little conversant with the history of proverbs, and would
unquestionably have smiled on those " men of fashion" of
another stamp, who, in the days of Elizabeth, James, and
Charles, were great collectors of them ; would appeal to them
in their conversations, and enforce them in their learned or
their statesmanlike correspondence. Few, perhaps, even now,
suspect that these neglected fragments of wisdom, which
exist among all nations, still offer many interesting objects for
the studies of the philosopher and the historian ; and for men
of the world still open an extensive school of human life and
manners.

TOL. III. D

31 The Philosophy of Proverbs.

The home-spun adages, and the rusty " sayed-saws," which
remain in the mouths of the people, are adapted to their ca-
pacities and their Immours. Easily remembered, and readily
applied, these are the philosophy of the vulgar, and often
more sound than that of their masters ! whoever would learn
what the people think, and how they feel, must not reject
even these as insignificant. The proverbs of the street and
of the market, true to nature, and lasting only because they
are true, are records that the populace at Athens and at
Home were the same people as at Paris and at London, and
as the}' had before been in the city of Jerusalem !

Proverbs existed before books. The Spaniards date the
orio'in of their refranes que dicen las viejas tras elfuego,
"sayings of old wives by their firesides," before the existence
of any writings in their language, from the circumstance that
these are in the old romance or rudest vulgar idiom. The
most ancient poem in the Edda, " the sublime speech of
Odin," abounds with ancient proverbs, strikingly descriptive
of the ancient Scandinavians. Undoubtedly proverbs in tha
earliest ages long served as the unwritten language of mo-
rality, and even of the useful arts ; like the oral traditions of
the Jews, they floated down from age to age on the lips of
successive generations. The name of the first sage who
sanctioned the saying would in time be forgotten, while the
opinion, the metaphor, or the expression, remained, conse-
crated into a proverb ! Such was the origin of those memo-
rable sentences by which men learnt to think and to speak
appositely ; the}^ were precepts which no man could contra-
dict, at a time when authority was valued more than opi-
nion, and experience preferred to novelt}'. The proverbs of a
ftither becanie the inheritance of a son ; the mistress of a
family perpetuated hers through her household ; the workman
condensed some traditional secret of his craft into a prover-
bial expression. Wlien countries are not yet populous, and
property has not yet produced great inequalities in its ranks,
every day will show them how " the drunkard and the
glutton come to poverty, and drowsiness clothes a man
with rags." At such a period he who gave counsel gave
wealth.

It might therefore have been decided, a p>-iori, that the
most homely proverbs would abound in the most ancient
writers — and such we find in Hesiod ; a poet whose learning
was not drawn from books. It could only have been in tho

The P/iilosopfiif of Provcrhs;. 35

agricultural state that this venerable bard could have indi-
cated a state of repose by this rustic proverb : —

Tlii^ cWiov HIV virip Kairrov Kurcthln,
Hang your plough- beam o'er the hearth !

The envy of rival workmen is as justly described by a re-
ference to the humble manufacturers of earthenware as by
the elevated jealousies of the literati and the artists of a
more polislied ai^-e. The famous proverbial verse in Hesiod's
Works and Days —

K.ai Kspafxivg Kipafiii Koriti,

is literally, " The potter is hostile to the potter !"

The admonition of tlie poet to his brother, to prefer a
friendly accommodation to a litigious lawsuit, has fixed a
paradoxical proverb often applied, —

The halt' is better thuu the whole !

In the progress of time, the stock of j)0i)ular proverbs re-
ceived accessions from the highest sources of human intelli-
gence ; as the philosophers of antiquity formed their collec-
tions, they increased in "weight and number." Erasmus
has pointed out some of these sources, in the responses of
oracles ; the allegorical symbols of Pythagoras ; the verses of
the poets ; allusions to historical incidents ; mythology and
apologue ; and other recondite origins. Such dissimilar
matters, coming fi'om all quarters, were melted down into
this vast bod}' of aphoristic knowledge. Those " WOUDS OF
TUE WISE and their dark satings," as they are distin-
guished in that large collection which bears the name of the
great Hebrew monarch, at length seem to have required
commentaries ; for what else can we infer of the enigmatic
wisdom of the sages, when the royal paroemiographer classes
among their studies, that of " tinderstanding a i^roverh and
the intevpretntion .?" This elevated notion of " the dark
sayings of the wise" accords with the bold conjecture of
their origin which the Stagyrite has thrown out, who con-
sidered them as the wrecks of an ancient philosophy which
had been lost to mankind by the fatal revolutions of all
human things, and that those liad been saved from the gene-
ral ruin by their pithy elegance and their diminutive I'oi m ;
like those marine shells found on the tops of mountains, the
relics of the Deluge ! Even at a later period, the sage of

d2

36 The PhilosopJiy of Proverbs.

Cheronca prized them among the most solemn mysteries ; and
Plutarch has described them in a manner which proverbs may
ev'en still merit : " Under the veil of these curious sentences
are hid those germs of morals which the masters of philo-
sophy have afterwai'ds developed into so many volumes."

At the highest period of Grecian genius, the tragic and the
comic poets introduced into their dramas the proverbial style.
St. Paul quotes a line which still remains among the firsfc
exercises of our school-pens : —

Evil communications corrupt good maimers.

It is a verse found in a fi-agment of Menauder the comic
poet :

^Qt'tpovtjiv yOtj \p)i<jQ' ufuXlai kcikuL

As this verse is a proverb, and the apostle, and indeed tho
highest authority, Jesus himself, consecrates the use of pro-
verbs by their occasional application, it is uncertain whether
St. Paul quotes the Grecian poet, or only repeats some popu-
lar adage. Proverbs were bright shafts in the Greek and
Latin quivers ; and when Bentley, by a league of superficial
wits, was accused of pedantry for his use of some ancient
proverbs, the sturdy critic vindicated his taste by showing
that Cicero constantly introduced Greek proverbs into his
writings, — that Scaliger and Erasmus loved them, and had
formed collections drawn from the stores of antiquity.

Some difliculty has occurred in the definition. Proverbs
must be distinguished from proverbial phrases, and from sen-
tentious maxims ; but as proverbs have many faces, from
their miscellaneous nature, the class itself scarcely admits of
any definition. When Johnson defined a proverb to be " a
short sentence frequently repeated by the people," this defi-
nition would not include the most curious ones, which have
not always circulated, among the populace, nor even belong
to them -, nor does it designate the vital qualities of a pro-
verb. The pithy quaintness of old Howell has admirably
described the ingredients of an exquisite proverb to be sense,
sli07-lncss, and salt. A proverb is distinguished from a maxim
or an apophthegm by that brevity which condenses a
thought or a metaphor, where one thing is said and another
is to be applied. This often produces wit, and that quick
pungency which excites surprise, but strikes with convic-
tion ; tliis gives it an epigrammatic turn. George Herbert
entitled the small collection which he formed " Jacula Pru-

The Philosophy of Proverhs. 85'

dentium," Darts or Javelins! sometbins:,' hurled and strikiuij
deeply ; a characteristic of a proverb whieh possibly Herbert
may have borrowed from a remarkable pas.sayc in Plato's
dialogue of '' Protagoras or the Sophists."

The influence of proverbs over the minds and conversations
of a whole people is strikingly illustrated by this philosopher's
explanation of tlie term to laconise, — the mode of speech
peculiar to the Lacedaemonians. This people affected to
appear loiJearned, and seemed only emulous to excel the rest
of the Greeks in fortitude and in military skill. According
to Plato's notion, this was reall}"- a political artifice, with a
view to conceal their pre-eminent wisdom. With the
jealousy of a petty state, they attempted to confine their
renowned sagacity within themselves, and under their
niiHtary to hide their contemplative character ! The
])hilosopher assures those who in other cities imagined they
laconised, merel^^ by imitating the severe exercises and the
other warlike manners of the LacediBrnonians, that they were
grossly deceived ; and thus curiously describes the sort of
wisdom whieh this singular people practised.

" If any one wish to converse with the meanest of the
Laccdajmonians, he will at first find him, for the most part,
apparently despicable in conversation ; but afterwards, when
a proper opporturiity presents itself, this same mean person,
like a skilful jaciilafor, will hurl a sentence, worthy of
attention, short and contorted; so that he who converses with
him will appear to be in no res])ect superior to a boy ! That
to laconise, therefore, consists much more in philosophising
than in the love of exercise, is understood by some of the
present age, and was known to the ancients, the}' being
persuaded that the ability of ntlerinr/ such sentences as thesu
is the ])rovince of a man perfectly learned. The seven sages
were emulators, lovers, and disciples of the Lacedannonian
erudition. Their wisdom was a thing of this kind, viz. short
sentences tittered bj/ each, and icort/ii/ to he rememhered.
Tliese men, assembling together, consecrated to Apollo the
first fruits of their wisdom ; writing in the Temple of Apollo,
at Delphi, those sentences which are celebrated by all men,
viz. Know thijselj I and Nothimj too much! IJut on what
account do I mention these things ? To show that tlic mode
of philosophif among the ancients was a certain laconic
diction.'' *

* Taylor's Transhitiou of Pkito's wovIjs, vol v. p. 36.

38 The Philosophy of Proverbs.

Tlio " laconisms " of the Laceclsomonlans evidently partook
of the proverbial style: tliey were, no doubt, often proverbs
themselves. The very instances which Plato supplies of this
"laconising" are two most venerable proverbs.

All this elevates the science of proteebs, and indicates
that these abridgments of knowledge convey great results,
with a parsimony of words prodigal of sense. They have,
therefore, preserved many "a short sentence, not repeated by
the people."

It is evident, however, that the earliest writings of
every people are marked by their most homelj'-, or domestic
proverbs ; for these were more directly addressed to their
wants. Franklin, who may be considered as the founder of a
people who were suddenly placed in a stage of civil society
which as jct could afford no literature, discovered the
philosophical cast of his genius, when he filled his almanacs
with proverbs, by the ingenious contrivance of framing them
into a connected discourse, delivered by an old man attending
an auction. "These proverbs," he tells us, " which contained
the wisdom of many ages and nations, when their scattered
counsels were brought together, made a great impression.
They were reprinted in Bi'itain, in a large sheet of paper, and
stuck up in houses : and were twice translated in France, and
distributed among their poor parishioners." The same occur-
rence had hap])ened with us ere we became a reading people.
Sir Thomas Elyot, in the reign of Henry the Eighth,
describing the ornaments of a nobleman's house, among his
hangings, and plate, and pictures, notices the engraving of
proverbs " on his plate and vessels, which served the guests
with a most opportune counsel and comments." Later even
than the reign of Elizabeth our ancestors had proverbs
always before them, on everything that had room for a piece
of advice on it; they had them painted in their tapestries,
stamped on the most ordinary utensils, on the blades of their
knives,* the borders of their plates,t and "conned them out

* Shakspeare satirically alludes to the quality of such rhymes ia his
Merchant of Voticc, Act v. Sc. 1. Speaking of one

" whose poesy 'was

For all the world like cutler's poetry
Upon a knife, Lore mc, and leave me not. "
t One of the /r«/< trenchers, for such these roundels are called in the
Gcvl. Mu(j. for 1793, p. 398, is engraved there, and the inscriptions of
an entire set given. —See also the Supplement to that volume, p. 1187.

The Philosoiihy of Proverbs. 39

of goldsmiths' rinfr?." * The usurer, in Robert Greene's
"Groat's worth of Wit," compivssed all his philosophy into
the circle of his rinu^, having learned sufficient Latin to under-
stand the proverbial motto of '' Tu tibi cura ! " The husband
was reminded of his lordly autliority when he only looked
into his trencher, one of its learned aphorisms having de-
scended to us, — ■

The calmest husbands miike the stormiest wives.

The English proverbs of the populace, most of which are
still in circulation, were collected by old John lleywood. f
They arc arranged by Tusser for " the parlour — the guest's
chamber — the hall — table-lessons," &c. Not a small portion
of our ancient proverbs were adapted to rural life, when our
ancestors lived more than ourselves amidst the works of God,

The author of the "Art of English Poesie," 15S9, tdls us they never
contained above one verse, or two at the most, but the shorter the
better. Two si)ecimen3 may suffice the reader. One, under the symbol
of a ikuU, tiius morally discourses : —

" Content thyself with thine estate,

And send no poor wight from thy gate ;
For why, this counsel I you give.
To learue to die, and die to live."

On another, decorated with pictures of fruit, are these satirical lines: —

" Feed and be fat : hear's pears and plums,
Will never hurt your teeth or spoil your gums.
And I wish those girls that painted are,
No other food than such fine painted fare."

* This constant custom of engraving " posies," as they were termed, on
rings, is noted by many authors of the Elizabethan era. Lilly, in his
"Euphucs," addresses the ladies for a favourable judgment on his work,
lioping it will be recorded "as you do the posies in your rings, which are
always next to the finger not to be scene of liira that holdcth you by the
hand, and yet knowne by you that weare them on your hands." They were
always engraved wilhinside of the ring. A MS. of the time of Charles I.
furnishes us with a single posy, of one line, to tliis effect — " This hath
alloy ;my love is pure." From the same source we have the two following
rhyming, or " double posies" —

" Constancy and heaven are round.
And in this tlie emblem's found."
'* Weare me out, love shall not waste ;
Love beyond tyme still is i)laced."

+ Heywood's "Dialogue, conteyninge the Number in Elfecte of all the
Proverbes in the English Tunge, lotil." There are more editions of this
little volume tlian Wartun has nutioed. There is some liumour in hia
narrative, but liLs mclro and his ribaldry are heavy taxes on our curiosity.

40 The P/nlosojjJnj of Proverbs.

and less among those of men.* At this thne, one of our old
statesmen, in commending the art of compressing a tedious
discourse into a few significant phrases, suggested the use of
proverbs in diplomatic intercourse, convinced of the great
benefit which would result to the negotiators themselves, as
well as to others ! I give a literary curiosity of this kind.
A member of the House of Commons, in the reign of
Elizabeth, made a speech entirely composed of the most
homely proverbs. The subject was a bill against double
payments of book-debts. Knavish tradesmen were then in
the habit of swelling out their book-debts with those who
took credit, particularly to their younger customers. One of
the members who began to speak "for very fear shook," and
stood silent. The nervous orator was followed by a blunt
and true representative of the famed governor of Barataria,
delivering himself thus — "It is now my chance to speak
something, and that without humming or hawing. I think
this law is a good law. Even reckoning makes long friends.
As far goes the penny as the penny's master. Vicjilantibiis
no)i dorrnieHtihits jura suhveniunt. Pay the reckoning' over-
night and ye shall not be troubled in the morning. If ready
money be mensura piiblica, let every one cut his coat accord-
ing to his cloth. When his old suit is in the wane, let him
stay till that his money bring a new suit in the increase." f

Another instance of the use of proverbs among our states-
men occurs in a manuscript letter of Sir Dudley Carlton,
written in 1632, on the impeachment of Lord Middlesex,
who, he says, is "this day to plead his own cause in the
Exchequer-chamber, about an account of four-score thousand
pounds laid to his charge. How his lordship sped I know
not, but do remember well the French proverb, Qui mange de

* The whole of Tussei's "Five Hunclred Pointes of Good Husbandrie,"
15S0, was composed in quaint couplets, long remembered by the peasantry
for their homely worldly wisdom. Oae, constructed for the bakehouse, rana
thus: —

" New bread is a drivell (waste) ;
Much crust is as evil."
Another for the dairymaid assures her —

" Good dairie doth pleasure ;
111 dairie spends treasure."
Another might rival any lesson of thrift : —
" Where nothing will last,
Spare such as thou hast,"
t Townshend's Historical Collections, p. 283.

The Philosojj/ii/ of Proverls. '11

Voij da lioi/ chicra une pltiiue qiuircaife ans aprcs. ' \\ lio
eats of the king's goose, will vuid a feather fortv years
after ! '"

Tills was the em of proverbs with Uo ; for then thcj' were
spoken by all ranks of society. The fVee use of trivial
proverbs got them into disrepute ; and as the abuse of a thing
raises a just opjjosition to its practice, a slend(;r wit affecting
"a cross hnmour," published a little volume of "Crossing of
Proverbs, Cross-answers, and Cross-humours." He pretends
to contradict the most popular ones ; but he has not always
the genius to strike at amusing paradoxes.*

Proverbs were long the fiivouritcs of our neighbours ; in
the splendid and refined court of Louis the Fourteenth they
gave rise to an odd invention. They plotted comedies and
even fantastical ballets from their subjects. In these Curio-
sities of Literature I cannot pass by such eccentric inveu--
tions unnoticed.

A Comedy of proverls is described by the Duke de la
Vallierc, which was })erformed in 1631 with prodigious suc-
cess. He considers that this comedy ought to be ranked
among farces; but it is gay, well-written, and curious for
containing the best proverbs, which are happily introduced
in the dialogue.

A more extraordinary attempt was a Ballet of proverls.
Before the opera was established in France, the ancient ballets
formed the chief amusement of the court, and Louis the
Fourteenth himself joined with the performers. The singular
attempt of forming a pantomimical dance out of proverbs is
quite French ; we have a " ballet des provcrbes, danse par le
Koi, in lGo-1." At eveiy proverb the scene changed, and
adapted itself to the subject. I shall give two or three of
the entrees that we ma}- form some notion of these ca-
Ijriccios.

• It was published in 1(116 : tlic writer only catches at some verhal ex
pressions — as, for iustuuce : —

The vulgar provtrb ruu^, "The more the merrier."

The cross, — " Not so ! one haud is eiuiuj^h iu a pur.ve."

The proverb, "It Is a great way to the bottom of the .sea."

The cross, — "Not so ! it is but a stone's cast."

The proverb, "The pride of the rich makes the labours of the poor."

The cross, — "Not so ! the labours of the poor make the pride of tUo

rich."
The proverb, " He runs far who never turns."
The cross,—'" Not so ! he may break his neck in a short course."

42 The Philosophy of Proverbs.

The proverb was —

Tel menace qui a grand peur.
He threatens who is afraid.

The scene was composed of swaggering scaramouches ai'^d
some honest cits, who at length beat them off.
At another entree the proverb was —

V occasion fait le larron.
Opportunity makes the thief.

Opportunity was acted by le Sieur Beaubrun, but it is diffi-
cult to conceive how the real could personify the abstract
personage. The thieves were the Duke d'Amville and Mon-
sieur de la Chesnaye.

Another entree was the proverb of —

Ce qui vient de la flute s'cn va au tamhour.
What comes by the pipe goes by the tabor.

A loose dissipated officer was performed by le Sieur I'Anglois ;
the Pipe hy St. Aignan, and the Tabor by le Sieur le Comte!
In this manner every proverb was spoken in action, the whole
connected by dialogue. More must have depended on the
actors than the poet.*

The French long retained this fondness for proverbs ; for
they still have dramatic compositions entitled proverles, on a
more refined plan. Their invention is so recent, that the
term is not in their great dictionary of Trevoux. These
proverbes are dramas of a single act, invented by Carmontel,
who possessed a peculiar vein of humour, but who designed
them only for private theatricals. Each proverb furnished a
subject for a few scenes, and created a situation powerfully
comic : it is a dramatic ainusement which does not appear to
have I'eached us, but one which the celebrated Catherine of
Russia delighted to compose for her own society.

Among the middle classes of society to this day, we may
observe that certain family proverbs are traditionally pre-
served : the favourite saying of a fi\ther is repeated by the
sons ; and frequently the conduct of a whole generation has
been influenced by such domestic proverbs. This ma}' be
perceived in many of the mottos of our old nobility, which
seem to have originated in some habitual proverb of the

* It has been suggested that this whimsical amusement has been lately
revived, to a certain degree, in the acting of charades among juvenile
parties.

Tlie PhUosopJnj of Proverbs. 48

founder of the family. In ages wlicn proverbs were most
prevalent, such pitliy sentences would admirably serve in the
ordinary business of life, and lead on to decision, even in its
greater exigencies. Orators, by some lucky proverb, without
wearying their auditors, would bring conviction home to their
bosoms : and great characters would appeal to a proverb, or
deliver that which in time by its aptitude became one. When
Nero was reproached for the ardour with which he gave him-
self up to the study of music, he replied to his censurers by
the Greek proverb, " An artist lives everywhere." The
emperor answered in the spirit of Eousscau's system, that
every child should be taught some trade. When Cresar, after
anxious deliberation, decided on the passage of the Rubicon
(which very event has given rise to a proverb), rousing him-
self with a start of courage, he committed himself to Fortune,
with that proverbial expression on his lips, used by gamesters
in desperate play: having passed the Rubicon, he exclaimed,
"The die is cast!" The answer of Paulus ^milius to the
relations of his wife, who had remonstrated with him on his
determination to separate himself from her against whom no
fault could be alleged, has become one of our most familiar
proverbs. This hero acknowledged the excellences of his
lady ; but, requesting them to look on his shoe, which
appeared to be well made, he observed, " None of you know
where the shoe pinches!" He either used a proverbial
phrase, or by its aptness it has become one of the most
popular.

There are, indeed, proverbs connected with the characters
of eminent men. They were either their favourite ones, or
have originated with themselves. Such a collection would
form a historical curiosity. To the celebrated Bayard are
the French indebted for a military proverb, which some
of them still repeat, " Ce que le (jantelet f/cgne Je gorgcrin le
mange''' — " What the gauntlet gets, the gorget consumes."
That reflecting soldier well calculated the profits of a military
life, which consumes, in the pomp and waste which are neces-
sary for its maintenance, the slender pay it receives, and even
what its rapacity sometimes acquires. Tlie favourite proverb
of Erasmus was Festina lente ! — "Hasten slowly!"* H*
wished it be inscribed wherever it could meet our eyes, on
public buildings, and on our rings and seals. One of our own

• Now the punning motto of a iioLle family.

41 TJie Philosojjliy of froverhs.

statesmen used a favourite sentence, which has enlarged our
stock of national proverbs. vSir Amias I'awlet, when he per-
ceived too much hurry in any business, was accustomed to
say, " Stay awhile, to make an end the sooner." Oliver
Cromwell's coarse but descriptive proverb conveys the con-
tempt he felt for some of his mean and troublesome coadju-
tors: " IS^its will he lice!" The Italians liave a proverb,
which has been occasionally applied to certain political per-
sonages : —

Egli e quello die Dlo vuole;

E sara qmllo che Dlo vorrdf

He is what God pleases ;
He sLall be -what God wills!

Ere this was a proverb, it had served as an embroidered motto
on the mystical mantle of Castruccio Castracani. That mili-
tary genius, who sought to revolutionise Italy, and aspired to
its sovereignty, lived long enough to repent the wild romantic
ambition which provoked all Italy to confederate against him ;
the mysterious motto he assumed entered into the proverbs
of his country ! The Border proverb of the Douglases, " It
were better to hear the lark sing than the mouse cheep," was
adopted by every Border chief, to express, as Sir Walter Scott
observes, what the gi'eat Bi'uce had pointed out, that the
woods and hills of their country were their safest bulwarks,
instead of the fortified places which the English surpassed
their neighbours in the arts of assaulting or defending. These
illustrations indicate one of the sources of proverbs ; they
have often resulted from the spontaneous emotions or the
})rofound reflections of some extraordinary individual, whose
energetic expression was caught b}^ a faithful ear, never to
perish !

The poets have been very husy with proverbs in all the
languages of Europe : some appear to have been the favourite
lines of some ancient poem : even in more refined times, many
of the pointed verses of Boileau and Pope have become pro-
verbial. Mau}^ trivial and laconic proverbs bear the jingle of
alliteration or rhyme, which assisted their circulation, and
were probably struclc off' extempore ; a manner which Swilt
practised, who was a ready coiner of such rhyming and ludi-
crous proverbs : delighting to startle a collector by his face-
tious or sarcastic humour, in the shape of an "old saying and

The PInlosopJnj of P raver ba. 45

true." Some of tliese rliyuiing proverbs are, however, terso
and elegant : we have

Little strokes
Fell great oaks.

The Italian —

Cld dxi.o lepri caccia

Uno pcrdc, c VuUro lascla.

Who hunts two hares, loses one and leaves the other.

The haughty Spaniard —

M liar (s honor,
Y I pedir dolor.

To give is honour, to ask is grief.

And tlie French —

Ami de tahJe
Est rariaOle.

The friend of the table
la very variable.

The composers of those short proverbs were a numerous
race of poets, who, probably, among the dreams of their im-
mortality never suspected that they were to descend to poste-
rity, themselves and tlieir works unknown, while their extem-
pore thoughts would be repeated by their own nation.

Proverbs were at length consigned to the people, when
books were addressed to scholars; but the people did not find
themselves so destitute of practical wisdom, by prcservinfj
their national proverbs, as some of those closet students who
liad ceased to repeat them. The various humours of man-
kind, in the mutability of human allairs, had given birth to
every species ; and men were wise, or merry, or satirical, and
mourned or rejoiced in proverbs. Nations held an universal
intercourse of proverbs, from the eastern to the wes^tern
world ; for we discover among tliose which appear strictly
national, many which arc common to theni all. Of our own
familiar ones several may be tracked among the snows of the
Latins and the Greeks, and have sometimes been drawn from
" The Mines of the East:" like decayed families which re-
main in obscurity, they may boast of a high lineal descent
whenever they recover their lost title-deeds. The vulgar
proverb, " To carry coals to Newcastle," local and idiomatio

46 The Philosophy of Proverbs,

as it appears, however, has been borrowed and applied by our-
selves ; it may be found among the Persians : in the " Bus-
tan" of Sadi we have Infers piper in Hindostan ; " To carry
pepper to Hindostan ;" among the Hebrews, " To carry oil
to the City of Olives ;" a similar proverb occurs in Greek ;
and in Galland's " Maxims of the East" we may discover
how many of the most common proverbs among us, as well
as some of Joe Miller's jests, are of oriental origin.

The resemblance of certain proverbs in ditferent nations,
must, however, be often ascribed to the identity of human
nature ; similar situations and similar objects have unques-
tionably made men think and act and express themselves
alike. All nations are parallels of each other ! Hence all
paroemiographers, or collectors of proverbs, complain of the
difficulty of separating their own national proverbs from
those which have crept into the language from others, parti-
cularly when nations have held much intercourse together.
We have a copious collection of Scottish proverbs by Kelly,
but this learned man was mortitied at discovering that many
which he had long believed to have been genuine Scottish,
were not only English, but French, Italian, Spanish, Latin,
and Greek ones ; many of his Scottish proverbs are almost
literally expressed among the fragments of remote antiquity.
It would have surprised him further had he been aware that
his Greek originals were themselves but copies, and might
have been found in D'Herbelot, Erpenius, and Golius, and in
many Asiatic works, which have been more recently intro-
duced to the enlarged knowledge of the European student,
who formerly found his most extended researches limited by
Hellenistic lore.

Perhaps it was owing to an accidental circumstance that
the proverbs of the European nations have been preserved in
the permanent form of volumes. Erasmus is usually con-
sidered as the first modern collector, but he appears to have
been preceded by Polydore Vergil, who bitterly reproaches
Erasmus with envy and plagiarism, for passing by his collec-
tion without even a poor compliment for the inventor ! Poly-
dore was a vain, superficial writer, who prided himself in
leading the way on more topics than the present. Erasmus,
with his usual pleasantry, provokingly excuses himself, by
acknowledging that he had forgotten his friend's book ! Few
sympathise with the quarrels of authors ; and since Erasmus
has written a far better book than Polydore Vergil's, the

The P/dlosopJnj of Proverbs. 47

original '^ Adngia" is left only to be commemorated in lite-
rary hi:^tory as one of its curiosities.*

The " Adagia" of Erasmus contains a collection of about
five thousand proverbs, gradually gathered from a constant
Btudy of the ancients. Erasmus, blest with the genius which
could enliven a folio, delighted himself and all Europe by the
continued accessions he made to a volume which even now
may be the companion of literary men for a winter day's fire-
side. The successful example of Erasmus commanded the
imitation of the learned in Europe, and drew their attention
to their own national proverbs. Some of the most learned
men, and some not sufficiently so, were now occupied in this
new study.

In Spain, Fernandez Nunes, a Greek professor, and the
Marcpiis of Santellana, a grandee, published collections of
their Refmnes, or Proverbs, a term derived A kefehendo,
because "it is often repeated. The " Kefranes o Proverbios
Castellanos," par Csesar Oudin, 1624, translated into French,
is a valuable compilation. In Cervantes and Quevedo, the
best practical illustrators, they are sown with no sparing
hand. There is an ample collection of Italian proverbs, by
Florio, who was an Englishman, of Italian origin, and who
published "11 Giardino di Pticreatione" at London, so early
as in 1591, exceeding six thousand proverbs ; but they are
unexplained, and are often obscure. Another Italian in
England, Torriano, in 1649, published an interesting collec-
tion in tlie diminutive form of a twenty-fours. It was sub-
sequent to these publications in England, that in Italy,
Augelus Monozini, in 1604, published his collection ; and
Julius Yaiini, in 1642, produced his Sciiola del VuJijo. In
France, Oudin, alter others had preceded him, published a
collection of French proverbs, under the title of Curiosites
Francoises. Fleury de Bellingen's ExpUcalion deProveries
Franqois, on comparing it with Lcs III us f res Proverbes His-
toriques, a subsequent publication, I discovered to be the
same work. It is the first attempt to render the study of
proverbs somewhat amusing. The plan consists of a dialogue
betwen a philosopher and a Sancho Pan^a, who blurts out his

* At the Royal Institotion there is a fine copy of Polydore Vergil's
" Adagia," with his other work, curious in its day, Ue Ittvcnforibtis
Jicvum, printed by Frobenius, iu 15'21. The wood cuts of this ediliou
beem to me to be executed with inimitable delicacy, resembiiug a pea-
tailing which Raphael mi^ht have euvied.

•iB The Phllosoplti) of Proverb?.

vrovcrbri with more delight than understanding. Tlie pliilo-
sopher takes that opportunity of explaining them by the eveiits
in which they originated, which, however, are not always to
be depended on. A. work of high merit on French proverbs
is the unfinished one of the Abbe Tuet, sensible and learned.
A collection of Danish proverbs, accompanied by a French
translation, was printed at Copenhagen, in a quarto volume,
1761. England may boast of no inferior paroemiographers. •'
The grave and judicious Camden, the religious Herbert, the
entertaining Howell, the facetious Fuller, and the laborious
Ea}', with others, have preserved our national sayings. Tlie
Scottish have been largely collected and explained by the
learned Kelly. An excellent anonymous collection, not un-
common, in various languages, 1707 ; the collector and trans-
lator was Dr. J. Mapletoft. It must be acknowledged, that
although no nation exceeds our own in sterling sense, we
rarely rival the delicacy, the wit, and the felicity of expres-
sion of the Spanish and the Italian, and the poignancy of
some of the French proverbs.

The interest we may derive from the study of proverbs is
not confined to their universal truths, nor to their poignant
pleasantry ; a philosophical mind will discover in proverbs a
great variety of the most curious knowledge. The manners
of a people are painted after life in their domestic proverbs ;
and it would not be advancing too much to assert, that the
genius of the age might be often detected in its prevalent
ones. The learned Selden tells us, that the proverbs of
several nations were much studied by Bishop Andrews : the
reason assigned was, because " by them he knew the minds of
several nations, which," said he, "is a brave thing, as we
count him wise who knows the minds and the insides of men,
which is done by knowing what is habitual to them." Lord
Bacon condensed a wide circuit of philosophical thought,
when he observed that " the genius, wit, and spirit of a nation
are discovered by their proverbs."

Proverbs peculiarly national, while they convey to us the
modes of thinking, will consequently indicate the modes of
jicting among a people. The Romans had a proverbial expres-
fIou for their last stake in play, Bern ad triarios venisse, " the
reserve are engaged !" a proverbial expression, from which the
military habits of the people might be inferred ; the triarii
being their reserve. A proverb has preserved a curl-ous cus-
tom of ancient coxcombry, which originally came from thf?

Tlie Philusoijlnj of Prociuhs, 49

Greeks. To men of effeminate manners in tlvjir dress, tlicy
applied tlie proverb of Unico dir/ituh scalpit caput. Scratching'
the head witli a sin<^lo finc^er was, it seems, done by tlie
critically nice youths in liome, that they nii:j:ht not discom-
pose the economy of their hair. The Arab, whose unsettled
existence makes him miserabl!.! and interested, says, " Vineo-ar
given is better than honey bought." Everything of high
esteem with him who is so often parched in the desert is
described as milk — " How large his How of milU !" is a pro-
verbial expression with the Arab to distinguish the most
copious eloquence. To express a state of perfect repose, tlie
Arabian proverb is, ''I throw the rein over my back ;" an
allusion to the loosening of the cords of the camels, which
are thrown over their backs when they arc sent to pasture.
We discover the rustic manners of our ancient Britons in the
Cambrian proverbs ; many relate to the hedje. " The cleanlv
Briton is seen in the hedcje : the horse looks not on the Jie(h/e
but the corn : the bad husband's Jicdje is full of gaps." Tlie
state of an agricultural people appears in such proverbs as
"You must not count your yearlings till jNIay-day:" and
their proverbial sentence for old age is, "An old man's end is
to keep sheep ?" Turn from the vagrant Arab and the agri-
cultural Briton to a nation existing in a high state of artificial
civilization : the Chinese proverbs frequently allude to mn<Tni-
ficent buildings. Affecting a more solemn exterior than all
other nations, a favourite proverb with them is, "A grave and
majestic outside is, as it were, the palace of the soul." Their
notion of a government is quite architectural. Tliey sa}', "A
sovereign may be compared to a hall; his officers to the
steps that lead to it ; the people to the ground on which they
stand." "What should wo think of a people who had a pro-
verb, that " Ho who gives blows is a master, he who gives
none is a dog p" "We should instantly decide on the mean
and servile spirit of those who could repeat it ; and such we
find to have been that of the Bcngalese, to whom the de"Ta-
ding proverb belongs, derived from the treatment they were
used to receive from their Mogul rulers, who answered the
claims of their creditors by a vigorous application of the
whip ! In some of the Hebrew proverbs we are struck by
the frequent allusions of that fugitive people to their own
history. The cruel oppression exercised by tlie ruling power,
and the confidence in their hope of change in the day of retri-
bution, was delivered in tills Hebrew proverb — " When the

VOL. UI. Ji

50 The Philosophy of Proverbs.

talc of bricks is doubled, Moses comes!" Tlic fond idolatry
of their devotion to their ceremonial law, and to everything
connected with their sublime Theocracy, in their magnificent
Temple, is finely expressed by this proverb — " None ever took
a stone out of the Temple, but the dust did fly into his eyes."
The Hebrew proverb tliat " A fast for a dream, is as fire for
stubble," -which it kindles, could only have been invented by
a people whose superstitions attached a holy mystery to fasts
and dreams. They imagined tliat a religious fast was pro-
pitious to a religious dream ; or to obtain the interpretation
of one which had troubled their imagination. Peyssonel, who
long resided among the Turks, observes that their proverbs
are full of sense, ingenuity, and elegance, the surest test of the
intellectual abilities of any nation. He said this to correct
the volatile opinion of De Tott, who, to convey an idea of
their stupid pride, quotes one of their favourite adages, of
which the truth and candour are admirable ; " Kiches in the
Indies, wit in Europe, and pomp among the Ottomans."

The Spaniards may appeal to their proverbs to show that
they were a high-minded and independent race. A Whiggish
jealousy of the monarchical power stamped itself on this
ancient one, Va el rey hasfa do 2)eiide, y no hasta do quiere :
" The king goes as far as he is able, not as far as he desires."
It must have been at a later period, when the national genius
became more subdued, and every Spaniard dreaded to find
under his own roof a spy or an informer, that another pro-
verb arose. Con el rey y la inquisicion, chiton ! " With the
king and the Inquisition, hush!" The gravity and taci-
turnity of the nation have been ascribed to the effects of this
proverb. Their popular but suppressed feelings on taxation,
and on a variety of dues exacted by their clergy, were mur-
mured in proverbs — Lo que no lleva Christo llcva el fisco !
"What Christ takes not, the exchequer carries away !" They
have a number of sarcastic proverbs on the tenacious gripe
of the "abad avariento," the avaricious priest, wlio, " having
eaten the olio offered, claims tlic dish !" A striking mixture
of chivalric habits, domestic decency, and epicurean comfort,
appears in the Spanish proverb, La murkier y la salsa a la mono
de la langa : " The wife and the sauce by the hand of the
lance ;" to honour the dame, and to have the sauce near.

The Italian proverbs have taken a tinge from their deep
and politic genius, and their wisdom seems wholly conceu-
tratcd in their personal interests. I think every tenth pre-

The Philosophy of Proverbs. 51

verb, in an Italian collection, is some cynical or some scltlsli
maxim : a book of the world lor worldlings ! The Venetian
proverb, Pria Veneziana, poi Christiane : " First Venetian,
and then Christian !" condenses the whole spirit of tlieir
ancient Republic into the smallest space possible. Their
political proverbs no doubt arose from the extraordinary state
of a people sometimes distracted among republics, and some-
times servile in petty courts. The Italian says, I popoU s'ain-
inazzano,ed i principis'abhi-acciano : "Tiie people murder one
another, and princes embrace one another." Chi prattica co'
grandi, V ultimo a tavola, e'l primo a strapazzi : " Who dan-
gles after the great is the last at table, and the first at blows."
Chi non sa adidare, non sa rerjnare : " Who knows not to
flatter, knows not to reign." Chi serve in corte muore &uV
paglinto : " Who serves at court, dies on straw." Waiy cnftv
ning in domestic life is perpetually impressed. An Italian
proverb, which is immortalised in our language, for it enters
into the history of Milton, was that by which the elegant
Wotton counselled the young poetic traveller to have — II
viso sciolto, ed i pensicri stretti, "An open countenance, but
close thoughts." In the same spirit, Chi parla semina, chi
tace raccoglie : " The talker sows, the silent reaps;" as well
as, Falli di miele, e ti mangieran le mosche : " Make yourself
all honey, and the flies will devour you." There are some
which display a deep knowledge of human nature : A Lucca
ti vidi, a Pisa ti connohhi ! " I saw you at Lucca, I knew
you at Pisa!" Guardati d'acelo di via dolce : "Beware of
vinegar made of sweet wine ;" provoke not the rage of a
patient man !

Among a people who had often witnessed their fine country
devastated by petty warfare, their notion of the military cha-
racter was not usually heroic. // soldato per far male e ben
pagato : " The soldier is well paid for doing mischief."
Soldato, aequo, e fuoco, presto si fan luoco : " A soldier, fire,
and water soon make room for themselves." But in a
poetical people, endowed with great sensibility, their proverbs
would sometimes be tender and fanciful. They paint the
activity of friendship, Chi ha Vamor net petto, ha to sprotie
^ ijlanchi: " Who feels love in the breast, feels a spur in his
limbs:" or its generous passion, Gli amici legono la horsa
non un filo di ragnatelo : " Friends tie their purse with a
cobweb's thread." They characterised the universal lover by
au elegant iwowcrh-^Appicarc il Maio ad O'/n' u^cio : " To

E 2

52 The Philosoplnj of Proverbs.

liaug evt'vy door with May ;" alliuVma: to the bough which
ill the nigiits of May the couiitiy people are accustomed to
pLint bel'ore the door of their mistress. If we turn to the
French, we discover tliat the mihtary genius of France dic-
tated the proverb Maille a maille se fait le liauhr.rgcon :
"Link b}' link is made the coat of mail;" and, Tel coup dc
lanijfucestpire qii'nn coujJ dc lance ; "The tongue strikes deeper
than the lance ;" and Ce qui vient du tamhour s'en rctourna
a la flute ; " AVhat comes by the tabor goes back with the
pipe." Point d'arr/ent point de Suisse has become proverbial,
observes an Edinburgh Reviewer ; a striking expression,
which, while French or Austrian gold predominated, was
justly used to characterise the illiberal and seltish policy of
the cantonal and Jederal governments of Switzerland, when it
began to degenerate from its moral patriotism. The ancient,
perhaps the extinct, spirit of Englishmen was once expressed
by our proverb, " Better be the head of a dog than the tail
of a lion;" i.e., the first of the yeomaniy rather than the
last of the gentry. A foreign philosopher might have disco-
vered our own ancient skill in archery among our proverbs ;
for none but true toxophilites could have had such a proverb
as, " I will either make a shaft or a bolt of it !" signifying,
says the author of Icanhoe, a determination to make one
use or other of the thing spoken of: the bolt was the arrow
peculiarly fitted to the cross-bov/, as that of the long-bow
was called a shaft. These instances sufficiently demonstrate
that the characteristic circumstances and feelings of a people
are discovered in their popular notions, and stamped on their
familiar proverbs.

It is also evident that the peculiar, and often idiomatic,
humour of a people is best preserved in their proverbs.
Th.ei'e is a shrewdness, although deficient in delicacy, in the
Scottish proverbs ; they are idiomatic, facetious, and strike
home. Kelly, who has collected three thousand, informs us,
that, in 1725, the Scotch were a great proverbial nation ; for
that few among the better sort will converse any consider-
able time, but will confirm every assertion and observation
with a Scottish proverb. The speculative Scotch of our own
times have probably degenerated in prudential lore, and deem
themselves much wiser than their proverbs. They may reply
by a Scotch proverb on proverbs, made by a great man in
Scotland, who, having given a splendid entertainment, was
harshl" told, that "Fools make feast.s, and wise men ef.t

The ritUosoplnj of Provtrhs. 53

tliem ;' but he readily ausworeJ, " Wise incii iiuikc proverbs,
and Ibols repeat them !"

National huinour, frequently loeal and idiomatieal, depends
on the artilicial habits of mankind, so opposite to each other;
but there is a natural vein, which the populace, always true
to nature, preserve, even among the gravest people. The
Arabian proverb, " The barber learns his art on the orphan's
lace ;" the Chiuei^e, '' In a Held of melons do not pull up
your shoe ; under a i)lum-tree do not adjust your cap ;" — to
impress caution in our conduct under circumstances of sus-
picion ; — and the Hebrew oiie, " He that hath had one of
liis family hanged may not say to his neighbour, lianff up tliis
Hsh !" are all ini^tances of this sort of humour. The Spa-
niards are a grave peoi)le, but no nation has equalled them in
their peculiar humour. The genius of Cervantes partook
largely of that of his country ; that mantle of gravity, which
almost conceals its latent facetiousness, and witli which he
has imbued his style and manner with such untranslatable
idiomatic raciness, may be traced to the proverbial erudition
of his nation. " To steal a sheep, and give away the trotters
for God's sake !" is Cervantic nature ! To one who is seek-
ing an opportunity to quarrel with another, their proverb
runs, Si quieres dar palos a sur miit/er pidele al sol a hever,
" Hast thou a mind to quarrel with thy wife, bid her brinj
water to thee in the sunshine!" — a very fair quarrel may be
picked up about the motes in the clearest u'ater ! On the
judges in Gallicia, who, like our former justices of peace, "for
lialf a dozen chickens would dispense with a dozen of penal
statutes," ^i ji'ezes GnJlicianos, con Jos pies en las mnnos :
"To the judges of Gallicia go with feet in hand;" a droll
allusion to a present of poultry, usually h.eld by the legs. To
descril)e i)ersons who live high without visible means, Los
que cahrilos venden, y Cithrus no tieiien, de donde los viencn I
" They that sell kills, and have no goats, how came they bj'
them ?" El vino no tro.e, hragas, '• Wine wears no
breeches;" for men in wine expose their most secret
thoughts. Vino di nn oreja, "Wine of one ear!" is good
wine ; for at bad, shaking our heads, both our ears are
visible; but at good the Spaniard, by a natural gesticulation
lowering on one side, shows a single ear.

Proverbs abounding in sarcastic humour, and found among
ever}' peoi)le, are those which are pointed at rival countries.
Among ou.rselves, hnrdly has a county escaped from some po-

5-.t 21ie Philosophy of Proverbs.

pular qnip ; even neigliLouring towns have their sarcasms,
usually pickled in some unlucky rhyme. The egotism of man
eagerly seizes on whatever serves to depreciate or to ridicule
his neighbour : nations proverb each other ; counties flout
counties ; obscure towns sharpen their wits on towns as ob-
scure as themselves — the same evil principle lurking in poor
human nature, if it cannot always assume predominance, will
meanly gratify itself by insult or contempt. They expose
some prevalent folly, or allude to some disgrace which the
natives have incurred. In France, the Burgundians have a
proverb, Micux vaiit hon repas que hel licihit ; " Better a good
dinner than a fine coat." These good people are great gor-
mandizers, but shabby dressers ; tbey are commonly said to
have "bowels of silk and velvet;" this is, all their silk and
velvet goes for their bowels 1 Thus Picardy is famous for
"hot heads ;" and the Norman for son dit et son dedlt, " his
saying and his unsaying !" In Italy the numerous rival
cities pelt one another w^ith proverbs : Chi ha a fare con
Tosco lion convicn esser Iosco, " He who deals with a Tuscan
must not have his eyes shut." A Venetia chivi nasce mcdvi
sipasce, " Whom Venice breeds, she poorly feeds."

There is another source of national characteristics, fre-
quently producing strange or whimsical combinations ; a
people, from a very natural circumstance, have drawn their
proverbs from local objects, or from allusions to peculiar
customs. The influence of manners and customs over the
ideas and language of a people would form a subject of ex-
tensive and curious research. There is a Japanese proverb,
that "A fog cannot be dispelled with a fan !" Had we not
known the origin of this proverb, it would be evident that it
could only have occurred to a people who had constantly
before them fogs and I'ans ; and the fact appears that fogs are
frequent on the coast of Japan, and that from the age of
five 3'ears both sexes of the Japanese carry fans. The Spa-
niards have an odd proverb to describe those who tease and
vex a person before they do him the very benefit which they
are about to confer — acting kindly, but speaking roughly ;
Moslrar privicro la horca qiie le lurjar, " To show the gal-
lows before they show the town ;" a circumstance alluding
to their small towns, which have a gallows placed on an
eminence, so that the gallows breaks on the eye of the tra-
veller before he gets a view of the town itself.

The Cheshire proverb on marriage, " Better wed over tiio

Tlie Philosophy of Proverbs. 55

mixon than over the moor," that is, at homo or in its vi(;i-
nity ; mixon alhulos to the tlunj, &c.,in tlie farm-yard, while
tlie road from Chester to London is over the moorland in
Staffordshire : this local ])roverb is a curious instance of pro-
vincial pride, perhaps of wisdom, to induce the gentry of
that county to form iritermarriages ; to prolong their own
ancient families, and perpetuate ancient friendships between
t hem .

In the Isle of iMan a proverbial expression forcibly indi-
cates the object constantly occupying the minds of the inha-
bitants. Tlie two Deemsters or judges, when appointed to
the chair of judgment, declare they will render justice be-
tween man and man " as equally as the herring bone lies be-
tween the two sides :" an image which could not have oc-
curred to any people unaccustomed to the herring-fishery.
There is a Cornish proverb, " Those who will not be ruled
by the rudder must be ruled by the rock" — the strands of
Cornwall, so olttm covered with wreclcs, could not fail to im-
press on the imaginations of its inhabitants the two objects
I'rom whence they drew this salutary proverb against obsti-
nate wrongheads.

When Scotland, in the last century, felt its allegiance to
England doubtful, and when the French sent an expedition
to the Land of Cakes, a local proverb was revived, to show the
identity of interests which affected both nations :

If Skiddaw liatli a cap,
Scrulk'l wots full well of that.

These are two high hills, one in Scotland and one in Eng-
land ; so near, that what happens to the one will not be long
ere it reach the other. If a fog lodges on the one, it is sure
to rain on the other ; the mutual sympathies of the two
countries were hence deduced in a co})ious dissertation, by
Oswald Dyke, on what was called "The Union-proverb,"
which local proverhs of our country Fuller has interspersed
in his " Worthies," and liay and Grose have collected sepa-
rately.

I was amused lately by a curious financial revelation which
I found in an opposition paper, where it appears that " Minis-
ters pretend to nialce their load of taxes more portable, by
shifting the burden, or altering the pressure, without, how-
ever, diminishing the weight ; according to the Italian pro-
yQv\>,Accommodare le hisaccic nella strada, 'To lit the load on

>)(\ The Philosophy of Proi'-rhff.

the journey :'" it is tukcu from a custom of tho mule*
drivers, who, placing their packages at first but awkwardly on
the backs ol' their poor beasts, and seeing them ready to sink,
cry out, '■ Never mind ! we must lit thera better on the
road!" I was gratified to discover, by the present and some
otl)er modern instances, that the taste lor proverbs was re-
viving, and that we were returning to those sober times,
wh.en the aptitude of a simple proverb would be preferred to
the verbosity of politicians, Tories, Whigs, or Eadicals !

There are domestic proverbs which originate in incidents
known only to the natives of their province. Italian litera-
ture is particular!}^ rich in these stores. The lively prover-
bial taste of that vivacious people was transferred to their
own authors ; and when these allusions were obscured by
time, learned Italians, in their zeal for their national litera-
ture, and in their national love of story-telling, have written
grave commentaries even on ludicrous, but popular tales, in
which the proverbs are said to have originated. They re-
semble the old facetious contes, whose simplicity and humour
.still live in the pages of Boccaccio, and are not forgotten in
those of the Queen of Navarre.

The Italians applj' a proverb to a person who wliile he is
beaten, takes the blows quietly : —

Per heuto ch' elle non furon pesche/
Luckily they vrere not peaches !

And to threaten to give a man —

Una 2-)€Sca in v.n occliio.
A peach in the eye,

means to give him a thrashing. This proverb, it is said,
originated in the close of a certain droll adventure. The com-
munity of the Castle Poggibonsi, probably from some jocular
tenure observed on St. Bernard's day, pay a tribute of peaches
to the court of Tuscany, which are usually shared among the
ladies in waiting, and the pages of the court. It happened
one season, in a great scarcity of peaches, that the good peo-
ple of Poggibonsi, finding them rather dear, sent, instead of
the customary tribute, a quantity of fine juicy figs, which was
60 nmch disapproved of by the images, that as soon as they got
hold of them, they began in rage to empty the baskets on the
heads of the ambassadors of the Poggibonsi, who, in attempt-
ing to fly as well as they could from the pulpy shower, half-

Tim Fhllosophij vj Proverbs, 57

blinded, and reoollecting that pciicliL's would liave had stones
in them, cried out —

Per licuto cW die non furun j'ticlt e/
Luckily they were not peaolie.s !

Fare le sealer di Sant^ Amhrof/io ; '"To mount the stairs of
Saint Ambroife," a proverb allusive to the business of the
school of scandal. Varchi explains it by a circumstance so
common in provincial cities. On summer evenings, for fresh
p.ir and gossip, the loungers met on the steps and landing-
places of the church of St. Ambrose : whoever left the party,
" they read in his book," as our commentator expresses it;
and not a leaf was passed over ! All liked to join a party so well
informed of one .inother's concerns, and everyone tried to be
the very last to vjuit it, — not ''to leave his character behind!"
It became a proverbial phrase with those who left a company,
and were too tender of their backs, to request they would not
" mount the stairs of St. Ambrose." Jonson has well described
such a compan}' :

Ycu are so truly fear'd, but not beloved
One ot'anotlier, as no one dares break
Company from the rest, lest they should fall
Upon him absent.

There are legends and histories which belong to proverbs ;
and some of tlie most ancient refer to incidents which have
not always been commemorated. Two Greek proverbs have
accidentally been explained by Pausanias : " He is a man of
Tenedos 1" to describe a person of unquestionable veracity;
and " To cut with the Tenedian axe;" to express an absolute
and irrevocable refusal. The hrst originated in a king of
Tenedos, who decreed that there should always stand behind
the judge a man holding an axe, ready to execute justice on
any one convicted of i'alsehood. The other arose from the
same king, whose father having reached his island, to suppli-
cate the son's I'orgiveness for the injury inllicted on him b}''
the arts of a step-mother, was ])rcpariug to land ; already the
ship was fastened by its cable to a rock ; when the son came
down, and sternly cutting the cable with an axe, sent the ship
adrift to the mercy of the waves : hence, " to cut with the
Tenedian axe," became proverbial to express an absolute
refusal. " Business to-morrow !" is another Greek proverb,
applied to a person ruined by his own negl.'ct. The fate of

58 The Philosophy of Proverbs.

an cnunent person perpetuated the expression whicli lie
casually employed on the occasion. One of the Theban pole-
marchs, in the midst of a convivial part}^ received despatches
relating to a conspiracy : flushed with wine, although pressed
by the courier to open them immediately, he smiled, and in
gaiety laying the letter under the pillow of his couch,
observed, "Business to-morrow !" Plutarch records that he fell
a victim to the twenty-four hours he had lost, and became the
authorof a proverb which was still circulated among theGreeks.

The philosophical antiquary may often discover how man\'
a proverb commemorates an event which has escaped from the
more solemn monuments of history, and is often the solitary
authority of its existence. A national event in Spanish his-
tory' is preserved by a pi'overb. Y vengar q^uiniento suehlos ;
" And revenge five hundred pounds !" An odd expression to
denote a person being a gentleman ! but the proverb is his-
torical. The Spaniards of Old Castile were compelled to pay
an annual tribute of five hundred maidens to their masters,
the Moors ; after several battles, the Spaniards succeeded in
compromising the shameful tribute, by as many pieces of coin :
at length the dayarrived when they entirely emancipated them-
selves from this odious imposition. The heroic action was per-
formed by men of distinction, and the event perpetuated in the
recollections of the Spaniards by this singular expression, which
alludes to the dishonourable tribute, was applied to characterise
all men of high honour, and devoted lovers of their country.

Pasquier, in his Iteclierclies sur la France, reviewing the
periodical changes of ancient families in feudal times,
observes, that a proverb among the common people conveys
the result of all his inquiries ; for those noble houses, which
in a single age declined from nobility and wealth to poverty
and meanness, gave rise to the proverb. Cent ans hannieres et
ce7it ans civieres ! " One hundred years a banner and one
hundred years a barrow !" The Italian proverb. Con VEvaJi-
gilio si diventa Jieretico, " With the gospel we become here-
tics,"— reflects the policy of the court of Rome ; and must
be dated at the time of the Reformation, when a translation
of the Scriptures into the vulgar tongue encountered such an
invincible opposition. The Scotch proverb, He that invented
tlie maiden Jlrst hanselled it; that is, got the first of it!
The maiden is that well-known beheading engine, revived by
the French surgeon Guillotine. This proverb may be applied
to one who falls a victim to his own ingenuity ; the artifiey

The Philosoplnj of Proverbs. 59

of his own destruction ! The inventor was James, Earl of
Blorton, who for some years governed Scotland, and after-
wards, it is said, very unjustly sudcred by his own invention.
It is a striking coinci<lence, that the same fate was shared by
the French reviver ; both alike sad examples of disturbed
times ! Among our own proverbs a remarkable incident has
been commemorated ; JIand over head, as the men took the
Covenant ! This preserves the manner in which the Scotch
covenant, so famous in our histor}', was violently taken by
above sixty thousand persons about Edinburgh, in 1G38 ; a
circumstance at that time novel in our own revolutionary
history, and afterwards paralleled by the French in voting
by "acclamation." An ancient English proverb preserves a
curious fact concerning our coinage. Testers are gone to Ox-
ford, to study at Brazennosc. When Henry the Eighth
debased the silver coin, called testers, from their having a head
stamped on one side ; the brass, breaking out in red pimples
on their silver faces, provoked the ill-humour of the people to
vent itself in this punning proverb, which has pi-eserved for
the historical antiquary the popular feeling which lasted about
fifty years, till Elizabeth relbrmed the state of the coinage.
A northern proverb among us has preserved the remarkable
idea which seems to have once been prevalent, that the
metropolis of England was to be the city of York ; Lincoln
was, London is, York shall he ! A\'hether at the time of the
union of the crowns, under James the First, when England
and Scotland became Great Britain, this city, from its centrical
situation, was considered as the best adapted for the seat of
government, or for some other cause which I have not dis-
covered, this notion must have been prevalent to have entered
into a proverb. The chief magistrate of York is the only
provincial one who is allowed the title of Lord Mayor; a cir-
cumstance which seems connected with this proverb.

The Italian history of its own small principalities, whose
well-being so much depended on their prudence and sagacity,
atlbrds many instances of the timely use of a proverb. Many
ttn intricate negotiation has been contracted through a gooil-
humoured proverb, — many a sarcastic one has silenced an
adversary ; and sometimes they have been applied on more
.solemn, and even tragical occasions. AVhen liinaldo degli
Albizzi was banished by the vigorous conduct of Cosmo de'
Medici, Machiavel tells us the expelled man sent Cosmo a
menace, in a proverb, La gallina covava I " The hen i?

CO Tiie PMIosophy of Proverbs.

brooding!" said of one meditating vengciiuce. The un-
daunted Cosmo replied by another, that " There was no
brooding out of the nest !"

I give an example of peculiar interest ; for it is perpetuated
by l)ante, and is connected with the character of Milton.

When the i'amilies of the Amadei and the XJberti felt their
honour v/ouuded in the affront the younger liuondelmonte
had put upon them, in breaking oil his match with a young
lady of their family, by marrying another, a council was held,
and the death of the young cavalier was proposed as the sole
atonement for their injured honour. But the consequences
which they anticipated, and which afterwards proved so fatal
to the Florentines, long suspended their decision. At length
Moscha Lamberti suddenly rising, exclaimed, in two pro-
verbs, "That those wlio considered everything would never
conclude on anything!" closing with an ancient proverbial
saying — cosaj'aita capo ha ! " a deed done has an end !" The
proverb sealed the fatal determination, and was long held in
mournful remembrance by the Tuscans ; for, according to
Yillani, it was the cause and beginning of the accursed
factions of the Guelphs and the Ghibellines. Dante has thus
immortalised the energetic expression in a scene of the
"Inferno,"

Ed un, ch' avea 1' una e 1' altia man mozza,
Levando i monclieiiu per 1' aura fosca,
iSi elie '1 sangue facea la faccia sozza,
Grido : — " PJcorderati anclie del ]\Iosca,
Clic dissi, lasso: Capo ha cosa falta,
Clie i\\ '1 mal seme della geiite Tosca."

Then one

Mahn'd of eaca hand, ujilifted in the gloom

The Ijleedin.c; stumis, that they with gory spots

Sullied his face, and cried — "Remember thee

Of Alosca too — I wlio, alas ! cxclaim'd

' The deed once done, there is an end' — that proved

A seed of sorrow to the Tuscan race."

Gary's Dante.

This Italian proverb was adopted by Milton ; for when deei)ly
engaged in writing " The Defence of the People," and
warned that it might terminate in his blindness, he resolvedly
concluded his work, exclaiming with great magnanimity,
although the fatal prognostication had been accomplished,
cosafatta capo ha 1 Did this proverb also influence his awful

The Philosojj/ii/ of Proverbs!. 61

t-lccision on that great national event, when tlie U'iost honcst-
niinded lluetuated between doubts and Tears ?

Of a person treaeherously used, the Itahan proverb suyo
that he has eaten of

Lc frutlc di fratre Albcri'jo.
Tlic fruit of brother Alberigo.

Landuio, on the following passage of D.mte, preserves the
tragic story : —

lo sou fratre Alberigo,

lu sun quel dalle frutta del lual orto
Che qui reprendo, \o.

Cauto xxxiii.

" The friar Alberigo," auswercd he,
"Am I, who from the evil garden pliickd

Its fruitage, and am here repaid the date

More luscious for my fig."

Cakv's Daiiie.

This was Manfred, the Lord of Fucnza, who, after many
cruelties, turned friar, "Reconciling himself to those whom
he had so often opposed, to celebrate the renewal of their
friendship he invited them to a magnificent entertainment.
At the end of the dinner the horn blew to announce the
dessert — but it was the signal of this dissimulating con-
sj)irator !— and the fruits wliieh that day were served to his
guests were armed men, who, rushing in, immolated their
victims.

Among these historical proverbs none arc more entertaining
than those which perpetuate national events, connected with
those of another people. When a Frenchman would let us
understand that he has settled with his creditors, the proverb
is J\n paije tons mcs Anglois : " I have paid all my English."
This proverb originated when John, the French king, was
taken prisoner by our Black Pj'ince. Levies of money were
made for the king's ransom, and for man}' French lords ; and
the French peo^jle have thus perpetuated the military glory
of our nation, and their own idea of it, by making the
Enc/Jish and their creditors synonymous terms. Another
relates to the same event — Le Fape est eleven u Francois, et
Jesus Christ Anglais : "Now the Pope is become French and
Jesus Christ English ; " a proverb which arose when the Pope,
exiled from Rome, held his court at Avjo^non in France; and

62 The Philosophy of Proverbs.

the English prospered so well, that they possessed more than
half the kingdom. The Spanish proverb concerning England
is well known —

Con todo el mondo gucrra,
Y itaz con Inglatcrra!

War with the world,
And peace with England !

"Wliether this proverb was one of the results of their
memorable armada, and was only coined after their conviction
of the splendid folly which they had committed, I cannot
ascertain. England must ahva^^s have been a desirable ally
to Spain against her potent rival and neighbour. The
Italians have a proverb, wliicli formerly, at least, was
strongly indicative of the travelled Englishmen in their
country, Inr/lese Italianato e un cliavoJo incarnato ; "The
Italianised Englishman is a devil incarnate." Formerly
there existed a closer intercourse between our country and
Italy than with France. Before and during the reigns of
Elizabeth and James the First that land of the elegant arts
modelled our taste and manners : and more Italians travelled
into England, and were more constant residents, from com-
mercial concerns, than afterwards v.'hen France assumed a
higher rank in Europe by her political superiority. This
cause will sufficiently account for the number of Italian
proverbs relating to England, which show an intimacy with
our manners that could not else have occurred. It was
probably some sarcastic Italian, and, perhaps, horologer, who,
to describe the disagreement of persons, proverbed our nation
■ — " They agree like the clocks of London ! " We were once
better famed for merry Christmases and their pies ; and it
must have been the Italians who had been domiciliated with
us who gave currency to the proverb — Ha piu da fare die i
forni di natale in Ingliilterra : " He has more business than
English ovens at Christmas." Our pie-loving gentry were
notorious, and Shakspeare's folio was usually laid open in the
great halls of our nobility to entertain their attendants, who
devoured at once Shakspeare and their pasty. Some of those
volumes have come down to us, not only with the stains,
but inclosing even the identical piecrusts of the Elizabethan
age.

I have thus attempted to develope the art of eeabixo
movDiiDS ; but have done little more than indicate tli«

The Philosophy of Proverbs. 03

theory, and must leave tlie slulful student to tlie delicacy of
tlie practice. I am anxious to rescue from prevailing preju-
dices these neglected stores of curious amusement, and of
deep insight into the ways of man, and to point out the bold
and concealed truths which are scattered in these collections.
There seems to he no occurrence in human affairs to which
some proverb may not bo applied. All knowledge was long
aphoristical and traditional, pithily contracting the dis-
coveries which were to be instantly comprehended and easily
retained. Whatever be the revolutionary state of man,
similar princii)les and like occurrences are returning on us;
and antiquity, whenever it is justly applicable to our times,
loses its denomination, and becomes the truth of our own age.
A proverb will often cut the knot whicli others in vain are
attempting to untie. Johnson, palled with the redundant
elegancies of modern composition, once said, " I fiincy
mankind may come in time to write all aphoristically, except
in narrative ; grow weary of preparation, and connexion, and
illustration, and all those arts by which a big book is made."
Many a volume indeed has often been written to demonstrate
what a lover of proverbs could show had long been ascer-
tained by a single one in his favourite collections.

An insurmountable difliculty, which every parajmiographer
has encountered, is that of forming an apt, a ready, and a
systematic classification : the moral Linna?us of such a
"systema naturae" has not yet appeared. Each discovered
his predecessor's mode imperfect, but each was doomed to
meet the same fate.* The arrangement of proverbs has
bafiled the ingenuity of every one of their collectors. Our
Kay, after long premeditation, has chosen a system with the
appearance of an alphabetical order ; but, as it turns out, his
system is no system, and his alphabet is no alphabet. After
ten years' labour, the good man could only arrange his
proverbs by commonplaces — by complete sentences — by
phrases or forms of speech — by proverbial similes — and so on.
All these are pursued in alphabetical order, "by the first

* Since tlie appearance of the present article, several collections of
Proveuds have been attempted. A little unpretending volume, entitled
"Select Proverbs of all Nations, with Notes and Comments, by Thomas
Fielding, 1824," is not ill arranged ; an excellent book for popular reading.
The editor of a recent miscellaneous compilation, " The Treasury of Know-
ledge," has whimsically bordered the four sides of the pages of a Dictionary
with as many proverbs. The plan was ingenious, but the proverbs ave
uut. Triteness and triviality are fatal to a proverb.

r>-l. The Philosophy of Proverbs.

letter of the most •' material wonl,' or if tliere be more words
'• equdltj material.^ by that which u;<ually stands foremost."
The moj^t patient examiner will usually find that he wants
the sagacity of the collector to discover that word which is
"the most material," or, '"the words equally material." We
have to search througli all that multiplicity of divisions, or
conjuring boxes, in which this juggler of proverbs pretends to
hide the ball.*

A still move formidable objection against a collection of
proverbs, for the impatient reader, is their unreadableness.
Taking in succession a multitude of insulated proverbs, their
slippei-y nature resists all hope of retaining one in a hundred;
the study of proverbs must be a frequent recurrence to a
gradual collection of favourite ones, which we ourselves must
form. The experience of life will throw a perpetual freshness
over these short and simple texts ; every day may furnish a
new commentary ; and wc may grow old, and find novelty in
proverbs by their perpetual application.

Tliere are, perliaps, about twenty thousand proverbs among
the nations of Europe : many of these have spread in their
common intercourse ; many are borrowed from the ancients,
chielly the Greeks, who themselves largely took them from
the eastern nations. Our own proverbs are too often defi-
cient in that elegance and ingenuity which are often found
in the Spanish and the Italian. Proverbs frequently enliven
conversation, or enter into the business of life in those coun-
tries, without any feeling of vulgarity being associated with
them : they are too numerous, too vvdtty, and too wise to cease
to please by their poignancy and their aptitude. I have heard
them fall from the lips of men of letters and of statesmen.
When recently the disorderly state of the manufacturers of
Manchester menaced an insurrection, a profound Italian poli-
tician observed to me, that it was not of a nature to alarm a
great nation ; for that the remedy was at hand, in the pro-
verb of the Lazzaroni of Naples, Mela consirjlio, mefcl csempio,
mefct, dcnaro ! "Half advice, half example, half money!"
The result confirmed the truth of the proverb, which, had it
been known at the time, might have quieted the honest fears
of a great part of the nation.

Proverbs have ceased to be studied or employed in con-

♦ A new edition of Eny's book, witli large additions, w.is publisLed by
Bob.n, in 1S55, under tlic title of "A Handbook of rrovcrbs." It is a
rast collection of " wise saws" of all ages and coimtriea.

Confusion of Words. 65

versation since the time we have deiived our knowledge from
books ; but in a philosophical age they appear to offer infi-
nite subjects for speculative curiosity. Originating in various
eras, these memorials of manners, of events, and of modes of
thinking, for historical as well as for moral purposes, still re-
tain a strong hold on our attention. The collected know-
ledge of successive ages, and of different people, must always
enter into some part of our own ! Truth and nature can
never be obsolete.

Proverbs embrace the wide sphere of human existence, they
take all the colours of life, they are often exquisite strokes of
genius, they delight by their airy sarcasm or their caustic
satire, the luxuriance of their humour, the playfulness of their
turn, and even by the elegance of their imagery, and the ten-
derness of their sentiment. The}' give a deep insight into
domestic life, and open for us the heart of man, in all the
various states which he may occupy — a frequent review of
proverbs should enter into our readings ; and although they
are no longer the ornaments of conversation, they have not
ceased to be the treasuries of Thought !

CONFUSION OF WORDS.

" There is nothing more common," says the lively Voltaire,
" than to read and to converse to no purpose. In histor}^ in
morals, in law, in physic, and in divinity, be careful of equi-
vocal terms." One of the ancients wrote a book to prove
that there was no word which did not convey an ambiguous
and uncertain meaning. If we possessed this lost book, our
ingenious dictionaries of " sj'nonyms " would not probably
prove its uselessness. Whenever the same word is associated
bv the parties with different ideas, the\' may converse, or
controverse, till "the crack of doom!" This with a little
obstinacy and some agility in shifting his ground, makes the
fortune of an opi)onent. Wliile one part}' is worried in dis-
entangling a meaning, and the other is winding and unwind-
ing about him with another, a word of the kind we have
mentioned, carelessly or perversely slipped into an argument,
ma}' prolong it for a century or two — as it has happened !
Vaugelas, who passed his whole life in the study of words,
would not allow that the sense was to determine the meaning
of words ; for, says he, it is the business of icords to explain
TOL. III. P

66 Confusion of fVords.

the sense. Kant for a long while discovered in this way a
facility of arguing without end, as at this moment do our
political economists. " I beseech you," exclaims a poetical
critic, in the agony of a confusion of words, on the Pope con-
troversy, "not to ask whether I mean this or that F^ Our
critic, positive that he has made himself understood, has
shown how a few vague terms ma}'' admit of volumes of vin-
dication. Throw out a word, capable of fifty senses, and you
raise lifty parties ! Should some friend of peace enable the
fifty to repose on one sense, that innocent word, no longer
ringing the tocsin of a party, Avould lie in forgetfulness in the
Dictionary. Still more provoking when an identity of mean-
ing is onl}'' disguised b}^ different modes of expression, and
when the term has been closely sifted, to their mutual
astonishment both parties discover the same thing lying
under the bran and chaff after this heated operation. Plato
and Aristotle probably agreed inuch better than the opposite
parties they raised up imagined ; their difference was in the
manner of expression, rather than in the points discussed.
The Nominalists and the Eealists, who once filled the world
with their brawls, and who from irregular words came to
regular blows, could never comprehend their alternate non-
sense; "whether in employing general terms we \x^e ivords
or names only, or whether there is in nature anything corre-
sponding to what we mean by is. general idea 7''^ The Nomi-
nalists only denied what no one in his senses would affirm ;
and the Realists only contended for what no one in his senses
would deny ; a hair's breadth might have joined what the
spirit of party had sundered !

Do we flatter ourselves that the Logomachies of the No-
minalists and the Realists terminated with these scolding
schoolmen ? Modern nonsense, weighed against the obsolete,
may make the scales tremble for awhile, but it will lose its
agreeable quality of freshness, and subside into an equipoise.
We find their spirit still lurking among our own metaphysi-
cians! Lo ! the Nominalists and the Realists again!" ex-
claimed my learned friend, Sharon Turner, alluding to our
modern doctrines on abstract ideas, on which there is still a
doubt whether they are anything more than generalising
terms* Leibnitz confused his philosophy by the term suffi-
cient 7'eason : for every existence, for every event, and ioi

* Turner's "History of England," i. ,')14

Confusion of Words. 67

ever}' truth there must be a sufficient reason. This vague-
ness of Language produced a perpetual miseonception, and
Leibnitz was proud of his equivocal triumphs in always
atlbrding a new interpretation ! It is conjectured that he
only employed his term of suffcient reason for the plain
simple word of cause. Even Locke, who has himself so ad-
mirably noticed the " abuse of words," has been charged with
using vague and indefniite ones ; he has sometimes employed
the words rejleclion, mind, and spirit in so indefinite a way,
that they have confused his philosophy : thus by some ambi-
guous expressions, our great metaphysician has been made to
establish doctrines fatal to the immutability of moral distinc-
tions. Even the eagle-eye of the intellectual Newton grew
dim in the obscurity of the language of Locke. AVe are
astonished to discover that two such intellects should not
comprehend the same ideas ; for Newton wrote to Locke, " I
beg your pardon for representing that you struck at the root
of morality in a principle laid down in your book of Ideas —
and that I took you for a Hobbist!"* The difference of
opinion between Locke and Eeid is in consequence of an am-
biguity in the word ^;r/?^e?};?e, as employed by Reid. The
removal of a solitary word may cast a luminous ray over a
whole bod}' of philosophy : " If we had called the infinite the
indefinite^'' says Condillac, in his Traite des Sensations, "by
this small change of a word we should have avoided the error
of imagining that we have a positive idea of infinity, from
whence so many false reasonings have been carried on, not
onl}'- by metaphysicians, but even by geometricians." The
word reason has been used with different meanings by diffe-
rent writers ; reasoning and reason have been often con-
foimded ; a man may have an endless capacity for reasoning,
witliout being much influenced b}'- reason, and to be reason'
able, perhaps ditiers from both ! So Moliere tells us,

Raisonner est I'emploi de toute ma maison ;
Et le raisonnement en bannit la raison !

In this research on " confusion of words," might enter the
voluminous history of the founders of sects, who iiave usually
employed terms which had no meaning attached to them, or
were so ambiguous that their real notions have never been
comprehended ; hence the most chimerical opinions have been

* We owe this curious unpublished letter to the zeal and care of Pro-
fessor Dujjald Stewart, iu his excel Wut " Dissertatious."

68 Confusion of Words.

imputed to founders of sects. We may instance that of the
Aniinomians, whose remarkable denomination explains their
doctrine, expressing that they were "against law!" Their
founder was John Agricola, a follower of Luther, who, while
he lived, had kept Agricola's follies from exploding, which
they did when he asserted that there was no such thing as
sill, our salvation depending on faith, and not on works ; and
when he declaimed against the Law of God. To what length
some of his sect pushed this verbal doctrine is known ; but
the real notions of this Agricola probably never will be !
Bayle considered him as a harmless dreamer in theology, who
had confused his head by Paul's controversies with the Jews ;
but Mosheim, who bestows on this early reformer the epithets
of ven fastis and ve7'sipellis, windj' and crafty ! or, as his trans-
lator has it, charges him witli " vanity, presumption, and
artifice," tells us by the term "law," Agi'icola only meant
the ten commandments of Moses, which he considered were
abrogated by the Gospel, being designed for the Jews and
not for the Christians. Agricola then, by the words the
"Law of God," and "that there was no such thing as sin,"
must have said one thing and meant another ! This appears
to have been the case with most of the divines of the six-
teenth century ; for even Mosheim complains of " their want
of precision and consistency in expressing their sentiments,
hence their real sentiments have been misunderstood." There
evidently prevailed a great "confusion of words" among
them ! The f/race siiffisante and the grace electee of the
Jansenists and the Jesuits show the shifts and stratagems by
M'hich nonsense may be dignified. "Whether all men received
from God svfjicient grace for their conversion !" was an in-
f[uiry some unhapp}' metaphysical theologist set afloat : the
Jesuits, according to their worldly system of making men's
consciences easy, affirmed it ; but the Jansenists insisted,
•,., tliat this siifflcient grace would never be efficacious, unless
f-^ accompanied by special grace. " Then the sufficient grace,
' which is not efficacious, is a contradiction in terras, and
worse, a heresy!" triumphantly cried the Jesuits, exulting
over their adversaries, This " confusion of words" thickened,
till the Jesuits introduced in this logomachy with the Jan-
senists papal bulls, royal edicts, and a regiment of dragoons !
The Jansenists, in despair, appealed to miracles and prodigies,
which they got up for public representation ; but, above all,
to their Fascial, whose immortal satire the Jesuits really felt

Confusion of Words. 69

was at once "sufficient and efficacious," thougli the dragoons,
in settling a "confusion of words," did not boast of inferior
success to Pascal's. Former ages had, indeed, witnessed
even a more melancholy logomachy, in the Ilomoousion and
the Homoiousion ! An event which Boileau has immortalised
by some fine verses, which, in his famous satire on L'Equi-
voque, for reasons best known to the Sorbonne, were struck
out of the text.

D'une syllabe impie un saint mot augmente
Remplit tous les esprits d'aigreurs si meurtrieres —
Til fis, dans une guerre et si triste et si longue,
P6rir tant de Chretiens, martyrs d'une diphthongutl

Whether the Son was similar to the substance of the
Father, or of the same substance, depended on the diphthong
oi, which was alternately rejected and received. Had they
earlier discovered, what at length they agreed on, that the
words denoted what was incomprehensible, it would havo
saved thousands, as a witness describes, " from tearing ono
another to pieces." The great controversy between Abelard
and St. Bernard, when the saint accused the scholastic of
maintaining heretical notions of the Trinity, long agitated
the world ; yet, now that these confusers of words can no
longer inflame our passions, we wonder how these parties
could themselves differ about v.'ords to which we can attach
no meaning whatever. There have been few councils or
synods where the omission or addition of a word or a phrase
might not have terminated an interminable logomachy ! At
tlie council of Basle, for the convenience of tlie disputants,
John de Secubia drew up a treatise of undecHned words,
chielly to determine the signification of the particles from,
hij, hut, and except, which it seems were perpetually occa-
sioning fresh disputes among the Hussites and the Bohemians.
Had Jerome of Prague known, like our Shakspeare, the virtue
of an IF, or agreed with Hobbes, that he should not have
been so positive in the use of tlie verb is, he might have
been spared from the flames. The philoso[)her of Malmsbury
lias declared that " Perhaps Judgment was nothing else but
the composition or joining of two names of thinr/s, or modes,
by the verb is." In modern times the popes have more
skilfully freed the church from this " confusion of words."
His holiness, on one occasion, standing in equal terror of the
court of France, who protected the Jesuits, and of the court

70 Confusion of Words.

of Spain, who maintained the cause of the Dominicans, con-
trived a phrase, where a comma or a full stop, placed at the
beginning or the end, purported that his holiness tolerated
the opinions which he condemned ; and when the rival parties
despatched deputations to the court of Rome to plead I'or the
pei'iod, or advocate the comma, his holiness, in this " con-
fusion of words," flung an unpunctuated copy to the parties ;
nor was it his fault, but that of the spirit of party, if the
rage of the one could not subside into a comma, nor that of
the other close by a full period !

In jurisprudence much confusion has occurred in the uses
of the term ric/lits ; yet the social union and human happiness
are involved in the precision of the expression. When Mon-
tesquieu laid down, as the active principle of a republic,
virtue, it seemed to infer that a republic was the best of
governments. In the defence of his great work he was
obliged to define the term ; and it seems that by virtue he
only meant 2^oJitical virtue, the love of the country.

In politics, what evils have resulted from abstract terms to
Avhich no ideas are affixed, — such as, " The Equality of Man
— ^the Sovereignty or the Majesty of the People — Loyalty
- — Keform — even Liberty herself! — Public Opinion — Public
Interest;" and other abstract notions, which have excited
the hatred or the ridicule of the vulgar. Abstract ideas, as
sounds, have been used as watchwords. The combatants will
usually be found willing to fight for w^ords to which, perhaps,
not one of them has attached any settled signification. This
is admirably touched on by Locke, in his chapter of " Abuse
of Words." " Wisdom, Glory, Grace, &c., are words frequent
enough in every man's mouth ; but if a gi'eat many of those
who use them should be asked what they mean by them,
they would be at a stand, and know not what to answer — a
plain proof that though they have learned those sounds, and
have them ready at their tongue's end, yet there are no deter-
mined ideas laid up in their minds which are to be expressed
to others by them."

When the American exclaimed that he was not represented
in the House of Commons, because he w^as not an elector, he
was told that a \cyy small part of the peojjle of England were
electors. As they could not call this an actual representation,
they invented a new name for it, and called it a virtual one.
It imposed on the English nation, who could not object that
others should be taxed rather than themselves ; but with the

Confusion of Words. 71

Americans it was a soplu^=ni ! and this virtual representa-
tion, instead oC an actual one, terminated in our separation ;
" wliicli," says Mr. Flood, " at the time appeared to have
swept away most of our glory and our territory ; forty thou-
sand lives, and one hundred millions of treasure ! "

That fatal expression which llousseau had introduced,
VEfjaUte des Ilommes, which finally involved the happiness
of a whole people, had he lived he had ])robably showii how
ill his country had understood. He could only have referred
in his mind to political equality, but not an equality of pos-
sessions, of property, of authority, destructive of social order
and of moral duties, which must exist among every people.
"Liberty," "Equality," and " Keform" (innocent words!)
sadly ferment the brains of those who cannot affix any definite
notions to them ; they are like those chimerical fictions in
law, which declare the " sovereign immortal, proclaim his
ubiquity in various places," and irritate the feelings of the
populace, by assuming that " the king can never do wrong!"
In the time of James the Second " it is curious," says Lord
Kussell, " to read the conference between the Houses on the
meaning of the words ' deserted' and ' abdicated,' and the
debates in the Lords whether or no there is an original con-
tract between king and people." The people would neces-
sarily decide that " kings derived their power from them-,"
but kings were once maintained by a " right divine," a
" confusion of words," derived from two opposite theories,
and both only relatively true. When we listen so frequently
to such abstract terms as " the majesty of the people," " the
sovereignty of the people," whence the inference that " all
power is derived from the people," we can form no definite
notions : it is " a confusion of words," contradicting all the
political experience which our studies or our observations
furnish ; for sovereignty is established to rule, to conduct,
and to settle the vacillations and quick passions of the mul-
titude. Public opinion expresses too often the ideas of one
party in place ; and public interest those of another party
out l" Political axioms, from the circumstance of having the
notions attached to them unsettled, are applied to the most
opposite ends! "In the time of the French Directory,"
observes an Italian philosopher of profound views, " in the
revolution of Naples, the democratic iaction pronounced that
* Every act of a tyrannical government is in its origin illegal ;'
a proposition which at first sight seems self-evident, but which

72 Confusion of Words.

went to render all existing laws impracticable. The doctrine
of the illegality of the acts of a tyrant was proclaimed by
Brutus and Cicero, in the name of the senate, against the
populace, who had favoured Caesar's perpetual dictatorship ;
and the populace of Paris availed themselves of it, against the
National Aascmhly.

This " confusion of words," in time-serving politics, has too
often confounded right and wrong ; and artful men, driven
into a corner, and intent only on its possession, have found
no difficulty in solving doubts, and reconciling contradictions.
Our own history in revolutionary times abounds with dan-
gerous examples from all parties ; of specious hypotheses^ for
compliance with the government of the day or the passions
of parliament. Here is an instance in which the subtle con-
fuser of words pretended to substitute two consciences, by
utterly depriving a man of any ! When the unhappy Charles
the First pleaded that to pass the bill of attainder against
the Earl of Strafford was against his conscience, that remark-
able character of " boldness and impiety," as Clarendon cha-
racterizes Williams, Archbishop of York, on this argument of
conscience (a simple word enough), demonstrated " that there
were two sorts of conscience, public and private ; that his
public conscience as a king might dispense with his private
conscience as a man!" Such was the ignominious argument
which decided the fate of that great victim of State ! It was
an impudent " confusion of words" when Prynne (in order to
quiet the consciences of those who were uneasy at warring
with the king) observed that the statute of twenty-fifth
Edward the Third ran in the singular number — " If a man
shall levy war against the king, and therefore could not be
extended to the houses, who are many and public persons."
Later, we find Sherlock blest with the spirit of Williams, the
Archbishop of York, whom we have just left. When some
did not know how to charge and to discharge themselves of
the oaths to James the Second and to William the Third, this
confounder of words discovered that there were two rights, as
tlie other had that there were two consciences; one was a
providential right, and the other a legal right ; one person
might very righteously claim and take a thing, and another
as righteously hold and keep it ; but that whoever got the
lel/er had the providential right by possession ; and since all
authority comes from God, the people were obliged to transfer
heir allegiance to him as a king of God's making; so that

Confusion of Words. 73

he who had the providential right necessarily had the legal
one ! a very simple discovery, which must, however, have cost
him some pains; for this confounder of words was himself
confounded by twelve answers by non-jurors! A French
])olitician of this stamp recently was suspended from his lec-
tureship for asserting that the possession of the soil was a
riglit ; by which principle, any Icinrj reigning over a country,
whether by treachery, crime, and usurpation, was a legitimate
sovereign. For this convenient principle the lecturer was
tried, and declared not guilty — by persons who have lately
found their advantage in a confusion of words. In treaties
between nations, a '• confusion of words" has been more par-
ticularly studied ; and that negotiator has conceived himself
most dexterous who, by this abuse of words, has i-etained an
arriere-pensee which may fasten or loosen the ambiguous
expression he had so cautiously and so finely inlaid in his
mosaic of treachery. A scene of this nature I draw out of
" Mesnager's Negociation with the Court of England."
When that secret agent of Louis the Fourteenth was nego-
tiating a peace, an insuperable difficulty arose respecting the
acknowledgment of the Hanoverian succession. It was abso-
lutely necessary, on this delicate point, to quiet the anxiety
of the English public and our allies ; but though the French
Icing was willing to recognise Anne's title to the throne, yet
the settlement in the house of Hanover was incompatible
with French interests and French honour. Mesnager told
Lord Bolingbroke that " the king, his master, would consent
to any such article, looking the other wag, as might disengage
him from the obligation of that agreement, as the occasion
should present." This ambiguous language was probably
understood by Lord Bolingbroke : at the next conference his
lordship informed the secret agent " that the queen could not
admit of any explanations, whatever her intentions might be ;
that the succession was settled by act of parliament ; that as
to the private sentiments of the queen, or of any about her,
he could say nothing." " All this was said with such an air,
as to let me understand that he gave a secret as.wnt to what
I had proposed, &c. ; but he desired me to drop the discourse."
Thus two great negotiators, both equally urgent to conclude
the treaty, found an insuperable obstacle occur, which neither
could control. Two honest men would have parted ; but the
" skilful confounder of words," tlie French diplomatist, hit on
an expedient ; he wrote the wo)-ds which afterwards appeared

f 4 Confusion of JVords.

in the preliminaries, " That Louis the Fourteenth will acknow-
ledge the Queen of Great Britain in that quality, as also the
succession of the crown according to the presejtt settle-
ment." " The English agent," adds the Frenchman, " would
have had me add — on the house of Hanover, but this I
entreated him not to desire of me." The term present
SETTLEMENT, then, was that article which was looking the
other "WAY, to disenr/ar/e his master from the obligation of
that agreement, as occasion should present ! that is, that
Louis the Fourteenth chose to understand by the present
SETTLEMENT the old One, by which the British crown was to
be restored to the Pretender ! Anne and the English nation
were to understand it in their own sense — as the new one,
which transferred it to the house of Hanover !

When politicians cannot rely upon each other's interpreta-
tion of one of the commonest words in our language, how can
they possi.bly act together ? The Bishop of Winchester has
proved this observation, by the remarkable anecdote of the
Duke of Portland and Mr. Pitt, who, Vv-ith a view to unite
parties, were to hold a conference on fair and equal terms.
His grace did not object to tlie word eair, but the word
equal was more specitic and limited ; and for a necessary pre-
liminary, he requested Mr. Pitt to inform him what he under-
stood by the word equal ? Whether Pitt was puzzled by the
question, or would not deliver up an arriere-pensee, he put off
the explanation to the conference. But the duke would not
meet Mr. Pitt till the tro/v? was explained ; and this important
negotiation was broken off by not explaining a simple word
which appeared to require no explanation.

There is nothing more fatal in language than to wander
from the popular acceptation of words ; and yet this popular
sense cannot always accord with precision of ideas, for it is
itself subject to great changes.

Another source, therefore, of the abuse of words, is that
mutability to which, in the course of time, the verbal edi-
fice, as well as more substantial ones, is doomed. A familiar
instance presents itself in the titles of tyrant, parasite,
and sophist, originall}' honourable distinctions. The abuses of
dominion made the appropriate title of kings odious ; the title
of a magistrate, who had the care of the public granaries of
corn, at length was applied to a wretched flatterer for a
dinner ; and absurd philosophers occasioned a mere denomina-
tion to become a by-name. To employ such terms in their

Confusion of Words. 75

primitive sense would iiow confuse all ideas ; yet there is an
arfectation of erudition which has frequently revived terms
sanctioned by anti(iuity. Bishop Watson entitled his vindi-
cation of the Bible " an apolof/y ;" this word, in its primitive
sense, had long been lost lor the multitude, v/hom he particu-
larly addressed in this woi-k, and who could only understand
it in the sense they are accustomed to. Unquestionably, many
of its readers have imagined that the bishop was offering an
excuse for a belief in the Bible, instead of a vindication of its
truth. The word impertinent, by the ancient jurisconsults, or
law-counsellors, who gave their opinion on eases, was used
merely in opposition to pertinent — ratio jjertinens is a perti-
nent reason, that is, a vcwson jjerfaininy to the cause in ques-
tion, and a ratio impertinens, an impertinent reason, is an
argument not pertaining to the subject.* Impertinent then
originally meant neither absurdity nor rude intrusion, as it
does in our present popular sense. The learned Arnauld
having characterised a reply of one of his adversaries by the
epithet impertinent, when blamed for the freedom of his lan-
guage, explained his meaning by giving this history of the
word, which applies to our own language. Thus also with us
the word indifferent has entirely changed : an historian, whose
work was indiferentJy written, would formerly have claimed
our attention. l\\ the Liturgy it is prayed that " magistrates
may indifferently minister justice." Indifferently originally
meant impartially. The word extravagant, in its primitive
signification, only signified to digress from the subject. The
Decretals, or those letters from the popes deciding on points
of ecclesiastical discipline, were at length incorporated with
the canon law, and were called extravagant by ivandering out
of the body of the canon law, being confusedly dispersed
through that collection. When Luther had the Decretals
publicly burnt at Wittemberg, the insult was designed for the
pope, rather than as a condemnation of the canon law itself.
Suppose, in the present case, two persons of opposite opinions.

* It is still a Chancery word. Au answer ia Chancery, &c., is re-
ferred for imprrtinevcr, rcportL-d impertinent — aud the impertinence
ordered to be struck out, uieauiug ouly what is immaterial or superfluous,
tending to unnecessary expense. I am indebted for this explanation to ray
friend, Mr. Merivale ; and to another learned friend, formerly in that
court, who describes its meaning as " an excess of words or matter in the
pleadings," and who has received many an official fee for "expunging
impertinence," leaving, however, he acknowledges, a sufficient Quantity to
make the lawyers ashamed .4" tlieir verbosity.

76 Confusion of Words.

The catholic, who had said that the decretals were extrava-
gant, might not have intended to depreciate them, or make
any concession to the Lutheran. What confusion of words
has the commo)i sense of the Scotch metaphysicians intro-
duced into philosophy ! There are no words, perhaps, in the
language wliieh may be so differently interpreted ; and Pro-
fessor Dugald Stewart has collected, in a curious note in the
second volume of his " Philosophy of the Human Mind," a
lingular variety of its opposite significations. The Latin
phrase, sensiis communis, may, in various passages of Cicero,
be translated by our phrase common sense; but, on other
occasions, it means something different ; i\vQsensus conwnonis
of the schoolmen is quite another thing, and is synonymous
with conception, and referred to the seat of intellect ; with Sir
John Davies, in his curious metaphysical i^oem, common sense
is used as imagination. It created a controversy with Beattie
and Reid ; and Reid, who introduced this vague ambiguous
phrase in philosophical language, often understood the term in
its ordinary acceptation. This change of the meaning of
words, which is constantly recurring in metaphysical disputes,
has made that curious but obscure science liable to this objec-
tion of Hobbes, " with many words making nothing under-
stood!"

Controversies have been keenly agitated about the principles
of morals, which resolve entirely into verbal disputes, or at
most into questions of arrangement and classification, of little
comparative moment to the points at issue. This observation
of Mr. Dugald Stewart's might be illustrated by the fate of
the numerous inventors of systems of thinking or morals, who
have only employed very different and even opposite terms in
appearance to express the same thing. Some, by their mode
of philosophising, have strangely unsettled the words self-
interest and self-love ; and their misconceptions have sadly
misled the votaries of these systems of morals; as others also
by such vague terms as " utility, fitness," &c.

When Epicurus asserted that the sovereign good consisted
in pleasure, opposing the unfeeling austerity of the Stoics by
the softness of pleasurable emotions, his principle was soon
disregarded ; while his word, perhaps chosen in the spirit of
paradox, was warmly adopted by the sensualist. Epicurus,
of whom Seneca has drawn so beautiful a domestic scene, iu
whose garden a loaf, a Cytheridoan cheese, and a draught

Confusion of Words. 77

winch did not inflame thirst,* was the sole hanquet, would
have started indignantly at

The fattest hog in Epicurus' sty !

Such are the facts which illustrate that principle in " the
abuHC of words," which Locke calls " an affected obscurity
arising from api)lying old words to new, or unusual signifi-
cations.''''

It was the same '' confusion of words" which gave rise to
the famous sect of the Sadducees. The master of its founder
Sadoc, in his moral purity, was desirous of a disinterested
worship of the Deity ; he would not have men like slaves,
obedient from the hope of reward or the fear of punishment.
Sadoc drew a quite contrary inference irom the intention of
his master, concluding that there were neither rewards nor
punishments in a future state. The result is a parallel to the
fate of Epicurus. The morality of the master of Sadoc was
of the most pure and elevated kind, but in the " confusion of
words," the libertines adopted them for their own purposes
— and having once assumed that neither rewards nor punish-
ments existed in the after-state, they proceeded to the erro-
neous consequence that man perished with his own dust !

The plainest words, by accidental associations, may suggest
the most erroneous conceptions, and have been productive of
the grossest errors. In the famous Bangorian controversy,
one of the writers e.xcites a smile by a complaint, arising from
his views of the signification of a plain word, whose meaning
he thinks had been changed by the contending parties. He
says, " the word country, like a great many others, such as
church and kingdom, is, by the Bishop of Bangor's leave,
become to signify a collection of ideas very different from its
original meaning ; with some it implies ^ja/Vy, with others
frivafe opinion, and with most interest, and perhaps, in time,
may signify some other country. When this good innocent
word has been tossed backwards and forwards a little longer,
some new reformer of language may arise to reduce it to its
primitive signification — the real interest of Great Britain /"
The antagonist of this controversialist probably retorted on
him his own term of the real interest, which might be a very
opposite one, according to their notions ! It has been said,
with what truth I know not, that it was by a mere confusion

• Sen. Epist. 21.

78 Confusion of Words.

of words that Burke was enabled to alarm the great Whig
families, by showing theni their fate in that of the
French nohJesse ; they were misled by the similitude of names.
The French nollesse had as little resemblance to our nobility
as they have to the Mandarins of China. However it may
be in this ease, certain it is that the same terms misapplied
have often raised those delusive notions termed false analogies.
It was long imagined in this country, that the parliaments of
France were somewhat akin to our own ; but these assemblies
were very differently constituted, consisting only of lawyers in
courts of law. A misnomer confuses all argument. There
is a trick which consists in bestowing good names on bad
things. Vices, thus veiled, are introduced to us as virtues,
according to an old poet.

As di-unkenness, good-fellowship -we call ?

Sir Thomas Wiat.

Or the reverse, when loyalty may be ridiculed, as
The right divine of kings — to govern -u-rong !

The most innocent recreations, such as the drama, dancing,
dress, have been anathematised by puritans, while philoso-
phers have written elaborate treatises in their defence — the
enigma is solved, when we discover that these words sug-
gested a set of opposite notions to each.

But the nominalists and the realists, and the doctor es fun-
datissimi, resolutissimi, refulgentes, profundi, and extaiici,
have left this heirloom of logomachy to a race as subtle and
irrefragable ! An extraordinary scene has recently been per-
formed by a new company of actors, in the modern comedy
of Political Economy ; and the whole dialogue has been car-
ried on in an inimitable " confusion of words !" This rea-
soning and unreasoning fraternity never use a term as a
term, but for an explanation, and which employed by them
all, signifies opposite things, but never the plainest ! Is it
not, therefore, strange that they cannot yet tell us what are
riclics? what is rent? what is value? Mon.sieur Say, the
most sparkling of them all, assures us tliat the English
\vriters are obscure, by their confounding, like Smith, the de-
nomination of labour. The vivacious Gaul cries out to the
grave Briton, Mr. jMalthus, " If I consent to employ your
\vord labour, you must understand me," so and so! Mr*
Malthus Bays, " Commodities are not exchanged for commo-

Confusion of Words, 79

ditios only ; they are also exchanged foi' labour ;" and when
the hypochondriac Englishman, with dismay, foresees " the
glut of markets," and concludes that we may produce more
than we can consume, the paradoxical Monsieur Say dis-
covers that "commodities" is a icrong word, for it gives a
wrong idea; it should be "productions;" for his axiom is,
that "productions can only be purchased with productions."
Money, it seems, according to dictionary ideas, has no exis-
tence in his vocabulary ; I'or Monsieur Say has I'ormed a sort of
Bcrkleian conception of wealth being immaterial, while wc
confine our views to its materiality. Hence ensues from this
" confusion of words," this most brilliant paradox, — that " a
glutted mai'ket is not a proof that we produce too much but
that we produce too Utile ! for in that case there is not
enough produced to exchange with what is produced !" As
Frenchmen excel in politeness and impudence. Monsieur Say
adds, " I revere Adam Smith ; he is my master ; but this
first of political economists did not understand all the phe-
nomena of production and consumption." AVe, who remain
uninitiated in this mystery of explaining the operations of
trade by metaphysical ideas, and raising up theories to con-
duct those who never theorise, can only start at the " con-
fusion of words," and leave this blessed inheritance to our
sons, if ever the science survive the logomachy.

Caramuel, a famous Spanish bishop, was a grand architect
of words. Ingenious in theory, his errors were confined to
his practice : he said a great deal and meant nothing; and by
an exact dimension of liis intellect, taken at the time, it ap-
peared that " he had genius in the eighth degree, eloquence in
the fifth, but judgment only in the second !" This great man
would not read the ancients ; for he had a notion that the
moderns must have acquired all they possessed, with a good
deal of their own " into the bargain." Two hundred and
sixty -two works, differing in breadth and length, besides his
manuscripts, attest, that if the world would read his writ-
ings, they could need no other ; for which purpose his last
work always referred to the preceding ones, and could never
be comprehended till his readers possessed those which were
to follow. As he h.ad the good sense to perceive that meta-
pliysicians abound in obscure and equivocal terms, to avoid
tins " confusion of words," he invented a jargon of his own ;
and to make "confusion worse confounded," projected gram-
mars and vocabularies by which we were to learn it ; but it

80 Political Nicknames.

is supposed that he was the only man who understood him'
self. He put every author in despair by the works which he
announced. This famous architect of words, however, built
more labyrinths than he could always get out of, notwith-
standing his " cahalistical grammar," and his '^audacious
grammar."* Yet this great Caramuel, the critics have
agreed, was nothing but a puffy giant, with legs too weak
for his bulk, and only to be accounted as a hero amidst a
"confusion of words."

Let us dread the fate of Caramuel ! and before we enter
into discussion with the metaph^'sician, first settle what he
means by the natui'e of ideas; with the politician, his notion
of liberty and equality ; with the divine, what he deems
ortliodox ; with the political economist, what he considers to
be value and rent ! By this means we may avoid, what is
perpetually recurring, that extreme laxity or vagueness of
words, which makes every writer, or speaker, complain of his
predecessor, and attempt sometimes, not in the best temper,
to define and to settle the signification of what the witty
South calls "those rabble-charming words, which carry so
much wildfire wrapt up in them,"

POLITICAL NICKNAMES.

Political calumny is said to have been reduced into an art,
like that of logic, by the Jesuits. This itself may be a poli-
tical calumny ! A powerful body, who themselves had prac-
tised the artifices of calumniators, may, in their turn, often
have been calumniated. The passage in question was drawn
out of one of the classical authors used in their colleges.
Busembaum, a German Jesuit, had composed, in duodecimo, a
" Medulla Theologiae moralis," where, among other casuistical
propositions, there was found lurking in this old Jesuit's
"marrow" one w'liich favoured regicide and assassination!
Fifty editions of the book had passed unnoticed ; till a new
one appearing at the critical moment of Damien's attempt,
the duodecimo of the old scholastic Jesuit, which had now
been amplified by its commentators into two folios, was con-
sidered not merely ridiculous, but dangerous. It was burnt

* Baillet, gives the dates and plans of these grammars. The cabnlistie
■was published in Bruxelles, 1642, in 12mo. The audacious was in folio,
printed at Frankfort, 1654. — Jugemens des Savans. Tome ii. 3me partie.

Political Nicknames. 81

at Toulouse, in 1757, b}- order of the parliament, and con-
demned at Paris. An Italian .Fesuit published an " apology"
for this theory of assassination, and the same flames devoured
it ! Whetlier Busembaum deserved the honour bestowed on
his ingenuity, the reader may judge by tlie passage itself.

" Whoever would ruin a person, or a government, must
begin this operation by spreading calumnies, to defame the
person or the government ; for unquestionably the calum-
niator will always find a great number of persons inclined to
believe him, or to side with him ; it therefore follows, that
whenever the object of such calumnies is once lowered in
credit by such means, lie will soun lose the reputation and
power founded on that credit, and sink under tlie permanent
and vindictive attacks of the calumniator." This is the
politics of Satan — the evil principle which regulates so many
things in this world. The enemies of the Jesuits have
formed a list of great names who had become the victims of
such atrocious Machiavelism.*

This has been one of the arts practised by all political
l)arties. Their first weak invention is to attach to a new
taction a contemptible or an opprobrious nickname. In the
history of the revolutions of Europe, whenever a new party
has at length established its independence, the original
denomination which had been fixed on them, marked by the
passions of the party which bestowed it, strangely contrasts
with the state of the party finally established !

The first revolutionists of Holland incurred the contemptu-
ous name of " Les Gueux," or the Beggars. The Duchess of
Parma inquiring about them, the Count of Barlamont scorn-
fully described them to be of this class ; and it was fiattery of
the great which gave the name currency. The Hollanders
accepted the name as mucli in defiance as with indignation,
and acted up to it. Instead of brooches in their hats, they
wore little wooden platters, such as beggars used, and foxes'
tails instead of feathers. On tlie targets of some of these
Gueux they inscribed '"' Rather Turkish than Popish ! " and
had the print of a cock crowing, out of whose mouth was a
label, Vive les Gueux par tout le moiule ! which was every-
where set up, and was the favourite sign of their inns. The
Protestants in France, after a variety of nicknames to render
them contemptible — such as Christodins, because they would

* See Recueil Chronologique et Analytique de tout ce qui a fail eu For*
tugal la Sociil'tc Je .Teius. Vol. ii. sect. 400.

VOL. HI. Q

82 Political Nicknames.

only talk about Christ, similar to ourPuritans ; aw\ Parj)ailhfe,
or ParpiroUes, a small base coin, whicli was odiously applied
to them — at length settled in the well-known term of"
Huguenots, which probably was derived, as the Dictiounaire
de Trevoux suggests, from their hiding themselves in secret
places, and appearing at night, like King Hugon, the great
hobgoblin of France. It appears that the term has been
preserved by an earthen vessel without feet, used in cookery,
which served the Huguenots on meagre days to dress their
meat, and to avoid observation ; a curious instance, where
a thing still in use proves the obscure circumstance of its
origin.

The atrocious insurrection, called La Jacquerie, was a term
which originated in cruel derision. When John of France
was a prisoner in England, his kingdom appears to have been
desolated by its wretched nobles, who, in the indulgence of
their passions, set no limits to their luxury and their extoi*-
tion. They despoiled their peasantry without mere}'-, and
when these complained, and even reproached this tyrannical
nobility Avith having forsaken their sovereign, they w^ere told
\]\2Li Jacque hon homme must pay for all. But Jack good'
man came forward in person — a leader appeared under this
fatal name, and the peasants revolting in madness, and being
joined by all the cut-throats and thieves of Paris, at once
pronounced condemnation on every gentleman in France !
Froissart has the horrid narrative ; twelve thousand of these
Jacques hon liommes expiated their crimes ; but the Jacquerie,
who had received their first appellation in derision, assumed
it as their nom de guerre.

In the spirited Memoirs of the Duke of Guise, written by
himself, of his enterprise against the kingdom of Naples, we
find a curious account of this political art of marking people
by odious nicknames. " Gennaro and Vicenzo," says the
duke, " cherished underhand that aversion the rascality had
for the better sort of citizens and civiller people, who, by the
insolencies they suffered from these, not unjustly hated them.
The better class inhabiting the suburbs of the Virgin were
called Mack cloaks, and the ordinary sort of people took the
name of lazars, both in French and English an old word foi-
a leprous beggar, and hence the lazaroni of Naples," We
can easily conceive the evil eye of a lazar when he encountered
a hlack cloak ! The Duke adds — " Just as, at the beginning
of the revolution, the revolters in Flanders formerly took that

Political Nicknames. SS

of heggars ; those of Guienne, that of eaters; those of
Normandy that of bare-feet ; unci of Beausse and Soulogne, of
ifooden-paltcns.'" In the hite French revohition, we observed
the extremes indulged by both parties chiefly concerned in
revolution — the wealthy and the poor! The rich, who, in
derision, called their humble fellow-citizens by the con-
temptuous term of sans-cuhttes, provoked a reacting injustice
from the populace, who, as a dreadful return for only a slight,
rendered the innocent term of aridocrale a signal for plunder
or slaughter !

It is a curious fact that the French \qx\) frond er, as well
the noun frondeur, are used to describe those who condemn
the measures of government ; and more extensively, designates
any hyperbolical and malignant criticism, or an}' sort of con-
demnation. These words have only been introduced into the
language since the intrigues of Cardinal de Retz succeeded in
raising a faction against Cardinal Mazarin, known in French
history by the nickname of the Frondeurs, or the Slingers.
It originated in pleasantry, although it became the password
for insurrection in France, and the odious name of a faction.
A wit observed, that the parliament were like those school-
boys, who fling their stones in the pits of Paris, and as soon
as they see the Lieutenant Civil, run away ; but are sure to
collect again directly he disappears. The comparison was
lively, and formed the burthen of songs ; and afterwards,
when artairs were settled between the king and the parlia-
ment, it wa* more particularly applied to the faction of
Cardinal de Retz, who still held out. " We encouraged the
application," says de Retz ; " for we observed that the dis-
tinction of a name heated the minds of people ; and one
evening we resolved to wear hat-strings in the form of slings.
A hatter, who might be trusted with the secret, made a great
number as a new fashion, and which were worn by many
who did not understand the joke ; we ourselves were the last
to adopt them, that the invention might not appear to have
come from us. The effect of this trifle was immense ; every
I'ashionable article was now to assume the shape of a sling ;
bread, hats, gloves, handkerchiefs, fans, &c.; and we ourselves
became more in fashion by this folly, than by what was
essential." This I'evolutionary term was never forgotten by
the French, a circumstance which might have been considered
as prognostic of that after-revolution, which de Retz had the
imagination to project, but not the daring to establish. We

q2

84 Political Nicknames.

see, however, this great pohtician, confessing the advantages
his party derived by encouraging the application of a by-
name, which served " to heat the minds of people."

It is a curious circumstance that I should have to recount
in this chapter on "Political Nicknames" a familiar term
with all lovers of art, that of Silhouette ! This is well under-
stood as a hlaclc profile ; but it is more extraordinary that a
term so universally adopted should not be found in any
dictionary, either in that of L' Academic, or in Todd's, and
has not even been preserved, where it is quite indispensable,
in Millin's Dictionnaire des Beaux- Arts ! It is little sus-
pected that this innocent term originated in a political nick-
name ! Silhouette was a minister of state in France in 1759 ;
that period was a critical one ; the treasury was in an
exhausted condition, and Silhouette, a very honest man, who
would hold no intercourse with financiers or loan-mongers,
could contrive no other expedient to prevent a national
bankruptcy, than excessive economy and interminable reform !
Paris was not the metropolis, any more than London, where
a Plato or a Zeno could long be minister of state without in-
curring all the ridicule of the wretched wits ! At first they
pretended to take his advice, merely to laugh at him : — they
cut their coats shorter, and wore them without sleeves ; they
turned their gold snuff-boxes into rough wooden ones ; and
the new-fashioned portraits were now only profiles of a face,
traced by a black pencil on the shadow cast by a candle on
white paper ! All the fashions assumed an air of niggardly
economy, till poor Silhouette was driven into retirement, with
all his projects of savings and reforms ; but he left his name
to describe the most economical sort of portrait, and one as
melancholy as his own fate !

This political artifice of appropriating cant terms, or odious
nicknames, could not fail to fiourish among a people so
j)crpetually divided by contending interests as ourselves ;
every party with us have had their watcliword, which has
served either to congregate themselves, or to set on the ban-
dogs of one faction to worry and tear those of another. "We
l^raetised it early, and we find it still prospering ! The
Puritan of Elizabeth's reign survives to this hour ; the trying
difficulties which that wise sovereign had to overcome in
settling the national religion, found no sympathy in either of
the great divii^ions of her people ; she retained as much of the
oathulic rit-^^s as might be decorous in the new religion, and

Political Nicknames. 85

sought to unite, and not to separate, her chihlren. Jolir
Knox, in the sph-it of charity, decUired, that " she waA
neither gude protestant, nor yet resolute papist ; let the
world judge quilk is the third."

A jealous party arose, who were for reforming the reforma-
tion. In their attempt at more than human purity, they
obtained the nickname of Puritans; and from their fastidi-
ousness about very small matters, Precisians ; these Drayton
characterises as persons that for a painted glass window
would pull down the whole church. At that early period
these nicknames were soon used in an odious sense ; for
Warner, a poet in the reign of Elizabeth, says, —

If hypocrites why puritaines we term be asked, in breefe,
'Tis but an ironised terme; good-fellow so spels theefe !

Honest Fuller, who knew that many good men were
among these Puritans, wished to decline the term altogether,
under the less offensive one of Non-conformists. But the
fierce and the fiery of this party, in Charles the First's tim»
had been too obtrusive not to fully merit the ironical appell*.
tive ; and the peaceful expedient of our moderator dropped
away with the page in which it was written. The people
have frequently expressed their own notions of different par-
liaments by some apt nickname. In Richard the Second's
time, to express their dislike of the extraordinary and irre-
gular proceedings of the lords against the sovereign, as well
as their sanguinary measures, they called it " The wonder^
u-orkinr/ and the unmerciful parliament." In Edward the
Third's reign, when the Black Prince was yet living, the
parliament, for having pursued with severity the party of
the Duke of Lancaster, was so popular, that the people dis-
tinguished it as the good parliament. In Henry the Tlf id's
time, the parliament opposing the king, was called " Parlia-
mentum insanum,^' the mad parliament, because the lords
came armed to insist on the conHrmation of the great charter.
A Scottish parliament, from its perpetual shiftings from place
to place was ludicrously nicknamed the runninc/ parliament;
in the same spirit we had our long parliamerit. The nick-
name of Pensioner parliament stuck to the House of Com-
mons which sate nearly eighteen years without dissolution,
under Charles the Second ; and others have borne satirical or
laudatory epithets. So true it is, as old Holingshed observed,
" The common people will manie times give such lie names a*

86 Political Nicknames.

secmeth he.<tf lilcinrf to iliPinfselvea.'''' It would be a curious
speculation to discover the sources of the popular feeling ;
influenced by delusion, or impelled by good sense !

The exterminating political nickname of onaligncmt dark-
ened the nation through the civil wars : it was a proscription
— and a list o^ good and had lords was read by the leaders of
the first tumults. Of all these inventions, this diabolical one
was most adapted to exasperate the animosities of the people,
so often duped by names. I have never detected the active
man of faction who first hit on this odious brand for persons,
but the period when the word changed its ordinary meaning
was early ; Charles, in 1642, retorts on the parliamentarians
the opprobrious distinction, as " The true malignant party
which has contrived and countenanced those barbarous
tumults." And the royalists pleaded for themselves, that
the hateful designation was ill applied to them : " for by
maJignity j'ou denote," said they, "activity in doing evil,
whereas we have always been on the suffering side in our
persons, credits, and estates;" but the parliamentarians,
"grinning a ghastly smile," would reply, that "the royalists
would have been malignant had they proved successful."
The truth is, that malignancy meant with both parties any
opposition of opinion. At the same period the offensive dis-
tinctions of roundheads and cavaliers supplied the people
with party names, who were already provided with so many
religious as well as civil causes of quarrel ; the cropt heads of
the sullen sectaries and the people, were the origin of the
derisory nickname ; the splendid elegance and the romantic
spirit of the royalists long awed the rabble, who in their
mockery could brand them by no other appellation than one
in which their bearers gloried. In the distracted times of
early revolution, any nickname, however vague, will fully
answer a purpose, although neither those who are blackened
by the odium, nor those who cast it, can define the hateful
appellative. When the term of delinquents came into vogue,
it expressed a degree and species of guilt, says Hume, not
exactly known or ascertained. It served, however, the end
of those revolutionists who had coined it, by involving any
person in, or colouring any action by, delinquency ; and many
of the nobility and gentry were, without any questions being
asked, suddenly discovered to have committed the crime of
delinquency ! Whether honest Fuller be facetious or grave
on this period of nicknaming parties I will not decide ; but,

Political Nicknames. 87

wlien he tells us that there was another word which was in-
troduced into our nation at this time, T thinJc at least that
the whole passage is an admirable commentary on this party
vocabulary. " Contemporary with maliyiiants is the word
plunder, which some make of Latin original, from ;;/«???»;»
dare, to level, to plane all to nothhig! Others of Dutch ex-
traction, as if it were to iiliime, or pluck the feathers of a
bird to the bare skin.* Sure I am we first heard of it in the
Swedish wars ; and if the name and thing be sent back from
whence it came few English eyes would weep thereat." All
England had wept at the introduction of the word. The
rump was the filthy nickname of an odious faction — the
liistory of this famous appellation, which was at first one of
horror, till it afterwards became one of derision and contempt,
must be referred to another place. The rump became a per-
petual whetstone for the loyal wits,t till at length its former
admirers, the rabble themselves, in town and country, vied
with each other in " burning rumps" of beef, which were hung
by chains on a gallows with a bonfire underneath, and proved
how the people, like children, come at length to make a play-
thing of that which was once their bugbear.

Charles the Second, during the short holiday of the resto-
ration— all holida3'S seem short ! — and when he and the people
were in good humour, granted anything to every one, — the
mode of "Petitions" got ut length very inconvenient, and
the king in council declared that this petitioning was " A
method set on foot by ill men to promote discontents among
the people," and enjoined his loving subjects not to subscribe
them, Tlie petitioners, however, persisted — when a new
l^arty rose to express their abhorrence of petitioning ; both
parties nicknamed each other the petitioners and the ah-
horrers ! Their day was short, but fierce ; the petitioners,
however weak in their cognomen, were far the bolder of the
two, for the commons were with them, and the ahhorrershsidi
expressed by their term rather the strength of their inclina-
tions than of their numbers. Charles the Second said to a

* Plunder, observed Mr. Douce, is pure Dutch or Flemish — Phnideren,
from Plunder, which means j^ropcrti/ of any kind. Jlay tells us it waa
brought by those officers who had returned from the wars of the Nether-
lauds.

+ One of the best collections of political songs written during the great
Civil War, is entitleil "The Rump," and has a curious frontispiece repre-
senting the mob burning rumps as described above.

88 Political Nicknames.

jyetifwner from Taunton, " How dare you deliver me such a
paper?" " Sir," replied the petitioner from Taunton, "my
name is Dabe !" A saucy reply, for which he was tried,
fined, and imprisoned ; when lo ! the commons petitioned
again to release the petitioner ! "The very name," says
Hume, " by which each party denominated its antagonists
discovers the virulence and rancour which prevailed ; for be-
sides pctitiojier and ahhorrer, this year is remarkable for being
the epoch of the well-known epithets of ivhig and ^orj/."
These silly terms of reproach, whig and tory, are still pre-
served among us, as if the palladium of British liberty was
guarded by these exotic names, for they are not English,
Avhich the parties so invidiously bestow on each other. They
are ludicrous enough in their origin. The friends of the
court and the advocates of lineal succession were, by the re-
publican party, branded with the title of tories, which was
the name of certain Irish robbers ;* while the court part}' in
return could find no other revenge than by appropriating to
the covenanters and the republicans of that class the name
of the Scotch beverage of sour milk, whose virtue they con-
sidered so expressive of their dispositions, and which is called
wliigrj. So ridiculous in their origin were these pernicious
nicknames, which long excited feuds and quarrels in domestic
life, and may still be said to divide into two great parties this
land of political freedom. But nothing becomes obsolete in
political factions, and the meaner and more scandalous the
name affixed by one party to another the more it becomes
not only their rallying cry or their password, but even con-
stitutes their glory. Thus the Hollanders long prided them-
selves on the humiliating nickname of "Les Gueux :" the
protestants of France on the scornful one of the Huguenots ;
the non-conformists in England on the mockery of the
puritan; and all parties have perpetuated their anger by
their inglorious names. Swift was well aware of this truth
in political history: "each party," says that sagacious ob-
server, " grows proud of that appellation which their adver-
saries at first intended as a reproach ; of this sort were the
Guelphs and the GhiheUines, Huguenots and Cavaliers.''*

Nor has it been only by nicknaming each other by derisory
or opprobrious terms that parties have been marked, but they

* The "History of the Tories and Rapparees" was a popular Irish chap,
book a few years ago, and devoted to the daring acta of these marauders.

Political Nicknames. 89

have also v.-oru a livery, and practised distinctive manners.
What sudcrings did not Italy endure for a long series of years
under those fatal party-names of the Guelphs and the Ghi-
idlines ; alternately the victors and the vanciuished, the
beautiful land of Italy drank the blood of her children.
Italy, like Greece, opens a moving picture of the hatreds and
jealousies of small republics ; lier Uianclii and her Neri, her
Guelphs and her GhibeJUnes ! In Bologna, two great fami-
lies once shook that cit}^ with their divisions ; the Pepoli
adopted the French interests ; the Maluezzi the Spanish. It
was incurring some danger to walk the streets of Bologna,
for the Pepoli wore their feathers on the right side of their
caps, and the Maluezzi on the left. Such was the party-
hatred of the two great Italian factions, that they carried
their rancour even into their domestic habits ; at table the
Guelphs placed their knives and spoons longwise, and the
Ghihellines across ; the one cut their bread across, the other
longwise. Even in cutting an orange they could not agree ;
for the Guelph cut his orange horizontally, and the Ghihel-
liiie downwards. Children were taught these artifices of fac-
tion— their hatreds became traditional, and thus the Italians
perpetuated the full benefits of their party-spirit from gene-
ration to generation.*

Men in private life go down to their graves with some un-
lucky name, not received in baptism, but more descriptive and
picturesque ; and even ministers of state have winced at a
political christening. Malagrida the Jesuit and Jemmy
Twitcher were nicknames which made one of our ministers
odious, and another contemptible. t The Earl of Godolphin
caught such fire at that of Yolpone, that it drove him into
the opposite party, for the vindictive purpose of obtaining the
im political prosecution of Sacheverell, who, in his famous
sermon, had first applied it to the earl, and unluckily it had
stuck to him.

" Faction," says Lord Orford, " is as capricious as for-
tune ; wrongs, oppression, the zeal of real patriots, or the
genius of false ones, may sometimes be employed for years in
kindling substantial opposition to authority ; in other seasons

* These curious particulars I found in a manuscript.
+ Lord Shelburue was named "Malagrida," and Lord Sandwich was
"Jemmy Twitcher ;" a name derived from the chief of Macheath's gang
in the Beggar's Opera.

90 Domestic Life of a Poet. — Shenstone Vindicated.

the impulse of a moment, a Jf/Z/at?, a nichname, a fasliion can
throw a city into a tumult, and shake the foundations of a
state."

Such is a slight history of the human passions in politics !
We might despair in thus discovering that wisdom ancS
patriotism so frequently originate in this turbid source of
part}' ; but we are consoled when we reflect that the most im-
portant political principles are immutable : and that they
are those which even the spirit of party must learn to
reverence.

THE DOMESTIC LIFE OF A POET.— SHENSTONE
VINDICATED.

The dogmatism of Johnson, and the f\istidiousnes3 of Gray,
the critic who passed his days amidst " the busy hum of
men," and the poet who mused in cloistered solitude, have
fatally injured a fine natural genius in Shenstone. Mr. Camp-
bell, with a brother's feeling, has (since the present article
was composed) sympathised with the endowments and the
pursuits of this poet ; but the facts I had collected seemed to
me to open a more important view. I am aware how lightly
the poetical character of Shenstone is held by some great
contemporaries — although this very poet has left us at least
one poem of unrivalled originality. Mr. Campbell has
regretted that Shenstone not only " affected that arcadian-
ism " which " gives a cei'tain air of masquerade in his pastoral
character," adopted by our earlier poets, but also has "rather
incongruously blended together the rural swain with the
disciple of virtu." All this requires some explanation. It is
not only as a poet, possessing the characteristics of poetry,
but as a creator in another way, for which I claim the atten-
tion of the reader. I have formed a picture of the domestic
life of a poet, and the pursuits of a votary of taste, both
equally contracted in their endeavours, from the habits, the
emotions, and the events which occurred to Shenstone.

Four material circumstances influenced his character, and
were productive of all his unhappiness. The neglect he
incurred in those poetical studies to which he had devoted his
hopes ; his secret sorrows in not having formed a domestic
union, from prudential motives, with one whom he loved; the
ruinous state of his domestic affairs, arising from a seducing

Domestic Life of a Fuet. — Shemtone Vindicated. 91

passion for creating- a new taste in landscape gardening and
an ornamented farm ; and finally, his disappointment of that
promised patronage, which might have induced him to have
become a political writer ; for which his inclinations, and, it
is said, his talents in early life, were alike adapted : with these
points in view, we may trace the did'erent states of his mind,
show what he did, and what he was earnestly intent to have
done.

Why have the " Elegies " of Shenstone, which forty years
ago formed for many of us the favourite poems of our youth,
ceased to delight us in mature life ? It is perhaps that these
Elegies, planned with peculiar felicity, have little in their
execution. They form a scries of poetical truths, devoid of
poetical expression ; truths, — for notwithstanding the pastoral
romance in which the poet has enveloped himself, the subjects
are real, and the feelings could not, therefore, be fictitious.

In a Preface, remarkable for its graceful simplicity, our poet
tells us, that " He entered on his subjects occasionally, as
particular inciJents in life suggested, or dispositions of mind
recommended them to his choice." He shows that " Ho
drew his pictures from the spot, and he felt very sensibly the
affections he communicates." He avers that all those atten-
dants on rural scenery, and all those allusions to rural life, were
not the counterfeited scenes of a town poet, any more than
the sentiments, which were inspired by Nature. Shenstone'a
friend Graves, who knew him in early life, and to his last days,
informs us that these Elegies were written when he had taken
the Leasowes into his own hands ;* and though his ferme
ornee engaged his thoughts, he occasionally wrote them,
" partly," said Shenstone, " to divert my present impatience,
and partly, as it will be a picture of most that passes in my
own mind ; a portrait which friends may value." This, then,
is the secret charm which acts so forcibly on the first emotions
of our youth, at a moment when, not too difficult to be
pleased, the reflected delineations of the habits and the affec-
tions, the hopes and the delights, with all the domestic
associations of this poet, always true to Nature, reflect back
that picture of ourselves which v,-e instantly recognise. It ia
only as we advance in life that we lose the relish of our early
simplicity, and that we discover that Shenstone was not
endowed with high imagination.

* This once-celebrated abode of the poet is situated at Hales-Qwen^
Shi-opsbire.

92 Domestic Life of a Poet. — Shenstone Vindicated.

These Elegies, with some other poems, maj-- be read with a
new interest when we discover them to form the true
Memoirs of Shenstone. Eecords of querulous but delightful
feelino-s ! whose subjects spontaneously offered themselves
from passing incidents ; they still perpetuate emotions
which will interest the young poet and the young lover ot
taste.

Elegy IV., the first which Shenstone composed, is entitled
" Opheiia's Urn," and it was no unreal one ! It was erected
by Graves in Mickleton Church, to the memory of an extra-
ordinary young woman, Utrecia Smith, the literary daughter
of a learned but poor clergyman. Utrecia had formed so fine
a taste for literature, and composed with such elegance in
verse and prose, that an excellent judge declared that " he
did not like to form his opinion of any author till he pre-
viously knew hers." Graves had been long attached to her,
but from motives of prudence broke off an intercourse with
this interesting woman, who sunk under this severe disap-
pointment. When her prudent lover, Graves, inscribed the
urn, her friend Shenstone, perhaps more feelingly, commemo-
rated her virtues and her tastes. Such, indeed, was the
friendly intercourse between Shenstone and Utrecia, that in
Elegy XVIII., written long after her death, she still hngered
in his reminiscences. Composing this Elegy on the calami-
tous close of Somerville's life, a brother bard, and victim to
narrow circumstances, and which he probably contemplated
as an image of his own, Shenstone tenderly recollects that he
used to read Somerville's poems to Utrecia : —

Oh, lost Ophelia ; smoothly flow'd the day
To feel his inusic with my flames agree ;

To taste the beauties of his melting lay,
To taste, and fancy it was dear to thee !

How true is the feeling ! how mean the poetical expression !
The Seventh Elegy descrihes a vision, where the shadow of
Wolsey breaks upon the author :

A graceful form appear'd,

White were his locks, with awful scarlet crown 'd.

Even this fanciful subject was not chosen capriciously, but
sprung from an incident. Once, on his way to Cheltenham,
Shenstone missed his road, and wandered till late at night
among the Cotswold Hills on this occasion he appears to

Domestic Life of a Poet. — Shenstone Vindicated. 93

liave made a moral reflection, which we find in liis " Ess^ays.'*
•' How mehmcholy is it to travel late upon any ambitious
project on a winter's night, and observe the light of cottages,
where all the unambitious people are warm and happy, or at
rest in their beds." While the benighted poet, lost among
the lonely hills, was meditating on " ambitious projects," the
character of Wolsey arose before him ; the visionary cardinal
crossed his path, and busied his imagination. " Thou,"
exclaims the poet,

Like a meteor's fire,
Shot' at blazing forth, disdaining dull degrees.

Ekgy vii.

And the bard, after discovering all the miseries of unhappy
grandeur, and murmuring at this delay to tlie house of his
friend, exchiims —

Oh if these ills the price of power advance,
Check not my speed where social joys invite !

The silent departure of the poetical spectre is line :

The troubled vision cast a mournful glance,
And sighing, vanish'd in the shades of night.

And to prove that the subject of this elegy thus arose to the
l)oet's fancy, he has himself commemorated the incident that
gave occasion to it, in the opening : —

On distant heaths, beneath autumnal skies,
Pensive I saw the circling shades descend ;

Weary and faint, I heard the storm arise,
While the sun vanish'd like a faithless friend.

Eler/y vii.

The Fifteenth Elegy, composed " in memory of a private
family in Worcestershire," is on the extinction of the ancient
family of the Penns in the male line.* Slienstone's mother
was a Penn ; and the poet was now the inhabitant of their
ancient mansion, an old timber-built house of the age of
Elizabeth. The local description was a real scene — " the
shaded pool" — "the group of ancient elms" — "the flocking
rooks," and the picture of the simple manners of his owu
ancestors, were realities ; the emotions they excited were
therefore genuine, and not one of those "mockeries" of
amplification from the crowd of verse-writers.

• This we learn from Dr. Nash'i History of Worcestershire!

94< Domestic Life of a Poet. — Shenstone Vindicated.

Tlie Tenth Elegy, " To Fortune, suggesting his Motive
for repining at her Dispensations," with his celebrated
" Pastoral Ballad, in four parts," were alike produced by
what one of the great minstrels of our own times has so
tinely indicated when he sung —

The secret woes the world has never known ;

While on the weary night dawn'd wearier day,
And bitterer was the grief devour'd alone.

In this Elegy Shenstone repines at the dispensations of
Fortune, not for having denied him her higher gifts, nor
that she compels him to

Check the fond love of art that fired my veins ;

nor that some "dull dotard with boundless wealth" finds
his "grating reed" preferred to the bard's, but that the
" tawdry shepherdess" of this dull dotard, by her " pride,"
makes " the rural thane" despise the poet's Delia.

Must Delia's softness, elegance, and ease.
Submit to Marian's dress? to Marian's gold?

Must Marian's robe from distant India please ?
The simple fleece my Delia's limbs infold !

Ah ! what is native worth esteemed of clowns ?

'Tis thy false glare, 0 Fortune ! thine they see;
Tis for my Delia's sake I dread thy frowns,

And my last gasp shall curses breathe on thee I

The Delia of our poet was not an " Iris en air." Shen-
stone was early in life captivated by a young lad}^, whom
Graves describes with all those n:iild and serene graces of
pensive melancholy, touched by plaintive love-songs and
elegies of woe, adapted not only to be the muse but the
mistress of a poet. The sensibility of this passion took
entire possession of his heart for some 3'ears, and it was in
parting from her that he first sketched his exquisite " Pas-
toral Ballad." As he retreated more and more into solitude,
his passion felt no diminution. Dr. Nash informs us that
Shenstone acknowledged that it was his own fault that he
did not accept the hand of the lady whom he so tenderly
loved ; but his spirit could not endure to be a perpetual
witness of her degradation in the rank of society, by an
inconsiderate union with poetry and poverty. That such
was his motive, we may infer from a passage in one of his
letters. " Love, as it regularly tends to matrimony, requires

Domestic Life of a Poet. — Shenstune Vindicated, 95

certain favours from fortune and circumstances to render it
propel to be indulged in." There are perpetual allusions to
these "secret woes" in his correspondence; for, although he
had the fortitude to refuse marriage, he had not the stoicism
to contract his own heart in cold and sullen celibacy. He
thus alludes to this subject, which so often excited far other
emotions than those of humour : — " It is long since I have
considered myself as undone. The world will not, perhaps,
consider me in that light entirely till I have married my
maid!"

It is probable that our poet had an intention of marrying
his maid. I discovered a pleasing anecdote among the late
Mr. Bindley's collections, which I transcribed from the origi-
nal. On the back of a picture of Shenstone himself, of whicli
Dodsley published a print in 1780, the following energetic
inscription was written by the poet on his new-year's gift : —

" This picture belongs to Mary Cutler, given her by her
master, William Shenstone, January 1st, 175-1, in acknow-
ledgment of her native genius, her magnanimity, her tender-
ness, and her fidelity.

"W. S."

" The Progress of Taste ; or the Fate of Delicacy," is
a poem on the temper and studies of the author ; and
" Economy ; a Khapsody addressed to Young Poets,"
abounds with self-touches. If Shenstone created little from
the imagination, he was at least perpetually under the influ-
ence of real emotions. This is the reason why his truths
so strongly operate on the juvenile mind, not yet matured:
and thus we have sufficiently' ascertained the fact, as the
poet himself luvs expressed it, " that he drew his pictures
from the spot, and he felt very sensibl}* the affections he
communicates."

All the anxieties of a poetical life were early experienced
by Shenstone. He first published some juvenile productions,
under a very odd title, indicative of modesty, perhaps too of
pride.* And his motto of Coiiientus paucis lectoribus, even

* While at college he printed, without his name, a small volume of
verses, with this title, "Poems upon various Occasions, written for the
Entertainment of the Author, and printed for tiie Amusement of a few-
Friends, prejudiced in hi.s Favour." Oxford, 1737. 12mo. — Nash's "His-
tory of Worcestershire," vol. i. p. 528.

I tind this notice of it in W. Lowndes's Catalogue ; 4433 Shenstone (W.)
Poems, 3/. 13s. C(/. — (Shenstone took uncommon pains to suppves-s this

96 Domestic Life of a Pod. — Shenstone Vindicated.

Horace himself might have smiled at, for it only conceals the

di'sire of every poet who pants to deserve many ! But when
he tried at a more elaborate poetical labour, '• The Judgment
of Hercules," it failed to attract notice. He hastened to
town, and he beat about literary coffee-houses ; and returned
to the country from the chase of Fame, wearied without having
started it.

A breath revived him — but a breath o'erthrew.

Even " The Judgment of Hercules" between Indolence
and Industry, or Pleasure and Virtue, was a picture of his
own feelings ; an argument drawn from his own reasonings ;
indicating the uncertaint}' of the poet's dubious disposition ;
who finally by siding with Indolence, lost that triumph which
his hero obtained by a directly opposite course.

In the following year begins that melancholy strain in his
correspondence which marks the disappointment of the man
who had staked too great a quantity of his happiness on the
poetical die. This is the critical moment of life when our
character is formed by habit, and our fate is decided by choice.
Was Shenstone to become an active or contemplative being ?
He yielded to nature !*

It was now that he entered into another species of poetry,
working with too costly materials, in the magical composition
of plants, water, and earth ; with these he created those emo-
tions which his more strictly poetical ones failed to excite.
He planned a paradise amidst his solitude. When we con-
sider that Shenstone, in developing his fine pastoral ideas in
the Leasowes, educated the nation into that taste for land-
scape-gardening, which has become the model of all Europe,
this itself constitutes a claim on the gratitude of posterity. f

book, by collecting and destroying copies wherever he met with them.) — la
Longman's Bibliotheca Anglo-Poetica, it is valued at \bl. Oxf. 1737.
Mr. Harris informs me, that about the year 1770, Fletclier, the bookseller,
at Oxford, had many copies of this first edition, which he sold at Ei'jldeen
•pence each. These prices are amusing ! The prices of books are connected
with their history.

* On this subject Graves makes a very useful observation. "In this
decision the happiness of Mr. Shenstone was materially concerned. Whe-
ther he determined wisely or not, people of taste and people of worldly
prudence will probably be of very different opinions. I somewhat suspect,
that ' people of worldly prudence' are not half the fools that ' people of
taste' insist they are."

t Shenstone's farm was surrounded by winding walks, decorated with
vaaes and statues, varied by wood and water, and occaaionally embracing

Domestic Life of a Poet. — Shenslone Vijidicutcd. 97

Tints the private pleasures ot" a man of j^ciiius may become
at length those of" a whole people. The creator of tliis new
taste appears to have received tar less notice than he merited.
The name of Slienstone does not appear in the Essay on Gar-
dening by Lord Orford : even the supercilious Gray only
bestowed a ludicrous image on these pastoral scenes, which,
however, his friend Mason has celebrated ; and the genius of
Johnson, incapacitated by nature to touch on objects of rural
fancy, after describing some of the offices of the land.scape
designer, adds, that " he will not inquire whether they demand
any great powers of mind." Johnson, he I'cver, conveys to
us his own feelings, when le immediately expresses them
under the character of a "sullen and surly speculator." Tlie
anxious life of Shenstone wr uld, indeed, have been remune-
rated, could he have read the enchanting eulogium of
Wheatley on the Leasowe? ; which, said he, " is a perfect
picture of his mind — simp'e, elegant, and amiable; and will
always suggest a doubt whether the spot inspired his ver.se,
or whether in the scenes vhich he formed, he only realized
the pastoral images wh.ch abound in his songs." Yes!
Shenstone would have been deliglited, could he have heard
that Montesquieu, on his return home, adorned his " Chateau
gothique, mais orne de bois charmans, dont j'ai pris I'idee en
Angleterre ;" and Shenstone, even with his modest and timid
nature, had been proud to have witnessed a noble foreigner,
amidst memorials dedicated to Theocritus and Virgil, to
Tliomson and Gesner, raising in his grounds an inscription,
in bad English, but in pure taste, to Shenstone himself for
having displayed in his writings "a mind natural," and in his
Leasowes "laid Arcadian greens rural." Recently Pindc-

flne views over Frankley and Clent Hill3, and the country about Cradley,
Dudley, Rawley, and the intermediate places. Some of his vases were
inscribed to the memory of relatives and friends. One had a Latin inscrip-
tion to his cousin Maria, another was dedicated to Somerviile his poet-
frieiid. In difterent parts of his domain lie constructed buildings at once
useful and ornamental, destined to serve farm-purposes, but to be also
grateful to the eye. A Chinese bridge led to a temple beside a lake, and
near was a seat inscribed with the popular Shropshire toast to " all friends
round the Wrekin," the spot commanding a distant view of the hill so
named. A wild path through a small wood led to an ingeniously con-
structed root-house, beside which a rivulet ran which helped to form the
lake already inentioncd ; on its banks was a dedicatory urn to the (-'eiiio
Loci. The general ellVct of the whole place was highly praised in the
poet's time. It was neglected at his death ; and its description is now but
a record of the past.

YOL. III. H

98 Domesiic Life of a Poet. — Shenstone Vindicated.

monte has traced the taste of English garilenhig- to Shenstone.

A mail of genius sometimes receives from Ibreigners, who are

placed out of the prejudices of his compatriots, the tribute of

posterity !

Amidst these rural elegancies which Shenstone was raising

about him, his muse has pathetically sung his melancholy

feelings —

But did tlie Muses haunt Lis cell,
Or iu his dome did Venus dwell ? —
When all the structures shone complete,
Ah, me ! 'twas Damon's own confession,
Came Poverty, and took possession.

The Progress of Taste.

The poet observes, that the wants of philosophy are con-
tracted, satisfied with " cheap contentment," but

Taste alone requires
Entire profusion ! days and nights, and hours
Thy voice, hydropic Fancy ! calls aloud

For costly draughts.

Economy.

An original image illustrates that fatal want of economy
which conceals itself amidst the beautiful appearances of
taste : —

Some graceless mark,
Some symptom ill-conceal'd, shall soon or late
Burst like a pimple from the vicious tide
Of acid blood, proclaiming want's disease
Amidst the bloom of show.

Economy,
He paints himself : —

Observe Florelio's mien ;
Why treads my friend with melancholy step
That beauteous lawn ? Why pensive strays his eye
O'er statues, grottos, urns, by critic art
Proportion'd fair ? or from his lofty dome
Returns his eye unpleased, disconsolate ?

The cause is, " criminal expense," and he exclaims —

Sweet interchange
Of i-iver, valley, mountain, woods, and plains,
How gladsome once he ranged your nativo turf,
Your simple scenes how raptured ! ere Expensb
Had lavish'd thousand oniaments, and taught
Convenience to perplex hins., Art to pall,
Pomp to deject, and Bea-ity to displease.

Economy,

Domestic Life of a Poet. — S/ienstone Vindicated. 99

While Slicnstone was rearing hazels and hawthorns, open-
ing vistas, and winding waters;

And having shown them where to stray,
Threw little pebbles in their way ;

while he was pulling down hovels and cowhouses, to compose
inottos and inscriptions for garden-seats and urns ; while he
had so finely obscured with a tender gloom the grove of
Virgil, and thrown over, " in the midst of a plantation of
yew, a bridge of one arch, built of a dusty-coloured stone,
and simple even to rudeness,"* and invoked Oberon in somo
Arcadian scene,

Where in cool grot and mossy cell
The tripping fauns and fairies dwell ;

the solitary magician, who had raised all these wonders, was,
in reality, an unfortunate poet, the tenant of a dilapidated
farm-house, where the winds passed through, and the rains
lodged, often taking refuge in his own kitchen —

Far from all resort of mirth,
Save tlie cricket on the hearth I

In a Icttert of the disconsolate founder of landscape gar-
dening, our author paints his situation with all its misery —
lamenting that his liouse is not fit to receive " polite friends,
were they so disposed ;" and resolved to banish all others, he
proceeds :

" But I make it a certain rule, ' arcere profiinum vulgus.'
Persons who will despise you for the want of a good set of
chairs, or an uncouth fire-shovel, at the same time that they
can't taste any excellence in a mind that overlooks those
things ; with whom it is in vain that your mind is furnished,
if the walls are naked ; indeed one loses much of one's ac-
quisitions in virtue by an hour's converse with such as judge
of merit by money — yet I am now and then impelled by the
social passion to sit half an hour in my kitchen."

But the solicitude of friends and the fivte of Somerville, a
neighbour and a poet, often compelled Shenstone to start
amidst his reveries; and thus he has preserved his feelings
and his irresolutions. Refiecting on the death of Somerville,
he writes —

* Wheatley, on "Modern Gardening," p. 172. Edition 5th.
t In "Hull's Collection," vol. ii. letter ii.

h2

100 Domestic Life of a Poet. — Shenstone Vindicated.

" To be forced to tlrink himself into pains of the boch'^, in
order to get rid of the pains of the mind, is a miserj^ which
I can well conceive, because I may, without vanity, esteem
myself his equal in point of economy, and consequently
ought to have an eye on his misfortunes — (as you kindly
liinted to me about twelve o'clock, at the Feathers.) — 1
should reti'ench — I will — but j^ou shall not see me — I will
not let you know that I took it in good part — I will do it at
solitary times as I may."

Such were the calamities of "great taste" with "little
fortune ;" but in the case of Shenstone, these were combined
with the other calamity of " mediocrity of genius."

Hei'e, then, at the Leasowes, with occasional trips to town
'n pursuit of fame, which perpetually eluded his grasp ; in
the correspondence of a few delicate minds, whose admiration
was substituted for more genuine celebrity ; composing dia-
tribes against economy and taste, while his income was di-
minishing every year ; our neglected author grew daily more
indolent and sedentary, and withdrawing himself entirely
into his own hermitage, moaned and despaired in an Arcadian
solitude.* The cries and the "secret sorrows" of Shenstone
have come down to us — those of his brothers have not al-
ways ! And shall dull men, because they have minds cold
and obscure, like a Lapland year which has no summer, be
permitted to exult over this class of men of sensibility r.nd
taste, but of moderate genius and without fortune ? The
passions and emotions of the heart are facts and dates only
to those who possess them.

To what a melancholy state was our author reduced, when
he thus addressed his friend : —

"I suppose you have been informed that my fever was in a
great measure hypochondriacal, and left my nerves so ex-
tremely sensible, that even on no ver}^ interesting subjects, I
could readily think myself into a vertirjo ; 1 had almost said an
epilepsy; for surely 1 was oftentimes near it."

The features of this sad portrait are more particularly
made out in another place.

* Graves was supposed to have glanced at his friend Shenstone in his
novel of " Coluviel/a; or, the Distressed Anchoret." The aim of this
■work is to convey all the moral instruction I could wish to offer here to
youthful genius. It is written to show the consequence of a person of
education and talents retiring to solitude and indolence in the vigour of
youth. Nichols's "Literary Anecdotes," Tol. iii. p. 134. Nash's "His-
tory of Worcestershire," vol. i. p. 528.

Domestic L'lj't' of a Poet. — Shenstone Vindicated. 101

" Now I am come home from a visit, every little uneasi-
ness is sufficient to introduce my whole train of melancholy
considerations, and to make me utterly dissatisfied with the
life I now lead, and the life which I foresee I shall lead. I
am angry and envious, and dejected and frantic, and disregard
all present things, just as becomes a madman to do. I am
infinitely pleased (though it is a gloomy joy) with the ap-
plication of Dr. Swift's complaint, ' that he is forced to die
in a rage, like a poisoned rat in a hole.' My soul is no more
fitted to the figure 1 make, than a cable rope to a cambric
needle ; I cannot bear to see the advantages alienated, whicli
I think I could deserve and relish so much more than those
that have them."

There are other testimonies in his entire correspondence.
Whenever forsaken by his company he describes the horrors
around him. delivered up " to winter, silence, and reflection ;"
ever foreseeing himself •' returning to the same series of me-
lancholy hours." His frame shattered by the whole train of
hypochondriacal symptoms, there was nothing to cheer the
querulous author, who with half the consciousness of genius,
lived neglected and unpatronised. His elegant mind had not
the force, by his productions, to draw the celebrity he sighed
after, to his hermitage.

Shenstone was so anxious for his literary character, that he
contemplated on the posthumous fame which he might derive
from the publication of his letters : see Letter Ixxix., On
hearinrj his letters to Mr. Whistler tcere destroyed ; the act
of a merchant, his brother, who being a very sensible man, as
Graves describes, yet with the stupidity of a Goth, destroyed
tlie tvhole correspondence of Shenstone, for " its sentimental
intercourse." — Slienstone bitterly regrets the loss, and says,
" 1 would have given more money for the letters than it is
allowable for me to mention with decency. I look upon my
letters as some oi my chefs-d' oeuvre — they are the history of my
mind for these twenty yeai-s past." This, with the loss uf
Cowley's correspondence, should have been ju'eserved in the
article, "of Suppressors and Dilaiiidators of JManuseripts."

Towards the close of life, when his spirits were ex-
hausted, and " the silly clue of hopes and expectations," as
he termed them, was undone, the notice of some persons of
rank began to reach him. Shenstone, however, deeply
colours the variable state of his oumi mind — " llecovering
from a nervous fever, as I have since discovered by many con-

l02 Secret History of the Building of Blenheim.

current s3'-mptoms, I seem to anticipate a little of tliat
" vernal delight' which Milton mentions and thinks

able to chase

All sadness but despair —

at least 1 begin to resume my silly clue of hopes and expec-
tations."

In a former letter he had, however, given them up : '" I
begin to wean myself from all hopes and expectations what-
ever. I feed my wild-ducks, and I water my carnations,
Happy enough if I could extinguish my ambition quite, to
indulge the desire of being something more beneficial in my
sphere. — Perhaps some few other circumstances would want
also to be adjusted."

What were these " hopes and expectations," from which
sometimes he weans himself, and which are perpetually re-
vived, and are attributed to " an ambition he cannot extin-
guish" ? This article has been written in vain, if the reader
has not already perceived, that they had haunted him in early
life ; sickening his spirit after the possession of a poetical
celebrity, unattainable by his genius ; some expectations too
he might have cherished from the talent he possessed for po-
litical studies, in which Graves confidently says, that " he
would have made no inconsiderable figure, if he had had a
sufficient motive for applying his mind to them." Shenstone
has left several proofs of this talent.* But his master-pas-
sion for literary fame had produced little more than anxieties
and disappointments ; and when he indulged his pastoral
fancy in a beautiful creation on his grounds, it consumed the
estate which it adorned. Johnson forcibly expressed his
situation: " Ilis death was probably hastened by his anxie-
ties. He was a lamp that spent its oil in blazing. It is
said, that if he had lived a little longer, he would have been
assisted by a pension."

SECRET HISTORY OF THE BUILDING OF BLENHEIM.

The secret history of this national edifice derives importance
from its nature, and the remarkable characters involved in
the unparalleled transaction. The great architect, when ob-
structed in the progress of his w^ork by the irregular pay-

* See his " Letters" xl. and xli., and more particularly xlii. and xliii.,
■vith a new theory of political principles.

Secret History of the Building of Blenheim. 103

ments of the workmen, appears to have practised one of his
own comic plots to ])ut the debts on the hci'o himself; while
the duke, who had it much at heart to inhabit the palace of
his fame, but tutored into wariness under the vigilant and
fierce eye of Atossa,* would neither approve nor disapprove,
silently looked on in hope and in grief, from year to year, as
the woi'k proceeded, or as it was left at a stand. At length
we find this comedie larmoyante wound up by the duchess
herself, in an attempt utterly to ruin the enraged and insulted
architect !t

Perhaps this was the first time that it had ever been re-
solved in parliament to raise a public monument of glory and
gratitude — to an individual ! The novelty of the attempt
may serve as the only excuse for the loose arrangements
which followed after parliament had approved of the design,
without voting any specific supply for the purpose ! The
queen always issued the orders at her own expense, and
commanded expedition ; and while Anne lived, the expenses
of the building were included in her majesty's debts, as be-
longing to the civil list sanctioned by parliament. J

VVhen George the First came to the throne, the parliament
declared the debt to be the debt of the queen, and the king
granted a privy seal as for other debts. The crown and the
parliament had hitherto proceeded in perfect union respecting
this national edifice. However, I find that the workmen
were greatly in arrears ; for when George the First ascended
the throne, they gladly accepted a third part of their several
debts !

The great architect found himself amidst inextricable
ditliculties. With the fertile invention which amuses in his
comedies, he contrived an extraordinary scheme, b}" which he
proposed to make the duke himself responsible for the build-
ing of Blenheim !

*■ The name by wlileli Pope ruthlessly satirized Sarah Duchess of
Marlborough.

+ I draw the materials of this secret history from an unpublished
"Case of the Duke of Marlborough and Sir John Yanbrugh," as also from
some confidential correspondence of Yaubrugh with Jacob Tonson, his friend
and jniblijher.

X Parliament voted 500,000Z. for the building, which was insufficient.
Tlie queen added thereto the honour of Woodstock, an appanage of the
crown, on the simple condition of rendering at Windsor Castle every year
on the anniversary of the victory of Blenheim, a flag adorned with three
fleur-de-lys, "as acquittance for all manner of rents, suits and services
due to the crown,"

104 Secret History of the Building of Blenheim.

However much the duke longed to see the magnificent
cdiHce conckided, he showed tlie same cahii intrepidity in th.e
building of Blenheim as he had in its field of action. Aware
that if he himself gave any order, or suggested any alteration,
he might he involved in the expense of the building, he was
never to be circumvented — never to be surprised into a spon-
taneous emotion of pleasure or disapprobation ; on no occasion,
he declares, had he even entered into conversation with the
architect (though his friend) or with any one acting under
his orders, about Blenheim House! Such impenetrable pru-
dence on all sides had often blunted the subdolous ingenuity
of the architect and plotter of comedies !

In the absence of the duke, when abroad in 1705, Sir John
contrived to obtain from Lord Godolphin, the friend and
relative of the Duke of Marlborough, and probably his agent
in some of his concerns, a warrant, constituting Vanbrugh
siirvei/or, with power of contracting on tltc hehalf of the Duke
of Marlhoroiigli. How he prevailed on Lord Godolphin to
get this appointment does not appear — his lordship probably
conceived it was useful, and might assist in expediting the
great work, the favourite object of the hero. This warrant,
however, Vanbrugh kept entirely to himself; he never mentioned
to the duke that he was in possession of any such power ; nor,
on his return, did he claim to have it renewed.

The building proceeded with the same delays, and the pay-
ments with the same irregularity ; the veteran now foresaw
what happened, that he should never be the inhabitant of his
own house ! The public money issued from the Treasury
was never to be depended on ; and after 1712, the duke took
tlie building upon himself, for the purpose of accommodating
the workmen. Tiiey had hitherto received what was called
"crown pay," wliicli was high wages and uncertain payment
— and they now gladly abated a third of tlieir prices. But
though the duke had undertaken to pay the workmen, this
could make no alteration in the claims on the Treasury.
Blenheim was to be built for Marlborough, not hy him ; it
was a monument raised by the nation to their hero, not a palace
to be built by their mutual contributions.

Whether Marlborough found that his own million might
he slowl_y injured while the Ti'easury remained still obdurate,
or that the architect was still more and more involved, I
cannot tell ; but in 1715, the workmen appear to have struck,
and the old delay.s and stand-still again renewed. It was

Secret History of the Building of Blenheim. 105

then Sir John, for the first time, produced the warrant he
had extracted from Lord Godolphin, to lay before the
Treasury ; adding, however, a memorandum, to prevent any
misconception, that the duke was to be considered as the
paymaster, tlie debts incurred devolving on the crown. This
part of our secret history requires more development than I
am enabled to afford : as my information is drawn from " the
Case " of the Duke of Marlborough in repl}' to Sir John's
depositions, it is possible Vanbrugh may suffer more than he
ought in this narration ; which, however, incidentally notices
his own statements.

A new scene opens ! Vanbrugh not obtaining his claims
from the Treasury, and the workmen becoming more
clamorous, the architect suddenly turns round on the duke,
at once to charge him with the whole debt.

The pitiable history of this magnificent monument of
public gratitude, from its beginnings, is given by Vanbrugh
in his deposition. The great architect represents himself as
being compti'oller of her majesty's works ; and as such was
appointed to prepare a model, which model of Blenheim
House her majesty kept in her palace, and gave her commands
to issue money according to the direction of Mr. Travers, tlie
queen's surveyor-general; that the lord treasurer appointed
her majesty's own officers to supervise these works ; that it
was upon defect of money from the Treasury that the work-
men grew uneasy ; that the work was stopped, till further
orders of money from the Treasury ; that the queen then
ordered enough to secure it from winter weather ; that after-
wards she ordered more for payment of the workmen ; that
they were paid in part ; and upon Sir John's telling them the
queen's resolution to grant them a further supply {offer a
stop put to it hi/ the duchess's order), they went on and
incurred the present debt ; that this was afterwards brought
into the House of Commons as the debt of the crown, not
owing from the queen to the Duke of Marlborough, but to
the workmen, and this by the queen's officers.

During the uncertain progress of the building, and wliile
the workmen were often in deep arrears, it would seem that
the architect often designed to involve the jNlarSboroughs in
its fate and his own ; he probaldy thought that some of their
round million might bear to W chipped, to Jinish his great
work, with which, too, their glory was so intimately
connected. The famous duchess had evidently put the duke

lOG Secret History of the Building of Blenheim.

on the defensive ; but once, perhaps, was the duke on the
point of indulging some generous architectural fancy, when
lo ! Atossa stepped forwards and " put a stop to the
building."

When Vanbi'ugh at length produced the warrant of Lord
Godolphin, empowering him to contract for the duke, this
instrument was utterly disclaimed by Marlborough ; the dulie
declares it existed without his knowledge ; and that if such an
instrument for a moment was to be held valid, no man would
be safe, but might be ruined by the act of another !

Vanbrugh seems to have involved the intricacy of his plot,
till it fell into some contradictions. The queen he had not
found difficult to manage ; but after her death, when the
Treasury failed in its golden source, he seems to have sat
down to contrive how to make the duke the great debtor.
Vanbrugh swears that " He himself looked upon the crown,
as engaged to the Duke of Marlborough for the expense ; but
that he believes the workmen always looked upon the duke
as their paymaster." He advances so far, as to swear that
he made a contract with particular workmen, which contract
was not unknown to the duke. This was not denied ; but the
duke in his reply obseiwes, that " he knew not that the work-
men were employed for his account, or by his own agent :" —
never having heard till Sir John produced the warrant from
Lord Godolphin, that Sir John was "his survej'or ! " which
he disclaims.

Our architect, however opposite his depositions appear,
contrived to become a witness to such facts as tended to con-
clude the duke to be the debtor for the building ; and " in his
depositions has taken as much care to have the guilt of perjury
without the punishment of it, as any man could do." He so
managed, though he has not sworn to contradictions, that
the natural tendency of one part of his evidence presses one
way, and the natural tendency of another part presses the
direct contrary way. In his former memorial, the main
design was to disengage the duke from the debt ; in his
depositions, the main design was to charge the duke with the
debt. Vanbrugh, it must be confessed, exerted not less of
bis dramatic than his architectural genius in the building of
Blenheim !

"The Case" concludes with an eloquent reflection, where
Vanbrugh is distinguished as the man of genius, though not,
in this predicament, the man of honour. " If at last the

Secret lilstunj of the Baildiny of Blenheim. ]07

charge run into by ovJcr of tlic crown must be upon the
duke, yet the infamy of it must go upon anotlier, who was
perhaps the cnly architect in the workl capable of building
such a house ; and the only friend in the world capable of
contriving to lay the debt upon one to whom he was so
highly obliged."

There is a curious fact in the depositions of Vanbrugh, by
which we might infer that tlie idea of Blenheim House might
have originated with the duke himself; he swears that ''in
1701, the duke met him, and told him he designed to build a
house, and must consult him about a model, &c. ; but it was
the queen who ordered the present house to be built with all
expedition."

The whole conduct of this national edifice was unworthy
of the nation, if in truth the nation ever entered heartily into
it. No specific sum had been voted in parliament for so
great an undertaking ; which afterwards was the occasion of
involving all the parties concerned in trouble and litigation ;
threatened the ruin of the architect ; and 1 think we shall see,
by Vanbrugh's letters, was linished at the sole charge, and
even under the superintendence, of the duchess herself ! It
may be a question, whether this magnilicent moimment of
glory did not rather originate in the sjjirit of party, in the
urgent desire of the queen to allay the pride and jealousies of
the Marlboroughs. From the circumstance to which Van-
brugh has sworn, that the duke had designed to have a house
built by Vanbrugh, before Blenheim had been resolved on,
we may suppose that this intention of the duke's alibrdod the
queen a suggestion of a national edifice.

Archdeacon Coxe, in his Life of Marlborough, has obscurely
alluded to the circumstances attending the building of Blen-
heim. "The illness of the duke, and the tedious litigation
which ensued, caused such delays, that little progress was
made in the work at the time of his decease. In the interim
a serious misunderstanding arose between the duchess and
the architect, which forms the subject of a voluminous cor-
respondence. Vanbrugh was in consequence removed, and
the direction of the building confided to other hands, under
her own immediate superintendence."

This " voluminous correspondence " would probably allbrd
"words that burn" of the lofty insolence of Atossa, and
"thoughts that breathe" of the comic v,it ; it might too re-
late, in many curious points, to the stupendous fabric itself.

108 Secret History of the Building of Blenheim.

If hei grace condescended to criticise its parts with the
frank roughness she is known to have done to the architect
himself, his own defence and explanations might serve to
let us into the bewildering fancies of his magical architecture.
Of that self-creation for which he was so much abused in his
own day as to have lost his real avocation as an architect,
and stands condemned for posterity in the volatile bitterness
of Lord Orford, nothing is left for us but our own convictions
— to behold, and to be for ever astonished! — But "this
voluminous correspondence?" Alas! the historian of war
and politics overlooks with contempt the little secret his-
tories of art and of human nature ! — and " a voluminous
correspondence" which indicates so much, and on which not a
solitary idea is bestowed, has only served to petrify our
curiosity !

Of this quarrel between the famous duchess and Vanbrugh
I have only recovered several vivacious extracts from confi-
dential letters of Vanbrugh's to Jacob Tonson. There was
an equality of the genius of invention, as well as rancour, in
her grace and the wit : whether Atossa, like Vanbrugh, could
have had the patience to have composed a comedy of five
acts I will not determine ; but unquestionably she could have
dictated many scenes with equal spirit. We have seen Vrnv
brugh attempting to turn the debts incurred by the buildinj^
of Blenheim on the duke ; we now learn, for the first time,
that the duchess, with equal aptitude, contrived a counterplot
to turn the debts on Vanbrugli !

"I have the misfortune of losing, for I now see little hopes
of ever getting it, near 2(J00Z. due to me for many years'
service, plague, and ti-ouble, at Blenheim, which that wicked
woman of ' Marlborough' is so far from paying me, that the
duke being sued by some of the workmen for work done there,
t^he has tried to turn the debt due to them upon me, for which
I think she ought to be hanged."

In 1722, on occasion of the duke's death, Vanbrugh gives
an account to Tonson of the great wealth of the Marlboroughs,
with a caustic touch at his illustrious victims.

" The Duke of Marlborough's treasure exceeds the most
extravagant guess. The grand settlement, which it was sus-
pected her grace had broken to pieces, stands good, and hands
an immense wealth to Lord Godolphin and his successors. A
round million has been moving about in loans on the land-
tax, &c. This the Treasury knew before he died, and thia

Secret History of tne Building of Blenheim. ] 09

was exclusive of his 'land ;' his 5000/. a ycai- upon the post-
office; his mortgages upon a distressed estate ; his South-Sea
stock ; his annuities, and which were not subscribed in, and
besides what is in foreign banks ; and 3'ct this man could
neither pay his workmen their bills, nor his architect his
salary.

" He has given his widow (may a Scottish ensign get her I)
lOjOOOZ. a year to spoil Blenheim her oicn way ; 12,000/. a
3'ear to keep herself clean and go to law ; 2000/. a year to
Lord Kialton for present maintenance; and Lord Godolphin
only 5000/. a year jointure, if he outlives my lady : this last
is a wretched article. The rest of the heap, for these arc but
snippings, goes to Lord Godolphin, and so on. She will have
40,000/. a year in present."

Atossa, as the quarrel heated and the plot thickened, with
the maliciousness of Puck, and the haughtiness of an empress
of Blenheim, invented the most cruel insult that ever archi-
tect endured ! — one perl'ectly characteristic of that extraordi-
nary woman. Yanbrugh went to Blenheim witli his lady, in
a company from Castle Howard, another magnificent monu-
ment of his singular genius.

" We staid two nights in Woodstock ; but there was an
order to the servants, under her qrace's own hand, not to let
me enter Blenheim ! and lest that should not mortify me
enough, she having somehow learned that my ivife, was ot
the companj'', sent an express the night before we came there,
with orders that if she came with the Castle Howard ladies,
the servants should not suffer her to see either house, gardens,
or even to enter the park : so she was forced to sit all day
long and keep me company at the inn !"

This was a coup-de-thtdtre in this joint comedy of Atossa
and Vanbrugh ! The architect of Blenheim, lifting his eyes
towards his own massive grandeur, exiled to a dull inn, and
imprisoned with one who required rather to be consoled, than
capable of consoling tlie enraged architect !

In 1725, Atossa still pursuing her hunted prey, had driven
it to a spot which she llattered herself would enclose it with
the security of a preserve. This produced the following
explosion !

" I have been forced into chancery by that B. B. B. the
Duchess of Marlborough, where she has got an injunction
upon me by her friend the late good chancellor (Earl of Mac-
clesfield), who declared that I was never employed by the

110 Secret History of the BuUding of Blenheim.

duke, and therefore had no demand upon his estate for my
services at Blenheim. Since my hands were thus tied up
from trying- by law to recover my arrear, I have prevailed
with Sir Eohert Walpole to help me in a scheme which 1 2>ro-
2)osecl tohim,hy ichich I got ony money in spite of the hussy's
teeth. My carrying this point enrages her much, and the
more because it is of considerable weight in my small fortune,
which she has heartily endeavoured so to destroy as to throw
me into an English Bastile, there to linish my da^'s, as /
began them, in a French one."

Plot for plot ! and the superior claims of one of practised
invention are vindicated ! The writer, long accustomed to
comedy-writing, has excelled the self-taught genius of Atossa.
The "scheme" by which Vanbrugh's fertile invention, aided
by Sir Robert Walpole, finally cii'cumvented the avaricious,
the haughty, and the capricious Atossa, remains untold, unless
it is alluded to by the passage in Lord Orford's " Anecdotes
of Painting," where he informs us that the "duchess quar-
relled with Sir John, and went to law with him ; but though
he proved to he in the right, or rather hecatise he proved to be
in the right, she employed Sir Christopher Wren to build
the house in St. James's Park."

I have to add a curious discovery respecting Vanbrugh
himself, which explains a circumstance in his life not hitherto
understood.

In all the biographies of Vanbrugh, from the time of
Gibber's Lives of the Poets, the early part of the life of this
man of genius remains unknown. It is said he descended
from an ancient family in Cheshire, which came originally
from France, though by the name, which properly written
would be Van Brugh, he would appear to be of Dutch exti'ac-
tion. A tale is universally repeated tliat Sir John once
visiting France in the prosecution of his architectural studies,
while taking a survey of some fortifications, excited alarm,
and was carried to the Bastile : where, to deepen the interest
of the story, he sketched a variety of comedies, which he
must liave communicated to the governor, who, whispering it
doubtless as an affair of state to several of the noblesse, these
admirers of " sketches of comedies" — English ones no doubt
— procured the release of this English Moliere. This tale is
further confirmed by a very odd circumstance. Sir John
built at Greenwich, on a spot still called " Van Brugh's
Fields," two whimsical housas j one on the side of Greenwich

Sca-et ITislory of Sir Walter Rawle'ifjh. ] 1 1

Park is still called "the Bastlle-IIouse," built on its model,
to commemorate this imprisonment.

Not a word of this detailed story is probably true ! that
the Bastile was an object which sometimes occupied the ima«
gination of our architect, is probable ; for by the letter we
have just quoted, we discover from himself the sint^ular inci-
dent of Vanbrugh's having been born in the Bastite*

Desirous, probably, of concealing his alien origin, this cir-
cumstance cast his early days into obscurity. He felt that
he was a Briton in all respects but that of his singular birth.
The father of Vanbrugh married Sir Dudley Carleton's
daughter. We are told he had "political connexions ;" and
one of his " political" tours had probably occasioned his con-
finement in that state-dungeon, where his lady was delivered
of her burden of love. This odd fancy of building a " Bas-
tile-House " at Greenwich, a fortified prison ! suggested to
his first life-writer the fine romance ; which must now be
thrown aside among those literary fictions the French distin-
guish by the softening and yet impudent term of " Anecdotes
hasardees !" with, which, formerly Varillas and his imitators
furnished their pages ; lies which looked like facts !

SECRET HISTORY OF SIR WALTER RAWLEIGH.f

RA.WLEIGK exercised in perfection incompatible talents, and
his character connects the opposite extremes of our nature !

* Cunningham, in Lis " Lives of the British Architects," does not in-
cline to the conclusions above drawn. He says, "I suspect that Van-
brugh, in saying he began his days in the Bastile, meant only that he was
its tenant in early life — at the commencement of his manhood." The
same author tells us that Vanbrugh's grandfather fled from Ghent, his
native city, to avoid the persecutions of the Duke of Alva, and established
himself as a merchant in Walbrook, where his son lived after him, and
where John Vanbrugh (afterwards the great architect) was born in the
year 10G6. His fatlier was at this time Comptroller of the Treasury
Chamber. Cunningham thinks the Cheshire part of the genealogy " un-
likely to be true."

+ Rawleigh, as was much practised to a much later period, wrote his
name various ways. I have discovered at least how it was pronounced in
his time — thus, Raidij. This may be additionally confirmed by the Scot-
tish poet Drummond, who spells it (in his conversations with Ben Jonsoa)
Ran;//ilcij. Tiio translation of Ortelius' ' ' Epitome of the Wurldo," 1003,
is dedicated to Sir Walter JRaiviei'jh. See vol. ii. p. 2()1, art. "Ortho-
graphy of Pi-oper Names." It was also written liawli/ by his contempo-
raries. He sometimes wrote it lialajh, the last syllable prob.-^bly prj-
tiouuced h/, or hiy. Rulcyh H])\AA\t on his olliciiil seal,

] 1.2 Secret History of Sir Walter Raicleiyh.

His " Book of Life," with its incidents of prosperity u!.«l
adversit}'', of glory and humiliation, was as chequered as the
novelist would desire for a tale of fiction. Yet in this mighty
genius there lies an unsuspected disposition, which requires
to be demonstrated, before it is possible to conceive its reality.
From his earliest days, probably by his eai-l}' reading of the
romantic incidents of the first Spanish adventurers in the
New World, he himself betrayed the genius of an adventurer,
which prevailed in his character to the latest ; and it often
involved him in the practice of mean artifices and petty
deceptions ; which appear like folly in the wisdom of a sage ;
like ineptitude in the profound views of a politician ; like
cowardice in the magnanimity of a hero ; and degrade by
their littleness the grandeur of a character which was closed
by a splendid death, worthy the life of the wisest and the
greatest of mankind !

The sunshine of his days was in the reign of Elizabeth.
From a boy, always dreaming of romantic conquests (for he
was born in an age of heroism), and formed by nature for the
chivalric gallantry of the court of a maiden queen, from the
moment he with such infinite art cast his rich mantle over
the miry spot, his life was a progress of glory. All about
Eawleigh was as splendid as the dress he wore : his female
sovereign, whose eyes loved to dwell on men who might have
been fit subjects for "the Faerie Queene" of Spenser, penu-
rious of reward, only recompensed her favourites by suffering
them to make their own fortunes on sea and land ; and Eliza-
beth listened to the glowing projects of her hero, indulging
that spirit which could have conquered the world, to have
laid the toy at the feet of the sovereign !

This man, this extraordinary being, who was prodigal of
his life and fortune on the Spanish Main, in the idleness
of peace could equally direct his invention to supply the
domestic wants of every-day life, in his project of " an office
for address." Nothing was too high for his ambition, nor
too humble for his genius. Pre-eminent as a military and a
naval commander, as a statesman and a student, liawleigh
was as intent on forming the character of Prince Henry, as
that jmnce was studious of moulding his own aspiring quali-
ties by the genius of the friend whom he contemplated. Yet
the active life of Rawleigh is not more remarkable than his
contemplative one. He may well rank among the founders
of our literature; for composing on a subject exciting little

1

Secret Histonj of tSir IVultcr Rawleiyh. 113

interest, his fine genius has sealed his untinislied volume with
immortality. For magnificence of eloquence, and massive-
ness of thought, we must still dwell on his pages.* Such
was the man who was the adored patron of Spenser ; whom
Ben Jonson, proud of calling other favourites " his sons,"
honoured by tlie title of " his father;" and who left political
instructions which Milton deigned to edit.

But how has it happened that, of so elevated a character,
Gibbon has pronounced that it was " ambiguous," while it is
described by Hume as " a great but ill-regulated mind !"

Tliere was a peculiarity in the character of this eminent
man ; he practised the cunning of an aduenturer — a cunning
most humiliating in tlie narrative ! The great difficulty to
overcome in this discovery is, how to account for a sage and
a hero acting folly and cowardice, and attempting to obtain
by circuitous deception what it may be supposed so mag-
nanimous a spirit would only deign to possess himself of by
direct and open methods.

Since the present article was written, a letter, hitherto
unpublished, appears in the recent edition of Shakspeare
which curiousl}- and minutely records one of those artifices
of the kind which I am about to narrate at length. When,
under Elizabeth, Rawleigh was once in confinement, it
appears that seeing the queen passing by, he was suddenly
seized with a strange resolution of combating with the
governor and his people, declaring that the mere sight of
the queen had made him desperate, as a confined lover would
feel at the sight of his mistress. The letter gives a minute
narrative of Sir Walter's astonishing conduct, and carefully
repeats the warm romantic style in which he talked of his
royal mistress, and his formal resolution to die rather than
e.xist out of her presence. t This extravagant scene, with all

* I shall give in the article " Literary Unions" a curious account how
" Rawleigh 's History of the World" was composed, which has hitherto
escaped discovery.

+ It is narrated in a letter to Sir llobert Cecil from Mr. (afterwards Sir)
Arthur Gorges, and runs as fallows : — "Upon a report of her majesty's
being at Sir George Carew's, Sir W. Ralegh having gazed aud sighed a long
time at his study window, from whence he might discern the bai'ges and
boats about the Blackfriars stairs, suddenly brake out into a great dis-
temper, and sware that his enemies had on purpose brought her majesty
thither to break his gall in sunder with Tantalus's torments, that when
she went away he might see death before his eyes ; with many such like
cunceits. Aud, as a man transported with passion, he sware to Sir
Ge nge Carew that he WuulJ disguise himself, and get int.. a pair of oara

VOL. Hi. 1

114 Secret History of Sir Walter Rawleigh.

its cunning, has been most elaborately penned by the inge-
nious letter-writer, with a hint to the person whom he
addresses, to suffer it to meet the eye of their royal mistress,
who could not fail of admiring our new " Orlando Furioso,"
and soon after released this tender prisoner! To me it is
evident that the whole scene was got up and concerted for
the occasion, and w-as the invention of Eawleigh himself;
the romantic incident he well knew was perfectly adapted to
the queen's taste. Another similar incident, in which I have
been anticipated in the disclosure of the fact, though not of
its nature, was what Sir Toby Matthews obscurely alludes to
in his letters, of " the guilt}^ blow he gave himself in the
Tower;" a passage which had long excited my attention, till
I discovered the curious incident in some manuscript letters
of Lord Cecil. Rawleigh was then confined in the Tower for
the Cobham conspiracy ; a plot so absurd and obscure that
one historian has called it a " state-riddle," but for which, so
many years after, Rawleigh so cruelly lost his life.

Lord Cecil gives an account of the examination of the
prisoners involved in this conspiracy. " One afternoon, whilst
divers of us w-ere in the Tower examining some of these
prisoners. Sir Walter attempted to murder Idmsetf; whereof,
when we were advertised, we came to him, and found him in
some agony to be unable to endure his misfortunes, and pro-
testing innocency, w^ith carelessness of life ; and in that
humour lie had icoicnded himself under the right 'j)U]), hut no
loay mortally^ heing in truth rather a cut than a stab, and now
very well cured both in body and mind."* This feeble attempt
at suicide, this " cut rather than stab," I must place among
those scenes in the life of Rawleigh so incomprehensible with
the genius of the man. If it were nothing but one of those
Fears of the Brave !

(

to ease his mind but with a sight of the queen, or else he protested his
heart would break." This of course the gaoler refused, and so they
fell to fighting, " scrambling and brawling like madmen," until parted by
Gorges. Sir Walter followed up his absurdity by another letter to Cecil,
couched in the language of romance, in which he declares that, while the
queen "was yet near at hand, that I might hear of her once in two or three
days my sorrows were the less, but now my heart is cast into the depth of
e11 misery."

* These letters were written by Lord Cecil to Sir Thomas Pairy, our
uuibassador in France, and were transcribed from the copy-book of Sir
Thomas Parry's corrrespondence which is preserved in the Pepysian library
U Cambridge.

Secret History of Sir I Fuller Rawlei<jh. 115

we must now open another of tlie

Follies of the Wise !

Rawleigh returned from the wild and desperate voyage of
Guiana, with misery in every shape ahout liini.* His son
had perished ; his devoted Keymis would not survive his
reproach ; and Ilawleigh, without fortune and without hope,
in sickness and in sorrow, hrooded over the sad thouglit, that
in the hatred of the Spaniard, and in the political pusilla-
nimity of James, he was arriving only to meet'inevitahle
death. With this presentiment, he had even wished to give
up his ship to the crew, had they consented to land him in
France ; but he was probably irresolute in this decision at
sea, as he was afterwards at land, where he wished to escape,
and refused to fly : the clearest intellect was darkened, and
magnanimity itself became humiliated, floating between the
sense of honour and of life.

Eawleigh landed in his native county of Devon : his arrival
was the common topic of conversation, and he was the object
of censure or of commiseration : but his person was not
molested, till the fears of James became more urgent than
his pity.

The Cervantic Gondomar, whose "quips and quiddities"
had concealed the cares of state, one day rushed into the
presence of James, breathlessly calling out for "audience!"
and compressing his " ear-piercing" message into the laconic
abruptness of " i^iratas ! piratas ! piratas!" There was agony
as well as politics in this crj' of Gondomar, whose brother,
the Spanish governor, had been massacred in this predatory
expedition. t The timid monarch, terrilied at this tragical
appearance of his facetious friend, saw at once the demands
of the whole Spanish cabinet, and vented his palliative in a
gentle proclamation. Rawleigh having settled his affairs in

* He had undertaken the expedition immediately upon his release from
the Tower in 1617. The king liad never pardoned him, and his release
was eflfected by bribing powerful court favourites, who worked upon the
avarice of James I. by leading him to hope for the possession of Guiana,
wliich, though discovered by the Spaniards, had never been conquered by
them ; and wliich Rawleigh promised to colonise.

t This occurred during the attack on the towni of St. Thomas ; a settle-
ment of the Spaniards near the gold mines. It ended disastrously to
Rawleign : his ships mutinied ; and he never recovered his ill-fortune ;
but sailed to Newfoundland, and thence, after a second mutiny, returuei
to Plymouth.

I 2

116 Secret History of Sir Walter Raivleigh.

the west, set off for London to appear before the king, in
consequence of the proclamation. A few miles from Ply-
mouth he was met hy Sir Lewis Stucley, vicc-adniii-iil of
Devon, a kinsman and a friend, who, in communication with
government, had accepted a sort of surveillance over Sir
"Walter. It is said (and will be credited, when we hear the
story of Stucley), that he had set his heart on the sliip, as a
probable good purchase ; and on the person, against whom,
to colour his natural treachery, he professed an old hatred.
He first seized on Rawleigh more like the kinsman tlian the
vice-admiral, and proposed travelling together to London, and
baiting at the houses of the friends of Eawleigh. The war-
rant which Stucley in the meanwhile had desired was instantly
despatched, and the bearer was one Manoury, a French em-
piric, who was evidently sent to act the part he did— a part
played at all times, and the last title, in French politics, that
so often had recourse to this instrument of state, is a Mouton !

Rawleigh still, however, was not placed under any harsh
restraint : his confidential associate, Captain King, accom-
panied him ; and it is probable, that if Eawleigh had effectu-
ated his escape, he would have conferred a great favoui' ou
the government.

They could not save him at London. It is certain that
he might have escaped ; for Captain King had hired a vessel,
And liawleigh had stolen out by night, and might have
reached it, but irresolutely returned home ; another night,
the same vessel was ready, but Rawleigh never came ! The
loss of his honour appeared the greater calamity.

As he advanced in this eventful journey, everything assumed
a more formidable aspect. His i'riends communicated fearful
advices ; a pursuivant, or king's messenger, gave a more
menacing appearance ; and suggestions arose in his own mind,
that he was reserved to become a victim of state. When
letters of commission from the Privy Council were brought
to Sir Lewis Stucley, Rawleigh was observed to change coun-
tenance, exclaiming with an oath, " Is it possible my fortune
should return upon me thus again?" He lamented, before
Captain King, that he had neglected the opportunity of
escape ; and which, every day he advanced inland, removed
hitn the more from any chance.

liawleigh at first suspected that Manomy was one of those
mstruments of state who are sometimes employed when o]K'u
measures are not to be pursued, or when the cabinet have not

Secret H'txtory oj Sir Walter Rawleigh. 1 17

yet determined on the fate of a person implicated in a state
crime; in a word, Rawleigh thought that Manoury was a spy
over him, and probahly over Stucley too. The first impres-
sion in these matters is usually the right one ; but when
Rawleigh found himself caught in the toils, he imagined that
such corrupt agents were to be corrupted. The French em-
piric was sounded, and found very compliant ; Rawleigh was
desirous by his aid to counterfeit sickness, and for this pur-
pose invented a series of the most humiliating stratagems.
He imagined that a constant appearance of sickness might
produce delay, and procrastination, in the chapter of accidents,
might end in pardon. He procured vomits from the French-
man, and, whenever he chose, produced every appearance of
sickness; with dimness of sight, dizziness in his head, he
reeled about, and once struck himself with such violence
against a pillar in the galkay, that there was no doubt of his
malad3^ Rawleigh's servant one morning entering Stucley's
chamber, declared that his master was out of his senses, for
that he had just left him in his shirt upon all fours, gnawing
the rushes upon the floor. On Stucley's entrance, Rawleigh
was ravmg, and reeling in strong convulsions. Stucley ordered
liim to be chafed and fomented, and Rawleigh afterwards
laughed at this scene with Manoury, observing that he had
made Stucley a perfect physician.

But Rawleigh found it required some more visible and
alarming disease than such ridiculous scenes had exhibited.
The vomits worked so slowly, that Manoury was fearful to
repeat the doses. Rawleigh inquired whether the empiric
knew of any preparation which could make him look ghastly,
without injuring his health. The Frenchman offered a harm-
less ointment to act on the surface of the skin, which would
give him the appearance of a leper. " That will do !" said
Rawleigh, " for the lords will be afraid to approach me, and
besides it will move their pity." Applying the ointment
to his brows, his arms, and his breast, the blisters rose, the
skin inflamed, and was covered with purple spots. Stucley
concluded that Rawleigh had the plague. Physicians were
now to be called in ; Rawleigh took the black silk ribbon
from his poniard, and INIanoury tightened it strongly about
his arm, to disorder his pulse ; but his pulse beat too strong
and regular. He appeared to take no food, while Manoury
secretly provided him. To perplex the learned doctors still
more, Rawleigli had the urinal coloured by a drug of a strong

118 Secret History of Sir Walter Ratokigh.

scent. The physicians pronounced the disease mortal, and
that the patient could not be removed into the air witliout
immediate danger. Awhile after, being in his bed-chamber
•undressed, and no one present but Manoury, Sir Walter held
a looking-glass in his hand to admire his spotted face,* and
observed in merriment to his new confidant, " how they
should one day laugh for having thus cozened the king,
council, physicians, Spaniards, and all." The excuse Eaw-
leigh offered for this course of poor stratagems, so unworthy
of his genius, was to obtain time and seclusion for writing
his Apology, or Vindication of his Voyage, which has come
down to us in his "Remains." "The prophet David did
make himself a fool, and suffei-ed spittle to fall upon his
beard, to escape from the hands of his enemies," said Raw-
leigh in his last speech. Brutus, too, was another example.
But his discernment often prevailed over this mockery of his
spirit. The king licensed him to reside at his own house on
his arrival in London ; on which Manoury observed that the
king showed by this indulgence that his majesty was favour-
ably inclined towards him ; but Eawleigh rephed, " They used
all these kinds of flatteries to the Duke of Biron, to draw
him fairly into prison, and then they cut off his head.^ I
know they have concluded among them that it is expedient
that a man should die, to re-assure the traffick which I have
broke with Spain." And Manoury adds, from whose narra-
tive we have all these particulars, that Sir Walter broke out
into this rant : " If he could but save himself for this time,
he would plot such plots as should make the king think hini-
self happy to send for him again, and restore him to his
estate, and would force the King of Spain to write into
England in his favour."

liawleigh at length proposed a flight to France with
Manoury, who declares it was then he revealed to Stucley
what he had hitherto concealed, that Stucley might double
his vigilance. Eawleigh now perceived that he had two
rogues to bribe instead of one, and that they were playing
into one another's hands. Proposals are now made to Stucley
through Manoury, who is as compliant as his brother-knave.

* A friend informs me, that he saw recently at a print-dealer's a, painted
porlraii of Sir Walter liawleigh, with the face thus spotted. It is extra-
ordinary that any artist should have chosen such a subject for his pencil ;
but should this be a portrait of the times, it shows that this strange stra-
tagem had excited public attention.

Secret History of Sir I falter Ruwhi(jh. 119

Rawk'igh presented Stucley with a "jewel made in the fashiou
of hail powdered with diamonds, with a ruby in the midst."
But Stucley observing to his kinsman and friend, that he
must lose his office of vice-admiral, which had cost him six
hundred pounds, in case he suffered Ilawleigh to escape ;
Kawleigh solemnly assured him that he should be no loser,
and that his lady should give hivn one thousand pounds when
they got into France or Holland. Ahout this time the
Frencli quack took his leave : the part he had to act was pei--
formed : the juggle was complete : and two wretches had
triumphed over the sagacity and magnanimity of a sage
and a hero, whom misfortune had levelled to folly ; and who,
in violating the dignity of his own character, had only
equalled himself with vulgar knaves; men who exulted that
the circumventer was circumvented ; or, as they expressed it,
'• the great cozener was cozened." But our story does not here
conclude, for the treacheries of Stucley were more intricate.
This perfect villain had obtained a warrant of indemnity to
authorise his compliance with any offer to assist Rawleigh in
his escape ; this wretch was the confidant and the executioner
of Kawleigh ; he carried about him a license to betray him,
and was making his profit of the victim before he delivered
him to the sacrifice. Kawleigh was still plotting his escape;
at Salisbury he had despatched his confidential friend Captain
King to London, to secure a boat at Tilbury ; he had also a
secret interview with the French agent. Kawleigh's servant
mentioned to Captain King, that his boatswain had a ketch*
of his own, and was ready at his service for "thirty pieces of
silver;" the boatswain and Kawleigh's servant acted Judas,
and betrayed the plot to Mr. William Herbert, cousin to
Stucley, and thus the treachery was kept among themselves
as a family concern. The night for flight was now fixed,
but he could not part without his friend Stucley, who had
promised never to quit him ; and who indeed, informed by
his cousin Herbert, had suddenly surprised Kawleigh putting-
on a false beard. The part}^ met at the appointed place ; Sit
Lewis Stucley with his son, and Kawleigh disguised. Stucley,
in saluting King, asked whether he had not shown himself
an honest man ? King hoped he would continue so. They
had not rowed twenty strokes, before the watermen observed,

* A small coastlug-vessel, made round at stem and stern like tbe Dutcli
boats. The word is still used in some English counties to denote a
tvb.

120 Secret History of Sir Walter Ruwleigh.

that jMr. Herbert had lately taken boat, and made towards
the bridge, but had returned down the river after them.
Eawleigh instantly expressed his apprehensions, and wished
to return home ; he consulted King — the watermen took
fright — Stucley acted his part well ; damning his ill-fortune
to have a friend whom he would save, so full of doubts and
fears, and threatening to pistol the watermen if thej^ did noc
proceed. Even King was overcome by the earnest conduct
of Stueley, and a new spirit was infused into the rowers. As
the}' drew near Gi'eenwich a wherry crossed them. Rawleigh
declared it came to discover them. King tried to allay his
fears, and assured him that if once they reached Gravesend,
he would hazard his life to get to 'J'ilbur}^ But in these
delays and discussions, the tide was failing ; the watermen
declared they could not reach Gravesend before morning;
Ivawleigh would have landed at Purfleet, and the boatswain
encouraged him ; for there it was thought he could procure
horses for Tilbury. Sir Lewis Stucley too was zealous ; and
declared he was content to carry the cloak-bag on his own
shoulders, for half-a-mile, but King declared that it was
useless, they could not at that hour get horses to go by
land.

They rowed a mile beyond Woolwich, approaching two or
three ketches, when the boatswain doubted whether any of
these were the one he had provided to furnish them. " We
are betrayed !" cried Eawleigh, and ordered the watermen to
row back : he strictly examined the boatswain ; alas ! his
ingenuity was baffled by a shuffling villain, whose real an-
swer appeared when a wherry hailed the boat : Rawleigh
observed that it contained Herbert's crew. He saw that all
was now discovered. He took Stucley aside ; his ingenious
mind still suggesting projects for himself to return home in
safety, or how Stucley might plead that he had only pre-
tended to go with Rawleigh, to seize on his private papers.
They whispered together, and Rawleigh took some things
from his pocket, and handed them to Stucley ; ])robably more
" rubies powdered with diamonds." — Some effect was in-
stantaneously produced ; for the tender heart of his friend
Stucley relented, and he not only repeatedly embraced him
with extraordinary warmth of affection, but was voluble in
effusions of friendship and fidelity. Stucley persuaded Raw-
leigh to land at Gravesend, the strange wherry which had
clogged them landing at the same time ; these were people

Secret History of Sir IValfcr Rawh-iyh. ^1\

lielonging to ^\y. Herbert and Sir William St. Jolin, wlio, it
Boems, had formerly shared in the spoils of this unhappy hero.
Ou Greenwieh bridge, Stucley advised Captain King'that it
would be advantageous to Sir AValter, that King should
confess that he had joined with Stucley to betray his master;
and Rawleiuli lent himself to the suggestion of Stuele}', of
whose treachery he might still be uncertain ; but King, a
rough and honest seaman, declared that he would not share
in the odium. At the moment he refused, Stucley arrested
the captain in the king's name, committing him to the charge
of Herbert's men. They then proceeded to a tavern, but
Eawleigh, who now viewed the monster in his true shape,
observed, " Sir Lewis, these actions will not turn out to your
credit ;" and on the following day, when they passed through
the Tower-gate, Eawleigh, turning to King, observed,
" Stucley and my servant Cotterell have betrayed me. You
need be in no fear of danger, but as for me, it is I who am
the mark that is shot at." Thus concludes the narrative of
Captain King. The fate of Rawleigh soon verified the pre-
diction.

This long narrative of treachery will not, however, be
complete, unless we wind it up with the fate of the infamous
Stucley. Fiction gives perfection to its narratives, by the
privilege it enjoys of disposing of its criminals in the most
exemplary manner ; but the labours of the historian are not
always refreshed by this moral pleasure. Retribution is not
always discovered in the present stage of human existence,
yet history is perhaps equally delightful as fiction, whenever
its perfect catastrophes resemble those of romantic invention.
The present is a splendid example.

I have discovered the secret history of Sir Lewis Stucley,
in several manuscript letters of the times.

Rawleigh, in his admirable address from the scaffold, where
he seemed to be rather one of the spectators than the suf-
ferer, declared he forgave Sir Lewis, for he had forgiven all
men ; but he was bound in charity to caution all men against
him, and such as he is! Rawleigh's last and solemn notice
of the treachery of his "kinsman and friend" was irrevo-
cably fatal to this wretch. The hearts of the people were
open to the deepest impressions of sympathy, melting into
tears at the pathetic address of the magnanimous spirit who
had touched them ; in one moment Sir Lewis Stucley became
an object of execration throughout the nation ;. he soon ob-

1.2.2 Secret History of Sir Walter Bawleigh.

tained a new title, that of " Sir Judas," and was shunned by
every man. To remove the Cain-Hke mark, which God and
men had fixed on him, he puUished an apology for his con-
duct ; a performance which, at least for its ability, might
raise him in our consideration ; but I have since discovered, in
one of the manuscript letter-writers, that it was written by
Dr. Sharpe, who had been a chaplain to Henrj'' Prince of
Wales, The writer pleads in Stucley's justification, that he
was a state-agent ; that it was lawful to lie for the discovery
of treason ; that he had a personal hatred towards Kawleigh,
for having abridged his father of his share of some prize-
money ; and then enters more into Eawleigh's character, who
" being desperate of any fortune here, agreeable to the height
of his mind, would have made up his fortune elsewhere, upon
any terms against his sovereign and his countxy. Is it not
marvel," continues the personifier of Stucley, " that he was
angry with me at his death for bringing him back ? Be-
sides, being a man of so great a wit, it was no small grief
that a man of mean wit as I should be thought to go beyond
him. No ? Sic ars deluditiir arte. Neqiie enim lex justior
2iUa est muim necis artifices arte perire sua. [This apt
latinity betrays Dr. Sharpe.] But wh}' did 3'ou not execute
your commission bravely [openly] ? — Why ? My commis-
sion was to the contrary, to discover his pretensions, and to
seize his secret papers," &c.*

But the doctor, though no unskilful writer, here wrote in
vain ; for what ingenuity can veil the turpitude of long and
practised treachery ? To keep up appearances. Sir Judas re-
sorted more than usually to court ; where, however, he was
perpetually enduring rebuifs, or avoided, as one infected with
the plague of treachery. He offered the king, in his own
justification, to take the sacrament, that whatever he had laid
to E,awleigh's charge was true, and would produce two un-
exceptionable witnesses to do the like. " Why, then," re-
plied his majesty, " the more malicious was Sir Walter to
utter these speeches at his death." Sir Thomas Badger, who
stood by, observed, " Let the king take ofi" Stucley's head, as
Stucley has done Sir Walter's, and let him at his death take
the sacrament and his oath upon it, and I'll believe him ; but
till Stucley loses his head, 1 shall credit Sir Walter Raw-
leigh's bare afiirmative before a thousand of Stucley's oaths."

* Stucley's Humble Petition, touching the bringing up Sir \V. Eawleigh,
4to. 1618 ; republished ia Somers' Tract.s, Vul. iii. 701.

Secret History of Sir Walter Rawleif/h. 123

When Stuc'lc}'', on pretence of giving an account of his office,
placed himself in the audience chamber of the lord admiral,
and his lordship passed him without any notice, Sir Judas
attempted to address the carl ; but with a bitter look his
lordship exclaimed — " Base fellow ! darest thou, who art the
scorn and contempt of men, offer thyself in my presence ?
Were it not in my own house, I would cudgel thee witli my
staff for presuming on this sauciness." This annihilating
affront Stucley hastened to convey to the king ; his majesty
answered him — " What wouldst thou have me do ? Wouldst
thou have me hang him ? Of m}' soul, if I should hang all
that speak ill of thee, all the trees of the country would not
suffice, so great is the number!"

One of the frequent crimes of that age, ere the forgery of
bank-notes existed, was the clipping of gold ; and this was
one of the private amusements suitable to the character of
our Sir Judas. Treachery and forgery are the same crime in
a different form. Stucley received out of the exchequer five
hundred pounds, as the reward of his espionnar/e and perfid}'.
It was the price of blood, and was hardly in his hands ere it
w'as turned into the fraudulent coin of "the cheater !" He
was seized on in the palace of Whitehall, for diminishing the
gold coin. " The manner of the discovery," says the manu-
script-writer, " was strange, if my occasions would suffer me
to relate the particulars." On his examination he attempted
to shift the crime to his own son, who bad lied ; and on his
man, who, being taken, in the words of the letter-writer, was
" willing to set the saddle upon the right horse, and accused
his master." Manoury, too, the French empiric, was ar-
rested at Plymouth for the same crime, and accused his
worthy friend. But such was the interest of Stucley with
government, bought, probabl}', with his last shilling, and, as
one says, with his last shirt, that he obtained his own and
his son's pardon, for a crime that ought to have finally con-
cluded the history of this blessed family.* A more solemn
and tragical catastrophe was reserved for the perfidious Stuc-
ley. He was deprived of his place of vice-admiral, and left
destitute in the world. Abandoned by all human beings, and

* The anecdotes respectiug Stucley I have Jeriveil from manuscript
letters, and they were considered to be of so dangerous a nature, that the
writer recommends secrecy, and requests, after reading, that "they may
lie burnt." With such injunctions I have generally found that the letters
wore tlie more carefully preserved.

124 Narrative of the Last Hours

most probabl}' by the son whom he had tutored lu the arts
of villany, he appears to have wandered about, an infamous
and distracted beggar. It is possible that even so seared a
conscience may have retained some remaining touch of sensi-
bility.

All are men,
Condemned alike to groan ;
The tender for another's pain,
The unfeeling for his own.

And Camden has recorded, among his historical notes on
James the First, that in August, 1G20, " Lewis Stucley, who
betrayed Sir Walter Rawleigh, died in a manner mad." Such
is the catastrophe of one of the most perfect domestic tales ;
an historical example, not easily paralleled, of moral retribu-
tion.

The secret practices of the " Sir Judas" of the court of
Jamci the First, which I have discovered, throw light on an
old tradition which still exists in the neighbourhood of AfFe-
ton, once the residence of this w^retched man. The country
people have long entertained a notion that a hidden treasure
lies at the bottom of a well in his grounds, guarded by some
supernatural power : a tradition no doubt originating in this
man's history, and an obscure allusion to the gold which
Stucley received for his bribe, or the other gold which he
clipped, and might have there concealed. This is a striking
instance of the many historical facts which, though entirely
unknown or forgotten, may be often discovered to lie hid, or
disguised, in popular traditions.

AN AUTHENTIC NARRATIVE OF THE LAST HOURS OP
SIR WALTER RAWLEIGH.

The close of the lift; of Sir Walter Rawleigh was as extra-
ordinary as many parts of his varied history ; the promptitude
and sprightliness of his genius, his carelessness of life, and
the equanimity of this great spirit in quitting the world, can
onlv be paralleled by a lew other heroes and sages. Raw-
leigh was both ! But it is not simply his dignified yet active
conduct on the scaffold, nor his admirable speech on that
occasion, circumstances by which many great men are judged,
when their energies are excited for a moment to act so great

of Sir UValter Rawlciy/t. 125

a part, before the eyes of the world assembled at their feet ;
it is not these only which claim our notice.

We may jiause with admiration on the real grandeur of
Rawleigh's character, not from a single circumstance, however
great, but from a tissue of continued little incidents, which
occurred from the moment of his condemnation till he laid
his head on the block, liawleigh was a man of such mark,
that he deeply engaged the attention of his contemporaries ;
and to this we owe the preservation of several iuteresting
particulars of what he did and what he said, which liave
entered into his life ; but all has not been told in the pub-
lished narratives. Contem])orary writers in their letters liave
set down every fresh incident, and eagerly caught up his
sense, his wit, and, what is more delightful, ihose marks of
the natural cheerfulness of his invariable presence of mind :
nor could these have arisen from any aft'ectation or parade, for
we shall see that they served him even in his last tender farewell
to his lady, and on many unpremeditated occasions.

I have drawn together into a short compass all the facts
which my researches have furnished, not omitting those which
are known, concerning the feelings and conduct of Rawleigh
at these solemn moments of his life ; to have preserved only
the new would have been to mutilate the statue, and to injure
the whole by an imperfect view.

liawleigh one morning was taken out of his bed, in a lit of
lever, and unexpectedly hurried, not to his trial, but to a sen-
tence of death. The story is well known. — Yet pleading
with " a voice grown weak by sickness and an ague he had at
tliat instant on him," he used every means to avert his fate:
he did, tlierefore, value the life he could so easily part with.
His judges, there, at least, respected their state criminal, and
ihey addressed him iu a tone far different from tliat which he
had fifteen years before listened to i'rom Coke. Yelverton, the
attorney-general, said — " Sir Walter Kawleigh hath been as
a star at wliich the world have gazed ; but stars may fall, nay,
tliey must fall, when they trouble the sphere where they
abide." And the lord chief-justice noticed Itawleigh's great
work : — " 1 know that you have been valiant and wise, and I
doubt not but a'ou retain both these virtues, for now 3-ou shall
have occasion to use them. Your book is an admirable work;
1 would give you counsel, but I know you can apply unto
your.sclf far better than I am able to give you." iiut the
judge ended with saying, "execution is granted." It uus

126 Narrative of the Last Hours

stifling Rawleigh with roses ! the heroic sage felt as if listen-
ing to fame from the voice of death.

He declared that now being old, sickly, and in disgrace,
and " certain were he allowed to live, to go to it again, life
was wearisome to him, and all he entreated was to have leave
to speak freely at his farewell, to satisfy the world that he
was ever lo3'al to the king, and a true lover of the common-
wealth ; for this he would seal with his blood."

Rawleigh, on his return to his prison, while some were
deploring his fate, observed that " the world itself is but
a larger prison, out of which some are daily selected for
execution."

That last nip;at of his existence was occupied by writing
what the letter-writer calls " a remembrancer to be left with
his lady, to acquaint the world with his sentiments, should he
be denied their delivery from the scaffold, as he had been at
the bar of the King's Bench. His lady visited him that
night, and amidst her tears acquainted him that she had
obtained the favour of disposing of his body ; to which he
answered smiling, " It is well, Bess, that thou mayst dispose of
that, dead, thou hadst not always the disposing of when it was
alive." At midnight he entreated her to leave him. It must
have been then, that, with unshaken fortitude, Eawleigh sat
down to compose those verses on his death, which being short,
the most appropriate may be repeated.

Even such is Time, that takes on trust
Oiu- youth, our joys, our all we have,

And pays us but with age and dust ;
Who in the dark and silent grave,

When we have wandered all our ways,

Shuts \\\) the story of our days !

He has added two other lines expressive of his trust in his
resurrection. Their authenticity is confirmed b}' the writer of
the present letter, as well as another writer, enclosing " half
a dozen verses, which Sir Walter made the night before his
death, to take his farewell of poetry, wherein lie had been a
scribbler even from his youth." The enclosure is not now
with the letter. Chamberlain, the writer, was an intelligent
man of the world, but not imbued with any deep tincture of
literature. On the same night llawleigh wrote this distich
on the candle burning dimly : —

Cowards fear to die ; but courage stout,
Bather than live in snuff, will be put out.

of Sir Walter Rawleigh. 1-27

At this solemn moment, before he lay down to rest, and at the
instant of parting from his lady, with all his domestic affoc-
tions still warm, to express his feelings in verse was with him
a natural effusion, and one to which he had long been used.
It is peculiar in the fate of Rawleigh, that having before
suffered a long imprisonment with an expectation of a public
death, his mind had been accustomed to its contemplation,
and had often dwelt on the event which was now passing. The
soul, in its sudden departure, and its future state, is often the
subject of his few poems ; that most original one of " The
Farewell,"

Go, soul ! the body's guest,

Upon a thankless enaad, &c.

is attributed to Rawleigh, though on uncertain evidence.
Ijut another, entitled "The Pilgrimage," has this beautiful
passage : —

Give me my scallop-shell of quiet,
My staft' of truth to walk upon,
My scrip of joy immortal diet;

My bottle of salvation;
My fc'own of glory, Hope's true gage,
Aud thus I'll take my pilgrimage — ■

Whilst my soul, like a quiet palmer,

Travelleth towards the laud of Heaven —

Rawleigh's cheerfulness was so remarkable, and his fearless-
ness of death so marked, that the Dean of Westminster, who
attended him, at first wondering at the hero, reprehended the
lightness of liis manner, but Rawleigh gave God thanks that
he had never feared death, for it was but an opinion and an
imagination ; and as for the manner of death, he would rather
die so than of a burning fever ; and that some might have
made shows outwardly, but he felt the joy within. The dean
says, that he made no more of his death than if he had
been to take ajourne}': "Not," said he, " but that I am a
great sinner, for I have been a soldier, a seaman, and a
courtier." The writer of a manuscript letter tells us, that
the dean declared he died not only religiously, but he
found him to be a man as ready and as able to give as to take
instruction.

On the morning of his death he smoked, as usual, his fa-
vourite tobacco, and when they brouglit him a cup of excellent
sack, being asked how he liked it, Rawleigh answered — " As
the fellow, that, drinking of St. Oiiles's bowl, as he went to

12S Narrative of the Last Huurs

Tyburn, said, ' that was good drink if a man might tarry by
it.' ''* The day before, in passing from Westminster Hall to
the Gate-house, his eye had caught Sir Hugli Keeston in the
throng, and calling on him, Rawleigh requested that he would
see him die to-morrow. Sir Hugh, to secure himseli' a seat on
the scaffold, had provided himself with a letter to the sheriff',
which was not read at the time, and Sir Walter Ibund his
friend thrust by, lamenting that he could not get there.
" Farewell 1" exclaimed Eawleigh, " I know not what shift
you will make, but 1 am sure to have a place." In going
from the prison to the scaffold, among others who were pressing
hard to see him, one old man, whose head was bald, came
very forward, insomuch that Rawleigh noticed him, and asked
" whether he would have aught of him ?" The old man
answered — " Nothing but to see him, and to pray God for
him." Rawleigh replied — " I thank thee, good friend, and
I am sorry I have no better thing to return thee for thy good
will." Observing his bald head, he continued, "but take
this night-cap (which was a very rich wrought one that he
wore), for thou hast more need of it now than I."

His dress, as was usual with him, was elegant, if not rich.f
Oldys describes it, but mentions, that " he had a wrought
nightcap under his hat ; " this we have otherwise disposed of;
he wore a ruff'-band, a black wrought velvet night-gown over
a hare-coloured satin doublet, and a black wrought waistcoat;
black cut taffety breeches, and ash-coloured silk stockings.

He ascended the scaffold with the same cheerfulness as he
had passed to it ; and observing the lords seated at a distance,
some at windows, he requested they would approach him, as
he wished that they should all witness what he had to siiy.
The request was complied with by several. His speech is
well known ; but some copies contain matters not in others.
When he finished, he requested Lord Arundel that the king
would not suffer any libels to defame him after death. — "And
now I have a long journey to go, and must take my leave."
" He embraced all the lords and other friends with .such
courtly compliments, as if he had met them at some feast,"

* In the old time, when prisoners were conveyed from Newgate to
Tyburn, they stopped about midway at the " Ohl Hospital," at St. Giles's-
in-the-fields, "and," says Stow, "were presented with a great bowl of
ale, thereof to drink at their pleasure, as to be their last refi'eshmcnt in
ill is life."

t Rawleigh's love of dress is conspicuous in the early portraits of liim
Vie possess, and particularly so in the one engraved by Lodge.

of Sir Walter Raivleiyk. "129

Bays a letter-writer. Having taken ofThis gown, ho callod to
tlie headsman to show him the axe, wliich not being instantly
clone, he repeated, " I prithee let me see it, dost thou tliinU
that I am afraid of it?" He passed the edge lightly over
his finger, and smiling, observed to the sheriff, " This is a
sharp medicine, but a sound cure for all diseases," and kissing
it laid it down. Another writer has, "This is that that will
cure all sorrows." After this he went to three several
corners of the scaffold, and kneeling down, desired all the
people to pray for him, and recited a long prayer to himself.
When he began to fit himself for the block, he first laid him-
self down to tr^' how the block fitted hini ; after rising up,
the executioner kneeled down to ask his forgivenes.^, which
liawleigh with an embrace gave, but entreated him not to
strike till he gave a token by lifting up his hand, ^' and (hen,
fear not, hut strike home ! " AVhen he laid his head down to
receive the stroke, the executioner desired him to lay his face
towards the east. " It was no great matter which way a
man's head stood, so that the heart lay right," said llawleigh ;
but these were not his last words. He was once more to
speak in this world with the same intrepidity he had lived in
it — for, having lain some minutes on the block in prayer, he
gave the signal ; but the executioner, either unmindful, or in
fear, failed to strike, and Rawleigh, after once or twice
putting forth his hands, was compelled to ask him, " Why
dost thou not strike ? Strike ! man ! " In two blows he was
beheaded ; but from the first his body never shrunk from the
spot by any discomposure of his posture, which, like his mind,
was immovable.

" In all the time he was upon the scaffold, and before,"
says one of the manuscript letter-writers, " there appeared
not the least alteration in him, either in his voice or counte-
nance ; but he seemed as free from all manner of apprehension
as if he had been come thither rather to be a spectator than
a sufferer ; na}', the beiiolders seemed much more sensible than
did he, so that he hath purchased here in the opinion of men
such honour and reputation, as it is thought his greatest
enemies are they that are most sorrowful lor his death, which,
they see is like to turn so nuich to his advantage."

The people were deeply affected at the sight, and so much,
that one said that "we had not such another head to cut off; "
and another " wished the head and brains to be upon Secre-
tary Naunton's shoulder?." The observer suffered for this;

VOL. III. K

130 The lust Hours of Sir Walter ttawlciyh.

he was a vvoaltliy citizen, and great newsmonger, and one
who haunted Paul's Wallc. Complaint was made, and the
citizen was summoned to the Privy Council. He pleaded
that lie intended no disrespect to Mr. Secretary, but only
spoke in reference to the old proverb, that " two heads were
better than one ! " His excuse was allowed at the moment ;
but when afterwards called on for a contribution to St. Paul's
Cathedral, and having subscribed a hundred pounds, the
Secretary observed to him, that "two are better than one,
Mr. Wiemark!" Either from fear or charity, the witty
citizen doubled his subscription.*

Thus died this 2,-lorious and jjallant cavalier, of whom
Osborne says, " His death was managed hy him with so high
and religious a resolution, as if a Roman had acted a Christian,
or rather a Christian a Roman." t

After having read the preceding article, we are astonished
at the greatness, and the variable nature of this extraordinary
man and this happy genius. With Gibbon, who once medi-
tated to write his life, we may pause, and pronounce " his
character ambiguous;" but we shall not hesitate to decide
that Rawleigh knew better how to die than to live. " His
glorious hours," says a contemporary, " were his arraignment
and execution ; " but never will be forgotten the intermediate
years of his lettered imprisonment ; the imjn'isonment of the
leai-ned may sometimes be their happiest leisure.

* The general impression was so mucli in disfavour of this judicial murder,
tliat James tliought it politic to publish an 8vo pamphlet, in 1618, entitled,
"A Declaration of tlie Demeanor and Cariage of Sir Walter Kaleigh,
Knight, as well in his Voyage, as in and sithence his Returne : and of the
true motives and inducemei.ts which occasioned his Maiestie to proceed in
doing justice upon him, as hath beene done." It takes the whole question
apologetically of the licence given him to Guiana, "as his Majestie's
honour was in a manner engaged, not to deny unto his people the adventure
and hope of such great riches " as the mines of that island might yield.
It afterwards details his proceedings there, which are i';eclared criminal,
dangerous to his Majesty's allies, and an abuse of his commission. It ends
by defending his execution, "because lie could not bylaw be judicially
called in question, for tliat his former attainder of treason is the highest
and last wcjrke of the law (whereby bee was civilitcr mortuus) his Maiestie
was enforced (except attainders should become priviledges for all subsequent
offences) to resolve to have him executed upon his former attainder."

'}• The chief particulars in this narrative are drawn from two manuscript
letters of the day, in the Sloane Collection, under their respective dates,
Nov. 3, 1618, Larkin to Sir Thos. Pickering; Oct. 1:3, 1618, Chamber'
laiu's letters.

131

LITERARY UNIONS.

SECnET niSTORY OF UAWLEIGll's HISTORY OF TUE WORLD,
AND VASA Ill's LIVES.

A UNION' of talents, diiVering- in tlicir qualities, might carry
some important works to a more extended perl'ection. In a
work of great enterprise, the aid of a friendly hand may be
absolutely necessary to complete the labours of the projector,
who may have neither the courage, the leisure, nor all neces-
sary acquisitions for performing the favourite task which he
has otherwise matured. Many great works, commenced by
a master-genius, have remained unfinished, or have been
deficient for want of this friendly succour. The public would
have been grateful to Johnson, had he united in his dic-
tionary the labours of some learned etymologist. Speed's
Chronicle owes most of its value, as it does its ornaments, to
the hand of Sir Robert Cotton, and other curious researchers,
who contributed entire portions. Goguet's esteemed work of
the "Origin of tlio Arts and Sciences" was greatly indebted
to the fraternal zeal of a devoted friend. The still valued
books of the Port Royal Society were all formed by this
happy union. The secret history of many eminent works
would show the advantages w-hich may be derived irom that
combination of talents, differing in their nature. Cumber-
land's masterly versions of the fragments of the Greek
dramatic poets would never have been given to the poetical
world, had he not accidentally possessed the manuscript notes
of his relative, the learned Eentley. This treasure supplied
that research in the most obscure works, which the volatile
studies of Cumberland could never have explored ; a circum-
stance which he concealed from the world, proud of the
Greek erudition which he thus cheaply possessed. Yet by
this literary union, Bentley's vast erudition made those
researches which Cumberland could not ; and Cumberland
gave the nation a copy of the domestic drama of Greece, of
Avhich Rcntley was incapable.

There is a large work, which is still celebrated, of which the
composition has excited the astonishment even of the
philosophic Hume, but whose secret history remains yet to be
disclosed. This extraordinary volume is " The History ot
the World by Rawleigh." I shall transcribe Hume's obser-
vationSj that the reader may observe the literarv pheuonienon.

" K 2

132 Literary Unions.

" The}' wei'e struck with the extensive genius of the man,
who being educated amidst naval and miUtaiy enterprises,
liad surpassed in the pursuits of literature, even tliose of the
most recluse and sedentary lives; and they admired his
unbroken magnanimit}-, which at his age, and under his cir-
cumstances, could engage him to undertake and execute so
great a work, as his History of the AVorld." Now when the
truth is known, the wonderful in this literary mystery will
disappear, except in the eloquent, the grand, and the pathetic
passages interspersed in that venerable volume. We may,
indeed, pardon the astonishment of oiu* calm philosopher,
when we consider the recondite matter contained in this work,
and recollect the little time which this adventurous spirit,
whose life was passed in fabricating his own fortune, and in
perpetual enterprise, could allow to such erudite pursuits.
Where could Rawleign obtain that familiar acquaintance with
the rabbins, of whose language he was probably entirely
ignorant ? His numerous publications, the effusions of a most
active mind, though excellent in their kind, were evidently
composed by one who was not abstracted in curious and
remote inquiries, but full of the daily business and the
wisdom of human life. His confinement in the Tower, which
lasted several years, was indeed sufficient for the composition
of this folio volume, and of a second which appears to have
occupied him. But in that imprisonment it .singularly
happened that he lived among literarv characters with most
intimate friendship. There he joined the Earl of Noi'thum-
berland, the patron of the philosophers of his age, and with
whom llawleigh pursued his chemical studies ; and Serjeant
Hoskins, a poet and a wit, and the poetical " father" of Ben
Joiisou, who acknowledged that " It was Hoskins who had
polished him ;" and that Rawleigh often consulted Hoskins
on his literary works, I learn from a manuscript. But
however literary the atmosphere of the Tower proved to
llawleigh, no particle of Hebrew, and perhaps little of Grecian
lore, floated from a chemist and a poet. The truth is, that
the collection of the materials of this history was the labour
of several j)ersons, who have not all been discovered. It has
been ascertained that Ben Jonsou was a considerable contri-
butor ; and there was an English philosopher from whom
Descartes, it is said even by his own countrj^men, borrowed
largely — Thomas Hariot, whom Anthony Wood charges with
infusing into Bawleigh's volume philosophical notions, while

Lifrrar)/ Unions. 133

Rawleigh was composing his History of the World. But if
Eawh'igh's jifj/z-szaV* surpassed even those of (he most rechise
and sedentary lives, as Hume observes, we must attribute this
to a " Dr. Robert Burrel, Rector of" Noi thwald, in the county
of Norfolk, who was a great favourite of Sir ^Valtcr
Rawleigh, and had been his chaplain. All, or the greatest
part of the drudgery of Sir Walter's History for criticisms,
chronology, and reading Greek and Hebrew authors, was
performed"^ by him for Sir Walter." * Thus a simple fact,
when discovered, clears up the whole mystery ; and we learn
how that knowledge was acquired, which, as Hume sa-
gaciously detected, required " a recluse and sedentary life,"
such as the studies and the habits of a country clergyman
would have been in a learned age.

The secret history of another work, still more celebrated
than the History of the World, by Sir Walter Rawleigh, will
doubtless surprise its numerous admirers.

Without the aid of a friendly hand, we should probably
have been deprived of the delightful History of Artists by
Vasari : althougli a mere painter and goldsmith, and not a
literary man, Vasari was blessed with the nice discernment of
one deeply conversant with art, and saw rightly what was to
be done, when the idea of the work was suggested by the
celebrated Paulus Jovius as a supplement to his own work of
the " Eulogiums of Illustrious Men," Vasari approved of the

* I draw my information from a very singular manuscript in the Lans-
downe collection, which I think has been mistaken for a boy's ciphering
book, of which it has much the appearance, No. 741, fo 57, as it stands
in the auctioneer's calaloguc. It appears to be a collection closely written,
extracted out of Anthony Wood's papers ; and as I h:ive discovered in the
manuscript numerous notices not elsewhere preserved, I am inclined to
think that the transcriber copied them from that mass of Anthony Wood's
papers, of which more than one sackful was burnt at his desire before
him when dying. If it be so, this MS. is the only register of many
curious facts.

Ben Jonson has been too freely censured for his own free censures, and
particularly for one he made on Sir Walter llawleigh, who, he told Drum-
mond, " esteemed more fame tiian conscience. The best wits in Emjland
were cmjdoyed in making his JJiHvry; Ben hunself had written a piece
to him of the Punic War, wliicli he altered and set in his book." Jonsun'a
powerful advocate, Mr. Gitlord, has not alleged a word in the defence of
our great bard's free conversational strictures ; the secret history of
Rawleigh's great work had never been discovered ; on this occasion, how-
ever, Jonson only spoke what he knew to be true — and there may have
been other truths, in those conversations which were set down at random
by Drumiuoud, who may have chiefly recollected the satirical touches.

134 Literary Unions.

project ; but on that occasion judiciously observed, not
blinded by the celebrity of the literary man who projected it,
that " It would require the assistance of an artist to collect
the materials, and arrange them in their proper order ; for
although Jovius displayed great knowledge in his observa-
tions, yet he had not been equally accurate in the arrange-
ment of his facts in his book of Eulogiums." Afterwards,
when Vasari began to collect his information, and consulted
Paulus Jovius on the plan, although that author highly
approved of what he saw, he alleged his own want of leisure
and ability to complete such an enterprise ; and this was for-
tunate : we should otlierwise have had, instead of the rambling
spirit which charms us in the volumes of Vasari, the verbose
babble of a declaimer. Vasari, however, looked round for
the assistance he wanted ; a circumstance which Tiraboschi
has not noticed : like Hogarth, he required a literary man
for his scribe, I have discovered the name of the chief
writer of the Lives of the Painters, who wrote under the
direction of Vasari, and probably often used his own natural
style, and conveyed to us those reflections which surely come
from their source. I shall give the passage, as a curious in-
stance where the secret history of books is often detected in
the most obscure corners of reseai'ch. Who could have ima-
gined that in a collection of the lives de' Santi e Beati delV
Ordine de'' Bredicatori, we are to look for the writer of
Vasari's lives ? Don Serafini Razzi, the author of this eccle-
siastical biography, has this reference : " Who would see more
of this may turn to the Lives of the Painters, Sculptors, and
Architects, ivrittenfor the greater part hy Don Silvano Jiazzi,
my brother, for the Signor Cavaliere M. Giorgio Vasari, his
great friend."*

The discovery that Vasari's volumes were not entirely
written by himself, though probably imder his dictation, and
unquestionably, with his communications, as we know that
Dr. Morell wvute the " Analysis of Beauty" for Hogarth, will
perhaps serve to clear up some unaccountable mistakes or

* I find tliis quotation in a soit of polemical work of natural philosophy,
entitled "Saggio di Storia Litteraria Fioreutina del Secolo XVII. da
Giovanue Clemente Nelli," Lucca, 1759, p. 58. Nelii also refers to what
he had said on this subject in his Pianiead alzati di S. M. del Fiore,
p. vi. e vii. ; a work on architecture. See Brunei ; and Ilaym, Bib. Ilal.
de Idbri rari

Lit entry U/iions. 133

omissions which appear in tliat series ol' volumes, written at
lon<,' intervals, and by diderent liands. Mr. Fuseli has
alluded to them in utter astonishment; and cannot account
for Vasari's " incredible dereliction of reminiscence, which
])roin]ited him to transfer what he had rightly ascribed to
Gioi'gione in one edition to the elder Parma in the subsequent
ones." Again : " Vasari's memory was either so treacherous,
or his rapidity in writing so inconsiderate, that his account
of the Capella Sistina, and the stanze of llalfaello, is a mere
heap of errors and unpardonable confusion." Even Bottari,
his learned editor, is at a loss how to account for his mis-
takes. Mr. Fuseli finely observes — " He has been called the
Herodotus of our art ; and if the main simplicity of his narra-
tive, and the desire of heaping anecdote on anecdote, entitle
him in some degree to that appellation, we ought not to
forget that the information of every day adds something to
the authenticity of the Greek historian, whiLst every day fur-
nishes matter to question the credibility of the Tuscan." All
this strongly conhrms the suspicion that Vasari employed
different hands at difl'erent times to write out his work. Such
mistakes would occur to a new writer, not always conversant
with the subject he was composing on, and the disjointed
materials of wliich were often found in a disordered state. It
is, however, strange that neither Bottari nor Tiraboschi
appears to have been aware that Vasari employed others to
write for him ; we see that from the first suggestion of tlie
work he had originally proposed that Paulus Jovius should
hold the pen for him.

The principle illustrated in this article might be pursued ;
but the secret history of two great works so well known is
as sufticient as twenty others of writings less celebrated. The
literary phenomenon which had puzzled the calm inquiring
Hume to cry out " a miracle !" has been solved by the dis-
covery of a little fact on Literary Unions, which derives ira-
portance from this circumstance.*

* Mr. PATnicK FuASER Tytleu, iu his recent biography of Sir Walter
Rawleigh, a work of vigorous research and elegant composition, has dedi-
cated to me a supernumerary article in his Appendix, entitled Mr.
I/Juradi's Errors!

lie has inferred from the present article, that I denied that Rawleigh
was the writer of his own great work ! — because I have shown how great
works maybe advantageously pursued by the aid of "Literary Union."
It is a monstrous inference ! The chimera which plavs before his eves is

136

OF A BIOGRAPHY PAINTED.

Tiieiit: are objects connected with literary curiosity, whose
veiy history, though they may never gratify our sight, is
literary ; and the originality of their invention, should they
excite imitation, may serve to constitute a class. I notice a
book-curiosity of this nature.

This extraordinar}- volume may be said to have contained
the travels and adventures of Charles Magius, a noble Vene-
tian ; and this volume, so precious, consisted only of eighteen
pages, composed of a series of highly-finished miniature paint-
ings on vellum, some executed by the hand of Paul Veronese.
Each page, however, may be said to contain many chapters ;
for, generally, it is composed of a large centre-piece, sur-
rounded by ten small ones, with many apt inscriptions, alle-
gories, and allusions ; the whole exhibiting romantic incidents
in the life of this Venetian nobleman. But it is not merely
as a beautiful production of art that we are to consider it ;
it becomes associated with a more elevated feeling in the
occasion which produced it. The author, who is himself the
hero, after having been long calumniated, resolved to set be-
fore the eyes of his accusers the sufferings and adventures he
could perhaps have but indifferently described : and instead of
composing a tedious volume for his justification, invented this
new species of pictorial biography. The author minutely
described the remarkable situations in which fortune had
placed him ; and the ai'tists, in embellishing the facts he fur-
nished them with to record, emulated each other in giving
life to their truth, and putting into action, before the spec-
tator, incidents which the pen had less impressively exhibited.
This unique production may be considered as a model to re-
present the actions of those who may succeed more fortu-
nately by this new mode of perpetuating their history ; dis-
covenng, by the aid of the pencil, rather than by their pen,
the forms and colom-s of an extraordinary life.

his own contrivance ; he starts at his own phantasmagoria, and leaves me,
after all, to tight with his shadow.

Mr. Tyiler has not contradicted a ginr/le statement of mine. I Lave
carefully read his article and my own, and I have made no alteration.

I may be allowed to add that there is much redundant matter in the
firticle of Mr. Tytler; and, to use the legal style, there is much "imper-
tinence," which, with a little candour and more philosophy, he would
strike his pen through, as sound lawyers do on these occasions.

Of a Bioijraplnj Painted. 137

It was when the Ottomans (ahout 1571) attacked tlie Isle
of Cvpi'us, that this Venetian nobleman was charged by his
i'epul)lic to review and repair the fortifications. He was
afterwards sent to the pope to negociate an alliance : he re-
turned to the senate to give an account of his commission.
Invested with the chief command, at the head of his troops,
Magius threw himself into the island of Cyprus, and after a
skill'ul defence, wliich could not prevent its fall, at Famagusta
he was taken prisoner by the Turks, and made a slave. His
age and infirmities induced his master, at length, to sell him
to some Christian merchants ; and after an absence of several
years from his beloved Venice, he suddenly appeared, to the
astonishment and mortification of a party who had never
ceased to calumniate him ; while his own noble family were
compelled to preserve an indignant silence, having had no
communications with their lost and enslaved relative. Magius
now returned to vindicate his honour, to reinstate himself in
the favour of the senate, and to be restored to a venerable
parent amidst his family ; to whom he introduced a fresh
branch, in a youth of seven years old, the child of his misfor-
tunes, who, born in trouble, and a stranger to domestic
endearments, was at one moment united to a beloved circle of
relations.

I shall give a rapid view of some of the pictures of this
Venetian nobleman's life. The whole series has been elabo-
rately drawn up by the Duke de la Valliere, the celebrated
book-collector, who dwells on the detail with the curiosity of
an amateur.*

In a rich frontispiece, a Christ is expiring on the cross;
Xleligion, leaning on a column, contemplates the Divinity,
and Hope is not distant from her. The genealogical tree of
the house of Magius, with an allegorical representation of
Venice, its nobility, power, and riches : the arms of Magius,
in which is inserted a view of the Holy Sepulchre of Jerusalem,
of which he was made a knight ; his portrait, with a Latin
inscription : " 1 have passed through arms and the enemy,
amidst fire and water, and the Lord conducted me to a safe

* The Duke's description is not to be found, as might be expected, ia
his own valued catiilogue, but was a contribution to Gaignat's, ii. ]G,
where it occupies fourteen pages. This singular work sold at Gaignat's
sale for 902 livres. It was then the golden age of literary curiosity, when
the rarest things were not ruinous ; and that price was even then consi-
dered extraorilinary, though the work was an unique. It must consist of
about 180 subjects, by Italian artists.

T38 Of a Biography Painted.

asj'Inm, in the j^ear of grace 1571." The portrait of his son,
aged seven years, finished with the greatest beauty, and sup-
posed to have come from the hand of Paul Veronese ; it
bears tliis inscription : " Overcome by violence and artifice,
almost dead before his birth, his mother was at length
delivered of him, full of life, with all the loveliness of in-
fancy ; under the divine protection, his birth was ha])py,
and his life with greater happiness shall be closed with good
fortune."

A. plan of the Isle of Cyprus, where Magius commanded,
and his first misfortune happened, his slavery by the Turks. —
The painter has expressed this by an emblem of a tree shaken
by the winds and scathed by the lightning ; but from the
trunk issues a beautiful green branch shining in a brilliant
sun, with this device — " From this fallen trunk springs a
branch full of vigour."

The missions of Magius to raise troops in the province of
La Puglia. — In one of these Magius is seen returning to
Venice ; his final departure, — a thunderbolt is viewed falling
on his vessel — his passage by Corfu and Zante, and his arrival
at Candia.

His travels to Egypt. — The centre figure represents this
province raising its right hand extended towards a palm-tree,
and the left leaning on a pyramid, inscribed " Celebrated
throughout the world for her wonders." The smaller pic-
tures are the entrance of Magius into the port of Alexandria;
Eosetta, with a caravan of Turks and diiierent nations ; the
city of Grand Cairo, exterior and interior, with views of other
places ; and finally, his return to Venice.

His journey to Home. — The centre figure an armed Pallas
seated on trophies, the Tyber beneath her feet, a globe in her
hands, inscribed Quod rerum victrix ac domina — "Because
she is the Conqueress and Mistress of the World." The ten
small pictures are views of the cities in the pope's dominion.
His first audience at the conclave forms a pleasing and fine
composition.

His travels into Syria. — The principal figure is a female,
emblematical of that line country ; she is seated in the midst
of a gay orchard, and embraces a bundle of roses, inscribed
Mundi delicice — " The delight of the universe." The small
compartments are views of towns and jiorts, and the spot
where Magius collected his fleet.

His pilgrimage to Jerusalem, where he was made a knight

Of a Biogruphy Painted. 139

Df the Holy Sepulchre.— The in-iiuiiial figure represents Devo-
tion, inscribed Diccit — " It is she who coii(hicts me." The
lompartments exliihit a variety of objects, with a correctness
of (h-awing which is described as belonging to the cla.ss, and
partaking of the charms of the pencil of Claude Lorraine.
His vessel is first viewed in the i-oadstead at Venice beat by
a storm ; arrives at Zante to refresh ; enters the port of
Simiso ; there having landed, he and his companions are pro-
ceeding to the town on asses, for Christians were not per-
mitted to travel in Turkey on horses. In the church at
Jerusalem the bishop, in his pontifical habit, receives him as
a knight of the Holy Sepulchre, arraying him in the armour
of Godfrey of Bouillon, and placing his sword in the hands of
Magius. His arrival at Betldehem, to see the cradle of the
Lord — and his return by Jaffa with his companions, in the
dress of pilgrims ; the groups are finely contrasted with the
Turks mingling amongst them.

The taking "of the city of Famagusta, and his slavery. —
The middle figure, with a dog at its feet, represents Fidelity,
the character of Magius, who ever preferred it to his life or
his freedom, inscribed Coptivat — " She has reduced me to
slavery." Six smaller pictures exhibit the difl'erent points of
the island of Cyprus where the Turks effected their descents.
Magius retreating to Famagusta, which he long defended, and
where his cousin, a skilful engineer, was killed. The Turks
compelled to raise the siege, but return with greater forces —
the sacking of the town and the palace, where Magius was
taken. — One picture exhibits him brought before a bashaw^,
who has him stripped, to judge of his strength and fix his
price, when, after examination, he is sent among other slaves.
He is seen bound and tied up among his companions in mis-
fortune— again he is forced to labour, and carries a cask of
water on his shoulders. — In another picture, his master, find-
ing him weak of body, conducts him to a slave-merchant to
sell him. In another we see him leading an ass loaded with
packages ; his new master, finding him loitering on his way,
showers his blows on him, while a soldier is seen purloining
one of the packages from the ass. Another exhibits Magiu?
sinking with fatigue on the sands, while his master would
raise him up by an unsparing use of the bastinado. The
varied details of these little paintings are pleasingly executed.
The close of his slavery. — The middle figure kneeling to
Heaven, and a light breaking from it, inscribed, " He breaks

140 0/« Biography Painted.

my chains," to express the confidence of Magius. The Turks
are seen hmding with their pilhige and their slaves. — In one
of the pictures are seen two ships on fire ; a young lady of
Cyprus preferring death to the loss of her honour and the
miseries of slavery, determined to set fire to the vessel in
which she was carried ; she succeeded, and the flames com-
municated to another.

His return to Venice. — The painter for his principal figure
has chosen a Pallas, with a helmet on her head, the ajgis on
one arm, and her lance in the otlier, to describe the courage
with which Magius had supported his misfortunes, inscribed
Heducit — " She brings me back," In the last of the com-
partments he is seen at the custom-house at Venice ; he enters
the house of his father ; the old man hastens to meet him,
and embraces him.

One page is filled by a single picture, which represents the
senate of Venice, with the Doge on his throne ; Magius pre-
sents an account of his different employments, and holds in
his hand a scroll, on which is written. Quod commisisti per-
feci ; quod restat agendum, pare Jide complectar — "I have
done what you committed to my care ; and I will perform
with the same fidelity what remains to be done." He is
received by the senate with the most distinguished honours,
and is not only justified, but praised and honoured.

The most magnificent of these paintings is the one attri-
buted to Paul Veronese. It is described by the Duke de la
Valliere as almost unparalleled for its richness, its elegance,
and its brilliancy. It is inscribed Pater mens et fratres met
dereliquerunt me; Dominus autem assumpsit me! — "My
father and my brothers abandoned me ; but the Lord took
me under his protection." This is an allusion to the accu-
sation raised against him in the open senate when the Turks
took the Isle of Cyprus, and his family wanted either the
confidence or the courage to defend Magius. In the front of
this large picture, Magius leading his son by the hand, eon-
ducts him to be reconciled with his brothers and sisters-in-
law, who are on the opposite side ; his hand holds this scroll,
Vos cogitastis de me malum; sed Deus converlit illud in
bonum — " You thought ill of me ; but the Lord has turned
it to good." In this he alludes to the satisfaction he had
given the senate, and to the honours they had decreed him.
Another scene is introduced, where Magius appears in a mag-
nificent hall at a table in the midst of all his family, with

Cause and Pretext. 141

whom a general reconciliation lias taken place : on his left
liand are gardens opening witli an enchanting cfFcct, and
magnificently ornamented, with the villa of his father, on
which flowers and wreaths seem dropping on the roof, as if
from heaven. In the pers[)ective, the landscape probably
represents the rural neighbourhood of Magius's early days.

Such ai"e the most interesting incidents which I have
selected from the copious description of the Duke de la Val-
liere. The idea of this production is new : an autobiography
in a series of remarkable scenes, painted under the eye of the
describer of them, in which, too, he has preserved all the
fulness of his feelings and his minutest recollections ; but the
novelty becomes interes;ting from the character of the noble
Magius, and the romantic fancy which inspired this elabo-
rate and costly curiosity. It was not, indeed, without some
trouble that 1 have drawn up this little account ; but while
thus employed, I seemed to be composing a very uncommon
romance.

CAUSE AND PRETEXT.

It is an important principle in morals and in politics, not to
mistake the cause for the pretext, nor the pretext lor the
cause, and by this means to distinguish between the con-
cealed and the ostensible motive. On this principle, history
might be reeomposed in a new manner ; it would not often
describe circtitnsfunces and characters as they usually appear.
When we mistake the characters of men, we mistake the
nature of their actions ; and we shall find in the study of
secret history, that some of the most important events in
modern liistory were produced from very different motives
than their ostensible ones. Polybius, the most philosophical
writer of the ancients, has marked out this useful distinction
of cause and jrrefexf, and aptly illustrates the observation by
the lacts which he explains. Amilcar, for instance, was the
first author and contriver of the second Punic war, though he
died ten j^ears before the commencemeut of it. " A states-
man," says the wise and grave historian, " who knows not
how to trace the origin of events, and discern the dilfcrent
sources from whence they take their rise, may be compared
to a physician who neglects to inform himself of the causes
of those distempers which he is called in to cure. Our pains
can never be better employed than in searching out the causes

142 Cause and Pretext.

of events ; for the most trifling incidents give birth to matters
of the greatest moment and importance." The latter part of
this remark of Polybius points out another principle which
has been often verified by history, and which furnished the
materials of the little book of " Grands Evenemens pai' lea
petitL'S Causes."

Our present inquiry concerns "cause and pretext."
Leo X. projected an alliance of the sovereigns of Christen-
dom against the Turks. The avowed object was to oppose
the progress of tlie Ottomans against the Mamelukes of
Egypt, who were more friendly to the Christians ; but the con-
cealed motive with his holiness was to enrich himself and his
family with the spoils of Christendom, and to aggrandise the
papal throne by war ; and such, indeed, the policy of these
pontiffs had always been in those mad crusades which they
excited against the East.

The Reformation, excellent as its results have proved in the
cause of genuine freedom, originated in no purer source than
human passions and selfish motives : it was the progeny of
avarice in Germany, of novelty in France, and of love in
England. The latter is elegantly alluded to by Gray —

And gospel-light first beam'd from Bullen's eyes.

The Reformation is considered b}^ the Duke of Nevers, in a
work printed in 1590, as it had been by Francis I., in his
Apology in 1537, as a coiqo-d'etat of Charles V. towards uni-
versal monarchy. The duke says, that the emperor silently
permitted Luther to establish his principles in Germany, that
they might split the confederacy of the elective princes, and
by this division facilitate their more easy conquest, and play
them off one against another, and by these means to secure
the imperial crown hereditary in the house of Austria. Had
Charles V. not been the mere creature of his politics, and had
he felt any zeal for the Catholic cause, which he pretended to
fight for, never would he have allowed the new doctrines to
sj)read for more than twenty years without the least oppo-
sition.

The famous League in France was raised for '• religion and
the relief of public grievances;" such was the pretext!
After the princes and the people had alike become its victims,
this "league" was discovered to have been formed b}- the
pride and the ambition of the Guises, aided by the machina-
tions of the Jesuits against the attempts of the Prince of

Cause and Pretext, ]43

Conde to dislotlge them IVom tlicir "scat of power." While
the Huguenots pillaged, burnt, and massacred, declaring in
their manifestoes that they were only fighting to release the
Icing, whom they asserted was a prisoner of the Guises, the
Catholics repaid them with the same persecution and the
same manifestoes, declaring that they only wished to liberate
the Prince of Conde, who was the prisoner of the Hugue-
nots. The people were led on by the cry of " religion ;" but
this civil war was not in reality so much Catholic against
Huguenot, as Guise against Conde. A parallel event oc-
curred between our Charles I. and the Scotch Covenanters ;
and the king expressly declared, in " a large declaration,
concerning the late tumults in Scotland," that "religion is
only pretended, and used by them as a cloak to palliate their
intended rebellion," which he demonstrated by the facts he
alleged. There was a revolutionar}- party in France, which,
taking the name of Frondeurs, shook that kingdom under the
administration of Cardinal Mazarin, and held out for their
pretext the public freedom. But that faction, composed of
some of the discontented French princes and the mob, was
entirely organized by Cardinal de Retz, who held them in
hand, to cheek or to spur them as the occasion required, from
a mere pei'sonal pique against IMazarin, who had not treated
that vivacious genius with all the deference he exacted.
This appears from his own Memoirs.

We have smiled at James I. threatening the States-general
by the English ambassador, about Vorstius, a Dutch pro-
fessor, who had espoused the doctrines of Arminius against
those of the contra-rcmonstrants, or Calvinists ; the osten-
sible subject was religious, or rather metaphysical-religious
doctrines, but the concealed one was a struggle for predomi-
nance between the Pensionary Barnevelt, assisted by the
French interest, and the Prince of Orange, supported by the
English. " These were the real sources," says Lord Hard-
wieke, a statesman and a man of letters, deeply conversant
with secret and public history, and a far more able judge tliau
Diodati the Swiss divine, and Brandt the ecclesiastical iiisto-
rian, who in the synod of Dort could see nothing but what
appeared in it, and gravely narrated the idle squabbles on
phrases concerning predestination or grace. Hales, of
Eaton, who was secretary to the English ambassador at this
synod, perfectly accords with the account of Lord Hard-
wieke. "Our synod," writes tliat judicious observer, "goes

144 Political Forcjtries and Fictions.

on like a watch ; the main wheels upon which tlie whole
business turns are least in sight ; for all things of moment
are acted in private sessions ; lohat is done in public is 07ily
for shoto and entertainment.''^

The cause of the pc-rsecution of the Jansenists was the
jealousy of the Jesuits ; the pretext was la grace suffisante.
The learned La Croze observes, that the same circumstance
occurred in the affair of Nestorius and the church of Alex-
andria ; the pretext was orthodoxy, the cause was the jea-
lousy of the church of Alexandria, or rather the fiery and
turbulent Cyril, who personally hated Nestorius. The opi-
nions of Nestorius, and the council which condemned them,
were the same in eff'ect. I only produce this remote fact to
prove that ancient times do not alter the truth of our prin-
ciple.

When James II. was so strenuous an advocate for tolera-
tion and liberty of conscience in removing the Test Act, this
enlightened principle of government was only a pretext with
that monk-ridden monarch ; it is well known that the cause
was to introduce and make the Catholics predominant in his
councils and government. The result, which that eager and
blind politician hun-ied on too fast, and which therefore did
not take place, would have been that " liberty of con-
science" would soon have become an " overt act of treason "
before an inquisition of his Jesuits !

In all political affairs drop the pretexts and strike at the
causes ; we may thus understand what the heads of parties
may choose to conceal.

POLITICAL FORGERIES AND FICTIONS.

A WRITER, wliose learning gives value to his eloquence, in his
Bampton Lectures has censured, with that liberal spirit so
friendly to the cause of truth, the calumnies and rumours of
parties, which are still industriousl}'' retailed, tliough they
have been often confuted. Forged documents are still re-
ferred to, or tales unsupported by evidence are confidently
quoted. Mr. Heber's subject confined his inquiries to theo-
logical history ; he has told us that " Augustin is not
ashamed, in his dispute with Faustus, to take advantage of
the popular slanders against the followers of Manes, though
his own experience (for he had himself been of that sect) was

PoUticaJ Forrjeries and Fictions. 115

sufTicient to detect this falsehood." The Romanists, in spite
of satisfactory answers, have continued to urge against the
Englisli protestant the romance of Parker's consecration ;*
while the protestant persists in falsely imputing to the
catholic public formularies the systematic omission of the
second commandment. ''The calumnies of llimius and
Stinstra against the Moravian brethren are cases in point,"
continues Mr. Heber. "No one now believes them, yet they
once could deceive even Warburton !" We may also add the
obsolete calumny of Jews crucifying boys — of which a mo-
nument raised to Hugh of Lincoln perpetuates the memoiy,
and which a modern historian records without any scruph; of
doubt ; several authorities, which are cited on this occasion,
amount only to the single one of INlatthew Paris, who gives
it as a popular rumour. Such accusations usually hap-
pened when the Jews were too rich and the king was too
poor !t

The falsehoods and forgeries raised by parties are over-
whelming! It startles a philosopher, in the calm of his
study, when he discovers how writers, who, we may pre-
sume, are searchers after truth, should, in fact, turn out to be
searchers after the grossest fictions. This alters the habits of
the literary man : it is an unnatural depravity of his pursuits
— and it proves that the personal is too apt to predominate
over the literary character.

I have already touched on the main point of the present
article in the one on " Political Nicknames." I have there
shown how political calumny appears to have been reduced
into an art ; one of its branches would be that of converting
forgeries and fictions into historical authorities.

When one nation is at war with another, there is no doubt
that the two governments connive at, and often encourage, the
most atrocious libels on each other, to madden the people to

* Absurdly reiwrted to Lave taken place at a meeting in the Kag's-
head Tavern, Cheaiiside.

t M. Michel published in P;uis, in 1S31, a collection of poems and
ballads concerniui; Hugh of Lincoln, whicli were all very popular at home
and abroad in the Middle Ages. One of these, preserved in au Anglo-
Norman MS. in the Bil)li otheque Royale at Paris, was evidently constructed
to be sung by the people soon after the event, which is stated to have hap-
pened in the reign of our Henry III. ; but there are many ballads compa-
ratively modern which show how carefully the story was kept before the
populace ; and may be seen in the collectiou.s of lUsliop Percy, Jaoicsouy
^lotherwell, &c.

TOL. lU Ii

146 FoVdical Forf/tries luid Fictions.

preserve their independence, and contribute cheerfully to the
expenses of the war. France and England formerly com-
plained of Holland — the Athenians employed the same policy
against the Macedonians and Persians. Such is the origin
of a vast number of supposititious papers and volumes, which
sometimes, at a renote date, confound the labours of the
honest historian, and too often serve the purposes of the dis-
honest, with whom they become authorities. The crude and
suspicious libels which were drawn out of their obscurity in
Cromwell's time against James the First have overloaded the
character of that monarch, yet are now eagerly referred to by
party writers, though in their own days they were obsolete
and doubtful. During the civil wars of Charles the First
such spurious documents exist in the forms of speeches which
were never spoken ; of letters never written by the names
subscribed ; printed declarations never declared ; battles never
fought, and victories never obtained ! Such is the language
of Rushworth, who complains of this evil spirit of party for-
geries, while he is himself suspected of having rescinded or
suppressed whatever was not agreeable to his patron Crom-
well. A curious, and perhaps a necessary list might be
drawn v\p of political forgeries of our own, which have been
Bometimes referred to as genuine, but which are the inven-
tions of wits and satirists ! Bayle ingeniously observes, that
at the close of every century such productions should be
branded by a skilful discriminator, to save the future inquirer
front errors he can hardly avoid. " How many are still kept
in error by the satires of the sixteenth century ! Those of
the present age will be no less active in future ages, for they
will still be preserved in public libraries."

The art and skill with which some have fabricated a forged
narrative render its detection almost hopeless. When young
Maitland, the brother to the secretary, in order to palliate
the crime of the assassination of the Regent Murray, was
employed to draw up a pretended conference between him,
Knox, and others, to stigmatise them by the odium of advising
to dethrone the young monarch, and to substitute the regent
for their sovereign, Maitland produced so dramatic a perform-
ance, by giving to each person his peculiar mode of expression,
that this circumstance long baffled the incredulity of those
who could not in consequence deny the truth of a narrative
apparently so correct in its particulars ! " The fiction of the
warming-pan enclosing the young Pretender brought more

Political Forgeries and Fictions. 1 17

adherents to the cause of the Whigs than the Bill of Rights,"
observes Lord John liussell.

Ainonp: such party narratives, the horrid tale of the bloody
Colonel Kirk has been worked up by Hume with all his elo-
quence and pathos ; and, from its interest, no suspicion has
arisen of its truth. Yet, so iar as it concerns Kirk, or the
reign of James the Second, or even English history, it is, as
Ititson too honestly expresses it, " an impudent and a bare«
faced lie !" The simple fact is told by Kennet in a few words:
Uu probably was aware of the nature of this political fiction.
Hume was not, indeed, himself the fabricator of the tale;
but he had not any historical authority. The origin of this
fable was probably a pious fraud of the Whig party, to whom
Kirk had rendered himself odious ; at that moment stoiies
still more terrifying were greedily swallowed, and which, liit-
son insinuates, have become a part of the history of England.
The original story, related more circumstantially, though not
more atleetingly, nor perhaps more truly, may be found in
Wanley's " Wonders of the Little ^A'orld,"* which I give,
relieving it from the tediousness of old Wanlcy.

A governor of Zealand, under the bold Duke of Burgundy,
had in vain sought to seduce the affections of the beautiful
wife of a citizen. The governor impi-isons the husband on an
accusation of treason ; and when the wife appeared as the
suppliant, the governor, after no brief eloquence, succeeded as
a lover, on the plea that her husband's life could only be spared
by her compliance. The woman, in tears and in av'^ersion, and
not without a hope of vengeance only delayed, lost her
honour! Pointing to the prison, the governor"^ told her, " If
you seek your husband, enter there, and take him along with
you !" The wife, in the bitterness of her thoughts, yet not
without the consolation that she had snatched her husband
from the grave, passed into the prison ; there in a cell, to her
astonishment and horror, she beheld the corpse of her hus-
band laid out in a coffin, ready for burial! Mourning over it,
she at length returned to the governor, fiercely exelaimin"-,
" You have kept your word ! you have restored to me my
husband! and be assured the fiivour shall be repaid!" Tlie
inhuman villain, terrified in the presence of his intrepid vic-
tim, attempted to appease her vengeance, and more, to win
her to his wishes. Returning home, she assembled her friends,

* Book iii. eh. 2?, sec. 18.

l2

1 18 Political Fori/eries and Fictions.

revealed her wliole story, and under their protection she
appealed to Charles the Bold, a strictlover of jui-tice. and who
now awarded a singular but an exemplary catastrophe. The
duke first commanded that the criminal governor should
instantlv marr\' the woman whom he had made a widow, and
at the same time sign his will, with a clause importing that
should he die before his lady he constituted her his heiress.
All this was concealed from both sides, rather to .«;atisfy the
duke than the parties themselves. This done, the unhappy
woman was dismissed alone ! The governor was conducted to
the prison to suffer the same death he had inilicted on the
husband of his wife ; and when this lady was desired once
moreto enterthepri3on,she beheld her second husuaud headless
in his coffin as she had her first ! Such extraordinary inci-
dents in so short a period overpowered the feeble frame of the
sufferer ; she died — leaving a son, who inherited the rich
accession of fortune so fatally obtained by his injured and
suffering mother.

Such is the tale of which the party story of Kirk appeared
to Eitson to have been a rifacimento ; but it is rather the
foundation than the superstructure. This critic was right in
the general, but not in the particular. It was not necessary
to point out the present source, when so many others of a
parallel nature exist. This tale, universally told, Mr. Douce
considers as the origin of Measure for Measure, and was
probably some traditional event ; for it appears sometimes
with a change of names and places, without any of incident.
It always turns on a soldier, a brother or a husband, executed;
and a wife, a sister, a deceived victim, to save them from death.
It was, therefore, easily transferred to Kirk, and Pom fret's
poem of " Cruelty and Lust" long made the story popular.
It could only have been in this form that it reached the his-
torian, who, it must be observed, introduces it as a " story
commonly told of him ;" but popular tragic romances should
not enter into the dusty documents of a history of England,
and much less be particularly specified in the index ! Belle-
forest, in his old version of the tale, has even the circumstance
of the " captain, who having seduced the wife under the pro-
mise to save her husband's Hfe, exhibited him soon afterwards
throuffh the ifindow of lier apartment suspended on a cjihhetr
This forms the horrid incident in the history of " the bloody
Colonel," and served the purpose of a party, who wished to
bury him in odium. Kirk was a soldier of fortune, and a loose

Political Forgeries and Fictions. 149

liver, and a great blusterer, wlio would sometimes threaten to
decimate his own rci^iment, but is said to have forgotten the
menacethc ntjxtday. Hatelul as such military men will always
be, in the present instance Colonel Kirk has been shamefully
calumniated by poets and historians, who suffer themselves to
be duped by the forgeries of political parties!*

While we arc detecting a source of error into which thd
party feelings of modern liistorians may lead them, let us
confess that they are far more valuable than the ancient; for
to us at least the ancients have written history without
producing authorities ! Modern historians must furnish their
readers with the truest means to become tlieir critics, by
providing them with their authorities ; and it is only by judi-
ciously appreciating these that we may confidently accept
their discoveries. Unquestionably the ancients have often
introduced into their histories many tales similar to the story
of Kirk — popular or party forgeries ! The mellifluous co-
piousness of Livy conceals many a tale of wonder; the graver
of Tacitus etches many a fatal stroke; and the secret history
of Suetonius too often raises a suspicion of those whispers,
Quid rex in aurem reqince dixerit, quid Juno fahulnta sit cum
Jove. It is certain that Plutarch has often told, and varied
too in the telling, the same story, which he has applied to
different persons. A critic in the Ritsonian style has said of
the grave Plutarch, Mendax /lie J'lutarchus qui vitas orato-
rum, dolis et errorihus consutas,olimconscrihiU.avit.'\ " That
lying Plutarch, who formerly' scribbled the lives of the orators,
made up of falsities and blunders !" There is in Italian a
scarce book, of a better design than execution, of the Abbate
Lancellotti, i^<7;;/«?/o«J degli Antichi Historici. — " Flim-flams
of the Ancients." Modern historians have to dispute their
passage to immortality step by step ; and however fervid bo
their eloquence, their real test as to value must be brought to
the humble references in their margin. Yet these must not

* A story still more absurd was connected with the uame of Colonel
Lunsford, a soldier who consistently defended Cliarles I., and was killed in
1643. It is related by Echard as reported of him, that he would kill and
eat tiie children of the opposite party. This horridly grotesque imputa-
tion has been preserved in the political ballads and poetry of the day.
Cleveland ridicules it in one of his poems, where he makes a IloundheaJ
declare —

" He swore he saw, when Lunsford fell,
A child's arm in his pocket."

+ Taylor, Annot. ad Lysiam.

150 Expression of Suppressed Opinion.

terminate our inquiries ; for in tracing a story to its original
source we shall find that fictions have been sometimes grafted
on truths or hearsays, and to separate them as they appeared
in their first stage is the pride and glory of learned criticism.

EXPRESSION OF SUPPRESSED OPINION.

A PEOPLE denied the freedom of speech or of writing have
usually left some memorials of their feelings in that silent
language which addresses itself to the eye. Many ingenious
inventions have been contrived to give vent to their sup-
pressed indignation. The voluminous grievance which they
could not trust to the voice or the pen they have carved in
wood, or sculptured on stone ; and liave sometimes even face-
tiously concealed their satire among the playful ornaments
designed to amuse those of whom they so fruitlessly com-
plained ! Such monuments of the suppressed feelings of the
multitude are not often inspected by the historian — their
minuteness escapes all eyes but those of the philosophical
antiquai-y ; nor are these satirical appearances always consi-
dered as grave authorities, which unquestionably they will be
found to be by a close observer of human nature. An enter-
taining history of the modes of thinking, or the discontents
of a people, drawn from such dispersed efforts in every sera,
would cast a new light of secret history over many dark
intervals.

Did we possess a secret history of tlie Saturnalia, it would
doubtless have afforded some materials for the present article.
In those revels of venerable radicalism, when the senate was
closed, and the Pileus, or cap of liberty, was triumphantly
worn, all things assumed an ap])earance contrary to what they
were ; and human nature, as well as human laws, might be
said to have been parodied. Among so many whimsical regu-
lations in favour of the licentious i-abble, there was one which
forbad the circulation of money ; if any one offered the coin
of the state, it was to be condemned as an act of madness,
and the man was brought to his senses by a penitential fast
for that day. An ingenious French antiquary seems to have
discovered a class of wretched medals, cast in lead or copper,
which formed the circulating medium of these mob lords,
who, to ridicule the idea of ononcy, used the basest metals,
stamping them with grotesque figures, or odd devices — such

Expression of Suppressed Opinion. 151

as a sow ; a cliimcrical bird ; an imperatoi' in liis car, witli a
monkey beliiiul him ; or an old woman's bead, Acca Laiirentia,
eitlior the traditional old nurse of Komulus, or an old courtesan
of the same name, who bequeathed the fruits of her labours
to the Roman people ! As all things were done in mockery,
this base metal is stamped with s. c, to ridicule the Sencdus
consulto, which our antiquary happily explains,* in the true
spirit of this government of mockery, SafuniaUum consulto,
agreeing with the legend of the reverse, inscribed in the
midst of four tali, or bones, which they used as dice, Qui
ludit arram det, quod safi-f sit — " Let them who play give a
pledge, which will be sufJicient." This mock-money served
not only as an expression of the native irony of the radical
gentry of Home during their festival, but, had they spoken
their mind out, meant a ridicule of money itself; for these
citizens of equality have always imagined that society might
proceed without this contrivance of a medium which served
to represent property in which they themselves must so little
participate.

A period so glorious for exhibiting the suppressed senti-
ments of the populace as were these Saturnalia, had been
nearly lost for us, had not some notions been preserved by
Lucian ; for we glean but sparingly from the solemn pages
of the historian, except in the remarkable instance which
Suetonius has preserved of the arch-mime who followed the
body of the Emperor Vespasian at his funeral. This officer,
as well as a similar one who accompanied the general to
whom they granted a triumph, and who was allowed the un-
restrained licentiousness of his tongue, were both the organs
of popular feeling, and studied to gratify the rabble, who
wei'o their real masters. On this occasion the arch-mime,
representing both the exterior personage and the character
of Vespasian, according to custom, inquired the expense of the
funeral ? He was answered, " ten millions of sesterces !" In

* Baiidelot de Diiirval, de VUlillte dcs Voyafjcs, ii. 645. There is a
work, by Ficoroni, on these lead coins or tickets. They are found in the
cabinets of the curious inedallist. Tinkerton, in referring to tliis cnter-
taiuing work, regret.s tliat "such curious remains have almost escaped the
notice of medallists, and have not yet been arranged in one class, or named.
A special work ou them would be highly acceptable." The time has per-
haps arrived when anti'iuarics may begin to be philosophers, and philo-
sophers antiquaries ! The unhappy separation of erudition from philosophy,
and of philosophy from erudition, has hitherto thrown impediments in the
progress of the human mind and the history of man.

153 Expression of Siippi'essed Opinion.

allusion to the love of money which characterised the emperor,
his mock representative exclaimed, " Give me the money, and,
if you will, throw my body into the Tiber !"

All these mock offices and festivals among the ancients I
consider as organs of the suppressed opinions and feelings
of the populace, who were allowed no other, and had not the
means of the printing ages to leave any permanent records.
At a later period, before the discovery of the art which mul-
tiplies with such facility libels or panegyrics, when the
people could not speak freely against those rapacious clergy
who sheared the fleece and cared not for the sheep, many a
secret of popular indignation was confided not to books (for
they could not read), but to pictures and sculptures, which
ai"e books which the people can always read. The sculptors
and illuminators of those times no doubt shared in common
the popular feelings, and boldly trusted to the paintings or
the carvings which met the eyes of their luxurious and indo-
lent masters their satirical inventions. As far back as in
1300, we find in AVolfius * the description of a picture of
this kind, in a MS. of jEsop's Fables found in the Abbey of
Fulda, among other emblems of the corrupt lives of the
churchmen. The present was a wolf, large as life, wearing a
monkish cowl, with a shaven crown, preaching to a flock of
sheep, with these words of the apostle in a label from his mouth
— " God is my witness how I long for you all in my bowels !"
And underneath was inscribed — " This hooded wolf is the
hypocrite of whom is said in the Gospel, ' Bewai'e of false
prophets!'" Such exhibitions were often introduced into
articles of furniture. A cushion was found in an old abbey, in
which was worked a fox preaching to geese, each goose holding
in his bill his praying beads ! In the stone wall, and on the
columns of the great churcli at Strasburg, was once viewed a
number of wolves, bears, foxes, and other mischievous animals,
carrying holy water, crucifixes, and tapers; and others more in-
delicate. These, probably as old as the year 1300, were engraven
in 1617 by a protestant ; and were not destroyed till 1685, by
the pious rage of the catholics, who seemed at length to have
'.•ightly construed these silent lampoons ; and in their turn
broke to pieces the protestant images, as the othei's had done
the papistical dolls. The carved seats and stalls in our own
cathedrals exhibit subjects not oidy strange and satirical,

* Lect. Jlem. i. ad. an. ISOO.

Expremon of Suppressed Opinion. 153

Init even indecent.* At ilie time tlicy built churches they
satirised the ministers ; a curious instance how the ("cehngs
of the people struggle to find a vent. It is conjectured that
rival orders satirised each other, and that some of the carv-
ings are caricatures of certain monks. The margins of illu-
minated manuscripts frequently contain ingenious caricatures,
or satirical allegories. In a magnificent chronicle of Frois-
sart I observed several. A wolf, as usual, in a monk's frock
and cowl, stretching his paw to bless a cock, bending its head
submissively to the wolf: or a fox with a crosier, dropping
beads, which a cock is picking up ; to satirise the blind devo-
tion of the bigots ; perhaps the figure of the cock alluded to
our Gallic neighbours. A cat in the habit of a nun, holding
a platter in its paws to a mouse approaching to lick it ;
alluding to the allurements of the abbesses to draw young
women into their convents ; while sometimes I have seen a
sow in an abbess's veil, mounted on stilts : the sex marked
by the sow's dugs. A pope sometimes appears to be thrust
by devils into a cauldron ; and cardinals are seen roasting
on spits ! These ornaments nmst have been generally exe-
cuted by the monks themselves; but these more ingenious
members of the ecclesiastical order appear to have sympa-
thised with the people, like the curates in our church, and
envied the pampered abbot and the purple bishop. Church-
men were the usual objects of the suppressed indignation of
the people in those days ; but the knights and feudal lords
have not always escaped from the " curses not loud, but
deep," of their satirical pencils.

As the Reformation, or rather the Revolution, was has-
tening, this custom became so general, that in one of the dia-
logues of Erasmus, where two Franciscans are entertained
by their host, it appears that such satirical exhibitions were
hung up as common furniture in the apartments of inns.
The facetious genius of Erasmus either invents or describes
one which he had seen of an ape in the habit of a Franciscan
sitting by a sick man's bed, dispensing ghostly counsel,
holding up a crucifix in one hand, while with the other he
is filching a purse out of the sick man's pocket. Such
are "the straws" by which we may always observe from
what corner the wind rises ! Mr. Dibdin has recently in-
formed us, that Goyler, whom he calls " the herald of the Ke-

* JFiiny specimens may be seen in Carter's curious volumes on "Ancient
Arcliitcoture and Painting."

154 Exjwession of Suppressed Opinion.

formation," preceding Lntlier by twelve years, had a stone
chair or pulpit in the cathedral at Strasbvu'g, from wliich he
delivered his lectures, or rather rolled the thunders of his
anathemas against the monks. This stone pulpit was con-
structed under his own superintendence, and is covered with
very indecent figures of monks and nuns, expressly designed
b}' him to expose their profligate manners. We see Geyler
doing what for centuries had been done !

In the curious folios of Sauval, the Stowe of France, there
is a copious chapter, entitled " Heretiqucs, leurs attentats.''^
In this enumeration of their attempts to give vent to their
suppressed indignation, it is very remarkable that, preceding
the time of Luther, the minds of many were perfectly
Lutheran respecting the idolatrous worship of the Roman
Church ; and what I now notice would have rightly entered
into that significant Historia Reformationis ante Beforma-
tionem, which was formerly projected by continental writers.

Luther did not consign the pope's decretals to the flames
till 1520 — this was the first open act of reformation and in-
surrection, for hitherto he had submitted to the court of
Rome. Yet in 1490, thirty years preceding this great event,
I find a priest burnt for having snatched the host in derision
from the hands of another celebrating mass. Twelve years
afterwards, 1502, a student repeated the same deed, tramp-
ling on it ; and in 1523, the resolute death of Anne de Bourg,
a counsellor in the parliament of Paris, to use the expression
of Sauval, "corrupted the world." It is evident that the
Huguenots were fast on the increase. From that period I
find continued accounts which prove that the Huguenots of
France, like the Puritans of England, were most resolute
iconoclasts. They struck oflF the heads of Virgins and little
Jesuses, or blunted their daggers by chipping the wooden
saints, which were then fixed at the corners of streets.
Every morning discovered the scandalous treatment they
hud undergone in the night. Then their images were painted
on the walls, but these were heretically scratched and dis-
figured: and, since the saints could not defend themselves, a
royal edict was published in their favour, commanding that
all holy paintings in the streets should not be allowed short
of ten feet from the ground ! They entered churches at
night, tearing up or breaking down the prians, the henitoires,
the crucifixes, the colossal ecce-homos, which they did not
always succeed in dislodging for want of time or tools.

Expression of Suppressed Opinion. 155

Amidst these battles with wooden adversaries, we may smile
at the frequent solemn processions instituted to ward o(l" the
vengeance of the parish saint; the wooden was expiated by a
silver image, secured by iron bars and attended by tlie king
and the nobility, carrying the new saint, with prayers that
he would protect himself I'rom the heretics!

In an earl}-^ period of the Reformation, an instance occurs
of the art of concealing what we wish only the few should
comprehend, at the same time that we are addressing the
public. Curious collectors are acquainted with " The Oli-
vetan Bible;" this was the first translation published by the
protestants, and there seems no doubt that Calvin was the
chief, if not the oidy translator ; but at that moment not
choosing to become responsibU^ for this new version, he made
use of the name of an obscure relative, Kobert Pierre Oli-
vetan. Calvin, however, prefixed a Latin preface, remarkable
for delivering positions very op])OsiLe to those tremendous
doctrines of absolute predestination which, in his theological
despotism, he afterwards assumed. De Bure describes this
first protestant Bible not only as rare, but, when found, as
usually imperfect, much soiled and dog-eared, as the well-
read tirst edition of Shakspeare, by the perpetual use of the
multitude. But a curious fact has escaped the detection
both of De Bure and Beloe ; at the end of the volume are
found ten verses, which, in a concealed manner, authenticate
the translation ; and which no one, unless initiated into the
secret, could possibly suspect. The verses are not poetical,
but I give the first sentence : —

Lecteur eiitcuds, si verlte adrcsse
Viens done ouyr instamcnt sa promesse
Et vif parlcr &c.

Tlie first letters of every icord of these ten verses form a per-
fect dislieh, containing information important to those to
whom the Olivetan Bible was addressed.

Les Vaudois, peuple cvangclique,
Ont mis ce thresor en publique.

An anagram would have been too inartificial a contrivance
to have answered the purpose of concealing from the world at
large this secret. There is an adroitness in the invention of
the initial letters of all the words through these ten verses.
They contained a communication necessary to authenticate

15G Expression of Suppressed Opinion.

tiie version, but which, at the same time, could not be sus-
pected by any person not intrusted with the secret.

AVhen the art of medal-engraving was revived in Europe,
the spirit we are now noticing took possession of those less
perishable and more circulating vehicles. Satiric medals were
almost unknown to the ancient mint, notwithstanding those
of the Saturnalia, and a few which bear miserable puns on the
unlucky names of some consuls. Medals illustrate history,
and history reflects light on medals ; but we should not place
such unreserved confidence on medals as their advocates, who
are warm in their favourite study. It has been asserted that
medals are more authentic memorials than history itself ; but
a medal is not less susceptible of the bad passions than a
pamphlet or an epigram. Ambition has its vanity, and
engraves a dubious victory ; and Flattery will practise its
art, and deceive us in gold ! A calumny or a fiction on metal
may be more durable than on a fugitive page ; and a libel
has a l)etter chance of being preserved when the artist is
skilful, than simple truths when miserably executed. Medals
of this class are numerous, and were the precursors of those
political satires exhibited in caricature prints.* There is a
large collection of wooden cuts about the time of Calvin,
where the Romish religion is represented by the most gro-
tesque forms which the ridicule of the early Reformers
could invent. More than a thousand figures attest the ex-
uberant satire of the designers. This work is equally rare
and costly .f

Satires of this species commenced in the freedom of the
Reformation ; for wo find a medal of Luther in a monk's
habit, satirically bearing for its reverse Catherine de Bora,
the nun whom this monk married ; the first step of his per-
sonal reformation ! Nor can we be certain that Catherine
was not more concerned in that great revolution than appears
in the voluminous Lives we have of the great reformer. How-
ever, the reformers were as great sticklers for medals as the
"papelins." Of Pope John Vlll., an effeminate voluptuary,
we have a medal with his portrait, inscribed Pope Joan ! and
another of Innocent X., dressed as a woman holding a spindle;
the reverse, his famous mistress, Donna Olympia, dressed as

* The series published during the wars in the Low Countries are the
most remarkable, and may be seen in the volumes ])y Van Loon.

•)" ]\Ir. Douce possessed a portion of this very curious collection : fur a
complete one De Bure asked about twenty pounds.

Eoepression of Suppressed Opinion. 157

a Pope, with the tiara on Iier liead, ami the keys of St. Peter
in her hands !*

When, in the reign of Mary, England was groaning under
Spanish influence, and no remonstrance could reach the
throne, tlie queen's person and government were made ridicu-
lous to the people's eyes hy prints or pictures " representin"
her majesty naked, meagre, withered, and wrinkled, with
every aggravated circumstance of deformity that could dis-
grace a i'emale figure, seated in a regal chair ; a crown on her
head, surrounded with M. K. and A. in capitals, accompanied
by small letters; Maria lieijina Anglice ! a number of Spa-
niards were sucking her to skin and bone, and a specification
was added of the money, rings, jewels, and other presents
with which she had secretly gratified her husband Phili[)."t
It is said that the queen suspected some of her own council
of this invention, who alone were privy to these transac-
tions. It is, however, in this manner that the voice which
is suppressed by authority comes at length in another shape
to the eye.

The age of Elizabetli, when the lloman pontiff and all his
adherents were odious to the people, jjroduced a remarkable
caricature, and ingenious invention — a gorgon's head ! A
church bell forms the helmet ; the ornaments, instead of the
feathers, are a wolf's head in a mitre devouring a lamb, an
ass's head with spectacles reading, a goose holding a rosary :
the face is made out with a fish for the nose, a chalice and
water for the eye, and otlier priestly ornaments for the
shoulder and breast, on which rolls of parchment pardons
hang.+

A lamous bishop of Munster, Bernard de Galen, who, in
his charitable violence for converting protestants, got himself
into such celebrity that he appears to have served as an ex-
cellent si(jn-post to the inns in Germany, was tlie true church

* The Roman satirists also invented a tale to ridicule what they dared not
openly condemn, iu which it was asserted that a play called The Marriage
of the Pope was enacted before Cromwell, in which the Dunna iiaviug ob-
tained the key of Paradise from Innocent, insists on that of Purgatory also,
tiial she may not be sent there when he is wearied of her. "The wedding"
is then kept by a ball of monks and nuns, delighted to think they may one
day marry also. Such was the means the Romans took to notify their sense
of the degradation of the pope.

+ Wartou's " Life of Sir Thomas Pope," p. 58.

% This ancient caricature, so descriptive of the popular feelings, is tole-
jably given in Malcolm's history of " Caricatiuing, " plate ii. fig. 1.

158 Expression of Suppressed Opinion.

militant : and his figure was exhibited according to the
popular fanc}'. His head was half mitre and half helmet ; a
crosier in one hand and a sahre in the other ; half a rochet
and half a cuirass : he was made performing mass as a dra-
goon on horseback, and giving out the charge when he ought
the Ife, missa est ! He was called the converter! and the
"Bishop of Munster " became popular as a sign-post in
German towns ; for the people like lighting men, though
.hey should even fight against themselves.

It is rather curious to observe of this new species of satire,
so easily distributed among the people, and so directly ad-
dressed to their understandings, that it was made the vehicle
of national feeling. Ministers of state condescended to invent
the devices. Loi'd Orford says that caricatures on cards were
the invention of George Townshend in the affair of Byng,
which was soon followed by a pack. I am informed of an
ancient pack of cards which has caricatures of all the Parlia-
mentarian Generals, which might be not unusefuUy shuffled
by a writer of secret history.* We may be surprised to find
the grave Sully practising this artifice on several occasions.
In the civil wars of France the Duke of Savoy had taken by
surprise Saluces, and struck a medal ; on the reverse a centaur
appears shooting with a bow and arrow, with the legend Op-
portune ! But when Henry the Fourth had reconquered the
town, he published another, on which Hercules appears killing
tne centaur, with the word Opportimius. The great minister
was the author of this retort If A medal of the Dutch am-
bassador at the court of France, Van Beuninghen, whom the
French represent as a haughty burgomaster, but who had the
vivacity of a Frenchman and the haughtiness of a Spaniard,
as Voltaire characterises him, is said to have been the occasion
of the Dutch war in 1G72 ; but wars will be hardly made for
an idle medal. Medals may, however, mdicate a preparatory
war. Louis the Fourteenth was so often compared to the

* This pack was probaLly executed in Holland in the time of Charles
the Second. There are other sets of political cards of the same reign,
particularly one connected with the so-called "popish plots," and the
murder of Sir Edmundbury Godfrey. The South-Sea Bubble was made
the subject of a similar pack, after it had exploded.

'(- The royal house of Navarre was fancifully derived by the old heraldic
writers from Hispalus, the son of Hercules ; and the pageant provided by
the citizens of Avignon to greet his entrance there in 1600, was entirely
composed in reference thereto, and Henry indicated in its title, Ullcrcule
Gaulois Triumphant.

Expression of Suppressed Opinion. 159

pun at its meridian, that some of his creatures may have
imagined that, like the sun, he could dart into any part of
Europe as he willed, and be as cheerfully received.* The
Dutch minister, whose Christian name was Joshua, however,
had a medal struck of Joshua stopping the sun in his course,
inferring that tliis miracle was operated b}' his little republic.
The medal itself is engraven in Van Loon's voluminous His-
toire MedaUiqiie dii Fays Bas, and in Marchand'sZ>/e/io«?mir(3
Jiistorique, who labours to prove against twenty authors that
the Dutch ambassador was not the inventor ; it was not,
however, unworthy of him, and it conveyed to the world the
high i'eeling of her power which Holland had then assumed.
Two years after the noise about this medal the republic paid
deal' for the device ; but thirty years afterwards this very
burgomaster concluded a glorious peace, and France and
Spain were compelled to receive the mediation of the Dutch
Joshua with the French Sun.f In these vehicles of national
satire, it is odd tliat the phlegmatic Dutch, more tlian any
other nation, and from the earliest period of their republic,
should have indulged freely, if not licentiously. It was a
republican humour. Their taste was usually gross. We owe
to them, even in the reign of Elizabetii, a severe medal on
Leicester, who, having retired in disgust from the government
of their provinces, struck a medal with his bust, reverse a dog
and sheep,

Non gregem, sed ingratos invltus dcsero;

on which the angry juvenile states struck another, represent-
ing an ape and young ones ; reverse, Leicester near a lire,

Fugiens fu7num, incidit in ignem.

Another medal, with an excellent portrait of Cromwell, was
struck by the Dutch. The Protector, crowned with laurels,
is on his knees, laying his head in tlie lap of tlie common-
wealth, but loosely exhibiting himself to the French and
Spanisli ambassadors with gross indecency : the Frenchman,
covered w'llXiJlcur de lis, is pushing aside the grave Don, and
disputes with him tlie precedence — lietire-toij ; Vhonneur

* He look for a device and motto on Lis shield on tlie occasion of
tilting-matches and court festivities, a representation of the sun in splen-
dour, and the words, Ncc I'luribus Impar.

t The history of this medal is useful in more than one respect ;. and
may be found in Prosper JIarchaud.

160 Expression of Suppressed Opinion.

appariient au roy mon maitre, Louis le Grand. V^\n Loon
is very right in denouncing this same medal, so grossly flat-
tering to the English, as most detestable and indelicate!
But why does Van Loon envy us this lumpish invention ?
why does the Dutchman quari'el with his own cheese ? The
honour of the medal we claim, hut the invention belongs to
his country. The Dutch went on commenting in this manner
on English allairs I'rom reign to reign. Cliarles the Second
declared war against them in 1G72 for a malicious medal,
though the States-General offered to break the die, by pur-
chasing it of the workman for one thousand ducats ; but it
served for a pretext for a Dutch war, whieli Charles cared
more about than the mala lestia of his exergue. Charles also
complained of a scandalous picture which the brothers de
Witt had in their house, representing a naval battle with
the English. Charles the Second seems to have been more
sensible to this sort of national satire than we might have
expected in a professed wit ; a race, however, who are not the
most patient in having their own sauce returned to their lips.
The king employed Evelyn to write a history of the Dutch
war, and " enjoined him to make it a little Iceen, for the Hol-
landers had very unhandsomely abused him in their pictures,
books, and libels." The Dutch continued their career of con-
veying their national feeling on English affairs more trium-
phantly when their Stadtholder ascended an English throne.
The birth of the Pretender is represented by the chest which
Minerva gave to the daughters of Cecrops to keep, and which,
opened, discovered an infant with a serpent's tail : Infan-
temque vident apporrectumque draconern ; the chest perhaps
alluding to the removes of the warming-pan ; and, in another,
James and a Jesuit flying in terror, the king throwing away
a crown and sceptre, and the Jesuit carrying a child ; Ite
missa est, the words applied from the mass.* But in these
contests of national feeling, while the grandeur of Louis the
Fourteenth did not allow of these ludicrous and satirical
exhibitions, and while the political idolatry which his forty
Academicians paid to him exhausted itself in the splendid
fictions of a series of famous medals, amounting to nearly y-
four hundred, it appears that we were not without our i-e- "
prisals ; for I find Prosper Marchand, who writes as a Hol-

* Anotber represents the young prince holding the symbol of the Romish
faith in his right hand, and crowning himself with the left ; Truth opens
a door below and discovers Father Petrc, as the guiding influence of all.

Expression of Suppressed Opinion. 161

lander, censuring his own country for having at length adu-
lated the grand nionarque by a coinpliincntary medal. He
says — " The EnL,dish cannot be reitroached with a similar
debonairefe." Alter the I'amous victories of Marlborough,
they indeed inserted in a medal the head of the French
monarch and the English queen, with this inscription,
Ludovicus ILagnus, Anna Jlajor. Long ere this one of our
queens had been exhibited by ourselves with considerable
energy. On the defeat of the Armada, Elizabeth, Pinkcrton
tells us, struck a medal representing the English and Spanish
fleets, Hespcridum regem devicit virgo. Philip had medals
dispersed in England of the same impression, with this addi-
tion, Negatur. Est mcretriv vulgi. These the queen sup-
pressed, but published another medal, with tliis legend ; —

Hesperidum regem devicit virgo ; negatur,
Est meretrix vulgi ; res eo deterior.

An age fertile in satirical prints was the eventful tera of
Charles the First : they were showered from all parties, and
a large collection of them would admit of a critical historical
conmientary, which might become a vehicle of the most
curious secret history. Most of them are in a bad style, for
they are allegorical ; yet that these satirical exhibitions influ-
enced the eyes and minds of the people is evident from an
extraordinary circumstance. Two grave collections of his-
torical documents adoi)ted them. We are surprised to find
prefixed to Ilushworth's and Nalson's historical collections
two such political prints ! Nalson's was an act of retributive
justice ; but he seems to have been aware that satire in the
shape of pictures is a language very attractive to the multi-
tude, for he has introduced a caricature print in the solemn
folio of the Trial of Charles the First.* Of the happiest of
these political prints is one by Taylor the Water-poet, not
included in his folio, but prefi.xed to his " Mad Fashions, Odd
Fashions, or the Emblems of these Distracted Times." It is
the figure of a man whose eyes have left their sockets, and
whose legs have usurped the place of his arms ; a hor.-e on

* It represents Cromwell as an armed monster, carrying tlie three
kingdoms captive at his foet in a triumphal car driven by the devil over
the body of liberty, and the decapitated Charles I. The state of tl e
people is emblematized by a bird Hying from ils cage to be devoured l.y a
hawk ; and sheep breaking h\>\\\ the fold to be set on by raven. u-j
wolves.

VOL. HI. M

1 G2 Expj-ession of Suppressed Opinion.

his hind legs is drawing a cart ; a church is inverted ; fish fly
in the air ; a candle burns with the flame downwards ; and
the mouse and rabbit are pursuing the cat and the fox !

The animosities of national hatred have been a fertile source
of these vehicles of popular feeling — which discover them-
selves in severe or grotesque caricatures. The French and
the Spaniards mutually exhibit one another under the most
extravagant figui'es. The political caricatures of the French
in the seventeenth century are numerous. The hadauds of
Paris amused themselves for their losses by giving an emetic
to a Spaniard, to make him render up all the towns his vic-
tories had obtained : seven or eight Spaniards are seen seated
around a large turnip, with their frizzled mustachios, their
hats en pot-a-heurre ; their long rapiers, with their pummels
down to their feet, and their points up to their shoulders ;
their ruffs stiffened by many rows, and pieces of garlick stuck
in their girdles. The Dutch were exhibited in as great variety
as the uniformity of frogs would allow. We have largely
participated in the vindictive spirit which these grotesque
emblems keep up among the pco])le ; they mark the secret
feelings of national pride. The Greeks despised foreigners,
and considered them only as fit to be slaves;* the ancient
Jews, inflated with a false idea of their small territory, would
be masters of the world: the Italians placed a line of demar-
cation for genius and taste, and marked it by their mountains.
The Spaniards once imagined that the conferences of God
with Moses on Mount Sinai were in the Spanish language.
If a Japanese become the friend of a foreigner, he is con-
sidered as committing treason to his emperor, and rejected
as a false brother in a country which, we are told, is figura-
tively called Tenka, or the Kingdom under the Heavens.
John Bullism is not peculiar to Englishmen ; and patriotism
is a noble virtue when it secures our independence without
depriving us of our humanity.

The civil wars of the League in France, and those in Eng-
land under Charles the First, bear the most striking resem-
blance ; and in examining the revolutionary scenes exhibited
by the graver in the famous Satire Menippee, we discover the
foreign artist revelling in the caricature of his ludicrous and

* A passage may be found in Aristotle's Politics, vol. i. c. 3 — 7 ; where
Aristotle advises Alexander to govern the Greeks like his subjects, and the
barbarians like slaves ; for that the one he was to consider as companions,
and the other as creatures of an infcrita- race.

Autographs. 168

gevere exhibition ; and in tliat otlier revolutionary period of
La Fronde, tlicre was a mania for political songs ; the curious
have formed them into collections; and we not only ha\e
"the Rump Songs" of Cliarles the First's times, but have
repeated this kind of evidence of the public feeling at many
subsequent periods.* Caricatures and political songs might
with us furnish a new sort of history ; and perhai s would
preserve some truths, and describe some particular events
not to be found in more grave authorities.

AUTOGRAPHS.t

The art of judging of the characters of persons by their
handwriting "can only have any reality when the pen, acting
without restraint, becomes an instrument guided by, and
indicative of, the natural dispositions. But regulated as the
pen is now too often by a mechanical process, which the pre-
sent race of writing-masters seem to have contrived for their
own convenience, a whole school exhibits a similar hand-
writing; the pupils are forced in their automatic motions,
as if acted on by the pressure of a steam-engine ; a bevy of
beauties will now write such fac-similes of each other, that in
a heap of letters presented to the most sharp-sighted lover to
select that of his mistress— though, like Bassanio among the
caskets, his happiness should be ri.^ked on the choice — he
would despair of fixing on the right one, all appearing to
have come irom the same rolling-press. Even brothers of
difierent tempers have been taught by the same master to

* The following may be mentioned as the most important of tbe.se col-
lections : —

" Rome rhymed to Death." 1683.

" A Collection of the newest and most ingenious Poems, Songs, Catches,
&c., against Popery." 1689.

" Poems on Affairs of State." 1703-7.

" Whig and Tory ; or, Wit on both sides." 1712.

" Political .Merriment; or, Truths told to some Tune." 1714.

t A small volume which I met with at Pari.s, entitled " L'Art ile juger
du Caractere des Hommes sur leiirs Ecritures," is curious for its illus-
trations, consisting of twcnlij-four plates, eahibiting facsimiles of the
wr'Uiwj of eminent and other persons, correctly taken from the original
autographs. Since this period both France and Germany have producid
many books devoted to the use of the curious in .•lulo.L.'rai.hs. In our owu
country J. T. Smith p\iblished a curious collection of fac-similes of lettei-s,
chiefly from literary characters.

Ai 'J.

164 Autographs,

give the same form to their letters, the same regularity to
their line, and have made our handwritings as monotonous
as are our cliaraoters in the present habits of society. The
true physiognomy of writing will be lost among our rising
generation : it is no longer a fixce that we are looking on, but
a beautiful mask of a single pattern ; and the fashionable
handwriting of our young ladies is like the former tight-
lacing of tlu'ir mothers' youthful days, when every one alike
had what was sui)posed to be a fine shape !

Assuredly nature would [irompt every individual to have a
distinct sort of writing, as she has given a peculiar coun-
tenance— a voice — and a manner. The flexibility of the
muscles differs with every individual, and the hand will follow
the direction of the thoughts and the emotions and the
habits of the wi-iters. The phlegmatic will portray his words,
while the pla^'ful haste of the volatile will scarcely sketch
them ; the slovenly will blot and efface and scrawl, while the
neat and orderly-minded will view tliemselves in the paper
before their ej^es. The merchant's clerk will not write like
the lawyer or the poet. Even nations are distinguished by
their writing ; the vivacity and variableness of the French-
man, and the delicacy and suppleness of the Italian, are
perceptibly distinct from the slowness and strength of pen
discoverable in the phlegmatic German, Dane, and Swede.
When we are in grief, we do not write as we should in joy.
The elegant and correct mind, which has acquired the foitu-
nate habit of a fixity of attention, will write with scarcely an
erasure on the page, as Fenelon, and Gra}^ and Gibbon ; while
we find in Pope's manuscripts the perpetual struggles of cor-
rection, and the eager and rapid interlineations struck off in
heat. Lavater's notion of handwriting is by no means
chimerical ; nor was General Paoli fanciful, when he told Mr.
Northcote that he had decided on the character and disposi-
tions of a man fron) his letters, and the handwriting.

Long before the days of Lavater, Shenstone in one of his
letters said, " I want to see Mrs. Jago's handwriting, that I
may judge of her temper." One great truth must however
be conceded to the opponents of tJie physiognomy of writ in y ;
general rules only can be laid down. Yet the vital principle
must be true that the handwriting bears an analogy to the
character of the writer, as all voluntary actions are character-
istic of the individual. But many causes operate to coun-
teract or obstruct this result. I am intitnatcl\' acquainted

Autographs. 165

with the handwritings of five of our i^reat poets. The first
in early Hie acquired among Scottish advocates a handwriting
wliich cannot be distinguished from that of liis ordinary
brotliers ; the second, educated in pubHc schools, where
writing is shamel'ully neglected, composes his sublime or
sportive verses in a school-boy's ragged scrawl, as if he had
never finished his tasks with the writing-master ; the third
writes his highly-wrought poetry in the common hand of a
merchant's clerk, from early commercial avocations ; the
fourth has all that finished neatness which polisiies his verses ;
while the fifth is a specimen of a full mind, not in the habit
of correction or alteration ; so that he appears to be printing
down his thoughts, without a solitary erasure. The hand-
writing of the first and third poets, not indicative of tlieir
character, we have accounted for ; the others are admirable
specimens of characteristic autographs.*

Oldys, in one of his curious notes, was struck by the dis-
tinctness of character in the handwritings of several of our
kings. He observed notliing further than the mere fact, and
did not extend his idea to the art of judging of tlie natural
character by the writing. Oldys has described these hand-
writings with the utmost correctness, as 1 have often verified.
I shall add a few comments.

" Henry tiie Eighth wrote a strong hand, but as if he had
seldom a good pen." — The vehemence of his character con-
veyed itself into his writing ; bold, hasty, and commanding, E
have no doubt the assertor of the Pope's supremacy and its
triumphant destroyer split many^ a good quill.

"Edward the Sixth wrote a fair legible hand." — We have
this promising young prince's diary, written by his own hand ;
in all respects he was an assiduous pupil, and he had scarcely
learnt to write and to reign when we lost him.

" Queen Elizabeth writ an upright hand, like the bastard
Italian." She was indeed a most elegant caligrapher, whom
Roger Ascham t had taught all the elegancies of the pen.
Tlie French editor of the little autographical work I have
noticed has given the autograph of her name, which she
usually wrote in a very hu-ge tall character, and painfully

• It vnW be of interest to tlie reader to note the names of these poets ia
the consecutive oriler they are alluded to. They are Scott, Byron, Kogers,
-Moore, and Camphell.

t lie was :ilso the tutor of Lady Jane Grey, and the author of one ol our
earliest and best works on education.

166 Autographs.

elaborate. He accompanies it with one of the Scottish Mary,
who at times wrote elegantly, though usually in uneven lines ;
when in haste and distress of mind, in several letters during
her imprisonment which I have read, much the contrary.
The French editor makes this observation : " Who could
believe that these writings are of the same epoch ? The first
denotes asperity and ostentation ; the second indicates
simplicity, softness, and nobleness. The one is that of Eliza-
beth, queen of England ; the other that of her cousin, Mary
Stuart. The difference of these two handwritings answer?
most evidently to that of their characters."

" James the First writ a poor ungainly character, all awry,
and not in a straight line." James certainly wrote a slovenly
scrawl, strongly indicative of that personal negligence which
he carried into all the little things of Hfe ; and Buchanan, who
had made him an excellent scholar, may receive the disgrace
of his pupil's ugly scribble, which sprawls about his careless
and inelegant letters.

" Charles the First wrote a fair open Italian hand, and
more correctly perhaps than any prince we ever had."
Charles was the first of our monarchs who intended to have
domiciliated taste in the kingdom, and it might have been
conjectui-ed from this unfortunate prince, who so finely
discriminated the manners of the different painters, which are
in fact their handwritings, that he would not have been
insensible to the elegancies of the pen.

" Charles the Second wrote a little fair running hand, as if
wrote in haste, or uneasy till he had done." Such was the
writing to have been expected from this illustrious vagabond,
who had much to write, often in odd situations, and could
never get rid of his natural restlessness and vivacity.

" James the Second writ a large fair hand." It is charac-
terised by his phlegmatic temper, as an exact detuile. of
occurrences, and the matter-oi-business genius of the writer.

" Queen Anne wrote a fair round hand ;" that is the
writing she had been taught by her master, probably without
any alteration of manner naturally suggested by herself; the
copying hand of a common character.*

Tlie subject of autographs associates itself with what has

* Since this article was written, Nichols has published a cleverly-
executed series of autographs of royal, noble, and illustrious persons of
Great Britain, in which the reader may study the accuracy of the criticism
above given.

The History of Writing-masters. 1G7

been dii^iilfied by its professors as caligrapb}^, or tbe art of
beautiful writing. As I havo sonietbing curious to commu-
nicate on tliat subject considered professionally, it shall form
our following article.

THE HISTORY OP WRITING-MASTERS.

There is a very apt letter from James the First to Prince
Henry when very young, on the neatness and fairness of bis
handwriting. The royal father suspecting that tin; prince's
tutor, Mr., afterwards Sir Adam, Newton, had lielped out tbe
young prince in the composition, and tbat in this specimen
of caligraphy he had relied also on the pains of Mr. Peter
Bales, the great writing-master, for touching up his letters,
his majesty shows a laudable anxiety that tbe prince should
be impressed with the higher importance of tbe one over the
other. James shall himself speak. '• I confess I long to
receive a letter from ^-ou tbat may be wbolW yours, as well
matter as form ; as well formed by your mind as drawn by
3'our fingers ; for ye may remember, that in my book to you I
warn you to beware with (of) that kind of wit that may ily
out at tbe end of your fingers ; not that I commend not a fair
handwriting ; sed hoc facito, illiul non omittito : and the other
is multo mayis prcecipuum.'" Prince Henrj^, indeed, wrote
with that elegance which he borrowed from his own mind ;
and in an age when such minute elegance was not universal
among the crowned heads of Europe. Henr}' IV., on receiving
a letter from Prince Henry, immediately o])ened it, a custom
not usual with him, and comparing the writing with the
signature, to decide whether it were of one baud. Sir George
Carew, observing tbe French King's hesitation, called Mr.
Douglas to testify to tbe fact ; on which Henry the Great,
admiring an art in which be bad little skill, and looking on
tbe neat elegance of tbe writing before him, politcl}' observed,
" I see that in writing fair, as in other things, the elder must
yield to the younger."

Had this anecdote of neat writing reacliod the professors
of caligraphy, who in this country have put forth such pain-
ful panegyrics on the art, these royal names had unquestion-
ably blazoned their pages. Not indeed tbat these penmen
require any fresh inflation ; for never has there been a race of
professors in any art who have exceeded in solemnity and

168 The History of Writing-masters.

pretensions the practitioners in this simple and mechanical
craft. I must leave to more ingenious investigators of
human nature to reveal the occult cause which has operated
such powerful delusions on these " Vive la Plume !" men,
who have been generally observed to possess least intellectual
ability in proportion to the excellence they have obtained in
their own art. I suspect this maniacal vanity is peculiar to
the writing-masters oi' England ; and I can only attribute
the immense importance which they have conceived of their
art to the perfection to which they have carried the art of
short hand writing ; an art which was always better under-
stood, and more skilfully practised, in England than in any
other country. It will surprise some when they learn that
the artists in verse and colours, poets and painters, have not
raised loftier pretensions to the admiration of mankind.
Writing-masters, or caligraphers, have had their engraved
" effigies," with a Fame in flourishes, a pen in one hand and
a trumpet in the other ; and fine verses inscribed, and their
very lives written ! They have compared

The nimbly-turning of their silver quill

to the beautiful in art and the sublime in invention ; nor is
this wonderful, since they discover the art of writing, like the
invention of language, in a divine original ; and from the
tablets of stone which the Deity himself delivered, they
trace their German broad text, or their fine running-hand.
One, for "the bold striking of those words, Vive la Plume"
was so sensible of the reputation that this last piece of com-
mand of hand would give the book which he thus adorned,
and which his biographer acknowledges was the product of
about a minute, — (but then how many years of flourishing
had that single minute cost him !) — that he claims the glory
of an artist ; observing, —

We seldom find
The man of business with the artist join'd.

Another was flattered that his ivriting could impart immor-
tality to the most wretched compositions ! —

And any lines prove pleasing, when you write.

Sometimes the caligrapher is a sort of hero : —

To you, you rare commander of the quill,

Whose wit and worth, deep learniiiL', and high skill.

Speak you the honour of Great Tower Hill !

The History of IVAtiny-masters. 1G9

The last line became traditionally adopted by those who were
so lucky as to live in the neighbourhood of this Parnassus.
But the reader must form some notion of that charm of cali-
gra])hy which has so bewitched its professors, when,

Soft, bold, and free, your manuscripts still please.

How justly bold in Snell's improving hand
The pen at once joins freerlom with command !
With softness stroiiL', with ornaIuent^^ not vain,
Loose with proportion, and with neatness plain ;
Not sweli'd, not full, complete in every part.
And artful most, when not affecting art.

And these describe tliose pencilled knots and flourishes,
" the angels, the men, the birds, and the beasts," which, as
one of them observed, he could

Command
Even by the rjcntle motion of his hand,

all the speciosa miracula of caligraphy ;

Thy tender strokes, inimitably fine,

Crown with perfection every flowing line ;

And to each yrand performance add a grace.

As curling hair adorns a beauteous face :

In every page new fancies give delight,

And sporting round the margin charm the sight.

One Massey, a writing-master, published in 1763, " The
Origin and Progress of Letters." The great singularity of
this volume is " a new species of biography never attempted
before in English." This consists of the lives of " English
Penmen," otherwise writing-masters ! If some have foolishly
enough imagined that the sedentary lives of authors are void
of interest from deiicient incident and interesting catastrophe,
what must they think of the baiTen labours of those who, in
the degree they become eminent, to use their own style, in
the art of " dish, dash, long-tail %," the less the}'^ become
interesting to the public ; for what can the most skilful
writing-master do but wear away his life in leaning over his
pupil's copy, or sometimes snatch a pen to decorate the
margin, though he cannot compose the page? Montaigne lias a
very original notion on writing-masters: he says that some of
those caligraphers who had obtained promotion by their ex-
cellence in the art, afterwards affected to write carelensly,
lest their promotion should he suspected to have been owing to
eiich an ordinary acquisition !

170 The History of Writing-masters.

Massey is an enthusiast, fortunately for his suhject. He
considers that there are schools of ivritinrj, as well as of
jjalnting' or sculpture ; and expatiates with the eye of frater-
nal feeling on " a natural genius, a tender stroke, a grand
performance, a bold striking freedom, and a liveliness in the
sprigged letters, and pencilled knots and flourishes ;" while
this Vasari of writing-masters relates the controversies and
the libels of man}^ a rival pen-nibber. " George Shelley, one
of the most celebrated worthies who have made a shining
figure in the commonwealth of English caligraphy, born I
suppose of obscure parents, because brought up in Christ'^
Hospital, yet under the humble blue-coat he laid the founda-
tion of his caligraphic excellence and lasting fame, for he was
elected writing-master to the hospital." Shelley published
his " Natural Writing ;" but, alas ! Snell, another Ijlue-coat,
transcended the other. He was a genius who would " bear
no brother near the throne." — " I have been informed that
there were jealous heart-burnings, if not bickerings, between
him and Col. Ayres, another of our great reformers in the
writing commonweal, both eminent men, yet, like our most
celebrated poets Fope and Addison, or, to carry the com-
parison still higher, like Ccesar and Pomjpey, one could bear
no superior, and the other no equal." Indeed, the great
Snell practised a little stratagem against Mr. Shelley, for
which, if writing-masters held courts-martial, this hero ought
to have appeared before his brothers. In one of his works
he procured a number of friends to write letters, in which
Massey confesses " are some satyrical strokes upon Shelley,"
as if he had arrogated too much to himself in his book of
" Natural Writing." They find great fault with pencilled
knots and sprigged letters. Shelley, who was an advocate
for ornaments in fine penmanship, which Snell utterly re-
jected, had parodied a well-known line of Herbert's in favour
of his favourite decorations : —

A Knot may take him who from letters flies,
And turu ddiyht into an exercise.

These reflections created ill-blood, and even an open difference
amongst several of the superior artists in icriting. The
commanding genius of Snell had a more terrific contest when
he published his "Standard Rules," pretending to have f/^-
monstrated them as Euclid would. " This proved a bone of
contention, and occasioned a terrific quarrel between Mr.

The History of Writing-masters. 171

Snell and j\Ir. Clark, This quarrel about ' Standard Rules'
run so hi,Lrh between them, that they could scarce forl)ear
scurrilous langunr/e therein, and a treatment of each other
unhacoxmw^ (jenllemen ! Both sides in this dispute liad their
abettors ; and to say which had the most truth and reason,
non nostrum est tantas componere liles ; perliaps hotli parties
might he too fond of their own schemes. They should have
left them to people to choose which they liked best." A
candid politician is our Massey, and a philosophical historian
too; for he winds up the whole story of this civil war by
describing its result, which happened as all such great con-
troversies have ever closed. " Who now-a-days takes those
Standard liules, either one or the other, for tlieir guide in
writing ?" This is the finest lesson ever offered to the
furious heads of parties, and to all their men ; let them me-
ditate on the nothingness of their " Standard Kules," b}' the
fate of Mr. Sncll.

It was to be expected, when once these writing-masters
imagined that they were artists, that they would be infected
with those plague-spots of genius — envy, detraction, and all
the jalousie du metier. And such to this hour we find
them ! An extraordinary scene of this nature has long been
exhibited in my neighbourhood, where two doughty cham-
pions of the quill have been posting up libels in their win-
dows respecting the inventor of a new art of loritinrj, the
Carstairian, or the Lewisian ? When the great German phi-
losopher asserted that he had discovered the method of
fluxions before Sir Isaac, and when the dispute grew so vio-
lent that even the calm Newton sent a formal defiance in set
>rms, and got even George the Second to try to arbitrate
(who would ratlier have luidertaken a campaign), the
method of fluxions was no more cleared up than the present
ftfiiiir between our two heroes of the quill.

A recent instance of one of these egregious caligraphers
may be told of the late Tomkins. This vainest of writing-
masters dreamed through life that penmanship was one of
the fine arts, and that a writing-master should be seated with,
his peers in the Academy 1 lie bequeathed to the British
Museum his opus magnum — a copy of !Maeklin's Bible, ])ro-
fusely embellished with the most beautil'al and varied deco-
rations of his pen ; and as he conceived that both the work-
man and the work would alike be darling objects with pos-
terity, he left something immortal with the legacy, his fine

172 The History of Writing-masters.

bust, by Chantrey, unaccompanied by which they were not
to receive the unparalleled gift ! When Tomkins applied to
have his bust, our great sculptor abated the usual price, and,
courteously kind to the feelings of the man, said that he
considered Tomkins as an artist ! It was the proudest day
of the life of our writing-master !

But an eminent artist and wit now living, once looking on
this fine bust of Tomkins, declared, that " this man had died
for want of a dinner !" — a fate, however, not so lamentable as
it appeared ! Our penman had long felt that he stood de-
graded in the scale of genius by not being received at the
Academy, at least among the class of engravers ; the next
approach to academic honour he conceived would be that of
appearing as a guest at their annual dinner. These invita-
tions are as limited as they are select, and all the Academy
persisted in consideringTomkins«s a writing-master ! Many a
year passed, every intrigue was practised, every remonstrance
was urged, every stratagem of courtesy was tried ; but nevev
ceasing to deplore the failure of his hopes, it preyed on his
spirits, and the luckless caligrapher went down to his grave — ■
without dining at the Academy ! This authentic anecdote
has been considered as "satire improperly directed" — by
some friend of Mr. Tomkins — but the criticism is much too
grave ! The foible of Mr. Tomkins as a writing-master pre-
sents a striking illustration of the class of men here delineated.
I am a mere historian — and am only responsible for the vera-
city of this fact. That "Mr. Tomkins lived in familiar
intercourse with the Royal Academicians of his day, and was
a frequent guest at their private tables," and moreover was
a most worthy man, I believe — but is it less true that he was
ridiculously mortified by being never invited to the Academic
dinner, on account of his caligraphy ? He had some reason
to consider that his art was of the exalted class to which he
aspired to raise it, when this friend concludes his eulogy of
this writing-master thus — "Mr. Tomkins, as an artist, stood
foremost in his own profession, and his name will be handed
down to posterity with the Heroes and Statesmen, whose
excellences his penmansJiip has contributed to illustrate and
to commemorate." I always give the I^our and the Contre!

Such men about such things have produced public contests,
combats a Voutrance, where much ink was spilled by the
knights in a joust of goose-quills ; these solemn trials have
often occm'red in the history of writing-masters, which ia

The Histonj of Writing-masters. 1 73

enlivened by public defiances, proclamations, and judicial
trials by umpires ! The prize was usually a golden pen of
some value. One as late as in the reign of Anne took place be-
tween Mr. German and Mr. More. German having cour-
teously insisted tliab Mr. More should set the eopy, he thus
set it, ingeniously quaint !

As more, and More, our uuderstanding clears,
So more and more our ignorance appears.

The result of this pen-combat was really lamentable ; they
displayed such an equality of excellence that the umpires re-
fused to decide, till one of them espied that Mr. German had
omitted the tittle of an i ! But Mr. More was evidently a
man of genius, not only by his couplet, but in his " Essay on
the Invention of Writing," where occurs this noble passage:
" Art with me is of no party. A noble emulation I would
cherish, while it proceeded neither from, nor to malevolence.
Bales had his Johnson, Norman his Mason, Ayres his Matlock
and his Shelley ; yet Art the while was no sufferer. The
busybody who officiously employs himself in creating mis-
understandings between artists, may be compared to a turn-
stile, which stands in every man's way, yet hinders nobody ;
and he is the slanderer who gives ear to the slander."*

Among these kniglits of the "Plume volante," whose
chivalric exploits astounded the beholders, must be distin-
guished Peter Bales in his joust with David Johnson. In
this tilting-match the guerdon of caligraphy was won by the
greatest of caligraphers ; its arms were assumed by the
victor, azure, a pen or; wdiile the "golden pen," carried
away in triumph, was painted with a hand over the door of
the caligrapher. The history of this renowned encounter
was only traditionally known, till with my own eyes I pon-
dered on this whole trial of skill in the precious manuscript
of the champion himself ; who, like Caesar, not oidy knew
how to win victories, but also to record them. Peter Bales
was a hero of such transcendent eminence, that his name has
entered into our history. Holinshed chronicles one of his
curiosities of niieroscopic writing at a time when the taste
prevailed for admiring writing which no eye could read ! In
the compass of a silver penny this caligrapher put more things
than would fill several of these pages. He presented Queen

* I have not met with Flore's book, and am obliged to transcribe this
from the liiog. Brit,

174 The History of Writing-masters.

Elizabeth with tlie manuscript set in a ring of gold covered
with a crystal ; he had also contrived a magnifying glass of
such power, that, to her delight and wonder, her majesty read
the whole volume, which she held on her thumb-nail, and
" commended the same to the lords of the council and the
ambassadors ;" and frequently, as Peter often heard, did her
majest}' vouchsafe to wear this caligraphic ring.*

"Some will think I labour on a cobweb" — modestly ex-
claimed Bales in his narrative, and his present historian much
fears for himself! The reader's gratitude will not be propor-
tioned to my pains, in condensing such copious pages into
the size of a " silver penny," but without its worth !

For a whole year had David Johnson affixed a challenge
" To any one who should take exceptions to this my writing
and teaching." He was a young friend of Bales, daring and
longing for an encounter; yet Bales was magnanimously
filent, till he discovered that he was " doing much less in
writing and teaching" since this public challenge was pro-
claimed ! He then set up his counter-challenge, and in one
hour afterwards Johnson arrogantly accepted it, " in a most
despiteful and disgraceful manner." Bales's challenge was
delivered "in good terms," "To all Enghshmen and
strangers." It was to write for a gold pen of twenty
pounds value in all kinds of hands, " best, straightest, and
fastest," and most kind of ways; " a full, a mean, a small,
with line, and without line ; in a slow set hand, a mean
facile hand, and a fast running hand;" and further, "to write
truest and speediest, most secretary and clerk-like, from a
man's mouth,reading or pronouncing, either English or Latin."

Young Johnson had the hardihood now of turning the
tables on his great antagonist, accusing the veteran Bales of
arrogance. Such an absolute challenge, says he, was never
witnessed by man, " without exception of any in the world!"
And a few days after meeting Bales, " of set purpose to
affront and disgrace him what he could, showed Bales a piece

* Howes, in his Chronicle under date 1576, has thus narrated the
story: — "A strange piece of work, and almost incredible, was brought to
pass by an Englishman from within the city of London, and a clerk of the
Chancery, named Peter Bales, who by his industry and practice of his pen
contrived and writ, within the compass of a penny, the Lord's Prayer, the
Creed, the Ten Commandments, a prayer to tfod, a jirayer for the queen,
his posy, his name, the day of the month, the year of our Lord, and Ihe
riign of the queen : and at Hampton Court he presented the same to the
queen's majesty."

The History of Writing-masters. IT'S

o( .vriting of secretary's band, which he had very much
laboured in fine abortive parchment,"* uttering to the chal-
lenger these words : " Mr. 13ales, give me one shiUing out
of your purse, and if within six months you better, or equal
this piece of writing, I will give you forty ])uunds for it."
This legal deposit of the shilling was made, and the challenger,
or appellant, was thereby bound by law to the performance.

The day before the ti-ial a printed declaration was affixed
throughout the city, taunting Bales's "proud poverty," and
his pecuniary motives, as "a thing ungentle, base, and mer-
cenary, and not answerable to the dignity of the golden
pen 1" Johnson declares he would maintain his challenge for
a thousand pounds more, but for the respondent's inability to
perform a thousand groats. Bales retorts on the libel ; de-
clares it as a sign of his rival's weakness, " yet who so bold
as blind Bayard, that hath not a word of Latin to cast at a
dog, or say Bo ! to a goose !"

On Michaelmas day, 1595, the trial opened before five
judges : the appellant and the respondent appeared at the
appointed place, and an ancient gentleman was intrusted with
"the golden pen." In the first trial, for the manner of teaching
scholars, after Johnson had taught his pupil a fortnight, he
would not bring him forward ! This was awarded in favour
of Bales.

The second, for secrctaiy and clerk-like writing, dictating
to them both in English and in Latin, Bales performed best,
being first done ; written straightest without line, with true
orthography: thechallenger himself confessing that he wanted
the Latin tongue, and was no clerk !

The third and last trial for fair writing in sundry kinds of
hands, the challenger prevailed for the beauty and most " au-
thentic proportion," and for the superior variety of the Ko-
man hand. In the court hand the respondent exceeded the
appellant, and likewise in the set text ; and in bastard secre-
tary was also somewhat perfecter.

At length Bales, pcrha))s perceiving an equilibrium in the
judicial decision, to overwhelm his antagonist presented what
he distinguishes as his "masterpiece," composed of secretary
and Roman hand four ways varied, and offering the defendant
to let pass all his previous advantages if he could better this

* This -was written in the reign of Elizabeth. ITiilyi.ke notices "virqin-
perchmeiit made of an abortive skin; incmbrayia viiyu." Peach.in; oc
" Drawing," calls parchment simply en abortive.

176 7Vie History of JVriting-maslers.

Bpeoimen of caligra])hj ! The challenc^er was silent ! At
this moment some of the judges perceiving that the decision
must go in favour of Bales, in consideration of the youth ot
the challenger, lest he might be disgraced to the world,
requested the other judges not to pass judgment in public.
Bales assures us, that he in vain remonstrated ; for by these
means the winning of the golden pen might not be so fa«
mously spread as otherwise it would have been. To Bales the
prize was awarded. But our history has a more interesting
close; the subtle Machiavelism of the first challenger!

When the great trial had closed, and Bales, carrying off the
golden pen, exultingly had it painted and set up (or his sign,
the baffled challenger went about reporting that he had won
the golden pen, but that the defendant had obtained the same
by " plots and shifts, and other base and cunning practices."
Bales vindicated his claim, and offered to show the world his
" masterpiece " which had acquired it. Johnson issued an
"Appeal to all Impartial Penmen," which bespread in great
numbers through the city for ten days, a libel against the
judges and the victorious defendant ! He declared that there
had been a subtle combination with one of the judges concern-
ing the place of trial ; which he expected to have been " before
penmen," but not before a multitude like a stage-play, and
shouts and tumults, with which thechallenger had hithertobeen
unacquainted. The judges were intended to be twelve ; but of
the five, four were the challenger's friends, honest gentlemen,
but unskilled in judging of most hands ; and he offered again
forty pounds to be allowed in six months to equal Bales's
masterpiece. And he closes his " appeal " by declaring that
Bales had lost in several parts of the trial, neither did the
judges deny that Bales possessed himself of the golden pen by
a trick ! Before judgment was awarded, alleging the sickness of
his wife to be extreme, he desired she might have a sight of the
fjolden pen to comfort her I The ancient gentleman who was the
holder, taking the defendant's word, allowed the golden pen
to be carried to the sick wife ; and Bales immediately pawned
it, and afterwards, to make sure work, sold it at a great loss,
so that when the judges met for their definite sentence, nor
pen nor pennyworth was to be had ! The judges being
ashamed of their own conduct, were compelled to give such a
verdict as suited the occasion.

Bales rejoins: he publishes to the universe the day and the
hour w'hen tlie judges brought the golden pen to his house,

The Italian Historians. 177

and while he checks the insolence of this Bobadil, to show
bimseir no recreant, assumes the gokh^n pen for liis sign.

Such is the shortest history 1 could contrive of this chivalry
of the pen ; something mysteriously clouds over the fate of
the defendant ; Bales's history, like Caesar's, is but an ex-parle
evidence. Who can tell whether he has not slurred over his
defeats, and only dwelt on his victories ?

There is a strange jihrase connected with the art of the
caligraplier, whieli J tliink may be found in most, if" not in all
modern languages, to write tike an angel ! Ladies have
been frequently compared with angels ; tliey are Ijeautiful as
angels, and sing and dance like angels ; but, however intelli-
gible these are, we do not so easily connect penmanship with
the other celestial accomplishments. This fancil'ul phrase,
liowever, has a very human origin. Among those learned
Greeks who emigrated to Italy, and atterwards into
France, in the reign of Francis I., was one Angelo Vcrcjecio,
whose beautiful caligraphy excited the admiration of the
learned. The French monarch had a Greek ibunt cast,
modelled by his writing. The learned Henry Stephens, who,
like our Porson for correctness and delicacy, was one of the
most elegant writers of Greek, had learnt the practice from
our Angelo. His name became synonymous for beautiful
writing, and gave birth to the vulgar proverb or familiar
phrase to lorite like an angel t

THE ITALIAN HISTORIANS.

It is remarkable that the country which has long lost its
political independence may be considered as the true parent
of modern history. The greater part of their historians have
abstained from the applause of their contemi)oraries, while
thev have not the less elaborately composed tlieir posthumous
folios, consecrated solely to truth and posterity ! The true
principles of national glory are opened by the grandeur of tlie
minds of these assertors of political freedom. It was their in-
dignant spirit, seeking to console its injuries by confiding them
to their secret manuscripts, which raised up this singular phe-
nomenon in the literary world.

Of the various causes which produced such a lofty race of
patriots, one is prominent. The proud recollections of their
Roman fathers often troubled the dreams of the sons. Tho

VOL. III. N

178 The Italian Historians.

petty rival republics, and the petty despotic principalities,
which had started up from some great I'amilies, who at first
came forward as the protectors of the people from their exte-
rior enemies or thtir interior factions, at length settled into
a corruption of power ; a power which had been conferred on
them to preserve liberty itself! These factions often shook,
by their jealousies, their fears, and their hatreds, that divided
land, which groaned whenever they witnessed the " Ultra-
montanes " descending from their Alps and their Apennines.
Petrarch, in a noble invective, warmed by Livy and ancient
Rome, impatiently belield the French and the Germans
passing the mounts. "Enemies," he cries, "so often con-
quered prepare to strike with swords which foi'merly served
us to raise our trophies . shall the mistress of the world bear
chains forged by hands which she has so often bound to their
backs ?" Machiavel, in his " Exhortations to Free Italy from
tbe Barbarians," rouses his country against their changeable
masters, the Germans, the French, and the Spaniards ; closing
with the verse of Petrarch, that short shall be the battle for
which virtue arms to show the world —

che 1' antico valore
Ne gl' Italic! cuor non e ancor morto.

Nor has this sublime patriotism declined even in more
-ecent times ; I cannot resist from preserving in this place a
sonnet by Filicaja, which I could never read without partici-
pating in the agitation of the writer for the ancient glory of
his degenerated country ! The energetic personification of
the close perhaps surpasses even his more celebrated sonnet,
preseivjd in Lord Byron's notes to the I'ourth canto of
" ChUde Harold."

Dov' e Italia, il tuo braccio? e a clie ti servi

Tu deir allrui ? non e s' io scorgo il vero,

Di clii t' ottende il defensor men fero :

Amlic nemici sono, ambo fur servi,
Cosi dunque 1' onor, cosi conservi

Gli avanzi tu del glorioso luipero ?

Cosi al valor, cosi al valor priuiiero

Che a te fede giuro, la fede osservi ?
Or va ; repudia il valor prisco, e sposa

L' ozio, e fra il sangue, i gemiti, e le strid*

Kel periglio maggior donui e riposa !
Dornii, AduJteravil! fin che omicida

Spada iiltrice ti svegli, e sonnacchiosa

V, imda in braccio al tuo fedel t'uccida 1

The Ttidian Historians. 179

Oh, Italy ! where is thine arm ? ^Vhat purpose eerves

So to be helped by others? Deem I right,

Among ofienders thy defender stands?

Both are tliy enemies — both were thy servants 1

Thus dost tliou honour — thus dust thuu preserve

The mighty boundaries of the glorious empire?

And thus to Vahmr, to thy pristine Vabmr

That swore its faith to thee, tiiy faith timu keep'st?

Go ! and divorce thyself from thy old V'aliauce,

And marry Idleness : and midst the blood,

The heavy groans and cries of agony,

In thy last danger sleep, and seek repose 1

Sleep, vile Adulteress ! the homicidal sword

Vengeful shall waken thee ! and lull'd to slumber,

While naked in thy minion's arms, shall strike !

Among the domestic contests of Italy the true principles
of political freedom were developed ; and in that country we
may find the origin of that puilosophical history which
includes so many important views and so many new results
unknown to the ancients.

Machiavel seems to have been the first writer who dis-
covered the secret of what may be called comparative history.
He it was who first sought in ancient history for the materials
which were to illustrate the events of his own times, by fixing
on analogous facts, similar personages, and parallel periods.
This was enlarging the field of histor}'-, and opening a new
combination for philosophical speculation. His profound
genius advanced still further ; he not only explained modern
by ancient history, but he deduced those results or principles
founded on this new sort of evidence which guided him in
forming his opinions. History had hitherto been, if we ex-
cept Taeitus, but a story well told ; and by writers of limited
capacity, the detail and number of facts had too often been
considered as the only valuable portion of history. An eru-
dition of I'acts is not the philosophy of history ; an historian
unskilful in the art of applying his facts amasses impure
ore, which he cannot strike into coin. The chancellor
D'Aguesseau, in his instructions to his son on the study of
liistory, has admirably touched on this distinction. " Minds
which are purely historical mistake a fact for an argument ;
they are so accustomed to satisfy themselves by repeating a
great number of facts and enriching their memory, that tliey
become incapable of reasoning on principles. It often hap-
pens that the result of their knowledge breeds confusion and
universal indecision ; for their facts, often contradictory, only

X 2

180 The Italian Historians.

raise up doubts. The superfluous and the fiivolous occupy
the place of what is essential and solid, or at least so overload
and darken it that we must sail with them in a sea of trifles
to get to Arm land. Those who only value the philosophical
part of history fall into an opposite extreme; they judge of
what has been done by that which should be done ; while the
others always decide on what should be done b}- that which
Las been : the first are the dupes of their reasoning, the
second of the facts which they mistake for reasoning. We
should not separate two things which ought always to go
in concert, and mutually' lend an aid, reason and example !
Avoid equally the contempt of some philosophers for the
science of facts, and the distaste or the incapacity which
those who confine themselves to facts often contract for what-
ever depends on pure reasoning. True and solid philosophy
should direct us in the study of history', and the study of
history should give perfection to philosojjhy." Such was the
enlightened opinion, as far back as at the beginning of the
seventeenth century, of the studious chancellor of France,
before the more recent designation of Fhilosofliical History
was so generally received, and so familiar on our title-pages.

From the moment that the Florentine secretary conceived
the idea that the history of the lloman people, opening such
varied spectacles of human nature, served as a point of com-
parison to which he might perpetually recur to try the
analogous facts of other nations and the events passing under
his own eye, a new light broke out and ran through the vast
extents of history. The maturity of experience seemed to
have been obtained by the historian in his solitary medita-
tion. Livy in the grandeur of Rome, and Tacitus in its fated
decline, exhibited for Machiavel a moving picture of his own
republics — the march of destiny in all human governments !
The text of Livy and Tacitus revealed to him many aa
imperfect secret — the fuller truth he drew from the depth
of his own observations on his own times. In Machiavel's
"Discourses on Livy" we may discover the foundations of
our PMloso-pldcal History.

The example of Machiavel, like that of all creative genius,
influenced the character of his age, and his history of Florence
produced an emulative spirit among a new dynasty of his-
torians.

The Italian historians have proved themselves to be an
extraordinary race, for they devoted their days to the com-

The Italian Historians. 181

position of historical works which they were certain couid
not see the Hght during tlieir lives ! They nobly determined
that their works sliould be posthumous, rather than be com-
])elled to mutilate them for the press. These historians were
rather the saints than the martyrs of history ; tliey did not
always personally suffer for truth, but during their protracted
labour they sustained their spirit by anticipating their glorified
after-state.

Among these Italian historians must be placed the illus-
trious Guicciardini, the friend of Machiavel. No ])erfect
edition of this historian existed till recent times. The his-
tory itself was posthumous ; nor did his nephew venture to
puljlish it till twenty years after the historian's death. He
only gave the first sixteen books, and these castrated. The
obnoxious jJassages consisted of some statements relating to
the papal court, then so important in the affairs of Europe ;
some account of the origin and progress of the papal power ;
some eloquent pictures of the abuses and disorders of that
corrupt court ; and some free caricatures on the government
of Florence. The precious fragments were fortunately pre-
served in manuscript, and the Protestants procured transcripts
Avhich they published separately, but which were long very
rare.* All the Italian editions continued to be reprinted in
the same truncated condition, and appear only to have been
reinstated in the immortal history so late as in 1775 ! Thus,
it required two centuries before an editor could venture to
give the world the pure and complete text of the manuscript
of the lieutenant-general of the papal army, who had been so
close and so indignant an observer of the Roman cabinet.

Adriaiii, whom his son entitles gentihiomo Fiorentino, the
writer of the pleasing dissertation " on the Ancient Painters
noticed by Pliny," prefixed to his friend Vasari's biographies,
wrote as a continuation of Guicciardini, a history of his own
times in twentA'-t wo books, of which Denina gives the highest
character for its moderate spirit, and from which De Thou
has largely drawn, and conmiends for its authentieit}'. Our
autlior, however, did not venture to publish his history during
his lifetime: it was after his death that his son became the
editor.

Nardi, of a noble family and high in office, famed for a

* They were printed at Basle in 15(39 — at London in 1595 — in Amster-
dam, l(Jti3. IIuw many attempts to echo the voice of suppressed trulli
^Haijm's Bib. Idd. ]803.

182 The Italian Historians.

translation of Liv}^ which rivals its original in the pleasure it
affords, in his retirement from public affairs wrote a history
vf Florence, which closes with the loss of the liberty of his
country in 1531. It was not published till fifty years after
his death ; even then the editors suppressed many passages
which are found in manuscript in the libraries of Florence
and Venice, with other historical documents of this noble and
patriotic historian.

About the same time the senator Philip Nerli was writing
his " Commentarj d& fatti civili''' which had occurred in
Florence. He gave them with his dying hand to his nephew,
who presented the MSS. to the Grand Duke; yet, although
this work is rather an apology than a crimination of the
Medici family for their ambitious views and their overgrown
power, probably some state-reason interfered to prevent the
publication, which did not take place till 150 years after the
death of the historian !

Bernardo Segni composed a history of Florence still more
valuable, which shared tlie same fate as that of Nerli. It
was only after his death that his relatives accidentally dis-
covered this history of Florence, which the author had care-
fully concealed during his lifetime. He had abstained from
communicating to any one the existence of such a work while
he lived, that he might not be induced to check the freedom
of his pen, nor compromise the cause and the interests of
truth. His heirs presented it to one of the Medici family,
who threw it aside. Another copy had been more carefully
preserved, from which it was printed in 1713, about 150
years after it had been written. It appears to have excited
great curiosity, for Lenglet du Fresno}' observes that the
scarcity of this history is owing to the circumstance " of the
Grand Duke having bought up the copies." Du Fresnoy,
indeed, has noticed more than once this sort of address of the
Grand Duke ; for he observes on the Florentine history of
Bruto that the work was not common, the Grand Duke
having bought up the copies to suppress them. The author
was even obliged to fly from Italy for having delivered his
opinions too freely on the house of the Medici. This honest
historian thus expresses himself at the close of his work : —
" My design has but one end — that our posterity may learn
by these notices the root and the causes of so many troubles
which we have suffered, while they expose the malignity of
those men who have raised them up or prolonged them, as

The Italiun Hlstoriuas. 183

well as the goodness of those who did all which they could
to turn tliem away."

It was the same motive, the fear of offending the great
personages or their families, of whom these historians had so
freely written, which deterred Benedetto Varchi from pub-
lishing his well-known " Storie Florentine," which was not
given to the world till 1721, a period which appears to have
roused the slumbers of the literary men of Italy to recur to
their native historians. Varchi, who wrote with so much
zeal the history of his fatherland, is noticed b}' Nardi as one
who never took an active part in the events he records ;
never having combined with any party, and living merely as
a spectator. This historian closes the narrative of a horrid
crime of Peter Lewis Farnese with this admirable reflection :
" I know well this story, with many others which 1 have
freely exposed, may hereafter prevent the reading of my his-
tory ; but also I know, that besides what Tacitus has said on
this subject, the great duty of an historian is not to be more
careful of the rej)utation of persons than is suitable with
truth, which is to be preferred to all things, however detri-
mental it may be to the writer."*

* My friend, Mr. Jterivale, whose critical research is only equalled by
the elegance of his taste, has supplied me with a note -n-hich proves but
too well that even writers who compose uninfluenced by party feelings,
may not, however, be sufficiently scrupulous in weighing the evidence of
tlie facts which they collect. Mr. Merivale oliserves, " Tlie strange and
iniiirobable narrative with which Varchi has the misfortune of closing his
history, should not have been even hinted at without adding, that it is
denounced by other writers as a most impudent forgery, invented years
after the occurrence is supposed to have happened, by the 'Apostate'
bishop Petrus Paulas Vergerius." See its refutation in Amiani, "Hist, di
Fano," ii. 149, et seq. 160.

" Varchi's character as an historian cannot but suffer greatly from his
having given it insertion on such autliority. The responsibility of an
author for the trutli of what he relates should render us very cautious of
giving credit to the writers of memoirs not intended to see the light till a
distant period. The credibility of Vergerius, as an acknowledged libeller
of Pope Paul III. and his family, appears still more conclusively from his
article in Rayle, note K." It must lie added, that the calumny of Verge-
rius may be found in Woltius's Lect. Mem. ii. 691, in a tract de Idolo
Laurctano, published 1556. Varchi is nuu-e parlieular in liis details of
this monstrous tale. Vergerius's liliels, universally read at the time,
though they were collected afterwards, are now not to be met with, even
in public libraries. Whether there was any truth in the story of Petet
Lewis Faruese I know not ; but crimes of as monstrous a dye occur in the
authentic Guicciardini. Tlic story is nut yet f iraotten, since in tlic last
edition of Haym's Inlliolcca huliaua, the best edition is marked as that

184' The Italian Historians.

Sucli was that free manner of thinking and of writing
which prevailed in these Itahun historians, who, often living
in the midst of the ruins of popular freedom, poured forth
their injured feelings in their secret pages; without the hope,
and perhaps without the wish, of seeing them publislied in
their lifetime: a glorious example of self-denial and lofty
patriotism !

Had it heen inquired of these writers why they did not
publish their histories, they might have answered, in nearly
the words of an ancient sage, " Because I am not permitted
to write as I would ; and I would not write as I am per-
mitted." We cannot imagine that these great men were iu
the least insensible to the applause they denied themselves ;
they were not of tempers to be turned aside ; and it was the
highest motive which can inspire an historian, a stern devo-
tion to truth, which reduced them to silence, but not to
inactivity! These Florentine and Venetian historians, ardent
with truth, and proibund in political sagacity, were writing
these legacies of history solely for their countrymen, hopeless
of their gratitude! If a Frenchman* wrote the English his-
tory, that labour was the aliment of his own glor3' ; if HuiTie
and Robertson devoted their pei!s to history, the motive of
the task was less glorious than their work ; but here we dis-
jover a race of historians, whose patriotism alone instigated
their secret labour, and who substituted for fame and fortune
that mightier spirit, which, amidst their conflicting passions,
has developed the truest principles, and even the errors, of
Political Freedom !

None of these historians, we have seen, published their
works in their lifetime. I have called them the saints of
history, rather than the martyrs. One, however, had the
intrepidity to risk this awful responsibility, and he stands
forth among th(* most illustrious and ill-fated examples of

HISTOKICAIi MAkrYRDOM !

This great historian is Giannone, whose civil history of the
kingdom of Naples is remarkable for its profound inquiries
concerning the civil and ecclesiastical constitution, the laws
and customs of that kingdom. With some interruptions

which at p. 639 contains "^a scrhratezza di Pier Lewis Farnese." I
am of opinion that Varolii believed the story, by the isolemnity of his
proposition. Whatever be its truth, the historian's feeling was elevated
uiid intrepid.

* Eapin.

TJie Italian Historians. 185

li-om his professional avocations at tlie bar, twenty years
were consumed in writing this history. Researches on eccle-
siastical usur])ations, and severe strictures on the clergy, are
the chief subjects of his bold and unreserved pen. These
passages, curious, grave, and indignant, were afterwards ex-
tracted from the hi.«tory by Vernet, and published in a small
volume, under the title of "Anecdotes Eeclesiastiques," 1738.
When Giannone consulted with a friend on the propriety of
publishing his history, his critic, in admiring the work, pre-
dicted the fate of the author. " You have," said he, "placed
on your head a crown of thorns, and of very sharp ones."
The historian set at nought his own personal repose, and in
1723 this elaborate history saw the light. From that mo-
ment the historian never enjoyed a day of quiet ! Rome
attempted at first to extinguish the author with his work ;
all the books were seized on ; and copies of the first edition
are of extreme rarity. To escape the fangs of inquisitorial
power, the historian of Naples llew from Naples on the pub-
lication of his immortal work. The fugitive and excommu-
nicated author sought an asylum at Vienna, where, though
he ibund no friend in the emperor. Prince Eugene and other
nobles became his patrons. Forced to quit Vienna, he
retired to Venice, when a new persecution arose from the
jealousy of the state-inquisitors, who one night landed him on
the borders of the pope's dominions. Escaping unexpectedlv
with his life to Geneva, he was preparing a supplemental
volume to his celebrated history, when, enticed by a treache-
rous friend to a catholic village, Giannone was arrested by an
order of the King of Sardinia ; his manuscripts were sent
to Rome, and the historian imprisoned in a fort. It is curious
that the im])risoned Giannone wrote a vindication of the
rights of the King of Sardinia, against the claims of the court
of Rome. This powerful appeal to the feelings of this sove-
reigu was at first favourably received ; but, under the secret
iniluence of" Rome, the Sardinian monarch, on the extraor-
dinary plea that he kept Giannone as a jirisoner of state that
he might preserve him from the papal power, ordered that
the vindicator of his rights should be more closely confined
than before ; and, lor this purpose, transferred his state-
prisoner to the citadel of Turin, where, after twelve years
of persecution and of agitation, our great historian closed
his life!

Such was the fate of this historical mai'tyr, whose wuik

186 0/ Palaces Built by Ministers.

the catholic Ha3-m describes as opera scritta con molto fuoco
e troppa liherta. He hints that this history is only paral-
leled by De Thou's great work. This Italian history will
ever be ranked among the most philosophical. But, pro-
found as was the masculine genius of Giannone, such was his
love of fame, that he wanted the intrepidity requisite to deny
himself the delight of giving his history to the world, though
some of his great predecessors had set him a noble and dig-
nified example.

One more observation on these Italian historians. All of
them represent man in his darkest colours ; their drama is
terrific ; the actors are monsters of perfidy, of inhumanity,
and inventors of crimes which seem to want a name! They
were all " princes of darkness ;" and the age seemed to afford
a triumph of Manicheism ! The worst passions were called
into play by all parties. But if something is to be ascribed
to the manners of the times, much more may be traced to
that science of politics, which sought for mastery in an unde-
fiuable struggle of ungovernable political power ; in the
remorseless ambition of the despots, and the hatreds and
jealousies of the republics. These Italian historians have
formed a perpetual satire on the contemptible simulation and
dissimulation, and the inexpiable crimes of that s^'stem of
politics, which has dei'ived a name from one of themselves —
the great, may we add, the calumniated, Machiayel ?

OF PALACES BUILT BY MINISTERS.

Our ministers and court favourites, as well as those on the
Continent, practised a very impolitical custom, and one likely
to be repeated, although it has never failed to cast a popular
odium on their names, exciting even the envy of their equals
— in the erection of palaces for themselves, which outvied
those of their sovereign ; and which, to the eyes of the
populace, appeared as a perpetual and insolent exhibition of
what they deemed the ill-earned wages of peculation, oppres-
sion, and court-favour. We discover the seduction of this
passion for ostentation, this haughty sense of their power,
and this self-idolatry, even among the most prudent and the
wisest of our ministers ; and not one but lived to lament over
this vain act of imprudence. To these ministers the noble
Bimplicity of Pitt will ever form an admirable contrast ; while

Of Palaces Built by Ministers. 187

his personal character, as a statesman, descends to posterity
unstained by calumny.

The houses of Cardinal Wolsey appear to have exceeded
the palaces of the sovereign in magnificence ; and potent as
he was in all the pride of pomp, the " great cardinal" found
rabid env}^ {)ursuing him so close at his heels, that he relin-
quished one palace after the other, and gave up as gifts to
the monarch what, in all his overgrown greatness, he trem-
bled to retain for himself The state satire of that day was
often pointed at this very circumstance, as appears in Skel-
ton's " Why come ye not to Court ?" and Roy's " Rede me,
and be not wrothe."* Skelton's railing rhymes leave their
bitter teeth in his purple pride ; and the style of both these
satirists, if we use our own orthography, shows how little
the language of the common people has varied during three
centuries.

Set up a wretcli on l)igh

In a throne triumphantly;

Make him a great state

And he will play check-mate

With royal majesty

The King's Court

Should havu the excellence,

But Hampton Court

Hath the pi-e -eminence ;

And Yorke Placet

"With my Lord's grace,

To whose magnificence

Is all the confluence,

Suits, and supplications ;

Embassies of all nations.

Rov, in contemplating the palace, is maliciously reminded
of the batcher's lad, and only gives plain sense in plain

words.

Hath the Cardinal any gay mansion?
Great palaces without comparison,
Most glorious of outward sight,

* Skelton's satire is accessible to the reader in the Kev. Alexander
Dyce's edition of the poet's works. Roy's poem was printed abroad about
1525, and is of extreme rarity, as the cardinal spared no labour and ex-
pense to purchase and destroy all the copies. A second edition was
printed at Wesel in 154t). Its author, who had been a friar, was ulti-
mately burned in Portugal for heresy.

+ The palace of Wolsey, as Archbishop of York, which he had furnished
in the most sumptuous manner ; after his disgrace it became a royal resi-
dence under the name of Whitehall. — Note in Dyce's ed. of Skelton's
W^orks.

188 Of Palaceft Built by Ministers.

And within decked point-device,*
More liKe unto a ptaradise

Than an eartlily habitation.
He Cometh then of some noble stock ?
Ilis fatlier could match a bullock,

A butcher by his occupation.

Whatever we ma_y now think of the structure, and the lo-.?
apartments of Wolsey's talace, it is described not only in
his own times, but much later, as of unparalleled magnifi-
cence ; and indeed Cavendish's narrative of the Cardinal's
entertainment of the French ambassadors gives an idea of
the ministerial prelate's imperial establishment very puzzling
to the comprehension of a modern inspector. Six hundred
persons, I think, were banqueted and slept in an abode which
appears to us so mean, but which Stowe calls " so stately a
palace." To avoid the odium of living in this splendid edifice,
Wolsey presented it to the king, who, in recompense, suf-
fered the Cardinal occasionally to inhabit this wonder of
England, in the character of keeper of the king's palace ;t
so that Wolsey only dared to live in his own palace by a
subterfuge ! This perhaps was a tribute which ministerial
haughtiness paid to popular feeling, or to the jealousy of a
royal master,

I have elsewhere shown the extraordinary elegance and
prodigality of expenditure of Buckingham's residences; they
were such as to have extorted the wonder even of Bassom-
pierre, and unquestionably excited the indignation of those
who lived in a poor court, while our gay and thoughtless
minister alone could indulge in the wanton profusion.

But Wolsey and Buckingham were ambitious and adventu-
rous ; they rose and shone the comets of the political horizon
of Europe. The Roman tiara still haunted the imagination
of the Cardinal : and the egotistic pride of having out-rivalled

* Point-device, a term expLained by Mr. Douce. He thinks that it is
boiTOwed from the labours of the needle, as we have poivt-lace, so point-
device, i. e., 2^'^int, a stitch, and devise, devised or invented ; applied to
describe anything uncommonly exact, or woi'ked with the nicety and pre-
cision of s?i7c/tcs made or devised by the needle. — Illustrations of Shah -
speare, i. 93. But Mr. Gifford has since observed that the origin of the
expression is, perhaps, yet to be sought for : he derives it from a mathe-
matical phrase, a point devise, or a (jiven point, and hence exact, correct,
&c. — Ben Jonson, vol. iv. 170. See, for various examples, iJr. Nares's
Glossary, art. Point-devise.

t L.vson's " Environs," v. 58

Of Palaces Built by Ministers. 189

Richelieu and Olivarcz, the nominal ministers but the real
sovereigns of" Europe, kindled the buoyant spirits of the i^'-\Y,
the gallant, and the splendid Villiers. But what '• fully of
the wise" must aceount for the conduct of the profound Cla-
rendon, and the sensible Sir Robert VValpole, who, like the
other two ministers, equally became the victims of this im-
prudent passion tor tlie ostentatious pomp of a palace. This
magnificence looked like the vaunt of insolence in the eyes
of the people, and covered the ministers with a popular
odium.

Clarendon House is now only to be viewed in a print ; but
its story remains to be told. It was built on the site of
Grafton-street ; and when afterwards pui'chased by Monk,
the Duke of Albemarle, he left his title to that well-known
street. It was an edifice of considerable extent and grandeur.
Clarendon reproaches himself in his Life for "his weakness
and vanity" in tlie vast expense incurred in this building,
which he acknowledges had '* more contributed to that gust
of envy that had so violently shaken him, than any misde-
meanour that he was thought to have been guilty of." It ruined
his estate ; but he had been encouraged to it by the royal
grant of the land, by that passion for building to which he
owns " he was naturally too much inclined," and perhaps by
other circumstances, among which was the opportunity of
purchasing the stones which had been designed for the re-
building of St. Paul's ; but the envy it drew on him, and the
excess of the architect's proposed expense, had made his life
" very uneasy, and near insupportable." The truth is, that
when this palace was finished, it was imputed to him as a
state-crime; all the evils in the nation, which were then
numerous, pestilence, conflagration, war, and defeats, were
discovered to be in some way connected with Clarendon
House, or, as it was popularly called, either Dunkirk House,
or Tangier Hall, from a notion that it had been erected with
the golden bribery which the chancellor had received for the
sale of Dunkirk and Tangiers.* He was reproached w'ith
having profaned the sacred stones dedicated to the use of the
church. The great but unfortunate master of this ]):ilace,
who, from a private lawyer, had raised himself by alliance
even to royalty, the father-in-law of the Duke of York, it

* Burnet says, " Otliers called it Holland House, because he was
belicveil to be no friend to the war : so it was given out iLat he haii
money from tlie Dutch."

190 Of Palaces Built by Ministers.

was maliciously suggested, had persuaded Charles the Second
to marry the Infanta of Portugal, knowing (but how Clarendon
obtained the knowledge his enemies have not revealed) that
the Portuguese princess was not likely to raise any obstacle
to the inheritance of his own daughter to the throne. At
the Restoration, among other enemies, Clarendon found that
the royalists were none of the least active ; he was reproached
by them for preferring those who had been the cause of
their late troubles. The same reproach was incurred on the
restoration of the Bourbons. It is perhaps more political to
maintain active men, who have obtained power, than to rein-
state inferior talents, who at least have not their popularity.
This is one of the parallel cases which so frequently strike us
in exploring political history ; and the ultras of Louis the
Eighteenth were only the royalists of Charles the Second,
There was a strong popular delusion carried on by the wits
and the Misses who formed the court of Charles the Second,
that the government was as much shared by the Hydes as
the Stuai ts. We have in the state-poems, an unsparing lam-
poon, entitled " Clarendon's House-warming;" but a satire
yielding nothing to it in severity I have discovered in manu-
script ; and it is also remarkable for turning chiefly on a pun
of the family name of the Earl of Clarendon. The witty and
malicious rhymer, after making Charles the Second demand
the Great Seal, and resolve to be his own chancellor, proceeds,
reflecting on the great political victim :

Lo ! his whole ambition already divides

The sceptre between the Stuarts and the Hydes.

Behold in the depth of our plague and wars,

He built him a palace out-braves the stars;

Which house (we Dunkirk, he Clarendon, names)

Looks down with shame upon St. James;

But 'tis not his golden globe that will save him,

Being less than the custom-house farmers gave him ;

His chapel for consecration calls,

Whose sacrilege plundered the stones from Paul's.

Wlieii Queen Dido landed she bought as much ground

As tlie Hyde of a lusty fat bull would surround;

But when the said Ilijde was cut into thongs,

A city and kingdom to Hyde belongs ;

So here in court, church, and country, far and wide,

Here's nought to be seen but Hyde ! Hyde ! Hyde I

Of old, and where law the kingdom divides,

'Twas our Hydes of land, 'tis now land of Ilydes !

Clarendon House was n palace, which had been raised with

0/ Palaces Built by Ministtrs. ] f)l

at least as much fondness as pride ; and Evelyn tells us that
the garden was planned by liiinself and his lordship ; but the
cost, as usual, trubled the calculation, and the noble master
grieved in silence amidst this splendid pile of architecture.*
Even when in his exile the sale was proposed to pay his debts,
and secure some provision for his younger children, he
honestly tells us that " he remained so infatuated with the
delight he had enjoyed, that though he was deprived of it,
he hearkened very unwillingly to the advice." In 1083
Clarendon House met its fate, and was abandoned to the
brokers, who had purchased it for its materials. An affecting
circumstance is recorded by Evelyn on this occasion. In re-
turning to town with the Earl of Clarendon, the sot of the
great earl, " in passing by the glorious palace his fatii^r built
but a few years before, which they were now demolishing,
being sold to certain undertakers,t I turned my head the
contrary way till the coach was gone past by, lest I might
minister occasion of speaking of it, which must needs have
grieved him, that in so short a time this pomp was fallen."
A feeling of intinite delicacy, so perfectly characteristic of
Evelyn !

And now to bring down this subject to times still nearer.
We find tluit Sir llobert Walpole had placed himself exactly
in the situation of the great minister we have noticed ; we
have his confession to his brother Lord Walpole, and to his
friend Sir John Hynde Cotton. The historian of this minister
observes, that his magnificent building at Houghton drew on
him great obloquy. On seeing his brother's house at Wol-
terton. Sir llobert expressed his wishes that he had contented
himself with a similar structure. Jn the reign of Anne, Sir
Robert, sitting by Sir John Hynde Cotton, alluding to a
sumptuous house which was then building by Harley, ob-
served, that to construct a great house was a high act of
imprudence in any minister ! It was a long time after, when
he had become prime minister, thiit he forgot the whole
result of the present article, and pulled down his family man-

* At the gateway of the Three Kings Inn, near Dover-street, in Picca-
dilly, are two pilasters with Curinthiau capitals, which lelougetl to
Clarendon Ili.use, and are perhaps the only remains of that edifice.

t An old term for contractors. Evelyn tells us they were " certain rich
bankers and mechanics, who gave for it, and the ground about it, 35,000/."
They built streets and houses on the site to their great profit, the ground
comprising twenty-four acres of laud.

192 Of Palaces Built by Ministers.

sion at Houghton to build its magnificent edifice; it was
then Sir John Hynde Cotton reminded him of the reflection
which he had made some years ago : the reply of Sir llobert
IS remarkable — " Your recollection is too hite ; I wish you
had reminded me of it before I began building, for then it
might have been of service to me !"

Tne statesman and politician then are susceptible of all
the seduction of ostentation and the pride of pomp ! Who
would have credited it ? But bewildered with power, in tlie
magnificence and magnitude of the edifices winch their
colossal greatness inhabits, they seem to contemplate on its
image !

Sir Francis Walsingham died and left nothing to pay his
debts, as appears by a cm'ious fact noticed in the anonymous
life of Sir Philip Sidne}'^ prefixed to the Arcadia, and evidently
written by one acquainted with the family history of his
friend and hero. The chivalric Sidney, though sought after
by court beauties, solicited the hand of the daughter of Wal-
singham, although, as it appears, she could have had no
other portion than her own virtues and her father's name.
"And herein," observes our anonymous biographer, "he was
exemplary to all gentlemen not to carry their love in their
purses." On this he notices this secret history of Wal-
singham :

" This is that Sir Francis who impoverished himself to
enrich the state, and indeed made England his heir ; and was
so far from building up of fortune by the benefit of his place,
that he demolished that fine estate left him by his ancestors
to purchase dear intelligence from all parts of Christendom.
He had a key to unlock the pope's cabinet ; and, as if master
of some invisible whispering-place, all the secrets of Christian
princes met at his closet. Wonder not then if he bequeathed
no great wealth to his daughter, being privafvJif interred in
the choir of Paul's, as much indebted to Ids creditors though
not so much as our nation is indebted to his memory."

Some curious inquirer may afford us a catalogue of great
ministers of state who have voluntarily declined the augmen-
tation of their private fortune, while they devoted their days
to the noble pursuits of patriotic glory ! Tlie labour of this
research will be great, and the volume small !

193

"TAXATION NO TYRANNY!"

Such was the title of a Aimous political tract, which was
issued at a moment when a people, in a state of insurrection,
put forth a declaration that taxation was tyranny ! It was
not against an insignificant tax they protested, but against
taxation itself! and in the temper of the moment this ab-
stract proposition appeared an insolent paradox. It was in-
stantly run down by that everlasting party which, so far
back as in the laws of our Henry the First, are designated
by the odd descriptive term of acephali, a people ivithout
heads I* the strange equality of levellers !

These political monsters iu all times have had an associa-
tion of ideas of taxation and tyranny, and with them one
name instantly suggests the other ! This happened to one
Gigli of Sienna, who published the first part of a dictionary
of the Tuscan language, f of which only 312 leaves amused
the Florentines ; these having had the honour of being con-
signed to the flames by the hands of the hangman for certain
popular errors ; such as, for instance, under the word Gran
Duca we find Vedi Gabelli ! (see Taxes !) and the word
Gdbella was explained by a reference to Gran Duca !
Grand-duke and taxes were synonymes, according to this
mordacious lexicographer ! Such grievances, and the modes
of expressing them, are equally ancient. A Roman consul,
by levying a tax on salt during the Punic war, was nick-
named SaUnator, and condemned by " the majesty" of the

* Cowel's "Interpreter," art. ^lce/y/iaZ(. This by-name we unexpectedly
find in a grave antiquarian law-dictionary ! probably derived from Pliny's
description of a people whom some tiavellers had reported to have found
in this predicament, in their fritrht and haste in attempting to land on a
hostile shore among savages. To account for this fabulous people, it has
been conjectured they wore such high coverings, that their heads did not
appear above their shoulders, while their eyes seemed to be placed in their
breasts. How this name came to be introduced into the laws of Henry the
First remains to be tnU by some profound antiquary ; but the allusion was
common in the middle a,'es. Oowel says, " Those are called acephali
■who were the levdlers of that age, and acknowledged no head or superior."

t Vocabulario di Santa Caterina e delta Lingua Sanese, 1717. Thia
pungent lexicon was prohibited at Rome by desire of the court of Florence.
The history of this supi)ressed work may be found in II Giornale dt
Letterati d' Italia, tomo x.xix. 1410. In the last edition of Haym's
" Biblioteca Italiana," 1803, it is said to be reprinted at Manilla, nelC
hole Fillippine! — For the book-licensers it is a great way to go for it.

VOL. III. O

194 '' Taxation no Tyranny !"

people! He had formerly done his dut}' to the country, bnt
the Salter was now his reward ! He retired froni Home, let
his beard grow, and by his sordid dress and melancholy air
evinced his acute sensibilit}'. The Romans at length wanted
the Salter to command the army — as an injured man, he re-
fused— but he was told that he should bear the caprice of
the Roman people with the tenderness of a son for the
humours of a parent ! He had lost his reputation by a pro-
ductive tax on salt, though this tax had provided an army
and obtained a victory !

Certain it is that Grigli and his numerous adherents are
wrong : for were they treed from all restraints as much as if
they slept in forests and not in houses ; were they inha-
bitants of wilds and not of cities, so that every man should
be his own lawgiver, with a perpetual immunity from all
taxation, we could not necessarily infer their political hap-
piness. There are nations where taxation is hardly known,
for the people exist in such utter wretchedness, that they are
too poor to be taxed ; of which the Chinese, among others,
exhibit remarkable instances. When Nero would have abo-
lished all taxes, in his excessive passion for popularity, the
senate thanked him for his good will to the people, but
assured him that this was a certain means not of repairing,
but of ruining the commonwealth. Bodin, in his curious
work " The Republic," has noticed a class of politicians who
are in too great favour with the people. " Many seditious
citizens, and desirous of innovations, did of late years pro-
mise immunity of taxes and subsidies to our people ; but
neither could they do it, or if they could have done it, they
would not ; or if it were done, should we have any com-
monweal, being the ground and foundation of one."*

The undisguised and naked term of " taxation" is, how-
ever, so odious to the people, that it may be curious to ob-
serve the arts practised 1)}^ governments, and even by the
people themselves, to veil it under some mitigating term. In
the first breaking out of tlie American troubles, they pro-
bably would have yielded to the mother-country the riylit of

* Bodin's "Six Books of a Commonwealth," translated Ly Richai-d
Knolles, 1606. A work replete with tlie practical knowledge of politics,
and of wliicli Mr. Dugald Stewart has delivered a high opinion. Yet this
great politician wrote a volume to anathematise those who doubted the
existence of sorcerers and witches, &c., whom he condemns to the ilames J
See his "Demonomanie des Sorciers," 1593.

" Taxation no Tyranny !" l!)."j

taxation, modilu'd h\ the term refjuhition (of tlieir trade) ;
tliis I infer IVoin a letter of Di-. lloljertsoii, who observes,
that " the distinction between taxation and rer/nlation is
mere folly !" Even despotic governments have condescended
to disguise the contributions forcibly levied, by some appel-
lative which should partly conceal its real nature. Terms
have often influenced circumstances, as names do things ; and.
conquest or oppression, which we may allow to be syno-
nymes, apes benevolence whenever it claims as a gift what it
exacts as a tribute.

A sort of philosophical history of taxation appears in the
narrative of Wood, in his " Inquiry on Homer." He tells us
tliat "the presents (a term of extensive signification in the
East) which are distributed annually by the bashaw of Da-
mascus to the several Arab princes through whose territory
he conducts the caravan of pilgrims to Mecca, are, at Con-
stantinople, called a free gift, and considered as an act of the
sultan's generosity towards his indigent subjects ; while, on
the other hand, the Arab Sheikhs deny even a right of pas-
sage through the districts of their comniand, and exact those
sums as a tax due for the permission of going through their
country. In the frequent bloody contef .s which the adjust-
ment of these fees produces, the Turks i^-omplain of robbery,
and the Arabs of invasion."*

Here we trace taxation thi'ough all its shifting forms, ac-
commodating itself to the feelings of the different people ;
the same principle regulated the alternate terms proposed by
the buccaneers, when they asked what the weaker party was
sure to give, or when they levied what the others paid only
as a common toll.

"When Louis the Eleventh of France beheld, his country ex-
hausted by the predatory wars of England, he bought a
peace of our Edwai'd the Fourth by an annual sum of fifty
thousand crowns, to be paid at London, and likewise granted
•pensions to the English ministers. Holinshed and all our
historians call this a yearly tribute; but Comines, the French
memoir-writer, with a national spirit, denies that these ffifts
were either pensions or tributes. " Yet," says Bodin, a
Frenchman also, but affecting a more philosoi)hical indiffe-
rence, " it must be cither the one or the other ; though I
confess, that those who receive a pension to obtain peace,

• Wood's " IiKiuiry on IToiiier," p. lo3.

O 2

196 " Taxation no Tyranny !'*

commonly boast of it as if it were a tribute P'* Such are
the shades of our feehngs in this history of taxation and tri-
bute. But there is another artifice of applying soft names to
hard things, by veiling a tyrannical act by a term which
presents no disagreeable idea to the imagination. When it
was formerly thought desirable, in the relaxation of morals
which prevailed in Venice, to institute the office of censor,
three magistrates were elected bearing this title ; bu* it
seemed so harsh and austere in that dissipated city, that
these reformers of manners were compelled to change their
title ; when they were no longer called censors, but I signori
sopra il hon vivere della citta, all agreed on the propriety of
the office under the softened term. Father Joseph, the
secret agent of Cardinal Hichelicu, was the inventor of
lettres ile cacTiet, disguising that instrument of despotism by
the amusing term of a sealed letter. Expatriation would
have been merciful compared with the result of that hillet-
doux, a sealed letter from his maiestv !

Burke reflects vvith profound truth — " Abstract liberty,
like other mere abstractions, is not to be found. Liberty in-
heres in some sensible object ; and every nation has formed to
itself some favourite point, which, by way of eminence, be-
comes the criterion of their happiness. It happened that the
great contests for freedom in this country were from the
earliest times chiefly upon the question of taxing. Most of
the contests in the ancient commonwealths turned primarily
on the right of election of magistrates, or on the balance
among the several orders of the state. The question of
money was not with them so immediate. But in England it
was otherwise. On this point of taxes the ablest pens and
most eloquent tongues have been exercised ; the greatest
spirits have acted and suffered. "f

One party clamorously asserts that taxation is their griev-
ance, while another demonstrates that the annihilation of
taxes would be their ruin ! The interests of a great nation,
among themselves, are often contrary to each other, and each
seems alternately to predominate and to decline. " The sting
of taxation," observes Mr. Hallam, " is wastefulness ; but it is
difficult to name a limit beyond which taxes will not be borne
without impatience when faithfully applied.'" In plainer
words, this only signifies, we presume, that Mr. Hallam's

* Bodin's "Commonweal," translated by R. Knolles, p. 148. 160G,
t Burke's Works, vol. i. 283.

" Taxation no Tyranny 1^* 197

party would tax us without " .vastefulness !" Ministerial or
0{iposition, whatever be the administration, it follows that
"taxation is no tyranny;" Dr. Johnson then was terribly
abused in his day ibr a vox el prcBterea nihil!

Still shall the innocent word be hateful, and the people will
turn even on their best friend, who in administration indicts
a new impost ; as we have shown by the fate of the lloman
SaJinator ! Among ourselves, our government, in its consti-
tution, if not always in its practice, long had a consideration
towards the feelings of the people, and oiten contrived to hide
the nature of its exactions by a name of blandishment. An
enormous grievance was long the office of purveyance. A
purveyor was an officer who was to furnish every sort of pro*
vision for the royal house, and sometimes for great lords,
during their progresses or journeys. His oppressive office, by
arbitrarily fixing the market prices, and compelling the
countrymen to bring their articles to market, would enter
into the history of the arts of grinding the labouring class of
society ; a remnant of feudal tyranny ! The very title of this
officer became odious ; and by a statute of Edward III. the
hateful name of purveyor was ordered to be clianged into
aclieteur or buyer ! * A change of name, it was imagined,
would conceal its nature ! The term often devised, strangely
contrasted with the thing itself. Levies of money were long
raised under the pathetic appeal of benevolences. When
Edward IV. was passing over to France, he obtained, under
this gentle demand, money towards *' the great journey," and
afterwards having " rode about the more part of the lands,
and used the people in such fair manner, that they were
liberal in their gifts;" old Fabian adds, "the which way of
the levying of this money was al'ter-named a benevolence."
Edward IV. was courteous in this newly-invented style, and
was besides the handsomest tax-gatherer in his kingdom !
His royal presence was very dangerous to the purses of his
lo3'al subjects, particularly to those of the fmnales. In his
progress, having kissed a widow for having contributed a
larger sum than was expected from her estate, she was so
overjoyed at the singular honour and delight, that she doubled
her benevolence, and a second kiss had ruined her ! In the
succeeding reign of Richard III. the term luid already lost
the freshness of its innocence. In the speech which the

' The uiiKlern word chvatrr is tr.ired by suiuc authors to this ttirrr.,
which suuu became odious to the populace.

198 " Taxation no Tyrannij /"

Duke of Bucking-ham delivered from the hustings in Guild-
hall, he explained the term to the satisfaction of his auditors,
who even then were as cross-humoured as the livery of this
day, in their notions of what now we gently call "supplies."
" Under the plausible name of henevolence, as it was held in
the time of Edward IV., j^our goods were taken from you
much against your will, as if by that name was undei-stood
tliat every man should pay, not what lie pleased, but what
the king would have him;" or, as a marginal note in Buck's
Life of llichard HI. more pointedly has it, that "the name
of henevolence signilled that every man should pay, not what
he of his own good will list, but what the king of his good
will list to take."* liichard III., whose business, like that
of all \isurpers, was to be popular, in a statute even condemns
this "benevolence" as "a new imposition," and enacts that
" none shall be charged with it in future ; many families
having been ruined under these pretended gifts." His suc-
cessor, however, found means to levy " a benevolence ;" but
when Henry VIII. demanded one, the citizens of London ap-
pealed to the act of llichard III. Cardinal Wolsey insisted
that the law of a murderous usurper should not be enforced.
One of the common council courageously replied, that " King
Richard, conjointly with parliament, had enacted many good
statutes." Even then the citizen seems to have compre-
hended the spirit of our constitution — that taxes should not
be raised without the consent of paidiament !

Charles the First, amidst his urgent wants, at first had
hoped, by the ])athetic appeal to benevolences, that he should
have touched the hearts of his unfriendly comnioners ; but the
term of henevolence proved unlucky. The resisters of taxa-
tion took full advantage of a significant meaning, which had
long been lost in the custom : asserting by this very term
that all levies of money were not compulsory, but the
voluntary gifts of the people. In that political crisis, when
in the fulness of time all the national grievances which had
hitherto been kept down started up witli one voice, the
courteous term strangely contrasted with the rough demand.
Lord Digby said " the granting of suhaidiea, under so prepos-

* Dailies Bamngloii, in "Observations on the Statutes," gives the mar-
ginal n<Ae of Buck as the words of the duke ; they certainly served \\\i
purpose to anuise, better than tlie veiacions ones ; but we expect from a
grave antiquary inviolable authenticity. The duke is made by iJarrinijtoa
a sort of wit, but the pithy quaiutiiess is Buck's.

" Taxation no Tyranny !" 109

Icrous a name as of a benevolence, was a malevolence" And
Mr. Griinstone ol^scrved, tliat "they have f,'ranted a benevo-
lence, but the nature of the ihinr/ agrees not with the name."
The nature indeed had so entirely clianged from the name,
that when James I. had tried to warm the hearts of his
"benevolent" people, he got " little money, and lost a great
deal of love." "Subsidies," that is grants made by parlia-
ment, observes Ai'thur Wilson, a dispassionate historian, "get
more of the people's money, but exactions enslave the mind."

When benevolences had become a grievance, to diminish
the odium they invented more inviting phrases. The subject
was cautiously informed that the sums demanded were only
loans ; or he was honoured by a letter under the Privy Seal ;
a bond which the king engaged to repay at a definite period ;
but privy seals at length got to be hawked about to persons
coming out of church. " Privy Seals," says a manuscript
letter, " are flying thick and threefold in sight of all the
world, which might surel}' have been better performed in
delivering them to every man privately at home." The
general loaii, which in fact was a forced loan, was one of the
most crying grievances under Charles I. Ingenious in the
destruction of his own popularity, the king contrived a ne\<
mode of ^^ secret instructions to commissioners."* They were
to find out persons who could bear the largest rates. How
the commissioners were to acquire this secret and inquisitorial
knowledge appears in the bungling contrivance. It is one of
their orders that after a number of inquiries have been put to
a person, concerning others who had spoken against loan-
money, and what arguments they had used, this person was
to be charged in his majesty's name, and upon his allegiance,
not to disclose to any other the answer he had given.
A striking instance of that fatuity of the human mind, when
a weak government is trying to do what it knows not how to
perlbrm : it was seeking to obtain a secret purpose by the
most open and general means : a self-destroying principle !

Our ancestors were children in finance ; their simplicity has
been too often described as tyranny ! but from my soul do I
believe, on this obscure subject of taxation, that old Burleigh's
advice to Elizabeth includes more than all the squabbling
pamphlets of our political economists, — " WlX llliAUTS, A>'i)

YOU HAVE THEIR HANDS AND PURSES !"

* These "Private In.^tniPtions to the Cummissionei"S for the General
Loan" may be found in liushwoith, i. 418.

200

THE BOOK OF DEATH.

Montaigne was fond of reading minute accounts of the
ueaths of remarkablepersons; and, in the simplicit^-of his heart,
old Montaigne wished to be learned enough to form a collec-
tion of these deaths, to observe '' their words, their actions,
and what sort of countenance they put upon it." He seems
to have been a little over curious about deaths, in reference,
no doubt, to his own, in which he was certainly deceived ; for
we are told that he did not die as he had promised himself,
— expiring in the adoration of the mass ; or, as his preceptor
Buchanan would have called it, in " the act of rank
idolatry."

I have been told of a privately printed volume, under the
singular title of " The Book of Death," where an amateur has
compiled the pious memorials of many of our eminent racii
in their last moments : and it may form a companion-piece to
the little volume on " Les grands hommes qui sont morts en
jdaisantant." This work, I fear, must be monotonous; the
deaths of the righteous must resemble each other ; the learned
and the eloquent can only receive in silence that hope which
awaits " the covenant of the grave." But this volume will
not establish any decisive principle, since the just and the
religious have not always encountered death with indifference,
nor even in a fit composure of mind.

The functions of the mind are connected with those of the
body. On a death-bed a fortnight's disease may reduce the
firmest to a most wretched state ; while, on the contrary, the
soul struggles, as it were in torture, in a robust frame. Nam,
the Venetian historian, has curiously described the death of
Innocent the Tenth, who was a character unblemished by
vices, and who died at an advanced age, witli too robust a con-
stitution. Dopo lunga e terrihile acjonia, con dolore e con
■pena, seperandosi Vanima da quel corpo robusto, egli spiro ai
sette di Genuaro, nel ottantesimo primo de suoi anno. "After
a long and terrible agony, with great bodily pain aiid diffi-
culty, his soul separated itself from that robust frame, and
expired in his eighty-first year."

Some have composed sermons on death, while they passed
many years of anxiety, approaching to madness, in contem-
plating their own. The certainty of an immediate separation
from all our human sympathies may, even on a death-bed

The Book of Death. 201

Buddenly disorder the imagination. The great physician of
our times told me of a general, who had oiten faced the can-
non's mouth, dropping down in terror, when informed by hini
that his disease was rapid and fatal. Some hav^e died of the
strong imagination of death. There is a print of a knight
brought on the scaffold to suffer ; he viewed the headsman ;
he was blinded, and knelt down toi'eceiveth -stroke. Having
])assed through the whole ceremony of a criminal execution,
accompanied by all its disgrace, it was ordered that his life
should be spared. Instead of the stroke from the sword,
they poured cold water over his neck. After this operation the
knight remained motionless ; they discovered that he had
expired in the very imagination of death ! Such are amon^
the man}' causes which may affect the mind in the hour of
its last trial. The habitual associations of the natural
character are most likely to prevail, though not always. The
intrepid Marshal Biron disgraced his exit by womanish tear.^
and raging imbecility ; the virtuous Erasmus, with miserable
groans, was heard crying out, Domine ! Domine ! facjinem 1
facjlnem I Bayle having prepared his proof for the printer,
pointed to where it lay, when dying. The last words whicli
Lord Chesterfield was heard to speak were, when the valet,
opening the curtains of the bed, announced Mr. Dayroles,
" Give Dayroles a chair !" " This good breeding," observed
the late Dr. Warren, his physician, " only quits liim with his
life." The last words of Nelson were, " Tell Collingwood to
bring the fleet to an anchor." The tranquil grandeur which
cast a new majesty over Charles the First on the scaffold,
appeared when he declared, " I fear not death ! Death is not
terrible to me !" And the characteristic pleasantrj' of Sir
Thomas More exhilarated his last moments, when, observing
the weakness of the scaffold, he said, in mounting it, " I pray
you, see me up safe, and lor my coming down, let me shift for
myself!" Sir Walter Rawleigh passed a similar jest wdicn
going to the scaffold.*

My ingenious friend Dr. Sherwen has furnished me with
the following anecdotes of death : — In one of the bloody
battles fought by the Duke d'Enghien, two French noblemen

* To these may be adiled Queen Anne Boleyn. Kingston, the Lieutenaut
of the Tower, in a letter to Cromwell, reconls that she remarked of
lier own execution, "'I heard s.iy the executioner was very good, and I
have a little neck ;' and she put lier hands about il, laUj^hing heartily.
Truly, this lady has much joy aud pleasure iu death."

202 The Book of Death.

were left wounded among the dead on the field of battle.
One complained loudly of his pains ; the other, after long
silence, thus offered him consolation : " My friend, whoever
you are, remember that our God died on the cross, our king
on the scaffold ; and if you have strength to look at him who
now speaks to you, you will see that both his legs are shot
away."

At the miu'der of the Duke d'Enghien, the royal victim
looking at the soldiers, who had pointed their fusees, said,
" Grenadiers ! lower your arms, otherwise you will miss, or
only wound me!" To two of them who proposed to tie a
handkerchief over his eyes, he said, " A loyal soldier who has
been so often exposed to fire and sword can see the approach
of death with naked eyes and without fear."

After a similar caution on the part of Sir George Lisle, or
Sir Charles Lucas, when murdered in nearly the same manner
at Colchester, by the soldiers of Fairfax, the loyal hero, in
answer to their assei'tions and assurances that they would
take care not to miss him, nobly replied, " You have often
missed me when I have been nearer to you in the field of
battle."

When the governor of Cadiz, the Marquis de Solano, was
murdered by the enraged and mistaken citizens, to one of his
murderers, who had run a pike through liis back, he calmly
turned round and said, " Cowai'd, to strike there ! Come
round — if you dare face — and destroy me!"

Abernethy, in his Physiological Lectures, has ingeniously
observed that " Shakspeare has represented Mercutio con-
tinuing to jest, though conscious that he was mortally
wounded ; the expijing Hotspur thinking of nothing but
honour; and the dying FalstalF still cracking his jests upon
Bardolph's nose. If such facts were duly attended to, they
would prompt us to make a more liberal allowance for each
other's conduct, under certain circumstances, tlian we are
accustomed to do." The truth seems to be, that whenever
the functions of the mind are not disturbed by " the nervous
functions of the digestive organs," the personal character
predominates even in death, and its habitual associations exist
to its last moments. Many religious persons may have died
without showing in their last moments any of those extei'ior
acts, or employing those fervent expressions, wdiich the col-
lector of "The Book of Death" would only deign to
chronicle ; their hope is not gathered iu their last hour.

The Bouk of JJcalh. 203

Yet many have delighted to taste of death long before they
have died, and have placed before their eyes all the furniture
ol mortality. The horrors of a charnel-housu is the scene o(
their pleasure. The " Midniglit IMcditations " of Quarles
preceded Young's " Night Thoughts " by a century, and both
these poets loved preternatural terror.

If I must die, I'll snatch at everything

That may but niiud me of my latest breath ;
Dkatii's-hkai'S, Graves, Knells, Blacks,* Tombs, all
these shall bring
Into my soul such useful thoughts of death,
That this sable king of fears
Shall not catch me miawares. — Qoarles.

But it may be doubtful whether the tlioiights of death are
useful, whenever they put a man out of the possession of his
faculties. Young pursued the scheme of Quarles : he raised
about him an artificial emotion of death : he darkened his
sepulchral study, placing a skull on his table by lamp-light ;
as Dr. Donne had his portrait taken, first winding a sheet
over his head and closing his eyes ; keeping this melancholy
picture by his bed-side as long as he lived, to remind him of
his mortalityt Young, even in his garden, had his conceits
of death : at the end of an avenue was viewed a seat of an
admirable chiaro-oscuro, which, when approached, presented
only a painted surface, with an inscription, alluding to the
deception of the things of this world. To be looking at
" the mirror which flattei's not ;" to discover ourselves only
as a skeleton with the horrid life of corruption about us, has
been among those penitential inventions, which have often
ended in shaking the innocent by the pangs which are only
natural to the damned. J Without adverting to those nume-
rous testimonies, the diaries of fanatics, I shall oiler a picture
of an accomplished and innocent lady, in a curious and un-

* Blacks was the term for mourning in James the First and Charles the
First's time.

+ It was from this picture his stone efBgy was constructed for his tomb
in old St. Paul's. This mutilated figure, wjiich withstood the great fire of
London, is still preserved in the crvpt of the present cathedral.

X A still more curious /«,s/((yn in this taste for mortuary memorials ori-
piuated at the court of Henry II. of France ; whose mistress, Diana of
Poitiers, being a widow ; mourning colours of black and wliite became the
fa.'^liionat court. Yv'atclics in the form of skulls were worn ; jewels and
pendants in the shape of coflins ; and rings decorated with skulls and
skeletons.

204 The Book of Death.

affected transcript she has left of a mind of great sensibility,
U'here the preternatural terror of death might perhaps hav(?
hastened the premature one she suffered.

From the " Eeliquiae Gethiniange," * I quote some of Lady
Gethin's ideas on " Death." — " The very thoughts of death
disturb one's reason ; and though a man may have many ex-
cellent qualities, yet he may have the weakness of not
commanding his sentiments. Nothing is worse for one's
health than to be in fear of death. There are some so wise
as neither to hate nor fear it ; but for my part I have an
aversion for it ; and with reason ; for it is a rash inconsiderate
thing, that always comes before it is looked for ; always
comes unseasonably, parts friends, ruins beauty, laughs at
youth, and draws a dark veil over all the pleasures of life. —
This dreadful evil is but the evil of a moment, and what we
cannot by any means avoid ; and it is that which makes it so
terrible to me ; for were it uncertain, hope might diminish
some part of the fear ; but when I think I must die, and that
I may die every moment, and that too a thousand several
ways, I am in such a fright as you cannot imagine. I see
dangers where, perhaps, there never were any. I am per-
suaded 'tis happy to be somewhat dull of apprehension in this
case ; and j^et the best way to cure the pensiveness of the
thoughts of death is to think of it as little as possible." She
proceeds by enumerating the terrors of the fearful, who
" cannot enjoy themselves in the pleasantest places, and
although they are neither on sea, river, or creek, but in good
health in their chamber, yet are thej^ so well instructed with
the. fear of dying, that they do not measure it only by the
present dangers that wait on us. — Then is it not best to
submit to God ? But some people cannot do it as they
would ; and though they are not destitute of reason, but per-
ceive they are to blame, yet at the same time that their
reason condemns them their imagination makes their hearts
feel what it pleases."

Such is the picture of an ingenious and a religious mind,
drawn by an amiable woman, who, it is evident, lived always
in the fear of death. The Gothic skeleton was ever haunting
her imagination. In Dr. Johnson the same horror was sug-
gested by the thoughts of death. When Bos well once in
conversation persecuted Johnson on this subject, wliether we

* My discovery of the nature of this rare volume, of wljal is original and
what collected, will be found in volume ii. of this work.

The Book of Death. 205

mip-ht not forlifv our nnuds for tlie approach of death ; he
answered in a passion, " No, sir ! let it alone ! It matters
not how a man dies, but how he lives ! The art of dying is
not of importance, it lasts so short a time!" But when
Boswell persisted in the conversation, Johnson was thrown
into such a state of agitation, that he thundered out " Give
us no more of this !" and, further, sternly told the trembling
and too curious philosopher, " Don't let us meet to-morrow !"
It may be a question whether those who by their prepara-
tory conduct have appeared to show the greatest inditference
for"^ death, have not rather betrayed the most curious art to
disguise its terrors. Some have invented a mode of escaping
from life in the midst of convivial enjoyment. A mortuary
ijreparation of this kind lias been recorded of an amiable man,
jNIoncritf, the author of " Histoire des Chats " and " L'Art de
riaire," by his literary friend La Place, who was an actor in,
as well as the historian of, the singular narrative. One
mornino' La Place received a note from jNIoncritf, requesting
that "he would immediately select for him a dozen volumes
most likely to amuse, and of a nature to withdraw the reader
from being occupied by melancholy thoughts." La Place
was startled at the unusual request, and flew to his old friend,
whom he ibund deeply engaged in being measured for a new
peruke, and a taflety robe-de-chambre, earnestly enjoining the
utmost expedition. "Shut the door!" said Moncritl:', ob-
servino- the surprise of his friend. " And now that we are
alone, I confide my secret : on rising this morning, my valet
in dressing me showed me on this leg tliis dark spot — from
that moment I knew I was ' condemned to death ; ' but I
had presence of mind enough not to betray myself." "Can
a head so well organised as yours imagine that such a trifle
is a sentence of death ? " — " Don't speak so loud, my friend !
or rather deign to listen a moment. At my age it is fatal !
The system from which I have derived the felicity of a long
life has been, that whenever any evil, moral or physical,
happens to us, if there is a remedy, all must be sacrificed to
deliver us from it — but in a contrary case, 1 do not choose to
wrestle with destiny and to begin complaints, endless as use-
less ! All that I request of you, my friend, is to assist me to
i)ass away the few days which remain for me, free from all
cares, of which otherwise they might be too susceptible. But
do not think," he added with warmth, " that I mean to elude
the reli'j-ious duties of a citizen, which so many of late afi'ect

206 Hislorij of the Skeleton of Death.

to contemn. The good and virtuous curate of my parish is
coming here under the pretext of an annual contribution, and
1 have even ordered m}'- pliysician, on whose confidence I can
rely. Here is a list of ten or twelve pert^ons, friends beloved !
who are mostly known to you. I shall write to them this
evening, to tell them of my condemnation ; but if they wish
me to live, they will do me the favour to assemble hei'e at
five in the evening, where they may be certain of finding all
those objects of amusement, which I shall study to discover
suitable to their tastes. And you, my old friend, with my
doctor, are two on whom I most depend."

La Place was strongly affected by this appeal — neither
Socrates, nor Cato, nor Seneca looked more serenely on the
approach of death.

" Familiarise yourself early with death !" said the good
old man with a smile — " It is onlv dreadful for those who
dread it!"

During ten days after this singular conversation, the whole
of Moncriff's remaining life, his apartment was open to his
friends, of whom several were ladies ; all kinds of games were
played till nine o'clock ; and that the sorrows of the host
might not disturb his guests, he plaj^ed the chouette at his
favourite game of 'picquet ; a supper, seasoned by the wit of
the master, concluded at eleven. On the tenth night, in
taking leave of his friend, MoncrifF whispered to him, "Adieu,
my friend! to-morrow morning I shall return your books !"
He died, as he foresaw, the following day.

I have sometimes thought that we might form a history of
this fear of death, by tracing the first appearances of the
SKELETOi^^ which haunts our funereal imagination. In the
modern history of mankind we might discover some very
strong contrasts in the notion of death entertained by men at
various epochs. The following article will supply a sketch of
this kind.

HISTORY OP THE SKELETON OF DEATH.

Euthanasia ! Eutlianasia ! an easy death ! was the exclama-
tion of Augustus ; it was what Antoninus Pius enjoj^ed ; and
it is that for which every wise man will pray, said Lord
Orrery, when perhaps he wag contemplating the close of
Swift's life.

History of the Skeleton of Death. 20r

The ancients contemplated death without terror, and
met it with indiflercnce. It was tlie only divinity to which
they never sacriticed, convinced that no human heing' could
turn aside its stroke. They raised altars to Fever, to Mis-
fortune, to all the evils of life ; for these might change ! But
though they did not court the presence of death in any shape,
they acknowledged its tranquillit}' ; and in the heautiful fables
of their allegorical religion, Death was the daughter oi' Night,
and the sister of Sleep ; and ever the friend of the unhappy !
To the eternal sleep of death they dedicated their s(;pulchral
monuments — jEteniaJi somno ! * If the full light of revela-
tion had not yet broken on them, it can hardly be denied
that they had some glimpses and a dawn of the life to come,
from the man}^ allegorical inventions which describe the
transmigration of the soul. A butterfly on the extremity of
an extinguished lamp, held up by the messenger of the gods
intently gazing above, implied a dedication of that soul ;
Love, with a melancholy air, his legs crossed, leaning on an
inverted torch, the flame thus naturally extinguishing itself,
elegantly denoted the cessation of human life ; a rose
sculptured on a sarcophagus, or the emblems of epicurean life
traced on it, in a skull wreathed by a chaplet of flowers, such
as they wore at their convivial meetings, a flask of wine, a
patera, and the small bones used as dice : all these symbols
were indirect allusions to death, veiling its painful recollec-
tions. They did not pollute their imagination with the con-
tents of a charnel-house. The sarcophagi of the ancients
rather recall to us the remembrance of the activity of life ; for
they are sculptured with battles or games, in basso relievo ; a
sort of tender homage paid to the dead, observes Mad. de
Stael, with her peculiar refinement of thinking.

It would seem that the Romans had even an aversion to
mention death in express terms, for they disguised its very
name by some periphrasis, such as discessit e vita, " he has
departed from life ;" and they did not say that their friend
had died, but that he had lived; vixit I In the old Latin
chronicles, and even in the Foedera and other documents of
the middle ages, we hnd the same delicacy about using the
fatal word Death, especially when applied to kings and great
people. " Transire d, Sa-culo — Vitain siiam miifare — Si quid
de eo human ilits conticjerit, (j'c." I am indebted to Mr.

* Montfaiicon, "L'Antiquite Expliqn6e," i. 362.

203 History of the Skeleton of Death.

Merivale for this remark. Even among a people less refined,
tiie obtrusive idea of death has been studiously avoided: we
are told that when the Emperor of Morocco inquires after
jiny one who has recently died, it is against etiquette to
mention the word "death;" the answer is "his destiny
is closed!" But this tenderness is only reserved for "the
fleet " of the Mussulmen. A Jew's death is at once
l)lainly expressed : " He is dead, sir ! asking your pardon
i'i;r mentioning such a contemptible wretch ! i. e. a Jew ! A
Christian's is described by " The infidel is dead!" or, " The
cuckold is dead."

The ancient artists have so rarely attempted to personify
Death, that we have not discovered a single revolting image
of this nature in all the works of antiquity.* — To conceal its
deformity to the eye, as well as to elude its suggestion to the
mind, seems to have been an universal feeling, and it accorded
with a fundamental principle of ancient art ; that of never
permitting violent passion to produce in its representation
distortion of form. This may be observed in the Laocoon,
where the mouth only opens sufficiently to indicate the sup-
pressed agony of superior humanity, without expressing the
loud cry of vulgar suffering. Pausanias considered as a per-
sonification of death a female figure, whose teeth and nails,
long and crooked, were engraven on a coffin of cedar, which
enclosed the body of Cypselus ; this female was unquestion-
ably only one of the Pcd'ccs, or the Fates, " watchful to
cat the thread of life." Hesiod describes Atropos indeed as
having sharp teeth and long nails, waiting to tear and
devour the dead ; but this image was of a barbarous era.
Catullus ventured to personify the Sister Destinies as three
Crones; "but in general," Winkelmann observes, "they are
portrayed as beautiful virgins, with winged heads, one of
whom is always in the attitude of writing on a scroll."
Death was a nonentity to the ancient artist. Could he ex-
hibit what represents nothing ? Could he animate into
action what lies in a state of eternal tranquillity ? Elegant

* A representation of Deatli by a skeleton appears among the Egyptians :
a custom more singular than barbarous prevailed, of enclosing a skeleton
(,f beautiful workmanship in a small coffin, which the bearer carried round
;.t their entertainments; observing, "After death you will resemble thia
figure : drink, then ! and be happy." A symbol of Death in a convivial
1 arty was not designed to excite terrific or gloomy ideas, but a recollection
'j{ the brevity of human life.

History of tJie Skeleton of Death. 209

images of repose and tender sorrow were all he could invent
to indicate the state of death. Even the terms which diffe-
rent nations have hestowed on a l)in-ial-))lace are not asso-
ciated with emotions of horror. The Greeks called a bury-
ing-ground by the soothing term of Coeinelerion, or " the
sleeping-place;" the Jews, who had no horrors of the grave,
by Beth-halm, or, " the house of the living ;" the Germans,
with religious simplicity, " God's-field." The Scriptures had
only noticed that celestial being "the Angel of Death," —
graceful, solemn, and sacred !

Whence, then, originated that stalkingr skeleton, sucrarestins:
so many ialse and sepulchral ideas, and which for us has so
long served as the image of death ?

When the Christian religion spread over Europe, the world
changed ! the certainty of a future state of existence, by the
artitices of wicked worldly men, terrified instead of consoling
human nature ; and in the resurrection the ignorant mul-
titude seemed rather to have dreaded retribution, than to
have hoped for remuneration. The Founder of Cliristianity
everywhere breathes the blessedness of social feelings. It is
" Our Father !" whom he addresses. The horrors with
wliich Christianity was afterwards disguised arose in the
corruptions of Christianity among those insane ascetics who,
misinterpreting " the Word of Life," trampled on nature ;
and imagined that to secure an existence in the other worltl
it was necessary not to exist in the one in which God had
placed them. The dominion of mankind fell into the usurp-
ing hnnds of those imperious monks whose artifices trafficed
with the terrors of ignorant and hypochondriac " Kaisers
and kings." The scene was darkened by penances and by
pilgrimages, by midnight vigils, by miraculous shrines, and
bloody flagellations ; spectres started up amidst their tene-
hres ; millions of masses increased their supernatural influ-
ence. Amidst this general gloom of Europe, their troubled
imaginations were frequently predicting the end of the
world. It was at this period that they first beheld the grave
yawn, and Death, in the Gothic form of a gaunt anatomy,
parading through the universe ! The people were fright-
ened as they viewed, everywhere hung before their e^'cs, in
the twilight of their cathedrals, and their "pale cloisters,"
the most revolting emblems of death. They startled the
traveller on the bridge ; they stared on the sinner '\\\ tho
carvings of his table and chair ; the spectre moved in the

VOL. III. V

210 History of the Skeleton of Death.

hangings of the apartment ; it stood iu the niche, and was
the picture of their sitting-room ; it was worn in their
rings, while the illuminator shaded the hony phantom in the
margins of their " Horse," their primers, and their brevia-
ries. Their barbarous taste perceived no absurdity in giving
action to a heap of dry bones, which could only keep toge-
ther in a state of immovability and repose ; nor that it was
burlesquing the awful idea of the resurrection, by exhibiting
the incorruptible spirit under the unnatural and ludicrous
figure of mortality drawn out of the corruption of the
grave.

An anecdote of these monkish times has been preserved by
old Gerard Leigh ; and as old stories are best set off by old
words, Gerard speaketh ! " The great Maximilian the em-
peror came to a monastery in High Almaine (Germany), the
monks whereof had caused to be curiously painted the char-
nel of a man, which they termed — Death ! When that well-
learned emperor had beholden it awhile, he called unto him
his painter, commanding to blot the skeleton out, and to
paint therein the image of — a fool. Wherewith the abbot,
humbly beseeching him to the contrar}^, said ' It was a good
remembrance !' — ' Nay,' quoth the emperor, ' as vermin that
annoyeth man's body cometh unlocked for, so doth death,
which here is but a fained image, and life is a certain thing,
if we know to deserve it.' "* The original mind of Maxi-
milian the Great is characterized by this curious story of
converting our emblem of death into a parti-coloured fool ;
and such satirical allusions to the folly of those who per-
sisted in their notion of the skeleton were not unusual with
the artists of those times ; we find the figure of a fool sitting
with some drollery between the legs of one of these
skeletons. t

This story is associated with an important fact. After
they had successfully terrified the people with their charnel-
house figure, a reaction in the public feelings occurred, for the
skeleton was now emplo^'ed as a medium to convey the most
facetious, satii'ical, and burlesque notions of human life.
Death, which had so long harassed their imaginations, sud-
denly changed into a theme fertile in coarse humour. The
Italians were too long accustomed to the study of the beau-
tiful to allow their pencil to sport with deformity ; but the

* "The Accidence of Ai-morie," p. 199.
f A woodcut preserved in Mr. Dibdin's Bibliographical Decameron, L 36.

History of the Skeleton oj Death. 211

Gothic taste of the German artists, who coukl only copy
their own homely nature, delighted to give human passions
to the hideous physiognomy of a noseless skull ; to put an
eye of mockery or malignity into its hollow socket, and to
stretch out the gaunt anatomy into the postures of a Ho-
garth ; and that the ludicrous might be carried to its ex-
treme, this imaginary being, taken from the bone-house, was
viewed in the action of dancing ! This blending of the
grotesque with the most disgusting image of mortality, is
the more singular part of this history of the skeleton, and
indeed of human nature itself!

"The Dance of Death," erroneously considered as Hol-
bein's, with other similar Dances, however differently
treated, have one common subject which was painted in the
arcades of burying-grounds, or on town-halls, and in market-
places. The subject is usually " The Skeleton" in the act of
leading all ranks and conditions to the grave, personated after
nature, and in the strict costume of the times. This inven-
tion opened a new field for genius ; and when we can for ,i
moment forget their luckless choice of their bony and blood-
less hero, who to amuse us by a variety of action becomes a
sort of hoiTid Harlequin in these pantomimical scenes, we
may be delighted by the numerous human characters, which
are so vividly presented to us. The origin of this extraor-
dinary invention is supposed to be a favourite pageant, or re-
ligious mummery, invented by the clergy, who in these ages
of barbarous Christianity always found it necessary to
amuse, as well as to frighten the pojmlace ; a circumstance
well known to have occurred in so uiuny other grotesque and
licentious festivals they allowed the people. The practice of
dancing in churches and church-yards was interdicted by
several councils ; but it was found convenient in those rude
times. It seems probable that the clergy contrived the pre-
sent dance, as more decorous and not without moral and re-
ligious emotions. This pageant was performed in churches,
in which the chief characters in society were supported in a
sort of masquerade, mixing together in a general dance, in
the course of which every one in his turn vanislied from the
scene, to show how one after the other died off". The sub-
ject was at once poetical and ethical ; and the poets and
painters of Germany adopting the skeleton, sent forth this
chimerical Ulysses of another world to roam among the men
and manners of their own. A popular poem was composed,

p 2

212 History of the Skeleton of Death.

said to be by one Macaber, which name seems to be a cor-
ruption of St. Macaire ; the old GauHsh version, reformed, is
still printed at Troyes, in France, with the ancient blocks of
woodcuts, under the title of " La Grande Danse Macabre des
liommes et des Femmes." Merian's " Todten Tanz," or the
" Dance of the Dead," is a curious set of prints of a Dance
of Death from an ancient painting, I think not entirely de-
facf>Q,in a cemetery at Basle, in Switzerland. It was ordered
to be painted by a council held there during many years, to
commemorate the mortality occasioned by a plague in 1439.
The prevailing character of all these works is unquestionably
grotesque and ludicrous ; not, however, that genius, however
barbarous, could refrain in this large subject of human life
from inventing scenes often imagined with great delicacy of
conception, and even great pathos. Such is the new-married
couple, whom Death is leading, beating a drum ; and in the
rapture of the hour, the bride seems, with a melancholy
look, not insensible of his presence ; or Death is seen issuing
from the cottage of the poor widow with her youngest
child, who waves his hand sorrowfully, while the mother and
the sister vainly answer ; or the old man, to whom Death is
playing on a psaltery, seems anxious that liis withered
fingers should once more touch the strings, while he is car-
ried off in calm tranquillity. The greater part of these sub-
jects of death are, however, ludicrous ; and it may be a ques-
tion, whether the spectators of these Dances of Death did
not find their mirth more excited than their religious emo-
tions. Ignorant and terrified as the people were at the view
of the skeleton, even the grossest simplicity could not fail to
laugh at some of those domestic scenes and familiar persons
drawn from among themselves. The skeleton, skeleton as it
is, in the creation of genius, gesticulates and mimics, while
even its hideous skull is made to express every diversified
character, and the result is hard to describe ; for we are at
once amused and disgusted with so much genius founded on
so much barbarism.*

When the artist succeeded in conveying to tlie eye the

* My greatly-lamented friend, the late Mr. Douce, has poured forth the
must curious knowledge on this singular subject, of " The Dance of Death."
This learned investigator has reduced Macaber to a nonentity, but not
" The Macaber Dance," which has been frequently painted. Mr. Douce's
eilition is accompanied by a set of woodcuts, which have not unsuccessfully
copied the exquisite origiuals of the Lyons wood-cutttr.

History of the Skeleton of Death. 213

most ludicrous notions of deatli, the poets also discoverc'l in
it a fertile source of the burlesque. The curious collector is
acquainted with many volumes where the most extraordinary
topics have been combined with this suliject. They made the
body and the soul debate together, and ridicule the complaints
of a damned soul ! The greater part of the poets of the time
were always composing on the subject of Death in their
humorous pieces.* Such historical records of the public mind,
historians, intent on political events, have rarely noticed.

Of a work of this nature, a popular favourite was long the
one entitled " Le faut mourir, ct les Ijxcuses Inutiles qu'on
apporte d, cette Necessite ; Le tout en vers burlesques, 1G5S."
Jacques Jacques, a canon of Ambrun, was the writer, who
humorously says of himself that he gives his thoughts just
as the}- lie on his heart, without dissimulation — " Fur 1 have
nothing double about me except m}^ name ! I tell thee some
of the most important truths in laughing; it is for thee d'y
penser tout d, hon." This little volume was procured for me
with some difficulty in France ; and it is considered as one of
the happiest of this class of death-poems, of which I know
not of any in our literature.

Our canon of Ambrun, in facetious rhymes, and with the
naivete of expression which belongs to his age, and an idio-
matic turn fatal to a translator, excels in pleasantry ; his
haughty hero condescends to hold very amusing dialogues
with all classes of society, and delights to confound their
" excuses inutiles." The most miserable of men, the galley-
slave, the mendicant, alike would escape when he appears to
them. " Were I not absolute over them," Death exclaims,
" they would confound me with their long speeches ; but
I have business, and must gallop on!" His geographical
rhymes are droll.

Ce que j'ai fait daus I'Afrique

Je le fais bien clans I'Amerique;

On I'appelle monde nouveau

Mais ce sont des brides il veau ;

Nulle terre A, nioy u'est nouvelle

Je vay partout sans qu'on m'appelle;

Mon bras de tout temps commanda

Dans le [lays du Canada ;

J'ai tenu de tout temps en bride

La Virginia et la Floride,

* Qoujet, "Bib. Fir8n9oi8e," vol. x. 186,

214 History of the Skeleton of Death,

Et j'ai hien donne sur le bee
Aux Fian^ais du foi't de Xebec.
Lorsque je veux je fais la nique
Aux Incas, aux rois de Mexique ;
Et montre aux Nouveaux Greiiadina
Qu'ils sont des foux et des badins.
Chacun sait bien comme je matte
Ceux du Bresil et de la Plate,
Ainsi que les Taupinembous —
En un mot, je fais voir a tout
Que ce que nait dans la nature,
Doit prendre de moy tablature !" *

The perpetual employments of Death display copious inven-
tion with a facility of humour.

Egalement je vay rangeaat,

Le conseiller et le serjent,

Le gentilbomme et le berger,

Le bourgeois et le boulanger,

Et la maistresse et la servante

Et la niece comme la tante ;

!^^onsieur I'abbe, monsieur son moine,

Le petit clerc et le chanoine ;

iSans cboix je mets dans mon butin

Waistre Claude, maistre Martin,

Dame Luce, dame Perrete, &c.

J'en prends iin dans le temps qu'il pleure

A quelque autre, au contraire a I'heure

Qui demesurement il rit ;

Je donne le coup qui le frit.

J'en prends un, pendant qu'il se leve ;

En se couchant I'autre j'enleve.

Je prends le malade et le sain

L'un aujourd'liui, I'autre le demain.

J'en surprends un dedans son lit,

L'autre a I'estude quand il lit.

J'en suiijrends un le ventre pleiu

Je mene I'autre par la faim,

J'attrape l'un pendant qu'il prie,

Et I'autre pendant qu'il renie ;

J'en saisis un au cabaret

Entre le blanc et le clairet,

L'autre qui dans son oratoire

A son Dicu rend houneur et gloire:

J'en surprends un lorsqu'il sc psame

Le jour qu'il epouse sa femme,

L'autre le jour que plein de deuil

La sienne il voit dans le cercueil ;

* Tallature (Tun luth, Cotgrave says, is the belly of a lute, meaning
"all in nature must dance to my music 1"

The Rival Biographers oj Heylin. 215

Un k pied et I'autre k cheval,
Dans le jeu Tun, et Taiitre au bal ;
Unqui mange et I'autre qui boit,
Un qui paye et I'aiitie qui doit,
L'un en etc lorsqu'il nioissonne,
L'autre en vendanges dans I'automne,
L'un criant almanachs nouveaux —
Un qui demande sou aumosne
L'autre dans le temjis qu'il la donne,
Je preuds le bon uiaistre Clement,
Au temps qu'il prend un lavement,
Et prends la dame Catherine
Le jour qu'elle prend medecine.

This veil of gaiety in the old canon of Ambrun covers
deeper and more philosopliical thoughts tlian the singular
mode of treating so solenm a theme. He has introduced
many scenes of human life which still interest, and he
addresses the " teste a triple couronne," as well as the
'' format de galere," who exclaims, " Laissez-moi vivre danri
mes fers," " le gueux," the " bourgeois," the " chanoine,"
tlie " pauvre soldat," the "medecin;" in a word, all ranks
in life are exhibited, as in all the " Dances of Death." But
our object in noticing these burlesque paintings and poems is
to show that after the monkish Goths had opened one general
scene of melanclioly and tribulation over Europe, and given
birth to that dismal skeleton of death, which still terrifies the
imagination of man}^ a reaction of feeling was experienced by
the populace, who at length came to laugh at the gloomy
spectre which had so long terrified them !

THE RIVAL BIOGRAPHERS OP HEYLIN.

Peter Hetlik was one of the popular writers of his times,
like Fuller and Howell, who, devoting their amusing pens to
subjects which deeply interested their own busy age, will not
be slighted by the curious.* We have nearly outlived their
divinity, but not their politics. Metaphysical absurdities are

* Dr. ITeylin's pviiicip.il wort, " Ecclesia Bestaurata; or, the History
of the Reformation of the Church of Eii,i;land," wa.s reprinted at the Cam-
bridge University press, for " the Eo(?lesiastical History Society, ' in 2 vols.
8vo, 1S49, under tlie able editorship of J. C. Robertson, .M.A., Vicar of
Bekesbourne, Kent. The introductory account of Heylin has enabled us
to correct the present article in some particulai*s, and add a few usefu
Qotes.

216 The Rival Biographers of Heylin.

luxuriant weeds which must be cut down by tlie scytlie of
Time ; but the great passions branching from the tree of hfe
are still " growing with our growth."

There are two biographies of our Heylin, which led to a
literary quarrel of an extraordinary nature ; and, in the pro-
gress of its secret history, all the feelings of rival authorship
were called out.

Heylin died in 1662. Dr. Barnard, his son-in-law, and a
scholar, communicated a sketch of the author's life to be pre-
iixed to a posthumous folio, of which Heylin's son was the
editor. Tliis Lii'e was given by the son, but anonymously,
which ma}^ not have gratified the author, the son-in-law.*

Twenty years had elapsed when, in 1682, appeared " The
Life of Dr. Peter Hejdin, by George Vernon." The writer,
alluding to the prior Life prefixed to the posthumous folio,
asserts that, in borrowing something from Barnard, Barnard
had also " Excerpted passages out of my papers, the very
words as well as matter, when he had them in his custody,
as any reader may discern who will be at the pains of com-
paring the Life now published with what is extant before the
Keimalea EccJesiastica ;" the quaint, pedantic title, after the
fashion of the day, of the posthumous folio.

This strong accusation seemed countenanced by a dedica-
tion to the son and the nephew of Heylin. Roused now into
action, the indignant Barnard soon produced a more complete
Life, to which he prefixed " A necessary Vindication." This
is an unsparing castigation of Vernon, the literary pet whom
the Heylins had fondled in preference to their learned rela-
tive.t The long-smothered family grudge, the suppressed mor-
tifications of literary pride, after the subterraneous grumblings
of twenty years, now burst out, and the volcanic particles flew

* Dr. John Barnard married the daughter of Heylin, when he lived at
Abingdon, near Oxford. He afterwards became rector of the rich living
of Waddington, near Lincoln, of which he purchased the perpetual advow-
son, holding also the sinecure of Gedney, in the same county. He was
ultimately made Prebendary of Asgarby, in the church of Lincoln, and
died at Newark, on a journey, in August, 1683. His rich and indolent life
would naturally hold out few inducements for literary labour.

+ Mr. George Venion, according to Wood (Athen. Oxon. iv. 606), was
made Chaplain of All Souls' College, afterwards Rector of Sarsden, near
Churchill, in Oxfordshire, of Bourton-on-the-\Vater, in Gloucestershire, and
of St. John and St. Alichael, in the city of Gloucester. Wood enumerates
several works by him, so that he was evidently more of a "literary man"

than Barnard, who enjoyed "learned ease" to a great degree, and wai

*^'.d?D.tly only to be aroused by sometliing flagitiou?,

The Rival Biographers of Heylin. 217

about in caustic pleasantries and sharp invectives ; all the
lava of an author's vengeance, mortified hy the choice of an
inferior rival.

It appears that Vernon had been selected by the son of
Heylin, in preference to his brother-in-law, Dr. IJarnard, from
some family disagreement. Barnard tells us, in describing
Vernon, that " No man, except himself, who was totally
ignorant of the doctor, and all the circumstances of his life,
would have engaged in such a work, which was never
])rimarily laid out for him, but by reason of some unhappy
diilerences, as usually fall out in families ; and he, who loves
to put his oar in troubh^d waters, instead of closing them up,
hath made them wider."

Barnard tells his story plainly. Heylin the son, intending
to have a more elaborate Life of his father prefixed to his
works. Dr. Barnard, from the high reverence in which he
held the memory of his father-in-law, offered to contribute it.
Many conferences were held, and the son entrusted him with
several papers. But suddenly his caprice, more than his
judgment, landed that George Vernon was worth John
Barnard. The doctor affects to describe his rejection with
the most stoical indiflerence. He tells us — " I was satisfied,
and did patiently expect the coming forth of the work, not
only term after term, but year after year — a very considerable
time for such a tract. But at last, instead of the Life, came
a letter to me from a bookseller in London, who lived at the
sign of the Black Boy, in Fleet-street."*

Now, it seems that he who lived at the Black Boy had
combined with another who lived at the Fleur de Luce, and
that the Fleur de Luce had assured the Black Boy that Dr.
Barnard was concerned in writing the Life of Heylin — this
was a strong recommendation. But lo ! it appeared that
"one Mr. Vernon, of Gloucester," was to be the man I a
gentle, thin-skinned authorling, who bleated like a lamb, and
was so fearful to trip out of its shelter, that it allows the
Black Boy and the Fleur de Luce to communicate its papers
to any one they choose, and erase ot add at their pleasure.f

* This was Harper, a bookseller, wlio had undertaken a republication of
the Ecclesia Vindicata, and other tracts by Heylin, to which the Life was
to be prefi.xed.

+ The author had "desired Mr. Harper to communicate the papers to
whom he pleases, and cross out or add what is thought convenient. '* A
laave very few literary men would give I

218 The Rival Biographers of HeyHn.

It occurred to the Black Boy, on this proposed arithmetical
criticism, that the work required addition, subtraction, and
division ; that the fittest critic, on whose name, indeed, he
had originally engaged in the work, was our Dr. Barnard ;
and he sent the package to the doctor, who resided near
Lincoln.

The doctor, it appears, had no appetite for a dish dressed
by another, while he himself was in the very act of the
cookery ; and it was suifered to lie cold for three weeks at
the carrier's.

But entreated and overcome, the good doctor at length
sent to the carrier's for the life of his father-in-law. " I
found it, according to the bookseller's description, most lame
and imperfect ; ill begun, worse carried on, and abruptly
concluded." The learned doctor exercised that plenitude of
power with which the Black Bo}^ had invested him — he very
obligingly showed the author in what a confused state his
materials lay together, and how to put them in order —

Nee facundia deseret tunc, nee lucidus ordo.

If his rejections were copious, to show his good-will as well
as his severity, his additions were generous, though he used
the precaution of carefully distinguishing by " distinct para-
graphs" his own insertions amidst Vernon's mass, with a
gentle hint that " He knew more of Heylin than any man
now living, and ought therefore to have been the biographer."
He returned the MS. to tlie gentleman with great civility, but
none he received back ! When Vernon pretended to ask for
improvements, he did not imagine that the work was to be
improved by being nearly destro3'ed ; and when he asked for
cori'ection, he probably expected all might end in a com-
pliment.

The narrative may now proceed in Dr. Barnard's details of
his doleful mortifications, in being "altered and mangled"
by Mr. Vernon.

" Instead of thanks from him (Vernon), and the return of
common civility, he disfigured my papers, that no sooner
came into his hands, but he fell upon them as a lion ram-
pant, or the cat upon the poor cock in the fable, saying, Tu
hodie mild discerperis — so my papers came home miserably
clawed, blotted, and blurred ; whole sentences dismembered,
and pages scratched out ; several leaves omitted which ought
to be printed, — shamefully he used my copy j so that before it

The Rival Biographers of Heylin. 210

was carried to the press, he swooped away the second part of
the Life wlioU}- from it — in the room of which he shuffled in
a preposterous conclusion at the last page, which he printed
in a different character, yet could not keep himself honest,
as the poet saith,

Dlcitque tua par/ina, fur es.

Marttal.

For he took out of my copy Dr. Heylin's dream, his sick-
ness, his last words before his death, and left out the burning
of his surplice. He so mangled and metamorphosed the
whole Life I composed, that I may say as Sosia did, Egomet
mihi non credo, ille alter Sosia me malis mulcavit modis —
Plaut."

Dr. Barnard would have " patiently endured these wrongs ;"
but the accusation Yernoa ventured on, that Barnard was the
plagiary, required the doctor " to return the poisoned chalice
to his own lips," that " himself was the plagiary both of
words and matter." The foct is, that this reciprocal accusa-
tion was owing to Barnard having had a prior peru.sal of
Heylin's papers, which afterwards came into the hands of
^'ernon : they both drew their water from the same source.
These papers' Heyhn himself had left for "a rule to guide
the writer of his life."

Barnard keenly retorts on Vernon for his surreptitious use
of whole pages from Heylin's works, which he has appropriated
to himself without any marks of quotation. " I am no such
excerptor (as he calls me) ; he is of the humour of the man
who took all the ships in the Attic haven for his own, and
yet was himself not master of any one vessel."

Again : —

" But all this while I misunderstand him, for possibly he
meaneth his own dear words I have excerpted. Why doth he
not speak in plain, downright English, that Ihe world may see
my faults ? For every one doth not know what is excerpting.
If I have been so bold to pick or snap a word from him, I
hope I may have the benefit of the clergy, ^^llat words
have I robbed him of? — and how have I become the richer
for them ? I was never so taken with him as to be once
tempted to break the commandments, because 1 love plain
speaking, plain writing, and plain dealing, which he does
not : I hate the word excerpted, and the action imported in
it. However, he is a fanciful man, and thinks there is no

220 The Rival Biographers of Heylin.

elegancy nor wit Imt in his own way of talking. I must say
as Tully did, ILiUm equidem indisertam prudentiam quam
stuJtam loquacitatem."

In his turn he accuses Vernon of being a perpetual tran-
scriber, and for the Malone minuteness of his history.

" But how have I excerpted his matter? Then I am sure
to rob the spittle-house ; for he is so poor and put to hai'd
shifts, that he has much ado to compose a tolerable story,
which he hath been hammering and conceiving in his mind
for four years together, before he could bring forth \\\?,fcetus
of intolerable transcriptions to molest the reader's patience
and memory. How doth he run himself out of breath, some-
times for twenty pages and more, at other times fifteen, ordi-
narily nine and ten, collected out of Dr. Heylin's old books,
before he can take his wind again to return to his story ! I
never met with such a transcriber in all my days ; for want
of matter to fill up a vacuum, of which his book was in much
danger, he hath set down the story of Westminster, as long
as the Ploughman's Tale in Chaucer, which to the reader
would have been more pertinent and pleasant. I wonder he
did not transcribe bills of Chancery, especially about a
tedious suit my father had for several years about a lease at
Norton."

In his raillery of Vernon's affected metaphors and com-
parisons, " his similitudes and dissimilitudes strangely hooked
in, and fetched as far as the Antipodes," Barnard observes,
'■ The man hath also a strange opinion of himself that he is
Dr. Heylin ; and because he writes his Life, that he hath his
natural parts, if not acquired. The soul of St. Augustin (say
the schools) was Pythagorically transfused into the corpse of
Aquinas; so the soul of Dr. Heylin into a narrow soul. I
];now there is a question in philosophy. An animee sint
aquales ? — whether souls be alike ? But there's a difference
between the spirits of EHjah and Elisha : so small a prophet
with so great a one !"

Dr. Barnard concludes by regretting that good counsel
came now unseasonably, else he would have advised the
writer to have transmitted his task to one who had been an
ancient friend of Dr. Heylin, rather than ambitiously have
assumed it, who was a professed stranger to him, by reason
of which no better account could be expected from him than
what he has given. He hits off the character of this piece
of biography — " A Life to the half; an imperfect oreatwej

Of Ltiijkt du FresnoT/. 221

that is not only lame (as the honest bookseller said), but
wantcth legs, and all other integral parts of a man ; nay, the
very soul that should animate a body like Dr. Heylin. So
that 1 must say ol" him, as Plutarch does of Tib. Gracchus,
' that he is a bold undertaker and rash talker of those matters
he does not understand.' And so I have done with him,
unless he creates to himself and me a future trouble!"

Vernon appears to have slunk away from the duel. The
son of Heylin stood corrected by the superior Life produced
by their relative ; the learned and vivacious Barnard probably
never again ventured to alter and improve the works of an
author kneeling and praying for corrections. These bleating
lambs, it seems, often turn out roaring lions 1*

OF LENGLET DU FRESNOY.

TiJE " Ilethode pour etudier rHisfoire," by the Abbe Lenglet
du Fresnoy, is a master-key to all the locked-up treasures of
ancient and modern history, and to the more secret stores of
the obscurer memorialists of every nation. The history of
this work and its author are equally remarkable. The man
was a sort of curiosity in human nature, as his works are in
literature. Lenglet du Fresnoy is not a writer merely labo-
rious ; without genius, he still has a hardy originality in his
manner of writing and of thinking ; and his vast and restless
curiosity fermenting liis immense book-knowledge, with a free-
dom verging on cynical causticity, led to the pursuit of uncom-
mon topics. Even the prefaces to the works which he edited

* The most curious part of the .story reinains yet to be told. Dr. Bar-
nard was mistaken in his imimtations, and Vernon was not the really
Llamable party. We tell the tale in Mr. Robertson's words in the work
already alluded to. — "Who was the party guilty of these outrages ? Bar-
nard assumed that it could be no other than Vernon ; but the truth seems
to be that the Rector of Bourton had nothing whatever to do with the
matter. The jtublisher had called in a more important adviser — Dr.
Barlow, Bishop of Lincoln (Ath. Oxon. iii. 567 ; iv. 606) ; the mutila-
tions of Barnard's AIS. were really the work, not of the obscure Gloucester-
shire clergyman, but of the indignant author's own diocesan ; and we need
not hesitate to ascribe the abrujitness of the conclusion, and the smallness
of the type in whiuh it is priutud, to Mr. Harper's economical desire to
save the expense of an additional sheet." Thus "Bishop Barlow and the
bookseller had made the mischief between the parties, who, instead of
atteiiipting a private explanation, attacked each other in print."

222 Of Lenglet du Fresntyy.

are singularly curious, and he has usually added hibliotheques,
or critical catalogues of" authors, which we may still consult
for notices on the writers of romances — of those on literary
subjects' — on alchymy, or the hermetic philosophy ; of those
who have written on apparitions, visions, &c. ; an historical
treatise on the secret of confession, &c. ; besides those
" Pieces Justificatives," which constitute some of the most
extraordinary documents in the philosoph}'^ of history. His
manner of writing secured him readers even among the un-
learned ; his mordacity, his sarcasm, his derision, his preg-
nant interjections, his unguarded frankness, and often his
strange opinions, contribute to his reader's amusement more
than comports with his graver tasks ; but his peculiarities
cannot alter the value of his knowledge, whatever they may
sometimes detract from his opinions ; and we may safely
admire the ingenuity, without quarrelling with the sincerity
of the writer, who having composed a work on i' Usage des
Romans, in which he gaily impugned the authenticity of all
histoi'v, to prove himself not to have been the author, ambi-
dexterously published another of L^ Histoire justifiee conire
les Romans; and perhaps it was not his fault that the attack
was spirited, and the justification dull.

This " Methode" and his " Tablettes Chronologiques," of
nearly forty other publications are the only ones which have
outlived their writer ; volumes, merely curious, are exiled to
the shelf of the collector ; the very name of an author merely
curious — that shadow of a shade — is not always even pre-
serveii by a dictionary-compiler in the universal charity of
his alpliabetical mortuary.

The histor}^ of this work is a striking instance of those
imperfect beginnings, which have often closed in the most
important labours. This admirable "Methode" made its
first meagre appearance in two volumes in 1713. It was
soon reprinted at home and abroad, and translated into vari-
ous languages. In 1729 it assumed the dignity of four
quartos ; but at this stage it encountered the vigilance of
government, and the lacerating hand of a celebrated censeur,
Gros de Boze. It is said, tliat from a personal dislike of the
author, he cancelled one hundred and fifty pages from the
printed copy submitted to his censorship. He had formerly
approved of the work, and had quietly passed over some of
these obnoxious passages: it is certain that Gros de Buze, in

Of Lenylet du Fresnoy. 223

a dissertation on the Janus of the ancients in this work,
actually erased a high commendation of himself,* which
Lcnglet had, with unusual courtesy, bestowed on Gros de
lioze ; for as a critic he is most penurious of panegyric, and
there is always a caustic flavour even in his drops of honey.
This censeur either affected to disdain the commendation, or
availed himself of it as a trick of policy. This was a trying
situation I'or an author, now proud of a great work, and who
himself partook more of the bull than of the lamb. He who
winced at the scratch of an epithet, beheld his perfect limbs
bruised by erasures and mutilated by cancels. This sort of
troubles indeed was not unusual with Lenglet. He had
occupied his old apartment in the Bastile so often, that at
the sight of the officer who was in the habit of conducting
him there, Lenglet would call for his nightcap and snuff; and
finish the work he had then in hand at the Bastile, where, he
told Jordan, that he made his edition of Marot. He often
silently restituted an epithet or a sentence which had been
condemned by the censeur, at the risk of returning once more ;
but in the present desperate affair he took his revenge by col-
lecting the castrations into a quarto volume, which was sold
clandestinely. I find, by Jordan, in his Voi/ar/e Litteraire,
who visited him, that it was his pride to read these cancels
to his friends, who generally, but secretly, were of opinion
that the decision of the censeur was not so wrong as the
hardihood of Lenglet insisted on. All this increased the
public rumour, and raised the price of the cancels. The craft
and mystery of authorship was practised by Lenglet to per-
lectiou ; and he often exulted, not only in the subterfuges by
whicli he parried his censeurs, but in his bargains with his
booksellers, who were equally desirous to possess, while they
lialf feared to enjoy, his uncertain or his perilous copyrights.
AVhen the unique copy of the Methode, in its pristine state,
before it had suffered any dilapidations, made its appearance
at the sale of the curious library of the censeur Gros de Boze,
it provoked a Roxburgh competition, where the coUectoi-s,
eagerly outbidding each other, the price of this uncastrated
copy reached to 1500 livres ; and even more extraordinary in
the history of French bibliography, than in our own. The
curious may now find all these cancel sheets, or castrations,

* This fact appears iu the accouut of the miuuter erasures.

224 0/ Lenglet du Fresnoy.

preserved in one of those works of literary history, to wliich
the Germans have contributed more largely than otiier
European nations, and I have discovered that even tlie
erasures, or hruises, are amply furnished in another biblio-
graphical record.*

This Methode, after several later editions, was still enlarg-
ing itself by fresh supplements ; and having been translated
by men of letters in Europe, by Coleti in Italy, by Mencken
in German}^ and by Dr. Rawlinson in England, these trans-
lators have enriched their own editions by more copious
articles, designed for their respective nations. The sagacity
of the original writer now renovated his work by the infu-
sions of his translators ; like old ^son, it had its veins filled
with green juices ; and thus his old work was always under-
going the magic process of rejuvenescence.f

The personal character of our author was as singular as
many of the uncommon topics which engaged his inquiries ;
these we might conclude had originated in mere eccentricity,
or were chosen at random. But Lenglet has shown no defi-
ciency of judgment in several works of acknowledged utility;
and his critical opinions, his last editor has shown, have, for
the greater part, been sanctioned by the public voice. It is
curious to observe how the first direction which the mind of
a hardy inquirer may take, will often account for that variety
of uncommon topics he delights in, and which, on a closer
examination, may be found to bear an invisible connexion
with some preceding inquiry. As there is an association of
ideas, so in literary history there is an association of research ;
and a ver}' judicious writer may thus be impelled to compose
on subjects which may be deemed strange or injudicious.

This observation may be illustrated by the literary history
of Lenglet du Fresnoy. He opened his career by addressing
a letter and a tract to the Sorbonne, on the extraordinary

* The castrations are in Beyeri Memorim historico-criticce Librorum
rariorum, p. 16G. The bruises are carefully noted in the Catalogue oj
the Dukede la Valiere, 4467. Those who are curious in such singularities
will be gratified by the extraordinary opinions and results in Beyer ; and
which after all were purloined from a manuscript " Abridgment of Uni-
versal History," which was drawn up by Count de Boulainvilliers, and
more adroitly than delicately inserted by Lenglet in his own work. The
original manuscript exists in various copies, which were afterwards disco-
vered. The minuter corrections, in the Duke de la Yaliere's catalogue,
furiiisli a most enlivening article in the dryness of bibliography.

t The last oditimi, enlarged by Drouet, is in fifteen V(jlumes, but is not
later than 1772. It is still an inestimable manual iov the historical stu-
ieut, as well as his 2'uUcttes Chronoluyi<iues.

Of Lenyh't da Frcsnoy. 2'25

afTair of !Maria d'Agivda, abbess of the inmncry of the Inmia-
cuhtte Conception in Spain, whose mystical Life of tlie VirL;in,
pul)lished on tlie decease of the abbess, and wliicli was re-
ceived with such rapture in Spain, had just appeared at Paris,
where it excited the murmurs of the pious, and the inquiries
of tlie curious. This mystical Life was declared to be founded
on api)aritions and revelations experienced by the abbess.
Lenglet proved, or asserted, that the abbess was not the
writer of this pretended Life, though the manuscript existed
in her handwriting ; and secondly, that the appariticms and
revelations recordeil were against all the rules of apparitions
and revelations which he had painfully discovered. The
airair was of a delicate nature. The writer was young and
incredulous ; a grey-beard, more deeply versed in theology, re-
plied, and the Sorbonnists silenced our philosopher in embryo.

Lenglet confined these researches to his portfolio ; and so
long a period as fifty-five years had elapsed before they saw
the light. It was wlien Calmet published his Dissertations
on Apparitions, that the subject provoked Lenglet to retui-n
to his ibrsaken researches. He now published all he had
formerly composed on the affair of Maria d'Agreda, and two
other works ; the one, " Traite hisforique et dogmatique sur
les Apparitions, les Visio)is, et Jes Eevelations particulieres,'"
in two volumes ; and " Recueil de Dissertations anciennes et
nouvelles, sur les Apparitions, Sfc," with a catalogue of authors
on this subject, in lour volumes. When he edited the Roman
de la Rose, in compiling the glossary of this ancient poem, it
led him to reprint many of the earliest French poets ; to give
an enlarged edition of the Arrets d' Amour, that work of love
and chivalry, in which his fancy was now so deeply embedded;
while the subject of Romance itself naturally led to the taste
of romantic productions which appeared in " i' Usage des
Romans," and its accompanying copious nomenclature of all
romances and romance-writers, ancient and modern. Our
vivacious Abbe had been bewildered by his delight in the
works of a chemical philoso})her ; and though he did not be-
lieve in the existence of apparitions, and certainly was more
than a sceptic in history, yet it is certain that tlie " grande
oeuvre" was an article in his creed ; it would have ruined him
in experiments, if he had been rich enough to have been
ruined. It altered his health ; and the most important result
of his chemical studies appears to have been the invention of
a syrup, in wliich he had great confidence; but its trial blew

VOI>. III. Q

226 Of Lenglet (hi Frcsnoy.

liim up into a tympany, Iroui which he was only relieved hy
having recourse to a drug, also of his own discovery, which,
in counteracting the syrup, reduced him to an alarming state
of atrophy. But the mischances of the historian do not
enter into his history : and our curiositj^ must be still eager
to open Lenglet's " Histoire de la Philosophic Hermetique,"
accompanied b}'' a catalogue of the writers in this mysterious
science, in two volumes : as well as his enlarged edition of
the works of a great Paracelsian, Nicholas le Fevre. This
philosopher was appointed b}'^ Charles the Second superinten-
dent over the royal laboratory at St. James's : he was also
a member of the Royal Society, and the friend of Boyle, to
whom he communicated the secret of infusing young blood
into old veins, with a notion that he could renovate that
which admits of no second creation.* Such was the origin
of Du Fresnoy's active curiosity on a variety of singular
topics, the germs of which may be traced to three or four of
our author's principal works.

Our Abbe promised to write his own life, and his pugna-
cious vivacity, and hardy frankness, would have seasoned a
piece of autobiography ; an amateur has, however, written it
in the style which amateurs like, with all the truth he could
discover, enlivened by some secret history, writing the life of
Lenglet with the very spirit of Lenglet : it is a mask taken
I'rom the very features of the man, not the insipid wax-work
of an hyperbolical eloge-maker.t

Although Lenglet du Fresnoy commenced in early life his

* The " Dictionnaire Ilistorique," 1789, in their article Kich. Le Fevre,
notices tlie third edition of his "Coiu-se of Chemistry," that of 1664, in
two volumes ; but the present one of Lenglet du Fresnoy's is more recent,
1751, enlarged into five volumes, two of which contain his own additions.
I have never met with this edition, and it is wanting at the British
Museum. Le Fevie published a tract on the great cordial of Sir Walter
Eawleigh, which niay be curious.

+ This anonymous work of " Memoires de Monsieur I'Abbe Lenglet du
Fresnoy," although the dedication is signed G. P., is written by Jlichault,
of Dijon, as a presentation copy to Count de Vienne in my possession
proves. Michault is the writer of two volumes of agreeable "Alelanges
Historiques et Philologiques ;" and the present is a very curious piece of
literary history. The "Dictionnaire Historique" has compiled the article
of Lenglet entirely from this work ; but the Journal dcs Sfavans was too
ascetic in this opinion. Etoit-ce la peine de faire tin livre pour apprcndre
au public qii'vM komme de lettren Jut espion, escroc, bizarre, foufjueux,
cynique, incapable d'umitie, de soumission aux loix? <i'C. Yet they do
not jiretend that the bibliop-aphy of Lenglet du Fresnoy is at all deficient iu
curiosity.

OJ Letujhl du Frcsuoy. ;227

career as a man of letti'rs, lie was at first engai^ed in tlie great
chase of pulitieal adventure; and some strikini>- facts are re-
corded, wliich sliow his successful activity. Michault describes
his occupations by a paraphrastieal delicacy of language,
which an Englishman might not have so happily composed.
The minister for foreign affairs, the jMarquis de Torcy, sent
Lenglet to Lille, where the court of the Elector of Cologne
w-as then held : " He had particular orders to watch that the
two ministers of the elector should do nothing prejudicial to
the king's aft'airs." He seems, however, to have ivatchcd
many otlier persons, and detected many other things. He
discovered a captain, who agreed to open the gates of Mons
to Marlborotigli, for 100,000 piastres; the captain was arrested
on the parade, the letter of Marlborough was found in his
pocket, and the traitor was broken on the wheel. Lenglet
denounced a foreign general in the French service, and the
event warranted the prediction. His most important dis-
covery was that of the famous conspiracy of Prince Cellamar,
one of the chimerical plots of Alberoni ; to the honour of
Lenglet, he would not engage in its detection unless the
minister promised that no blood should be shed. These suc-
cessful incidents in the life of an honourable spy were rewarded
with a moderate pension. — Lenglet must have been no vulgar
intriguer ; he was not only perpetuall}^ confined by his very
patrons when he resided at home, for the freedom of his pen,
but I find him early imprisoned in the citadel of Strasburgh
for six months : it is said for purloining some curious books
from the library of the Abbe Bignon, of which he had the
care. It is certain that he knew the value of the scarcest
works, and was one of those lovers of bibliography who trade
at times in costly rarities. At Vienna he became intimately
acquainted with the poet Rousseau, and Prince Eugene. The
prince, however, who suspected the character of our author,
long avoided him. Lenglet insinuated himself into the fa-
vour of the prince's librarian ; and such was his bibliographical
skill, that this acquaintance ended in Prince Eugene laying
aside his political dread, and preferring the advice of Lenglet
to his librarian's, to enrich his magnificent librar}'. Wlien
the motive of Lenglet's residence at Vienna became more and
more suspected, Rousseau was employed to watch him ; and
not yet having quarrelled with his brother spy, he could only
report that the Abbe Lenglet was every morning occupied in
working on his " Tablettes Chronologiques," a work not

Q '-

228 Of Lengltt du Fresnoy.

worthy of alarming the government ; that he spent his
evenings at a vioHn-player's married to a Frenchwoman, and
returned home at eleven. As soon as our historian had dis-
covered that the poet was a brother spy and newsmonger on
the side of Prince Eugene, their reciprocal civilities cooled.
Lenglet now imagined that he owed his six months' retire-
ment in the citadel of Strasburgh to the secret officiousness
of Rousseau : each grew suspicious of the other's fidelity ;
and spies are like lovers, for their mutual jealousies settled
into tlie most inveterate hatred. One of the most defama-
tor3' libels is Lenglet's intended dedication of his edition of
Marot to Rousseau, which being forced to suppress in Hol-
land, by order of the States-general ; at Brussels, by the
intervention of the Duke of Aremberg; and by every mea)is
the friends of the unfortunate Rousseau could contrive ; was,
however, many years afterwards at length subjoined by Leng-
let to the first volume of his work on Romances ; where an
ordinary reader may wonder at its appearance unconnected
■with any part of the w^ork. In this dedication, or " Eloge
Historique," he often addresses " Mon cher Rousseau," but
the irony is not delicate, and the calumny is heavy. Rous-
seau lay too open to the unlicensed causticity of his accuser.
The poet was then expatriated from France for a false accusa-
tion against Saurin, in attempting to fix on him those
criminal couplets, which so long disturbed the peace of the
literary world in France, and of which Rousseau was generally
supposed to be the writer ; but of which on his death-bed he
solemnly protested that he was guiltless. The coup-de-grace
is given to the poet, stretched on this rack of invective, by
just accusations on account of those infamous epigrams, which
appear in some editions of that poet's works ; a lesson for a
poet, if poets would be lessoned, who indulge their imagina-
tion at the cost of their happiness, and seem to invent crimes,
as if they themselves were criminals.

But to return to our Lenglet. Had he composed his own
life, it would have offered a sketch of political servitude and
political adventure, in a man too intractable for the one, and
too literary for the other. Yet to the honour of his capacity,
we must observe that he might have chosen his patrons,
would he have submitted to patronage. Prince Eugene at
Vienna ; Cardinal Passionei at Rome ; or Mons. Le Blanc,
the French minister, would have held him on his own terms
But " Liberty and my books !" was the secret ejaculation of

The Dictionary of Trevoux. 229

Lenglet ; and I'roni that moment all things in life were sacri-
ficed to a jealous sjjirit of independence, which broke out in
his actions as well as in his writin<i;s ; and a passion for stud^y
for ever crushed the worm of ambition.

He was as singular in his conversation, which, says Jordan,
was extremely agreeable to a foreigner, for he delivered him-
self without reserve on all things, and on all jiersons, seasoned
with secret and literary anecdotes, lie refused all the conve-
niences offered by an opulent sister, that he might not endure
the restraint of a settled dinner-hour. He lived to his
eightieth year, still busied, and then died by one of those
grievous chances, to which aged men of letters are liable : our
caustic critic slumbered over some modern work, and, fixlling
into the fire was burnt to death. Many characteristic anecdotes
of the Abb6 Lenglet have been preserved in the Dictiunnaire
Mistoriqiie, but I shall not repeat what is of easy recurrence.

THE DICTIONARY OF TREVOUX.

A LEARNED friend, in his very agreeable " Trimcstre, or a
Three Months' Journey in France and Switzerland," could
not pass through the small town of Trevoux without a literary
association of ideas which should accompany every man of
letters in his tours, abroad or at home. A mind well-in-
formed cannot travel without discovering that there are
objects constantly ])resenting themselves, which suggest lite-
rary, historical, and moral facts. My friend writes, "As you
proceed nearer to Lyons you stop to dine at Trevoux, on the
left baidc of theSaone. On a sloping hill, down to the water-side,
rises an amphitheatre, crowned with an ancient Gothic castle,
in venerable ruin ; under it is the small town of Trevoux, well
known for its Journal and Dictionary, which latter is almost
an enclycopaidia, as there arc few tJiinc/s of ichich something is
not s<nd in that most valuable compilation, and the whole was
j>rinted at Trevoux. The knowledge of this circumstance
greatly enhances the delight of an}' visitor who has consulted
the book, and is acquainted with its merit ; and nmst add
much to his local pleasures."

A work from which every man of letters maybe continually
deriving such varied knowledge, and wliich is little known but
to the most curious readers, claims a place in these volumes ;
nor is the historv of the work itself without interest. 'E'lsht

230 The Dictionary of Trevoux.

large folios, each consisting of a thousand closely printed
pages, stand like a vast mountain, of which, helore we climb,
we may be anxious to leai-n the security of the passage. The
history of dictionaries is the most mutable of all histories ; it
is a picture of the inconstancy of the knowledge of man ;
the learning of one generation passes away with another ; and
a dictionary of this kind is always to be repaired, to be
rescinded, and to be enlarged.

The small town of Trevoux gave its name to an excellent
literary journal, long conducted by the Jesuits, and to this
dictionary — as Edinburgh has to its Critical Review and
Annual Register, &c. It first came to be distinguished as a
literary town from the Due du Maine, as prince sovereign of
Dombes,* transferring to this little town of Trevoux not only
his parliament and other public institutions, but also estab-
lishing a magnificent printing-house, in the beginning of the
last century. The duke, probably to keep his printers in con-
stant employ, instituted the "Journal de Trevoux;'' and
this perhaps greatly tended to bring the printing-house into
notice, so that it became a favourite with many good wri-
ters, who appear to have had no other connexion with the
place ; and this dictionary borrowed its first title, which it
always preserved, merely from the place where it was printed.
Both the journal and the dictionary were, however, consigned
to the care of some learned Jesuits ; and perhaps the place
always indicated the principles of the writers, of whom none
were more eminent for elegant literature than the Jesuits. f
The first edition of this dictionary sprung from the spirit
of rivalry, occasioned by a French dictionary published in
Holland, by the protestant Basnage de Beauval. The duke
set his Jesuits hastily to work ; who, after a pompous
announcement that this dictionar}^- was formed on a plan
suggested by their patron, did little more than pillage Fure-
tiere, and rummage Basnage, and produced three new folios
without any novelties ; they pleased the Due de Maine, and
no one else. This was in 1704. Twenty years after, it was
republished and improved ; and editions increasing, the
volumes succeeded each other, till it reached to its present

* It was always acknowledged as an iudepeiideut state by the French
kings from the time of Philip Augustus. It had its own parliament, and
the pi-ivilege also of coining its own money.

t The house in which the Jesuits resided, having the shield of arms of
their order over its portal, still remains at Trevoux.

Tht Dictionary of Trevoux. 231

maE^iiitude and value in eight large folios, in 1771, the only
edition now esteemed. Many of the names of the eontri-
hutors to this exeellent eoUeetion of words and things, the
industry of iMonsieur Barbier has revealed in his " Uietion-
iiaire des Anonymes," art. 10782. The work, in the progress
of a century, evidently became a favourite receptacle with
men of letters in France, who eagerly contributed the small-
est or largest articles with a zeal honourable to literature and
most useful to the public. They made this dictionary their
commonplace book for all their curious acquisitions ; every
one competent to write a short article, preserving an impor-
tant fact, did not aspire to compile the dictionary, or even an
entire article in it ; but it was a treasury in which such mites
collected together formed its wealth ; and all the literati may
be said to have engaged in perfecting these volumes during
a century. In this manner, from the humble beginnings of
three volumes, in which the plagiary much more than the
contributor was visible, eight were at length built up with
more durable materials, and which claim the attention and
the gratitude of the student.

The work, it ap])ears, interested the government itself, as a
national concern, from the tenor of the following anecdotes.

Most of the minor contributors to this great collection
were satisfied to remain anonymous ; but as might be ex-
pected among such a number, sometimes a contributor was
anxious to be known to his circle ; and did not like this peni-
tential abstinence of fame. An anecdote recorded of one of
this class will amuse : A Monsieur Lautour du Chatel, avooat
an parlement de Normandie, voluntarily devoted his studious
hours to improve this work, and furnished nearly three thou-
sand articles to the supplement of the edition of 1752. This
ardent scholar had had a lively quarrel thirty years before
with the first authors of the dictionary. He had sent them
one thousand three hundred articles, on condition that the
donor should be handsomely thanked in the preface of the
new edition, and further receive a copy en grand papier.
They were accepted. The conductors of the new edition, in
1721, forgot all the promises — nor thanks, nor copy ! Our
learned avocat, who was a little irritable, as his nephew who
wrote his life acknowledges, as soon as the great work
appeared, astonished, like Dennis, that "they were rattling
his own thunder," without saying a word, quits his country
town, and ventures, half dead with sickness and indignation,

232 The Dictionary of Trevoux.

on an expedition to Paris, to make his complaint to tlie chan-
cellor ; and the work was deemed of that importance in the
eye of government, and so zealous a contributor was con-
sidered to have such an honourable claim, that the chancellor
ordered, first, that a copy on large paper should be imme-
diately delivered to Monsieur Lautour, richly bound and free
of carriage ; and secondl}^, as a reparation of the unperformed
]iromise, and an acknowledgment of gratitude, the omission
()(' thanks should be inserted and explained in the three great
literary journals of France ; a curious instance, among others,
of the French government often mediating, when difficulties
occurred in great literary undertakings, and considering not
lightly the claims and the honours of men of letters.

Another proof, indeed, of the same kind, concerning the
present work, occurred after the edition of 1752. One Jamet
I'aine, who had with others been usefully emplo3'ed on this
edition, addressed a proposal to government for an improved
one, dated from the Bastile. He proposed that the govern-
ment should choose a learned person, accustomed to the
labour of the researches such a work requires ; and he calcu-
lated, that if supplied with three amanuenses, such an editor
would accomplish his task in about ten or twelve years, the
produce of the edition would soon repay all the expenses and
capital advanced. This literary projector did not wish to
remain idle in the Bastile. Fifteen years afterwards the last
improved edition appeared, published by the associated book-
sellers of Paris.

As for the work itself, it partakes of the character of our
Encyclopaedias ; but in this I'espect it cannot be safely con-
sulted, for widely has science enlarged its domains and cor-
]-ected its errors since 1771. But it is precious as a vast
collection of ancient and modern learning, particularly in that
sort of knowledge which we usually term antiquarian and
jdiilological. It is not merely a grammatical, scientific, and
technical dictionary, but it is replete with divinity, law,
moral philosophy, critical and historical learning, and abounds
with innumerable miscellaneous curiosities. It would be
difficult, whatever may be the subject of inquiry, to open it,
without the gratification of some knowledge neither obvious
nor trivial. I heard a man of great learning declare, that
whenever he could not recollect his knowledge he opened
Hoffman's Lexicon Universale Ilistoricum, where he was
sure to find what he had lost. The works are similar ; and

Quadrio's Account of Etiglish Poetry. 233

valuable as are the German's four folios, the eight of the
Frenchman may safely be recommended as their substitute,
or their supplement. As a Dictionary of the French Lan-
guage it bears a peculiar feature, which has been presump-
tuously dropped in the Dictionnaiie de rAcademie ; the last
invents pliniscs to explain words, which therelbre have no
other authority than the writer himself! this of Trevoux is
furnished, not only with mere authorities, but also with quo-
tations from the classical French writers — an improvement
which was probably suggested by the English Dictionary of
Johnson. One nation improves by another.

QUADRIO'S ACCOUNT OF ENGLISH POETRY.

It is, perhaps, somewhat mortifying in our literary' researches
to discover that our own literature has been only known to
the other nations of J^urope comparatively within recent
times. We have at length triumphed over our continental
rivals in the noble struggles of genius, and our authors now
see their works printed even at foreign presses, while we are
furnishing with our gratuitous labours nearly the whole lite-
rature of a new empire ; yet so late as in the reign of Anne,
our poets were only known by the Latin versifiers of tlic
" Musse Anglicanai ;" and when Boileau was told of the public
funeral of Dryden, he was pleased with the national honours
bestowed on genius, but he declared that he never heard of
his name before. This great legislator of Parnassus has never
alluded to one of our own poets, so insular then was our lite-
rary glory! The most i-eniarkable fact, or perhaps assertion,
I have met with, of the little knowledge which the Continent
had of our writers, is a French translation of Bishop Hall's
''Characters of Virtues and Vices." It is a duodecimo,
printed at Paris, of 109 pages, 1610, with this title Cluirac-
teres de Vertus et de Vices ; tires de VAnr/lois de M. Josef
Hall. In a dedication to the Earl of Salisbury, the translator
informs his lordship that " ce livre est la premiere traduction
de I'Anglois jamais imprimee en aucun vulgaire" — the first
translation from the English ever printed in any modern lan-
guage ! Whether the translator is a bold liar, or an ignorant
blunderer, remains to be ascertained ; at all events it is a
humiliating demonstration of tl)e small progress which our
hoijue literature had made abroad in ICJIO I

234< Quadrio's Account of English Poetry.

I come now to notice a contemporary writer, professedly
writing the history of our Poetiy, of which liis knowledge
will open to us as we proceed with our enlightened and ama-
teur historian.

Father Quadrio's Delia Storia e delV rar/ione d' ogni
Poesia, — is a gigantic work, which could only have been pro-
jected and persevered in by some hypochondriac monk, who,
to get rid of the ennui of life, could discover no pleasanter
way than to bury himself alive in seven monstrous closely-
printed quartos, and every day be compiling something on a
subject which he did not understand. Fortunately for Father
Quadrio, without taste to feel, and discernment to decide,
nothing occurred in this progress of literary history and cri-
ticism to abridge his volumes and his amusements; and with
dihgence and erudition unparalleled, he has here built up a
receptacle for his immense, curious, and trifling knowledge on
the poetry of every nation. Quadrio is among that class of
authors whom we receive with more gratitude than pleasure,
iiy to sometimes to quote, but never linger to read ; and fix
on our shelves, but seldom have in our hands.

I have been much mortified, in looking over this volumi-
nous compiler, to discover, although he wrote so late as about
1750, how little the history of English poetry was known to
foreigners. It is assuredly our own fault. We have too
long neglected the bibliography and the literary history of
our own country. Italy, Spain, and France have enjoyed
eminent bibliographers — we have none to rival them. Italy
may justly glory in her Tiraboschi and her Mazzuchclli
Spain in the Bibliothecas of Nicholas Antonio; and France,
so rich in bibliographical treasures, affords models to every
literary nation of every species of literary history. With us,
the partial labour of the hermit Antliony for the Oxford
writers, compiled before philosophical criticism existed in the
nation ; and Warton's History of Poetry, which was left un-
finished at its most critical period, wlien that delightful anti-
quary of taste had just touched the threshold of his Paradise
— these are the sole great labours to which foreigners might
resort, but these will not be found of much use to them. The
neglect of our own literary history has, thei'efore, occasioned
the en'ors, sometimes very ridiculous ones, of foreign writers
respecting our authors. Even the lively Chaudon, in his
" Dictionnaire ITistorique," gives the most extraordinary
accounts of most of the Enulish writers. Without an Enij^-

Quadrio's Account of E/if/lish Poetry. 235

lish guide to attend sucli weary travellers, they liave too
often been deeeived by the miraycs of our literature. They
liave given blundering aeeounts of works whieh do exist, and
chronicled others whieh never did exist ; and have often made
up the personal history of our authors, by confounding two
or three into one. Chaudon, mentioning Dryden's tragedies,
observes, that Atterbury translated two into Latin verse,
entitled Achitophel and Absalom /*

Of all these foreign authors, none has more egregiously
failed than this good Father Quadrio. In this universal his-
tory of poetry, 1 was curious to observe what sort of iigure
we made, and whether the fertile genius of our original
poets had struck the foreign critic with admiration or with
critical censure. But little was our English poetry known
to its universal historian. In the chapter on those who have
cultivated " la meliea poesia in propria lingua tra, Tedesehi,
Fiamminghi e Inglesi,"t we lind the following list of Eng-
lish poets.

"Of John Gower ; whose rhymes and verses are ])reserved
in manuscript in the college of the most Holy Trinity, in
Cambridge.

"Arthur Kelton, flourished in 1548, a skilful English
poet : he composed various poems in English ; also he lauds
the Cambrians and their genealogy.

" The works of William Wycherly, in English prose and
verse."

These were the only English poets whom Quadrio at first
could muster together ! In his subsequent additions he
caught the name of Sir Philip Sidney with an adventurous
criticism, " le sue poesie assai buone." He then was lucky
enough to pick up the title — not the volume, surely — which
was one of the rarest; " Fiori poetiei de A. Cowley," which
he calls " poesie amorose :" this must mean that early
volume of Cowley's, published in his thirteenth year, imder
the title of "Poetical Blossoms." Further he laid hold of
"John Donne" by the skirt, and " Thomas Creech," at whom
he made a full pause, informing his Italians that " his poems
are reputed by his nation as ' assai buone.' " He has also

* Even recently, il Cavaliere Onofrio Boni, iu bi.s Eluge of Lauzi, in
naming the tlivee Auiju.stan periods of modern literature, tixcs them, fur
the Italians, under Leo the Tenth ; for the Frcix-li, under Louis the Four-
teenth, or the Great ; and for the English, under Charles the Second!
t Quadiio, vol. ii. p. ilU.

236 Quadrio's Account of English Poetry.

" Le opere di Guglielmo ;" but to this Christian name, as it
would appear, he liad not ventured to add the surname. At
length, in his progress of inquiry, in his fourth volume (for
they were published at different periods), he suddenly dis-
covers a host of Enghsh poets — in Waller, Duke of Buck-
ingham, Lord Eoscommon, and others, among whom is Dr.
Swift ; but he acknowledges their works have not reached
Vim. Shaksjieare at length appears on the scene ; but
Quadrio's notions are derived from Voltaire, whom, perhaps,
he boldly translates. Instead of improving our drama, he
conducted it a totale rovina nelle sue f arse monstruose, die si
chiaman iragedie ; alcune scene vi ahhia luminose e belle e
alcuni tratti si trovono terrihili e grandi. Otway is said to
have composed a tragic drama on the subject of " Venezia
Salvata;" he adds with surprise, "ma affatto regolare."
Regularity is the essence of genius with such critics as
Quadrio. Dryden is also mentioned ; but the only drama
specified is " King Arthur." Addison is the first English-
man who produced a classical tragedy ; but though Quadrio
writes much about the life of Addison, he never alludes to
the Spectator.

We come now to a more curious point. Whether Quadrio
had read our comedies may be doubtful ; but he distinguishes
them by very high commendation. Our comedy, he says,
represents human life, the manners of citizens and the
people, much better than the French and Spanish comedies,
in which all the business of life is mixed up with love af-
fairs. The Spaniards had their gallantry from the Moors,
and their manners from chivahy ; to which they added their
tumid African taste, differing from that of other nations. I
shall translate what he now adds of English comedy.

" The English, more skilfully even than the French, have
approximated to the true idea of comic subjects, choosing for
the argument of their invention the customary and natural
objects of the citizens and the populace. And when religion
and decorum were more respected in their theatres, they
were more advanced in this species of poetry, and merited
not a little praise, above their neighbouring nations. But
more than the English and the French (to speak according to
pure and bare truth) have the Italians signalised them-
selves." A sly, insinuating criticism ! But, as on the
whole, for reasons which I cannot account for, Father Qua-
drio seems to have relished our English comedy, we must

Quadrio's Account of English Poetry. 237

value his candour, lie praises our comedy ; " ))er il bello ed
il buono ;" but, as he is a methodical AristoteUan, he will
not allow us that liberty in the theatre which we are sup.
posed to possess in parliament — by delivering whatever we
conceive to the purpose. His criticism is a specimen of" the
irrefragable. " We must not abandon legitimate rules to f/ivr.
mere pleasure therehy ; because pleasure is produced by, and
flows from, the leautifiil ; and the beautiful is chiefly drawn
from the good order and unity in wliich it consists!"

Quadrio succeeded in discovering the name of one of our
greatest comic geniuses ; for, alluding to our diversity of
action in comedy, he mentions in his fifth volume, page 148,
— " 11 celebre Benjanson, nella sua commedia intitolato Bar-
tolommeo Foicere,Q'\n quella altra commedia intitolato Ipsum
Veetz." The reader ma}^ decipher the poet's name with his
Fair ; but it required the critical sagacity of iSIr. Douce to
discover that by Ipsum Veefz we are to understand Shad-
well's comedy of Epsom Wells. The Italian critic had
transcribed what he and his Italian printer could not spell.
We have further discovered the source of his intelligence in
St. Evremond, who had classed Shadwcll's comedy with Ben
Jonson's. To such shifts is the writer of an universal his-
tory d' ogni Poesia miserably reduced !

Towards the close of the fifth volume we at last find the
sacred muse of Milton, — but, unluckily, he was a man " di
])()ehissima religione," and spoke of Christ like an Arian.
Quadrio quotes Kamsay for Milton's vomiting forth abuse on
the Roman Church. His figures are said to be often mean,
unworthy of the majesty of his subject ; but in a later
place, excepting his religion, our poet, it is decided on, is
worthy " di molti laudi."

Thus much for the information the curious may obtain on.
English poetry from its universal history. Quadrio unques-
tionably writes with more ignorance than prejudice against
us : he has not only highly distinguished the comic genius of
our writers, and raised it above that of our neighbours, but
he has also advanced another discovery, which ranks us still
higher for original invention, and which, I am confident, will
be as new as it is extraordinary to the English reader.

Quadrio, who, among other erudite accessories to his work,
has exhausted the most copious researches on the origin of
Punch and Harlequin, has also written, with equal curiosity
and value, the history of Puppet-shows. But whom has he

238 " Political Religionism"

liuicled ? wliom has he placed paramount, above nil other
people, for their genius of invention in improving- this art ! — •
Tlie English ! and the glory which has hitherto been uni-
versally conceded to the Italian nation themselves, appears to
belong to us ! For wo, it appears, while others were dan-
dling and pulling their little representatives of human nature
into such awkward and unnatural motions, first invented
pulleys, or wires, and gave a fine and natural action to the
artificial life of these gesticulating machines !

We seem to know little of ourselves as connected with the
history of puppet-shows ; but in an article in the curious
Dictionary of Trevoux, I find that John Brioche, to whom
had been attributed the invention of Marionncftes, is only to
be considered as an improver ; in his time (but the learned
writers supply no date) an Englishman discovered the secret
of moving them by springs, and without strings ; but the
Marionnettes of Brioche were preferred for the pleasantries
which he made them deliver. The erudite Quadrio appears
to have more successfully substantiated our claims to the
pulleys or wires, or springs of the puppets, than any of our
own antiquaries ; and perhaps the uncommemorated name of
this Englishman was that Powell, whose Solomon and Sheba
were celebrated in the days of Addison and Steele ; the
former of whom has composed a classical and sportive Latin
poem on this very subject. But Quadrio might well rest
satisfied that the nation which could boast of its Fantoc-
cini, surpassed, and must ever surpass the puny efforts of a
doll-loviiig people !

" POLITICAL RELIGIONISM."

Ttst Professor Dugald Stewart's first Dissertation on the
Progress of Philosophy, I find this singular and significant
term. It has occasioned me to reflect on those contests
for religion, in which a particular faith has been made
the ostensible pretext, while the secret motive was usually
political. The historians, who view in religious wars only
religion itself, have written large volumes, in which we may
never discover that they have either been a struggle to
obtain predominance, or an expedient to secure it. The
hatreds of ambitious men have disguised their own purposes,
while Christianity has borne the odium of loosening a

" Political ReUgionisni." 239

destroying spirit among mankind; wliieli, liad Christianity
never existed, would have equally jirevailed in human afi'airs.
Of a moral malady, it is not only necessary to know
the nature, but to designate it by a right name, that we nia\^
not err in our mode of treatment. If we call that religious
which we shall find for the greater pai't is political, we are
likely to be mistaken in the regimen and the cure.

Fox, in his "Acts and jNIonuments," writes the mar-
tyrology of the Frotcstants in three mighty folios ; where,
in the third, "the tender mercies " of the Catholics are " cut
in wood" for those who might not otherwise be enabled
to read or spell them. Such pictures are abridgments
of long narratives, but they leave in the mind a fulness of
horror. Fox made more than one generation shudder ;
and his volume, particularly this third, chained to a reading-
desk in the halls of the great, and in the aisles of churches,
often detained the loiterer, as it furnished some new scene
of papistical horrors to paint forth on returning to his
fireside. The protestants were then the martyrs, because,
under Mary, the protestants had been thrown out of power.

Dodd has opposed to Fox three curious folios, which he calls
"The Church History of England," exhibiting a most abun-
dant martyrology of the catholics, inflicted by the hands of
the protestants ; who in the succeeding reign of Elizabeth,
after long trepidations and balancings, were confirmt.*! into
power. lie grieves over the delusion and seduction of the
black-letter romance of honest John Fox, which he says, " has
obtained a place in ])rotestant churches next to the Bible,
while John Fox himself is esteemed little less than an
evangelist."* Dodd's narratives are not less pathetic: for
the situation of the catholic, who had to secrete himself, as
well as to sutler, was more adapted for romantic adventures,
than even the melancholy but monotonous story of the pro-
testants tortured in the cell, or bound to the stake. These
catholics, however, were attempting all sorts of intrigues ; and
the saints and martyrs of Dodd, to the parliament of
England, were onl}' traitors and conspirators !

Heylin, in his history of the Puritans and the Preshi/-
terians, blackens them for political devils. He is the Spag-
nolet of history, delighting himself with horrors at which the

* " Fox's IMartyis," as the book was popularly called, was often chained
to a rcailing-ck'sk in cluirches ; one is still thus affixed at Cirencester ;
it thus received equal honour ^vith the Bible.

210 "Political Religionism'*

painter himself must have started. He tells of their " oppo-
sitions " to monarchical and episcopal government; their
"innovations" in the church; and their "embroilments" of
tlie kingdoms. The sword rages in their hands ; treason,
sacrilege, plunder ; while " more of the blood of Englishmen
had poured like water within tlio space of four j-ears, than
had been shed in the civil wars of York and Lancaster in four
centuries ! "

Neal opposes a more elaborate history; wliere these "great
and good men," the puritans and the presbyterians, " are
placed among the reformers ;''^ while their fame is blanched
into angelic purity. Neal and his party opined that the pro-
testant had not sufficiently protested, and that the reforma-
tion itself needed to be reformed. They wearied the
impatient EHzabeth and her ardent churchmen ; and disputed
with the learned James, and his courtly bishops, about such
ceremonial trifles, that the historian may blush or smile who
has to record them. And when the 'puritan was thrown out
of preferment, and seceded into separation, he turned into a
preshyter. Nonconformity was their darling sin, and their
sullen triumph.

Calamy, in four painful volumes, chronicles the bloodless
mart3'rology of the two thousand silencfd and ejected
ministers. Their history is not glorious, and their heroes are
obscure ; but it is a domestic tale. When the second Charles
was restored, t\iQ presbyterians, like every other faction, were
to be amused, if not courted. Some of the king's chaplains
were selected from among them, and preached once. Their
hopes were raised that they should, by some agreement,
be enabled to share in that ecclesiastical establishment which
they had so often opposed ; and the bishops met the presby-
ters in a convocation at the Savoy. A conference was
held between the high church, resuming the seat of power,
and the low church, now prostrate ; that is, between the old
clergy who had recently been mercilessly ejected by the new,
who in their turn were awaiting their fate. The conference
was closed with arguments by the weaker, and votes by the
stronger. Many curious anecdotes of this conference have
come down to us. The presbyterians, in their last struggle,
petitioned for indulgence ; but oppressors who had become
})etitioners, only showed that they possessed no longer the
means of resistance. This conference was followed up by the
Act of Uniformity, which took place on Bartholomew day.

" Political Religionism.'* 241

August 24, 1G(52 : an act wliich ejected Calamy's two
thousand ministers from the bosom of the established church.
Bartholomew day with this party was long paralleled, and
perhaps is still, with the dreadful French massacre of that
fatal saint's day. The calamity was rather, however, of
a private than of a public nature. The two thousand ejected
ministers were indeed de])rived of their livings ; but tliis was,
however, a happier fate than what has often occurred in these
contests for the security of political power. This ejection
was not like the expulsion of the Moriscoes, the best and
most useful subjects of Spain, which was a human sacrilice of
luilf a million of men, and the proscription of many Jews
Irom that land of Catholicism ; or the massacre of thousands
of Huguenots, and the expulsion of more than a hundred
thousand by Louis the Fourteenth from France. The
presbyterian divines were not driven from their fatherland,
and compelled to learn another language than their mother-
tongue. Destitute as divines, they were suffered to remain
as citizens ; and the result was remarkable. These divines
could not disrobe themselves of their learning and their piety,
while several of them were compelled to become tradesmen :
among these the learned Samuel Chandler, whose literary
productions are numerous, kept a bookseller's shop in the
Poultry.

Hard as this event proved in its result, it was, however,
pleaded, that " It was but like for like." And that the his-
tory of " the like " might not be curtailed in the telling,
opposed to Calamy's chronicle of the two thousand ejected
ministers stands another, in folio magnitude, of the same sort
of chronicle of the clergy of the Church of England,
with a title by no means less pathetic.

This is Walker's " Attempt towards recovering an Account
of the Clergy of the C'hurch of England who were
sequestered, harassed, &c., in the late Times." Walker
is himself astonished at the size of his volume, the number of
his sufferers, and the variety of the sufferings. " Shall
the church," says he, " not have the libert}'' to preserve
the history of her sufferings, as well as the separation to set
forth an account of theirs ? Can Dr. Calamy be acquitted for
jjubiishing the histor}' of the Bartholomew sujferers, if
1 am condemned for writing that of the sequestered
loyalists f " lie allows that '" the number of the ejectid
amounts to two thousand," and there were no less than
yoL. 111. u

243 " Political Religionism*'

" seven or eight thousand of the episcopal clergy imprisoned,
banished, and sent a starving," &c. &c.

Whether the reformed were martyred by the catholics, or
the catholics executed by the reformed ; whether the puritans
expelled those of the established church, or the established
church ejected the puritans, all seems reducible to two
classes, conformists and non-conformists, or, in the political
style, the administration and the opposition. When we
discover that the heads of all parties are of the same
hot temperament, and observe the same evil conduct in
similar situations ; when we view honest old Latimer with his
own hands hanging a mendicant iViar on a tree, and, the
government changing, the friars binding Latimer to the
stake ; \vhen we see the French catholics cutting out
the tongues of the protestants, that they might no longer
protest ; the haughty Luther writing submissive apologies to
Leo the Tenth and Henry the Eighth for the scurrility with
which he had treated them in his writings, and finding
that his apologies were received with contempt, then retract-
ing his retractations; when we find that haughtiest of the
haughty, John Knox, when Elizabeth first ascended the
throne, crouching and repenting of having written his famous
excommunication against all female sovereignty ; or pulling
down the monasteries, from the axiom that when the rookery
was destroyed, the rooks would never return ; when we find
his recent apologist admiring, while he apologises for, some
extraordinary proofs of Machiavelian politics, an impenetrable
mystery seems to hang over the conduct of men who profess
to be guided by the bloodless code of Jesus. But try them by
a human standard, and treat them as politicians, and the
motives once discovered, the actions are understood !

Two edicts of Charles the Fifth, in 1555, condemned to
death the Itelbrmed of the Low Countries, even should they
return to the catliolic faith, with this exception, however,
in favour of the latter, that they shall not be burnt alive,
but that the men shall be beheaded, and the women buried
alive! Religion could not, then, be the real motive of the
Spanish cabinet, for in returning to the ancient faith that
point was obtained; but the truth is, that the Spanish
government considered the reformed as rebels, whom it was
not safe to re-admit to the rights of citizenship. The undis-
guised fact appears in the codicil to the will of the emperor,
when he solemnly declares that he had written to the inqui-

" Political Religionism." 2 13

sition " to burn and extirpate the heretics," after trying to
make Christians oj them, because he is convinced that they
never can become sincere cathoHcs ; and he acknowledj^oa
that he had committed a great fault in permitting Luther
to return free on the faith of his safe-conduct, as tlie emperor
was not bound to keep a promise with a heretic. " It is
because that I destroyed him not, that heresy has now
become strong, which I am convinced might have been
stifled with liim in its birth."* The whole conduct of
Charles the Fifth in this mighty revolution was, fi'om its
beginning, censured by contemporaries as purely jwUticul.
Francis the First observed that the emperor, under the colour
of i-eligion, was placing himself at the head of a league to
make his w^ay to a predominant monarchy. " The pretext
of religion is no new thing," writes the Duke of Nevers.
" Charles the Fifth had never undertaken a war against the
Protestant princes but with the design of rendering the
Imperial crown hereditary in the house of Austria ; and he
has only attacked the electoral princes to ruin them, and to
abolish their right of election. Had it been zeal for the
catholic religion, would he have delayed from 1519 to
1549 to arm ? That he might have extinguished the Lutheran
heresy, which he could easily have done in 1526, but
he considered that this novelty would serve to divide the
German princes, and he patiently waited till the effect was
realised." t

Good men of both parties, mistaking the nature of these
religious wars, have drawn horrid infercnees ! The " dragon-
nades" of Louis XIV. excited the admiration of Bruyere ;
and Anquetil, in his " Esprit de la Ligue," compares the
revocation of the Edict of Nantes to a salutary amputation.
The massacre of St. Bartholomew in its own day, and even
recently, has found advocates ; a Greek professor at tlie time
asserted that there were two classes of protestants in France
— political and religious ; and that " the late ebullition of
public vengeance was solely directed against the former."
Dr. M'Crie, cursing the catholic with a catholic's curse, exe-
crates "the stale sophistry of this calumniator." But
should we allow that the Greek professor who advocated
their national crime was the wretch the calvinistic doctor

* Llorente's " Critical History of the Inquisition."
t Naiulc, " Cousiderations Politiques," p. 115. Sec a curious note ia
Hart's " Life of (iustavus Atlolphus," ii. Vld.

b2

244 " Political Religionism."

describes, yet the nature of tilings cannot be altered by the
equal violence of Peter Charpentier and Dr. M'Crie.

This subject of " Political Religionism" is indeed as nice
as it is curious ; politics have been so cunningly worked into
the cause of relic/ion, that the parties themselves will never
be able to separate them ; and to this moment the most oppo-
site opinions are formed concerning th'^ same events and the
same persons. When public disturbances broke out at Nismes
on the first restoration of the Bourbons, the protestants,
who there are numerous, declared that they were perse-
cuted for religion, and their cry, echoed by their brethren
the dissenters, resounded in this country. We have not
forgotten the ferment it raised here ; much was said, and
something was done. Our minister, however, persisted in
declaring that it was a mere political affair. It is clear that
our government was right on the cause, and those zealous
complainants wrong, who only observed the effect; for as
soon as the Bourbonists had triumphed over the Bonapartists,
we heard no more of those sanguinary persecutions of the
protestants of IS'ismes, of which a dissenter has just published
a large history. It is a curious fact, that when two writers
at the same time were occupied in a Life of Cardinal Ximenes,
riechier converted the cardinal into a saint, and every inci-
dent in his administration was made to connect itself with
his religious character ; MarsoUier, a writer very inferior to
riechier, shows the cardinal merely as a politician. The
elegances of Flechier were soon neglected by the public, and
the deep interests of truth soon acquired, and still retain, for
the less elegant writer the attention of the statesuum.

A modern historian has observed that " the affairs of
religion were the grand fomenters and promoters of the
Thirty Years' War, which first brought down the powers of
the North to mix in the politics of the Southern states.'*
The fact is indisputable, but the cause is not so apparent,
Gustavus Adolphus, the vast military genius of his age, had
designed, and was successfully attempting, to oppose the
overgrown power of the imperial house of Austria, which
had long aimed at an universal monarchy in Europe ; a cir-
cumstance which Philip IV. weakly hinted at to the world
when he placed this motto under his arms — " Sine ipso fac-
tum est nihil ;^' an expression applied to Jesus Christ by
St. John !

245

TOLERATION.

An enlightened toleration is a blessing of the last age — it
would seem to have been practised by the Konians, when they
did not mistake the primitive Christians for seditious members
of society ; and was inculcated even by i\Iahoniet, in a pas-
sage in the Koran, but scarcely practised by his followers.
In modern history it was condemned when religion was
turned into a political contest under the aspiring house of
Austria — and in Spain — and in France. It required a long
time before its nature was comprehended — and to this
moment it is far from being clear, either to the tolerators
or the tolerated.

It do(\s not appear that the precepts or tlie practice of
Jesus and tlie apostles inculcate the compelling of any to be
Christians ;* yet an expression employed in the nuptial
parable of the great supper, when the hospitable lord com-
manded the servant, finding that he had still room to accom-
moclate more guests, to go out in the highways and hedges,
and " compel them to come in, that my house may he Jllled,'^
was alleged as an authorit^v by those catholics who called
themselves " the converters," for using religious force, which,
still alluding to the hospitable lord, they called " a charitable
and salutary violence." It was this circumstance wdiich pro-
duced Bayle's " Commentaire Philosophique sur ces Paroles
de Jesus Christ," published under the supposititious name of
an Englishman, as printed at Canterbury in 1686, l)ut really
at Amsterdam. It is curious that Locke published his first
letter on "Toleration" in Latin at Gouda, in 1689 — the
second in 1690 — and the third in 1692. Bayle opened the
mind of Locke, and some time after quotes Locke's Latin
letter with high commendation. t The caution of both
writers in publishing in foreign places, however, indicates
tlie prudence which it was deemed necessary to observe in
writing in favour of toleration.

These were the first philosophical attempts; but tlie

* Bishop Barlow's "Several Miscellaneous .and Weighty Cases of Con-
Bcienee liesolved," 1692. His "Case of a Toleration in Matters of Eeli-
gioD," addressed to Robert Boyle, p. 39. This volume was not intended
to have been given to the world, a circumstance which does not make it
ths less curiou8.

+ Iti the ftrtiole Sancteriut, Note F,

246 Toleration.

earlitst advocates for toleration may be found among the
religious controversialists of a preceding period ; it waf
probably started among the fugitive sects who had found
an asylum in Holland. It was a blessing which they had
gone far to find, and the miserable, reduced to humane feel-
ings, are compassionate to one another. With us the sect
called "the Independents" had, early in our revolution
under Cliarles the First, pleaded for the doctrine of rehgious
liberty, and long maintained it against tlie presbyterians.
Both proved persecutors when they possessed power. The
first of our respectable divines who advocated this cause were
Jeremy Taylor, in his " Discourse on the Liberty of Prophe-
sying," 16-17, and Bishop Hall, who had pleaded the cause
of moderation in a discourse about the same period.* Locke
had no doubt examined all these writers. The history of
opinions is among the most curious of histories ; and I sus-
pect that Bayle was well acquainted with the pamphlets of
our sectarists, who, in their flight to Holland, conveyed
those curiosities of theology, which had cost them their
happiness and their estates : I think he indicates this hidden
source of his ideas by the extraordinary ascription of his
book to an Englishman, and fixing the place of its publica-
tion at Canterbury !

Toleration has been a vast engine in the hands of modern
politicians. It was established in the United Provinces of
Holland, and our numerous non-conformists took refuge in
that asylum for disturbed consciences ; it attracted a valuable
community of French refugees ; it conducted a colony of
Hebrew fugitives from Portugal ; conventicles of Brownists,
quakers' meetings, French churches, and Jewish synagogues,
and (had it been required) Mahometan mosques, in Amster-
dam, were the precursors of its mart, and its exchange ; the
moment they could preserve their consciences sacred to them-

* Recent -svTiters among our sectarists assert that Dr. Owen was t\ie first
who wrote in favour of toleration, in 1648 ! Another claims the honour
for John Goodwin, the chaplain of Oliver Cromwell, who published one of
his obscure polemical tracts in 1644, among a number of other persona
v.ho, at that crisis, did not venture to prefix their names to pleas in favour
of toleration, so delicate and so obscure did this subject then appear ! In
1651, they translated the liberal treatise of Grotius, De Imperio Summa-
rum, Potestatum circa Sacra, under the title of " The Authority of the
Highest Powers about Sacred Things." London, 8vo, 1651. To the
honour of Grotius, the first of philosophical reformers, be it recorded, that
be displeased both parties !

Toleration. 2 17

Bolvcs, thoy lived williout mutual persecution, and mixed
togetlier as good Dutchmen.

The excommunicated part of Europe seemed to be the
most enlightened, and it was then considered as a proof of
tlie admirable progress of the human mind, that Locke and
Clarke and Newton corresponded with Leibnitz, and others
of the learned in France and ltal3^ Some were astonished
that philosophers who differed in their relirjious opinions
should communicate among themselves with so much tole-
ration.*

Jt is not, however, clear that had any one of these sects
at Amsterdam obtained predominance, which was sometimes
attempted, they would have granted to others the toleration
they participated in common. The infancy of a party is accom-
panied by a political weakness which disables it from weaken-
ing otliers.

The catholic in this country pleads for toleration ; in his
own he refuses to grant it. Here, the presbyterian, who had
complained of persecution, once fixed in the seat of power,
abrogated every kind of independence among others. When
the llames consumed Servetus at Geneva, the controversy
began, whether the civil magistrate might punish heretics,
which Beza, the associate of Calvin, maintained ; he triumphed
in the small predestinating city of Geneva ; but the book he
wrote was fatal to the protestants a few leagues distant,
among a majority of catholiis. Whenever the protestants
complained of the persecutions they suffered, the catholics,
for authority and sanction, never failed to appeal to the volume
of their own Beza.

j\L Xecker de Saussure has recently observed on "what
trivial circumstances the change or the preservation of the
established religion in dillVrent districts of Europe has de-
pefided!" When the lietbrmation ])enetrated into Switzer-
land, the government of the principality of Neufchatel,
wishing to allow liberty of conscience to all their subjects,
invited each ])arish to vote '• lor or against the adoption of
the new worship ; and in all the parishes, except two, the
majoi'ity of sull'rages declared in favour of the protestant
communion." The inhabitants of the small village of
Cressier had also assembled ; and forming an even number,
there happened to be an equality of votes for and against

* J. P. Kal>aut, "sur la Revolution Fran^aise," p. 27.

248 Toleration.

the change of rcligion. A shepherd being absent, tending
the flocks on the hills, they summoned him to appear and
decide this important question : when, having no liking to
innovation, he gave his voice in favour of the existing form
of worship ; and this parish remained catholic, and is so at
this da}'-, in the heart of the protcstant cantons.

I proceed to some facts which 1 have arranged for the his-
tory of Toleration. In the Memoirs of James the Second,
when that monarch published " The Declaration for Liberty
of Conscience," the catholic reasons and liberalises like a
modern philosopher: he accuses "the jealousy of our clerg}^
who had degraded themselves into intriguers ; and like me-
chanics in a trade, who are afraid of nothing so much as
interlopers — they had therefore induced indifferent persons to
imagine that their earnest contest was not about their faith,
but about their temporal possessions. It was incongruous
that a church, which does not pretend to be infallible, should
constrain persons, under heavy penalties and punishments, to
believe as she does: they delighted, he asserted, to hold an
iron I'od over dissentei's and catholics ; so sweet was domi-
nion, that the very thought of others participating in their
freedom made them deny the very doctrine they preached."
The chief argument the catholic urged on this occasion was
" the reasonableness of repealing laws which made men hable
to the greatest punishments for that it was not in their power
to remedy, ibr that no man could force himself to believe
what he really did not believe."*

Such was the rational language of the most bigoted of
zealots !-^The fox can bleat like the lamb. At the very mo-
ment James the Second was uttering this mild expostulation,
in his own heart he had anathematised the nation ; for I have
seen some of the king's private papers, which still exist ;
they consist of communications, chiefly by the most bigoted
priests, with the wildest projects, and most infatuated pro-
phecies and dreams, of restoring the true catholic faith in
England ! Had the Jesuit-led monarch retained the English
throne, the language he now addressed to the nation would
have been no longer used ; and in that case it would have
served his protestant subjects. He asked for toleration, to be-
come intolerant ! He devoted himself, not to the hundredth

• "Life of James the Second, from hiiown Papers," ii. 114,

Toleration. 249

part of the English nation ; and yet he was surprised that he
was left one morning without an army ! When the cathohc
monarch issued this declaration for "liberty of conscience,"
the Jekyll of his day observed, that " it was but scaffolding :
they intend to build another house, and when that house
(Popery) is built, they will take down the scaffold,"*

When presbytery was our lord, they who had endured the
tortures of persecution, and raised such sharp outcries for
freedom, of all men were the most intolerant : hardly had
they tasted of the Circean cup of dominion, ere they were
transformed into the most hideous or the most grotesque
monsters of political power. To their ej'es toleration was an
hydra, and the dethroned bishops had never so vehemently
declaimed against what, in ludicrous rage, one of the high,
flying presbyterians called " a cursed intolerable toleration !"
'i'hey advocated the rights of persecution ; and " shallow
Edwards," as Milton calls the author of " The Gangrtena,"
published a treatise ar/ainst toleration. They who had so
long complained of "the licensers," now sent all the books
they condemned to penal fires. Prynne now vindicated the
very doctrines under which he himself had so severely suf-
fered ; assuming the highest possible power of civil govern-
ment, even to the infliction of death on its opponents. Prynne
lost all feeling for the ears of others !

The idea of toleration was not intelligible for too long a
period in the annals of Europe : no parties probably could
Conceive the idea of toleration in the struggle tor predo-
n)inance. Treaties are not proflered when conquest is the
concealed object. ]\Ien were immolated ! a massacre was a
sacrifice ! medals were struck to commemorate these holy per-
secutions If The destroying angel, holding in one hand a
cross, and in the other a sword, with these words — Tgonot-
torum Strages, 1572 — "The massacre of the Huguenots" —

* This was a Baron Wallop. From Dr. H. Sampson's Jranuscript Diary.

t It is curious to observe tliat the catholics were afterwards ashamed uf
these indiscretions ; they were unwilling to own that there were any medals
■which commemorate massacres. Thuanus, in his 53rd book, has minutely
described them. The medals, however, have become excessively scarce ;
but copies inferior to the originals have been sold. They had also pictures
on similar subjects, accompanied by insulting inscriptions, which latter
they have effaced, sometimes very imperfectly. See Hollis's " Memoirs,"
p. 312 — 14. This enthusiast advertised in the papers to request traveller*
to procure them.

250 Toleration*

proves that toleration will not agree with that date.* Cas-
telnau, a statesman and a humane man, was at a loss how to
decide on a point of the utmost importance to France. In
1532 they first began to burn the Lutherans or Calvinists,
and to cut out the tongues of all protestants, " that they
might no longer protest." According to Father Paul, fifty
thousand persons had perished in the Netherlands, by dil-
ferent tortures, for relie-ion. But a chansre in the religion of
the state, Castelnau considered, would occasion one in the
government : he w^ondered how it happened, that the more
they punislied with death, it only increased the number of the
victims : martyrs produced proselj'tes. As a statesman, he
looked round the great field of human actions in the history
of the past ; there he discovered that tlie Romans were more
enlightened in their actions than ourselves ; that Trajan com-
manded Plin}'' the younger not to molest the Christians for
their religion, but should their conduct endanger the state,
to put down illeqal assemblies ; that Julian the Apostate eX'
pressly forbad the execution of the Christians, who then ima-
gined that they were securing their salvation by martyrdom ;
but he ordered all their goods to be confiscated — a severe pu-
nishment— by which Julian prevented more than he could have
done by persecutions. " All this," he adds, " we read in eccle-
siastical histor3^"t Such were the sentiments of Castelnau,
in 1560. Amidst perplexities of state necessity, and of our
common humanity, the notion of toleration had not entered
into the views of the statesman. It was also at this time
that De Sainetes, a great controversial writer, declared, that
had the fires lighted for the destruction of Calvinism not
been extinguished, the sect had not spread ! About half a
century subsequent to this period, Thuanus was, perhaps, the
first great mind who appears to have insinuated to the French
monarch and his nation, that they might live at peace with
heretics ; b}' which avowal he called down on himself the
haughty indignation of Rome, and a declaration that the
man who spoke in favour of heretics must necessarily be one
of the first class. Hear the afilicted historian : " Have men
no compassion, after forty years passed full of continual
miseries ? Have they no fear after the loss of the Nether-

* The Rala Regia of the Vatican has still upon its walls a painting by
Vasari of this massacre, among the other important events in the history
of the Popes similarly commemorated.

+ " Memoires de Michel de Castelnau," liv. i, c. 4,

Toleration. 251

lands, occasioned by the frantic obstinacy which marked the
times ? I jr^riove tliat such sentiments should have occasioned
my hook to have been examined with a rigour that amounts
to calumny." Such was the language of Thuanus, in a letter
written in LGOG ;* which indicates an approximation to tole-
ration, but which term was not probably yet found in any
dictionary. We may consider, as so many attempts at tole-
ration, the great national synod of Dort, whose history is
amply written by Brandt ; and the mitigating protestantism of
Laud, to approximate to the ceremonies of the Roman church ;
but the synod, after holding about two hundred sessions,
closed, dividing men into universalists and semi-universalists,
supralapsarians and sublapsarians ! The reformed themselves
produced the remonstrants ; and Laud's ceremonies ended in
placing the altar eastward, and in raising the scaffold for the
monarchy and the hierarchy. Error is circuitous when it
will do what it has not yet learnt. They were pressing for
conformity to do that which, a century afterwards, they found
could only be done by toleration.

The secret history of toleration among cei'tain parties has
been disclosed to us by a curious document, from that reli-
gious Machiavel, the fierce ascetic republican John Knox, a
calvinistical Pope. "While the posterity of Abraham," says
that mighty and artful reformer, " were few in numher, and
while they sojourned in different countries, they were merely
required to avoid all participation in the idolatrous rites of
the heathen ; but os soon as they prospered into a kingdom,
and had obtained possession of Canaan, they were strictly
charged to suppress idolatry, and to destroy all the monu-
ments and incentives. The same duty was now incumbent
on the professors of the true religion in Scotland. Formerly,
when not more than ten persons in a cow«/y were enlightened,
it would have been foolishness to have demanded of the
nobility the suppression of idolatry. But now, when know-
ledge had been increased," &c.t Such are the men who cry
out for toleration during their state of political weakness, but
who cancel the bond by which they hold their tenure when-
ever they " obtain possession of Canaan." The only com-
mentary on this piece of the secret history of toleration ia
the acute remark of Swift : — " We are fully convinced that we
Bhall always tolerate them, but not that they will tolerate us."

• " Life of Thuanus, by the Rev. J. Collinson," p. 115.
+ Dr. M'Ciie's "Life of John Knox," ii. 122.

252 Toleration.

The truth is that toleration was allowed by none of the
parties ! and I will now show the dilemmas into which each
part\' thrust itself.

When the kings of England would forcibly have established
episcoi)acy in Scotland, the presbyters passed an act against
the toleration of dissenters from preshyterian doctrines and
discipline; and tlius, as Guthrie observes, they were com-
mitting the same violence on the consciences of their brethren
which thej"^ opposed in the king. The presbyterians contrived
their famous covenant to dispossess the royalists of their
livings ; and the independents, who assumed the principle of
toleration in their very name, shortly after enforced what
tliey called the engagement, to eject the presbyterians ! In
England, where the dissenters were ejected, their great advo-
cate Calamy complains that the dissenters were only making
use of the same arguments which the most eminent reformers
had done in tlieir noble defence of the reformation against the
papists; while the arguments of the established church against
the dissenters were the same which were urged by the papists
against the protestant reformation!* When the presbyte-

* I quote fi-om an unpublished letter, written so late as in 1749, ad-
dressed to the author of " The Free and Candid Disquisition," by the Rev.
Thomas Allen, rector of Kettering, Northamptonshire. However extrava-
gant his doctrine appears to us, I suspect that it exhibits the concealed
sentiments of even some protestant churchmen ! This rector of Kettering
attributes the growth of schism to the negligence of the clergy, and seems
to have persecuted both the archbishops, "to his deti'iment," as he tells
us, with singular plans of reform borrowed from monastic institutions.
He wished to revive the practice inculcated by a canon of the counsel
of Laodicea of having prayers ad lioram nonam et ad vesperam — prayers
twice a day in the churches. But his grand project take in his own
words : —

"I let the archbishop know that I had composed an irenicon, wherein
I prove the necessity of an ecclesiastical /lower over consciences in matters
of religion, which utterly silences their arguments who plead so hard for
toleration. I took my scheme from 'A Discourse of Ecclesiastical Polity,'
wlierein the authority of the civil magistrate over the consciences of sub-
jects in matters of external religion is asserted ; the mischiefs and incon-
veniences of toleration are represented, and all pretences pleaded in behalf
of liberty of conscience are fully answered. If this book were re-
printed and considered, the king would know his power and the people
their duty."

The rector of Kettering seems not to have known that the author of this
"Discourse on Ecclesiastical Polity" was the notorious Parker, immor-
talised by the satire of Marvell. This political apcstate, from a republican
and Presbyterian, became a furious advocate for arbitrary government in
church and state I H« easily won the favour of James th«> Secondj wb.«

Toleration. 253

rians were our masters, and preached up the doctrine of pas-
sive obedience in spiritual matters to the civil power, it was
unquestionably passing a self-condemnation on their own
recent opposition and detraction of the former episcopacy.
Whenever men act from a secret motive entirely contrary to
their ostensible one, such monstrous results will happen ; and
as extremes will join, however opposite they appear in their
beginnings, John Knox and Father Petre, in office, would
have equally served James the Second as confessor and prime
minister !

A. fact relating to the famous Justus Lipsius proves the
difficulty of forming a clear notion of toleeatiox. This
learned man, after having been ruined by the religious wars
of the Netherlands, ibund an honourable retreat in a profes-
sor's chair at Ley den, and without difficulty abjured papacy.
He published some political works : and adopted as his great
principle, that only one religion should be allowed to a people,
and that no clemency should be granted to non-conformists,
who, he declares, should be pursued by sword and hre : in this
manner a single member would be cut off to preserve the
body sound. Tire, seca — are his words. Strange notions
these in a protestant republic ; and, in fact, in Holland it was
approving of all the horrors of their oppressors, the Duke
d'Alva and Philip the Second, from which they had hardly
recovered.* It was a principle by which we must inevitably
infer, says Bayle, that in Holland no other mode of religious
l)elief but one sect should be permitted ; and that those
Pagans who had hanged the missionaries of the gospel had
done what they ought. Lipsius found himself sadly embar-
rassed when refuted by Theodore Cornhert,t the firm advo-
cate of political and religious freedom, and at length Lipsius,
that protestant witli a catholic heart, was forced to cat his

made him Bishop of O.\ford ! His principles were so violent that Father
Petre, the confessor of James, made sure of him ! This letter of the
rector of Kettering, in adopting the system of such a catholic bishop,
confirms my suspicion that toleration is condemned as an evil among some
protestants !

* The cruelties practised by the Protestant against the Catholic party
are pictured and desci'ibed in Arnoudt Van (ieluwe's book, " Over de Out-
ledinghe van dry verscheyden Niew-Ghereformeerde Martelaers Boecken,"
puliliblicd at Antwerp in ItJiiG.

t Conihert was one of the fathers of Dutch literature, and even of their
arts, lie was the composer of the great national air of William of Oninje ;
he was too a famous engraver, the master of Goltzius. On his dtuth-LcJ
he was still writing against iiaiitnecution of /unties.

254 Toleration.

words, like Pistol his onion, declai'ing that the two objection-
able words, ure, seca, were borrowed from medicine, meaning
not literally fire and sword, but a strong efficacious remedy,
one of those powerful medicines to expel poison. Jean de
Serres, a warm Huguenot, carried the principle of toleration
so far in his '• Inventaire generale de I'llistoire de France,"
as to blame Cliarles Martel for compelling the Frisans, whom
he had conquered, to adopt Christianity ! " A pardonable
zeal," he observes, "in a warrior; but in fact the minds of
men cannot be gained over by arms, nor that religion
forced upon them, which must be introduced into the hearts
of men by reason." It is curious to see a protestant, in his
zeal for toleration, blaming a king for forcing idolaters to be-
come Christians ; and to have found an opportunity to ex-
press his opinions in the dark history of the eighth century,
is an instance how historians incorporate tlieir passions in
their works, and view ancient facts with modern eyes.

The protestant cannot grant toleration to the catholic,
unless the catholic ceases to be a papist ; and the Arminian
church, which opened its wide bosom to receive every deno-
mination of Christians, nevertheless were forced to exclude
the papists, for their passive obedience to the supremacy of
the Roman pontiff. The catholic has curiously told us, on
this word toleration, that Ce mot devient fort en usage a
mesure que le nombre des tolerans augmente* It was a word
which seemed of recent introduction, though the book is
modern ! The protestants have disputed much how far they
might tolerate, or whether they should tolerate at all ; " a
difficulty," triumphantly exclaims the catholic, " wliich they
are not likely ever to settle, while they maintain their principles
of pretended reformation ; the consequences which naturally
follow excite horror to the Christian. It is tlie weak who
raise such outcries for toleration ; the strong find authority
legitimate."

A religion which admits not of toleration cannot be safely
tolerated, if there is any chance of its obtaining a political
ascendancy.

When Priscillian and six of his followers were condemned
to torture and execution for asserting that the tliree persons
of the Trinity were to be considered as three different accep-
tions of the same being, Saint Ambrose and Saint Martin

* " Dictioiiuaire de Trevoux," ad voccn Tuleiance. PriuteJ iu 1771.

Apology for the Parisian Massacre. 5J55

Hsserted the cause of offended hiimanitv, and refused to coiTI-
municate with the bishops who liad called out for the blood
of the Priscillianists ; but Cardinal Baronius, the annalist of
ttie church, was greatly embarrassed to explain how men of
real purity could abstain fi-om applaud'uij the ardent zeal of
the persecution : he preferred to give up the saints rather
than to allow of toleration — for he acknowledges that the
toleration which these saints would have allowed was not
exempt from sin.*

In the preceding article, " Political Keligionism," we have
shown how to provide against the possible evil of the tolerated
becoming the tolerators ! Toleration has been suspected of
indifference to religion itself; but with sound minds, it is
only an indifference to the logomachies of theology — things
" not of God, but of man," that have perished, and that are
uerishins: around us !

APOLOGY FOR THE PARISIAN MASSACRE.

An original document now lying before me, the autograph
letter of Charles the Ninth, will prove, that the unparalleled
massacre, called by the world religious, was, in the French
cabinet, considered merely as political ; one of those revolting
state expedients which a pretended instant necessity has too
often inflicted on that part of a nation which, like the under-
current, subterraneously works its way, and runs counter to
the great stream, till the critical moment arrives when one or
the other must cease.

The massacre began on St. Bartholomew day, in August,
1572, lasted in France during seven days : that awful event
interrupted the correspondence of our court with that of
France. A long silence ensued ; the one did not dare to tell
the tale which the other could not listen to. But sovereigns
know how to convert a mere domestic event into a political
expedient. Charles the Ninth, on the birth of a daughter,
sent over an ambassador extraordinary to request Elizabeth
to stand as sponsor : by this the French monareh obtained a
double purpose ; it served to renew his interrupted inter-

* Sismoudi, "Hist, des Fran^ais," i. 41. The character of the first
person who introduced civil persecution iuto the Christian church has beea
described by .Siiii)icius Severiis. See Dr. jMachiiiic's note in his trauslatiju
of Mosheim's '•Jioelesiastieal History," vol. i. 423.

256 Apology for the Parisian Massacre.

course witli tlie silent queen, and alarmed the French protes-
tants by abating their hopes, which long rested on the aid or'
the English queen.

The following letter, dated 8th February, 1573, is ad-
dressed by the king to La Motte Fenelon, his i-esident am-
bassador at London. The king in this letter minutely details
a confidential intercourse with his mother, Catharine of Me-
dicis, who, perhaps, mviy have dictated this letter to the
secretary, although signed by the king with his own hand.*
Such minute particulars could only have been known to her-
self. The Earl of Wolchester (Worcester) was now taking
his departure, having come to Paris on the baptism of the
princess ; and accompanied by Walsingham, our resident
ambassador, after taking leave of Charles, had the following
interview with Catharine de Medicis. An interview with
the young monarch was usually concluded by a separate
audience with his mother, who probably was still the direc-
tress of his councils.

The French court now renewed their favourite project of
marrying the Duke d'Alen9on with Elizabeth. They had
long wished to settle this turbulent spirit, and the negotia-
tion with Elizabeth had been broken off* in consequence of
the massacre at Paris. They were somewhat uneasy lest he
should share the fate of his brother, the Duke of Anjou, who
had not long before been expedited on the same fruitless
errand ; and Elizabeth had already objected to the disparity
of their ages, the Duke of Alen^on, being onl}" seventeen,
and the maiden queen six-and-thirty ; but Catharine ob-
served that Alen9on was only one year younger than his
brother, against whom this objection had not occurred to
Elizabeth, for he had been sent back upon another pretext — ■
some difficulty which the queen had contrived about his per-
forming mass in his own house.

After Catharhie de Medicis had assured the Earl of Wor-
cester of her great affection lor the Queen of England, and

* All the numerous letters whicb I Lave seen of Charles the Ninth, now
in tlie possession of Mr. Murray, are carefully signed by himself, and I
have also observed postscripts written with his own hand : they are always
countersigned t)y his secretary. I mention this circumstance, because, in
the Dictionnaire Historique, it is said that Charles, who died young, was
so given up to the amusements of his age, that he would not even sign his
despatches, and introduced the custom of secretaries subscribing for the
king. This voluminous correspondence sliuvvs the lalsity of this stale-
in..;ut. History is too often composed of popular tales of this stamp.

Apolorjy for llio Parisian Massacre. 257

bor and the king's strict intention to preserve it, and tliat
they were therefore desirous ol" tliis propo.sed marriage
taking place, she took this opportunity of inquiring of tlie
Earl of Worcester the cause of the queen his mistress's
marked coolness toward them. The narrative becomes now
dramatic.

" On this Walsingham, wlio kept always close by the side
of the count, here took on himself to answer, acknowledging
that the said count had indeed been charged to speak on this
head; and he then addressed some words in English to
Worcester. And afterwards the count gave to my lady and
mother to understand, that the queen his mistress hud been
waiting for an answer on two articles ; the one concerning
religion, and the other for an interview. My lady and
mother instantly replied, that she had never lieard any arti-
cles mentioned, on which she would not have immediately
satisfied the Sieur Walsingham, who then took up the word ;
first observing tliat the count was not accustomed to business
of this nature, but that he himself knew for certain that the
cause of this negotiation for marriage not being more ad-
vanced, was really these two unsettled points : that his mis-
tress still wished that the point of religion should be cleared
up ; for that they concluded in England that this business
was designed only to amuse and never to be completed (as
happened in that of my brother the Duke of Anjou) ; and
the other point concerned the interview between my brother
the Duke of Alen^on ; because some letters which may have
been written between the parties* in such sort of matters,
could not have the same force which the sight and presence
of both the persons would undoubtedly have. But, ho
added, another thint/, which had also fjreaihj retarded this
business, ivas lohat had happened lately in this kinr/doni ; and
during such troubles, proceeding from religion, it could not
have been well timed to have spoken with them concerning
the said marriage ; and that himself and those of his nation
had been in great fear in this kingdom, thinking that we in-
tended to extirpate all those of the said religion. On this,
my lady and mother answered him instantl}' and in order :

* These love-letters of Alen^on to our Elizabeth are noticed by Camilen,
who observes, that the quecu became wearied by receiviug so many ; and
to put ail end to this truublo, she consented that tlie young duke should
come over, conditionally, that he should not be ofteudud if her suitor should
return home snitless.

VOL. m. fci

258 Apolog]! for the Parisian Massacre.

That she was certain that the queen his mistress could never
like nor value a prince who had not his religion at heart ;
and whoever would desire to have this otherwise, would be
depriving him of what we hold dearest in this world ; That
he might recollect that my hrother had always insisted on
tlie freedom of religion, and that it was from the difficulty of
its public exercise, which he always insisted on, which had
In'oken off' this negotiation : the Duke d'Alen^on will be
s^atisfied when this point is agreed on, and will hasten over to
the queen, persuaded that she will not occasion him the pain
and the shame of passing over the seas without happily ter-
minating this affair. In regard to what has occurred these
latter days, that he must have seen how it happened b}' the
fault of the chiefs of those who remained here ; for when the
late admiral was treacherously wounded at Notre Dame, he
knew the affliction it threw us into (fearfvil that it might
have occasioned great troubles in this kingdom), and the
diligence we used to verify judicially whence it proceeded ;
and the verification was nearly finished, when they were so
forgetful, as to raise a conspiracy, to attempt the lives of
myself, ray lady and mother, and my brothers, and endanger
the whole state ; which was the cause, that to avoid this, I
was compelled, to my very great regret, to permit what had
happened in this citj^ ; but as he had witnessed, I gave orders
to stop, as soon as possible, this fury of the people, and place
every one in repose. On this, the Sieur Walsingham replied
to my lady and mother, that the exercise of the said religion
had been interdicted in this kingdom. To which she also
answered, that this had not been done but for a good and
holy piu'pose ; namely, that the fury of the catholic people
might the sooner be allayed, who else had been reminded of
the past calamities, and would again have been let loose
against those of the said religion, had they continued to
preach in this kingdom. Also should these once more fix on
any chiefs, which I will prevent as much as possible, giving
him clearly and pointedly to understand, that what is done
here is much the same as what has been done, and is now
practised by the queen his mistress in her kingdom. For she
permits the exercise but of one religion, although there an^
many of her people who are of another ; and having also,
during her reign, punished those of her subjects whom she
found seditious and rebellious. It is true this has been done
by the laws, but I indeed could not act in the same manner ;

Apology for the Parisian Massacre, 259

lor Hiiding mj'sclf in such imminent peril, and the conspiracy
raised against me and mine, and my kingdom, ready to bo
executed, I had no time to arraign and try in open justice as
much as I wished, but was constrained, to my very great re-
gret, to strike tlie blow (lascher lo main) in what has been
done in this eity."

This letter of Charles the Ninth, however, does not here
conclude. "My lady and mother" plainly acipiaints the
Earl of Worcester and Sir Francis Walsingham, that her son
had never interfered between their mistress and her subjects,
and in return expects the same favour ; although, by accounts
they had received from England, many ships were arming to
assist their rebels at Rochelle. '' My lady and mother" ad-
vances another step, and declares that Elizabeth by treaty is
boimd to assist her son against his rebellious subjects ; and
they expect, at least, that Elizabeth will not onl}' stop these
armaments in all her ports, but exemphirily punish the
offenders, I resume the letter.

" And on hearing this, the said Walsingham changed
colour, and appeared somewhat astonished, as my lady and
mother well perceived by his face ; and on this he requested
the Count of Worcester to mention the order which he knew
the queen his mistress had issued to prevent these people
from assisting those of La KocheUe ; but that in England, so
numerous were the seamen and others who gained their live-
lihood by maritime affairs, and who would starve without the
entire freedom of the seas, that it was impossible to interdict
them."

Charles the Ninth encloses the copy of a letter he had
received from London, in part agreeing with an account the
ambassador had sent to the king, of an English expedition
nearly ready to sail for La Kochelle, to assist his rebellious
subjects. He is still further alarmed, that Elizabeth foments
the li-artegeux, and assists underhand the discontented. He
urges the ambassador to hasten to the queen, to impart these
complaints in the most friendly way, as he knows the ambas-
sador can well do, and as, no doubt, Walsingham will have
ilready prepared her to receive. Charles entreats Elizabeth
to prove her good faith by deeds and not by words ; to act
)penly on a point which admits of no dissimulation. The
best proof of her friendship will be the marriage ; and the
ambassador, after opening this business to her chief ministers,
who the king thinks are desirous of this projected marriage,

s 2

260 Prediction.

is then '• to acquaint the queen with what has passed between
lier ambassadors and myself."

Such is the iirst letter on English affairs which Charles
the Ninth despatched to his ambassador, after an awful
silence of six months, during which time La Motte Fenelon
was not admitted into the presence of Elizabeth. The
apology for the massacre of St. Bartholomew comes from the
king himseli", and contains several remarkable expressions,
which are at least divested of that style of bigotry and
exultation we might have expected : on the contrar}^ this
sanguinary and inconsiderate young monarch, as he is repre-
sented, writes in a subdued and sorrowing tone, lamenting his
hard necessity, regretting he could not have recourse to the
laws, and appealing to others for his efforts to check the fury
of the people, which he himself had let loose. Catharine de
Medicis, who had governed him from the tender age of eleven
years, when he ascended the throne, might unquestionably
have persuaded him that a conspiracy was on the point of ex-
plosion. Charles the Ninth died young, and his character is
unfavourably viewed by the historians. In the voluminous
correspondence which I have examined, could we judge by
state letters of the character of him who subscribes them, wo
must form a very different notion ; they are so prolix, and so
earnest, that one might conceive they were dictated by the
young monarch himself!

PREDICTION.

I>' a curious treatise on " Divination," or the knowledge
of future events, Cicero has preserved a complete account of
the state-contrivances which were practised by tlie Roman
government to instil among the people those hopes and fears
by which they regulated public opinion. The pagan creed,
now become obsolete and ridiculous, has occasioned this
treatise to be rarely consulted ; it remains, however, as a
chapter in the history of man !

To these two books of Cicero on " Divination," perhaps a
third might be added, on political and moral piu;dictiok.
The principles which may even raise it into a science are self-
evident ; they are di-awn from the heart of man, and they
depend on the nature and connexion of human events ! We
presume we shall demonstrate the positive existence of such

Prediction. 2G1

a flvculty ; a faculty which Lord Bacon describes of " makiii!,'
things FUTURi: and uemote as puesent." The aruspex, the
augur, and the astrologer have vanished with tlieir own
superstitions ; but the moral and the political predictor, pro-
ceeding on principles authoi-ised by nature and experience,
has become more skilful in his observations on the phenomena
of human history ; and it has often happened tliat a tolerable
philosopher has not made an indiflerent prophet.

No great political or moi-al n-volution has occui-red which
has not been accompanied by its procpiostic ; and men of a
philosophic cast of mind in their retirement, freed from the
delusions of parties and of sects, at once intelligent in the
quicqaid acjimt homines, while they are withdrawn ."rom their
conflicting interests, have rarely been confounded by the
astonishment which overwhelms those who, absorbed in
active life, are the mere creatures of sensation, agitated by
the shadows of truth, the unsubstantial appearances of things !
Intellectual nations are advancing in an eternal circle of
events and passions which succeed each other, and the last is
necessarily connected with its antecedent ; the solitary force
of some fortuitous incident only can interrupt this con-
catenated progress of human affairs.

That every great event has been accompanied by a presago
or prognostic, has been observed by Lord Bacon. "The
shepherds of the people should understand the prognostics oj
state tempests ; hollow blasts of wind seemingly at a distance,
and secret swellings of the sea, often precede a storm." Such
were the prognostics discerned by tlie politic Bishop Williams
in Charles the First's time, who clearly foresaw and predicted
the final success of the Puritanic party in our country :
attentive to his own security, he abandoned the government
and sided with the rising opposition, at the moment when
such a change in public affairs was by no means apparent.*

In this spirit of foresight our contemplative antiquary
Dugdale must have anticijjated the scene which was ap-
proaching in 1641, in the destruction of our ancient monu-
ments in cathedral churches. He hurried on his itinerant
labours of taking draughts and transcribing inscriptions, as
he says, "to preserve them for future and better times."
Posterity owes to the prescient spirit of Dugdale the ancient
Monuments of England, which bear the marks of the haste,
as well as the zeal, which have perpetuated them.

• See Rushv.-ortli, vol. i. p. 420. His language was decisive.

2Q2 Prediction.

Continental writers formei'ly employed a fortunate expres-
sion, when they wished to have an Historia Reformationis
ante Eeformationem : this history of the lleformation would
have commenced at least a century hefore the Reformation
itself! A letter from Cardinal Julian to Pope Eugenius the
Fourth, wa-itten a century before Luther appeared, clearly
predicts the Reformation and its consequences. He observed
that the minds of men were ripe for something tragical ; he
felt the axe striking at the root, and the tree beginning to
bend, and that his party, instead of propping it, were hasten-
ing its fall.* In England, Sir Thomas More was not less
prescient in his views ; for when his son Roper was observing
to him that the Catholic religion, under " the Defender of
the Faith," was in a most flourishing state, the answer of
More was an evidence of political foresight — " Truth, it is,
son Roper ! and yet I praj^ God that we may not live to see
the day that we would gladly be at league and composition
with heretics, to let them have their churches quietly to
themselves, so that they would be contented to let us have
ours quietly to ourselves." Whether our great chancellor
predicted from a more intimate knowledge of the king's cha-
racter, or from some pi'ivate circumstances which may not
have been recorded for our information, of which I have an
obscure suspicion, remains to be ascertained. The minds of
men of great political sagacity were unquestionably at that
moment full of obscure indications of the approaching change ;
Erasmus, when at Canterbury before the tomb of Becket,
observing it loaded with a vast profusion of jewels, wished
that those had been distributed among the poor, and that
the shrine had been only adorned with boughs and flowers ;
" For," said he, " those who have heaped up all this mass of
treasure will one day be plundered, and fall a prey to those
who are in power;" — a prediction literally fullilled about
twenty years after it was made. The unknown author of the
Visions of Piers Ploughman, who wrote in the reign of
Edward the Third,t surprised the world by a famous predic-
tion of the fall of the relif/ioiis houses from the hand of a

* This letter is iu tlie works of JEneas Sylvius ; a copious extract is given
by Bossuet, in his "Variations." See also Moslieim, Cent. xiii. part ii.
chap. 2, note in.

t Though it cannot be positively asserted it is generally believed that
the autlior was Robert Longlande, a monk of Malvern. See introduc-
tion to Wright's edition of " The Vision." The latter part of the year 1362
JB believwl to be the time of its composition.

Prediction. 203

kincj* The event was realised, two liuiulred years afturward,-;,
by our Henry the Eightli. The protestant writers iiave not
scrupk-d to deelare that in this instance lie was divino
numine ajflatus. But moral and j)olitical prediction is not in-
spiration ; the one may be wrongiit out by man, the other
descends from God. The same principle which led Erasmus
to predict that tliose who were "in power" would destroy
the rich shrines, because no other class of men in society
could mate with so might}' a body as the monks, conducted
the author of Piers Ploughman to the same conclubion ; and
since power only could accomplish that great purpose, ho
fixed on the highest as the most likely ; and thus the wise
prediction was, so long after, literally accomplished !

Sir Walter Rawleigh foresaw the future consequences of
the separatists and the sectaries in the national church, and
the very scene his imagination raised in 1530 has been
exhibited, to the letter of his description, two centuries after
the prediction ! His memorable words are — " Time will even
bring it to pass, if it were not resisted, that God would be
turned out of clnivches into hams, and from thence again
into the Jlelds and mountains, and under hedges — all oi'der
of discipline and church government left to newness of
opinion and men's fancies, and as many kinds of religion
spring up as there are parish churches within England."
We are struck by the profound genius of Tacitus, who
clearl}' foresaw the calamities whicli so long ravaged Euro[)e
on the fall of the Roman Empire, in a work written live
hundred years before the event ! In that sublime anticipa-
tion of the future, he observed — '• When the Romans sluUl
be hunted out from those countries which they have con-
quered, what will then happen ? The revolted people, freed
from their master oppressor, will not be able to subsist with-

* Tlie passage is so remarkable as to be worth giving here, for the
imiueiliate reference of such readers as may not have ready access to the
oiigiiial. We modernize the spelling from Mr. Wright's edition : —

But there shall come a king,
And confess you religious,
And award you as the iiible telkth
For breaking of your rule.

* *■ ^- *

And then shall the Abbot of Abin^u.ii
And all his issue for ever,
Have a knock of a king.
And incurable the wound.

264 Prediction.

out destroying tlieir neighbours, and the most cruel wars
will exist among all these nations."

We are told that Solon at Athens, contemplating on the
port and citadel of Munychia, suddenly exclaimed, " How
blind is man to futurity ! Could the Athenians foresee what
mischief this will do their city, they would even eat it w^th
their own teeth to get rid of it!" — a prediction verified
more than two hundred years afterwards ! Thales desired to
be buried in an obscure quarter of Milesia, observing that
that very spot would in time be the forum. Charlemagne,
in his old age, observing from the window of a castle a
Xorman descent on his coast, tears started in the eyes of
the aged monarch. He predicted that since they dared to
threaten his dominions while he was yet living, what would
they do when he should be no more ! — a melancholy predic-
tion, says De Foix, of their subsequent incursions, and of the
])rotracted calamities of the French nation during a whole
century !

There seems to be something in minds which take in
extensive views of human nature which serves them as a
kind of divination, and the consciousness of this faculty has
even been asserted by some. Cicero appeals to Atticus how
he had always judged of the aflTairs of the republic as a good
diviner ; and that its overthrow had happened as he had
Ibreseen fourteen years before.* Cicero had not only pre-
dicted what happened in his own times, but also what
occurred long after, according to the testimony of Cornelius
Xepos. The philosopher, indeed, affects no secret revelation,
nor visionary second-sight ; he honestly tells us that this art
had been acquired merely by study and the administration
of public affairs, while he reminds his friend of several
remarkable instances of his successful predictions. " I do
not divine human events by the arts practised by the augurs,
but I use other signs." Cicero then expresses himself with
ihe guarded obscurity of a philosopher who could not openly
ridicule the prevailing superstitions ; but we perfectly com-
prehend the nature of his " signs" when, in the great pend-
ing event of the rival conflicts of Ponipey and of CiEsar, he
shows the means he used for his purpose. " On one side I
consider the humour and genius of Caesar, and on the other
the condition and the manner of civil wars."t In a word,

* Ep. ad Att. Lib. x. Ep. 4.
+ Ep. ad Att. Lib. vi. Ep. 6.

Prediction. 265

the political diviner foretold events by their dependence on
general causes, while the moral diviner, by his experience of
the personal character, anticipated the actions of the indi-
vidual. Others, too, have asserted the possession of this
faculty. Du Vair, a famous chancellor of France, imagined
the faculty was intuitive with him : by his own experience
he had observed the results of this curious and obscure
faculty, and at a time when the history of the human mind
was so imperfectly comprehended, it is easy to account for
the apparent egotism of this grave and dignified character.
'■ IJorn," says he, " with constitutional infirmity, a mind and
body but ill adapted to be laborious, with a most treacherous
memory, enjoying no gift of nature, yet able at all times to
exercise a sagacity so great that I do not know, since I have
reached manhood, that anything of importance has happened
to the state, to the public, or to myself in particular, which
I had not foreseen."* This faculty seems to be described by
a remarkable expression employed by Thucydides in his cha-
racter of Themistocles, of which the following is given as a
close translation : " By a species of sagacity peculiarly his
own, for which he was in no degree indebted either to early
education or after study, he was supereminently happy in
forming a prompt judgment in matters that admitted but
little time for deliberation ; at the same time that he far
surpassed all in his deductions of the future from the past,
or was the best guesser of the future from the past."t
Should this faculty of moral and political prediction be ever
considered as a science, we can even furnish it with a denomi-
nation ; for the writer of the Life of Sir Thomas Browne
prefixed to his works, in claiming the honour of it for that
]>hilosopher, calls it " the Stochastic," a term derived I'rom
the Greek and fi-om archer^', meaning " to shoot at a mark."
This eminent genius, it seems, often " hit the white." Our
biographer declares, that " though he weve no prophet, yet
in tliat faeult}' which comes nearest to it, he excelled, ?. e.,
Ihe Stochastic, wherein he was seldom mistaken as to future
events, as well public as private."

* Tliis remarkable coufession I find in Menage's "Observations sur la
Langue Fran9oise," Part II. p. 110.

i" OtKit^ yap ^vi'iati, Kai ovrt ■trponaOuji' iQ avTi]v ovciv, ovr' inifia-
Oijf Tuiu rt TrapaxP^ll^n cC i\axio~i}i l^ovKi}^ Kpariarog yvwftwy, Kai
rQ)v fitWovTiov tTrnrXiinrov tov yivtjaophov upi<7roQ (iKaffn'ic. — Tliiicy-
dides, lib. i.

266 Prediction.

We are not, indeed, inculcating the fanciful elements of an
occult art. We know whence its principles may be drawn ;
and we maj- observe how it was practised by the wisest
among the ancients. Aristotle, who collected all the curious
knowledge of his times, has preserved some remarkable
opinions on the art of divination. In detailing the various
subtei'fuges practised by the pretended diviners of his day,
he reveals the secret jyfinciple by which one of them regu-
lated his predictions. He frankly declared that the future
being always very obscure, while the past was easy to know,
Jiis predictions had never the future in view ; for he decided
from the past as it appeared in human affairs, which, how-
ever, lie concealed from the multitude.* Such is the true
principle by which a philosophical historian may become a
skilful diviner.

Human affairs make themselves ; they grow out of one
another, with slight variations ; and thus it is that they
usually happen as they have happened. The necessaiy
dependence of effects on causes, and the similarity of human
interests and human passions, are confirmed by comparative
parallels with the past. The philosophic sage of holy writ
truly deduced the important principle, that " the thing that
hath been is that which shall be." The vital facts of history,
deadened by the touch of chronological antiquarianism, are
restored to animation when we comprehend the principles
which necessarily terminate in certain results, and discover
the characters among mankind who are the usual actors in
these scenes. The heart of man beats on the same eternal
springs ; and whether he advances or retrogrades, he cannot
escape out of the march of human thought. Hence, in the
most extraordinary revolutions we discover that the time and
the place only have changed ; for even when events are not
strictl}' parallel, we detect tlie same conducting principles,
Scipio Ammirato, one of the great Italian historians, in his
curious discourses on Tacitus, intermingles ancient examples
with the modern ; that, he says, all may see how the truth
of things is not altei'ed by the changes and diversities of time.
Machiavel drew his illustrations of modern history from the
ancient.

When the French Revolution recalled our attention to a
similar eventful period in our own history, the neglected

* Arist, Ebet. lib, vli. c 5.

Prediction. 267

volumes which preserved the public and private history of
our Charles the First and Cromwell were collected with
eager curiosity. Olteii the scene existin<j before us, even the
eery personages themselves, opened on us in these forgotten
pages. But as the annals of htnnan nature did not com-
mence with those of Charles the First, we took a still more
reti'ograde step, and it was discovered in this wider range,
that in the various governments of Greece and Rome, the
events of those times had been only reproduced. Among
them the same principles had terminated in the same results,
and the same personages had figured in the same drama.
This strikingly appeared in a little curious volume, entitled,
" Essai sur I'Histoire de la Revolution Fran9oise, par une
Societo d'Auteurs Latins," published at Paris in ISOl. This
'' Society of Latin Authors," who have written so inimitably
the history of the French Revolution, consist of the Roman
historians themselves ! By extracts ingeniously applied, the
events of that melancholy period are so appositely described,
indeed so minutely narrated, that they will not fail to sur-
prise those who are not accustomed to detect the perpetual
parallels which we meet with in philosophical history.

Many of these crises in history are close resemblances of
each other. Compare the history of " The League" in
France with that of our own civil wars. We are struck by
the similar occurrences performed by the same political cha-
racters who played their part on both those great theatres of
human action. A satirical royalist of those times has com-
memorated the motives, the incidents, and tlie perisonages in
the " Satire Menippee de la Vertu du Catholicon d'Espagne ;"
and this famous " Satire Menippee" is a perfect Hudibras in
l)rose ! Tlie writer discovers all the bitter ridicule of Butler
in his ludicrous and severe exhibition of the " Etats de Paris,"
while the artist who designed the satirical prints becomes no
contemptible Hogarth. So much are these public events
alike in their general spirit and termination, that they have
atlbrded the subject of a printed but unpublished volume,
entitled "Essai sur les Revolutions."* The whole work

* This work was printed in London as ajirst volume, but remained un-
published. This singularly curious production was suppressed, but re-
printed at Paris. It has suQered the most cruel mutilations. 1 read with
!<urprise and instruction the single copy which I was assured was the only
one saved from the havoc of the entire edition. The writer was the cele*
Irated Cliateaubriaud.

268 Prediction.

was modelled on this principle. " It would be possible,"
says the eloquent writer, " to frame a table or chart in which
all the given imaginable events of the history of a people
would be reduced to a mathematical exactness." The con-
ception is fanciful, but its foundation lies deep in truth.

A remarkable illustration of the secret principle divulged
by Aristotle, and described by Thucydides, appears in the
recent confession of a man of genius among ourselves. When
Mr. Coleridge was a political writer in the Morning Post and
Courier, at a period of darkness and utter confusion, that
writer was then conducted by a tract of light, not revealed to
ordinary journalists, on the Napoleonic empire. " Of that
despotism in masquerade" he decided b}'' " the state of Rome
under the first Caesars ;" and of the Spanish American Revo-
lution, by taking the Avar of the United Provinces with Philip
the Second as the groundwork of the comparison. " On
every great occurrence," he says, " I endeavoured to discover,
in PAST niSTOEY the event that most nearly resembled it. I
procured the contemporary historians, memorialists, and
pamphleteers. Then fairly subtracting the points of dife-
rence from those of likeness, as the balance favoured the
former or the latter, I conjectured that the result would,
be the same or different. In the essays ' On the Probable
Final Restoration of the Bourbons,' I feel myself authorised
to affirm, by the effect produced on many intelligent men,
that were the dates wanting, it might have been suspected
that the essays had been written within the last twelve
months."*

In moral predictions on individuals, many have discovered
the future character. The revolutionary character of Cardinal
de Retz, even in his youth, was detected by the sagacity of
Mazarin. He then wrote the histor}'' of the conspiracy of
Fiesco, with such vehement admiration of his hero, that the
Italian politician, after its perusal, predicted that the young
author would be one of the most turbulent spirits of the age!
The father of Marshal Biron, even amid the glory of his son,
discovered the cloud which, invisible to others, Avas to obscure
it. The father, indeed, well knew the fiery passions of his
son, "Biron," said the domestic seer, "I advise thee, when
peace takes place, to go and plant cabbages in thy garden,
otherwise I warn thee, thou wilt lose thy head on the scaf-

* " Biograpbia Literaria; or, Biographical Sketches of my Literary Life
and Opiaious." By S.T. Coleridge, Esq. 1807. YqU i. p. 214.

Prediction. 269

fold !" Lorenzo de' Medici had studied the tomper of his son
Piero ; for Guicciardiiii informs us that he had often com-
phiined to his most intimate friends that "he foresaw the
imprudence and arrogance of his son would occibion the ruin
of his family." There is a remarkable prediction of James
the First of the evils likely to ensue from Laud's violence, in
a conversation given by Haeket, which the king held with
Archbishop Williams. When the king was hard pressed to
promote Laud, he gave his reasons why he intended to " keep
Laud back from all place of rule and authority, because I lind
he hath a restless spirit, and cannot see when matters are
well, but loves to toss and change, and to bring things to a
pitch of reformation floating in his own brain, which endangers
the steadfastness of that which is in a good pass. 1 speak
not at random ; he hath made himself known to me to be
such an one." James then gives the circumstances to which
he alludes ; and at length, when, still pursued by the arch-
bishop, then the organ of Buckingham, as usual, this king's
good nature too easily yielded ; he did not, however, without
closing with this prediction : " Then take him to you ! — but,
on my soul, you will repent it !" The future character of
Cromwell was apparent to two of our great politicians.
"This coarse unpromising man," said Lord Falkland, point-
ing to Cromwell, " will be the first person in the kingdom, if
the nation comes to blows !" And Archbishop Williams told
Charles the First confidentially, " There was that in Cromwell
which foreboded something dangerous, and wished his majesty
would either win him over to him, or get him taken off."
The Marquis of Wellesley's incomparable character of Bona-
])arte predicted his fall when highest in his glor}- ; that great
statesman then poured forth the sublime language of philo-
sophical prophecy. " His eagerness of power is so inordinate;
his jealousy of independence so fierce ; his keenness of appe-
tite so feverish in all tliat touches his ambition, even in the
most trifling things, that he must plunge into dreadful diffi-
culties. He is one of an order of minds that by nature make
lor themselves great reverses."

Lord Mansfield was once asked, after the commencement
of the French Itevolution, when it would end? His lordsliip
replied, " It is an event without precedent, -Awi^ therefore «.•///«-
out prognostic.'" The truth, however, is, that it had both.
Our own history had furnished a precedent iu the times of
Charles the First. And the prognostics were so redundant,

270 Prediction.

that a volume might be collected of passages from various
writers who had predicted it. However ingenious might be
a history of the Reformation before it occurred, the evidence
could not be more authentic and positive than that of the
great moral and political revolution which we have witnessed
in our own days.

A prediction which Bishop Butler threw out in a sermon
before the House of Lords, in 1741, does honour to his poli-
tical sagacity, as well as to his knowledge of human nature ;
he calculated that the irreligious spirit would produce, some
time or other, political disorders similar to those which, in
the seventeenth century, had arisen from religious fanaticism.
"Is there no danger," he observed, "that all this may raise
somewhat like that levelling spirit, upon atheistical principles,
which in the last age prevailed upon enthusiastic ones ? Not
to speak of the possibility that different sorts of people may
unite in it upon these contrary principles f All this literally
has been accomplished ! Leibnitz, indeed, foresaw the result?
of those selfish, and at length demoralizing, opinions, which
began to prevail through Eui'ope in his day. These disor-
ganizing principles, conducted by a political sect, who tried
" to be worse than they could be," as old Montaigne expresses
it ; a sort of men who have been audaciously congratulated
as "having a taste for evil;" exhibited to the astonished
world the dismal catastrophe the philosopher predicted. I
shall give this remarkable passage. " T find that certain
opinions approaching those of Epicurus and Spinoza, are, little
by little, insinuating themselves into the minds of the great
rulers of public affairs, who serve as the guides of others, and
on whom all matters depend ; besides, these opinions are also
sliding into fashionable books, and thus tliey are preparing
all things to that general eevolution ivhich menaces
Europe ; destroying those generous sentiments of the
ancients, Greek and Roman, which preferred the love of
country and public good, and the cares of posterity, to for-
tune and even to life. Our public spirits,* as the English
call them, excessively diminish, and are no more in fashion,
and will be still less while the least vicious of these men pre-
serve only one principle, which they call honour ; a principle

* Public spirit, and public spirits, were about the year 1700 household
words with us. Leiljuitz was struck by their significance, but it might
Duw puzzle us to find synonyms, or even to explain the very terras thcia-
Belves.

Prediction. 271

which only keeps them from not doing what they deem a
low action, while they openly laugh at the love of country —
ridicule those wlio are zealous for public ends — and wlien a
well-intentioned man asks what will become of tlieir poste-
rity, they reply ' Then, as now !' But it may happen to these
persons themselves to have to endure those evils which they
believe are reserved for others. If this epidemical and intel-
lectual disorder could be corrected, tvhose bad effects are
already visible, those evils might still be prevented ; but if it
proceeds in its growth. Providence ivill correct man by the
very revolution ivhich 7nust spring from it. Whatever may
happen indeed, all must turn out as usual for the best in
general, at the end of the account, although this cannot
happen without the punishment of those who contribute even
to general good by their evil actions." The most superficial
reader will hardly require a commentary on this very remark-
able passage ; he nmst instantly perceive how Leibnitz, in
the seventeenth century, foresaw what has occurred in the
eighteenth ; and the prediction has been verified in the his-
tory of the actors in the late revolution, while the result,
which we have not perhaps yet had, according to Leibnitz's
own exhilarating system of optimism, is an eduction of good
from evil.

A great genius, who was oppressed by malignant rivals in
his own times, has been noticed by Madame de Staiil, as
having left behind him an actual prophecy of the French Re-
volution : this was Guibert, who, in his Commentary on
Folard's Polybius, published in 1727, declared that "a con-
spiracy is actually forniing in Europe, by means at once so
subtle and etricacious, that I am sorry not to have come into
the world thirty years later to witness its result. It must be
confessed that the sovereigns of Europe wear very bad spec-
tacles. The proofs of it are mathematical, if such proofs ever
were, of a conspirac}'." Guibert unquestionably foresaw the
anti-monarchical spirit gathering up its mighty wings, and
rising over the universe! but could not judge of the nature
of the impulse which he predicted ; prophesying from the
ideas in his luminous intellect, he seems to have been far
more curious about, than certain of, the consequences.
Rousseau even circumstantially predicted the convulsions of
modern Europe. He stood on the crisis of the French Revo-
lution, which he vividly foresaw, for he seriously advised the
hiarher classes of societv to have their children taught some

Z72 Prediction.

useful trade ; a notion highly ridiculed on the lirst appearance
of the Emile : hut at its hour the awful truth struck ! He,
too, foresaw the horrors of that revolution ; for he announced
that Emile designed to emigrate, because, from the moral
state of the people, a virtuous revolution had become impos-
sible.* The eloquence of Burke was often oracular ; and a
speech of Pitt, in ISOO, painted the state of Europe as it was
oniy realised tifteen years afterwards.

But many remarkable predictions have turned out to be
false. Whenever the facts on which the prediction is raised
are altered in their situation, what was relatively true ceases
to operate as a general principle. For instance, to that
striking anticipation which Rousseau formed of the French
revolution, he added, by way of note, as remarkable a pre-
diction on MONAEcnr. tTe tiens pour impossible qiie les
grandes monarcliies de VJ^urope aient encore long tents d,
durer ; toutes ont hrille et tout etat qui hrille est sur son de-
clin. The predominant anti-monarchical spirit among our
rising generation seems to hasten on the accomplishment of
the prophecy ; but if an important alteration has occurred in
the nature of things, we may question the result. If by
looking into the past, Rousseau found facts which sufficiently
proved that nations in the height of their splendour and cor-
ruption had closed their career by falling an easy conquest to
barbarous invaders, who annihilated the most polished people
at a single blow ; we now find that no such power any
longer exists in the great family of Europe : the state of the
question is therefore changed. It is now how corrupt na-
tions will act against corrupt nations equally enlightened ?
But if the citizen of Greneva drew his prediction of the ex-
tinction of monarchy in Europe from that predilection for
democracy which assumes that a republic must necessarily
produce more happiness to the people than a monarchy, then

* This extraordinaiy passage is at the close of the third book of Emile,
to which I must refer the reader. It is curious, however, to observe, that
in 17C0 Rousseau poured forth the following awful predictions, which
were considered quite absurd ;—" Vous vous fiez i I'ordre actuel de
la societe, sans songer que cet ordre est sujet a des revolutions inevitables
— le graud devient petit, le riche devieut pauvre, le monanjue devient
sujet — nous approchons I'etat de crise et du, siecle des revolutions. Que
fera done dans la bassesse ce satrape que vous n'aurez elevc que pour la
grandeur ? Que fera dans la pauvrete, ce publicain qui ne sgait vivre que
i'or ' Que fera, depourvu de tout, ce fastueux imbecille qui ne sait point
user do lui-mcnic '■'' k>:. &c.

Predicflon. 273

wo say that the fatal experiment was again repeated smce
the predietion, and the I'aet proved not true ! The excess of
democracy inevitahly tLrniinates in a monarchical state; and
were all the monarchies in Eurojje at present republics, a
philosopher might safely predict the restoration of mo-
narchy !

If a prediction be raised on facts which our own prejudices
induce us to infer will exist, it must be chimerical. We have
an Universal Chronicle of the Monk Carion, printed in 15:32,
in whicli he announces that the world was about ending,* as
well as his chronicle of it; that the Turkish empire would
not last many years ; tluvt after the death of Charles the
Fifth the empire of Germany would be torn to jjieces by the
Germans themselves. This monk will no longer pass for a
prophet ; he belongs to that class of historians who write to
humour their own prejudices, like a certain lady-prophetess,
who, in 1811, predicted that grass was to grow in Cheapside
about this time If The monk Carion, like others of greater

* This i)rediction of the end of the world is one of the most popular
hallucinations, warmly receiveJ by many whenever it is promulgated. It
I'^d the most marked eflect wheu the cycle of a thousand years after the
birtii of Christ was approaching completion ; and the world was assured
that was the limit of its present state. Numerous acts of piety were per-
formed. Churches were built, religious houses founded, and asceticism
became the order of the day, until the dreaded year was completed without
the accompaniment of the su))' ruatural horrors so generally feared ; the
world soon relapsed into forgetfulness, and went on as before. Very many
prophecies have since been promulgated ; and in defiance of such repeated
failures are still occasionally indulged in by persons from whom better
things might be expected. Richard Brothers, in the last century, and
more than one reverend gentleman in the present one, have been bold
enough to fix au exact time fur the event : but it has passed as quietly as
the thousandth anniversary noted above.

t One of the most eft'ective prophecies against London, and which
frightened for the time a very large number of its inhabitants, was that
given out in the spring of 1750, after a slight shock of an earthquake
was felt in Loudon, and it was prophesied that another should occur
which would destroy the town and all its inhabitants. All the roads were
thronL'ed with persons flying to the country a day or two before the
threatened event ; and they were all unmercifully ridiculed when the day
passed over quietly. Walpole in one of his amusing letters speaks of a
party who went "to an inn ten miles out of town, where they are to play
at brag till five in the morning, and then come back — I sujipose, to look
for the bones of their husbands and families under the rubbish !" Jokeia
who were out late amused themselves by bawling in the watchmen's voice,
" Past four o'clock, and a dreadful earthquake !" A pamphlet ijurportii;:,'
to be "a full and true account" of this earthquake which never happened
was "printed for Tim Tremor, in Fleet-street, ITtiO," and made tho
VOL. III. X

271. Prediction.

name, had miscalculated the weeks of Daniel, and wished
more ill to the Mahometans than suit the Christian cahinets
of Europe to inflict on them ; and, lastly, the monastic his-
torian had no notion that it would please Providence to
prosper the heresy of Luther ! Sir James Mackintosh once
ohserved, " I am sensible that in the field of political pre-
diction veteran sagacity has often been deceived." Sir
James alluded to the memorable example of Harrington, who
published a demonstration of the impossibility of re-esta-
blishing monarchy in England six months before the restora
tion of Charles the Second ! But the author of the Oceana
was a political fanatic, who ventured to predict an event, not
by other similar events, but by a theoretical principle which
he had formed, that " the balance of power depends on that
of property." Harrington, in his contracted view of human
nature, had dropped out of his calculation all the stirring
passions of ambition and party, and the vacillations of the
multitude. A similar error of a great genius occurs in De
Foe. " Child," says Mr. George Chalmers, " foreseeing from
experience that men's conduct must finally be decided by
their 2^^?"c^P^^-?5 toretold the colonial revolt. De Foe,
allowing his prejudices to obscure his sagacity, reprobated
that suggestion, because he deemed interest a more strenuous
prompter than enthusiasm.''^ The predictions of Hamngton
and De Foe are precisely such as we might expect from a
petty calculator, a political economist, who can see nothing
farther than immediate results ; but the true philosophical
predictor was Child, who had read the past. It is probable
that the American emancipation from the mother country of
England was foreseen twenty or thirty years before it
occurred, though not perhaps by the administi'ation. Lord
Orford, writing in 1754, under the ministry of the Duke of
Newcastle, blames " The instructions to the governor of New
York, which seemed better calculated for the latitude of
Mexico, and for a Sj^anish tribunal, than for a free British
settlement, and in such opulence and such haughtiness, that
suspicions had long been conceived of their meditating to throxo

vehicle for much personal satire. Thus it is stated that the "Cojamis-
Bioiers of Westminster-bridge have ordered this calamity to be entered iu
their books, as a glorious excuse for the next sinking pier ;" and that the
town received some comfort upon hearing that "the Inns of Court were
all sunk, and several orders wei-e given that no one should assist in
bringing any one lawyer above ground."

Prediction. 275

of the dependence on tlieir viother-countri/." If tliis was
written at the time, as the author asserts, it is a very re-
markable passage, observes the noble editor of his memoirs.
The prognostics or presages of this revolution it may now be
ditHcult to recover ; but it is evident that Child, before the
time when Lord Orford wrote this passage, predicted the
separation on true and philosophical principles.

Even when the event does not always justify the predic-
tion, the predictor may not have been the less correct in his
principles of divination. The catastrophe of human life, and
the turn of great events, oiten i)rove accidental. Marshal
Biron, whom we have noticed, might have ascended the
throne instead of the scaffold ; Cromwell and De Retz might
have become only the favourite general or the mini^'ter of
their sovereigns. Fortuitous events are not comprehended in
the reach of human prescience ; such must be consigned to
those vuhi'ar superstitions which presume to discover the
issue of human events, without pretending to any human
knowledge. There is nothing supernatural in the prescience
of the philosopher.

Sometimes predictions have been condemned as iuhe ones,
which, when scrutinised, we can scarcely deem to have
failed : they may have been accomplished, and they may
again revolve on us. In 1749 Dr. Hartley published his
"Observations on Man," and predicted the fall of the exist-
ing governments and hierarchies in two simple propositions ;
among others —

Prop. 81. It is probable that all the civil governments will
be overturned.

Prop. 82. It is probable that the present forms of church-
goverimient will be dissolved.

Many were alarmed at these predicted falls of church and
state. Lady Charlotte Wentworth asked Hartley when
these terrible things would happen. The answer of the
predictor was not less awful : "I am an old man, and shall
not live to see them ; but you are a young woman, and pro-
bably will see them." In the subsequent revolutions of
America and of France, and perhaps now of Spain, we can
hardly deny that these predictions had failed. A fortuitous
event has once more thrown back Europe into its old cor-
ners : but we still revolve in a circle, and what is now dark
and remote may again come round, when time has performed
its great cycle. There was a prophetical passage in Hooker's

t2

270 Predict 1071.

Ecclesiastical Polity regarding the church which long occu-
pied the speculations of its expounders. Hooker indeed
seemed to have done what no predictor of events should do ;
he fixed on the period of its accomplishment. In 1597 he
declared that it would " peradventure fall out to he three-
score and ten years, or if strength do awe, into fourscore."
Those who had outlived the revolution in 1G41, when the
long parliament pulled down the ecclesiastical estahlishment,
and sold the church-lands — a circumstance which Hooker
had contemjdated — and were afterwards returned to their
places on the llestoration, imagined that the prediction had
not yet heen completed, and were looking with great anxiety
towards the year 1677, for the close of this extraordinary
prediction ! When Bishop Barlow, in 1675, was consulted
on it, he endeavoured to dissipate the panic, hy referrnig to an
old historian, who had reproached our nation for their prone-
ness to prophecies !* The prediction of the venerable
Hooker in truth had heen fully accomplished, and the event
had occurred without Bishop Barlow having recurred to it ;
so easy it seems to forget what we dislike to remember !
The period of time was too literally taken, and seems to
have been only the figurative expression of man's age in
scriptural language which Hooker had employed ; but no
one will now deny that this prescient sage liad profoundly
foreseen the results of that rising party, whose designs on
church and state were clearly depicted in his own luminous
view.

The philosophical predictor, in foretelling a crisis from the
appearance of things, will not rashly assign the period of time ;
for the crisis which he anticipates is calculated on by that
inevitable march of events which generate each other in
human affairs ; but the period is alwa^'s dubious, being either
retarded or accelerated by circumstances of a nature incapable
of entering into this moral arithmetic. It is probable that a
revolution similar to that of France would have occurred in
this countiy, had it not been counteracted b}'^ the genius of
Pitt. In 1618 it was easy to foretell by the political prog-
Aiostic that a mighty war throughout Europe must neces-

* An eye-witness of the great fire of London has noted the difficulty of
olitaining efiective assistance in endeavouring to stay its progress, owing to
the superstition which seized many persons, because a jirophecy of Jlother
Shiptou's was quoted to show tliat London was doomed to hopeless and
entire destruction.

Prediction. 277

F,an]y occur. At that moment, observes Bayle, the house of
Austria aimed at a universal monarchy ; the consequent
domineerin.'j^ spirit of the ministers of the Emperor and the
King of Spain, combined witli their determination tu extermi-
nate the new rehgion, excited a reaction to this imperial
despotism ; public opinion had been suppressed, till every
people grew impatient ; while their sovereigns, influenced by
national feeling, were combining against Austria. But
Austria was a vast military power, and her generals were the
first of their class. The ellbrts of Europe would then be
often i-epulsed ! This state of affairs prognosticated a long
war ! — and when at length it broke out it lasted thirt}' years !
The approach and the duration of the war might have been
predicted ; but the period of its termination could not have
been foreseen.

There is, however, a spirit of })olltical vaticination which
presumes to pass beyond tlie boundaries of human prescience ;
it has been often ascribed to the highest source of inspiration
by enthusiasts ; but since " the language of prophecy " has
ceased, such pretensions are not less impious than they are
unphilosophical. Knox the reformer possessed an extraordi-
nary portion of this awful prophetic confidence : he appears to
have predicted several remarkable events, and the fates of
some persons. We are told that, condemned to a galley at
Sochelle, he predicted that " within two or three years he
should preach the gospel at Saint Giles's in Edinburgh ;" an
improbable event, which happened. Of Mary and Darnley.
he pronounced that, " as the king, for the queen's pleasure,
had gone to mass, the Lord, in his justice, would make her
the instrument of his overthrow." Other striking [)redictions
f>f the deatlis of Thomas jNIaitland, and of Kirkaldy of Grange,
and the warning he solemnly gave to the Regent Murray not
to go to Linlithgow, where he was assassinated, occasioned a
barbarous people to imagine that the prophet Knox had
received an immediate communication from Heaven. A
Spanish friar and almanac-maker predicted, in clear and
precise words, the death of Henry the Fourth of France ; and
Fieresc, thdugh he had no faith in the vain science of astro*
logy, yet, alarmed at whatever menaced the life of a beloved
monarch, consulted with some of the king's friends, and had
the Spanish almanac laid before his majesty. That high-
spirited monarch thanked them for their solicitude, but
utterly slighted the prediction : tlic event occurred, and in

278 Prediction.

the following year tlie Spanish friar spread his own fame in a
new almanac. I have been occasionally struck at the Jere-
miads of honest George Withers, the vaticinating poet of our
civil \v"">: some of his works afford many solemn predictions.
We may account for many predictions of this class without
the intervention of any supernatural agency. Among the
busy spirits of a revolutionary age, the heads of a party, such
as Knox, have frequently secret communications with s[)ies or
with (riends. In a constant soui'ce of concealed information,
a slirewd, confident, and enthusiastic temper will find ample
matter for nn'sterious prescience. Knox exercised that deep
sagacity which took in the most enlarged views of the future,
as appears b}' his Machiavelian foresight on the barbarous
destruction of the monasteries and the cathedrals — " The best
way to keep the rooks from returning, is to pull down their
nests.'''' In the case of the prediction of the death of Henry
the Fourth, by the Spanish friar, it resulted either from his
being acquainted with the plot, or from his being made an
instrument for their purpose by those who were. It appears
that rumours of Henry's assassination were rife in Spain and
Italy before the event occurred. Such vaticinators as George
Withers will always rise in those disturbed times which bis
own prosaic metre has forcibly depicted : —

It may be on that darkness, which they find
^Yithin their hearts, a sudden light hath shin'd,
Jlalving reflections of some things to come,
Which leave within them musings troublesome
To their weak spirits ; or too intricate
For them to put in order, and relate.
They act as men in ecstasies have done —
Striving their cloudy visions to declare —
And I, perhaps, among these may be one
That was let loose for service to be done :
I blunder out what worMly-prudent men
Count madnesse. — P. 7.*

Separating human prediction from inspired prophec}'', we
only ascribe to the faculties of man that acquired prescience
which we have demonstrated that some gi'eat minds have
unquestionabl}'' exercised. We have discovered its principles
in the necessary dependence of effects on general causes, and
we have shown that, impelled by the same motives, and
circumscribed by the same passions, all human affairs revolve

* " A Dark Lantherne, offering a dim Discoveiy, intermixed with Re-
membrances, Predietious, &c. 1652."

Prediction, 279

in a circle ; and we have opened the true source of this yet
imperfect science of moral and political prediction, in an
intimate but a discriminative knowledge of the r.vST.

Authority is sacred, wlien experience affords parallels and
analogies. If much which may overwhelm when it shall
happen can be foreseen, the prescient statesman and moralist
may provide defensive measures to break the watery, whose
streams they cannot always direct; and the venerable Hooker
has profoundly observed, tbat " the best things have been over-
thrown, not so much by puissance and might of adversaries,
as through defect of council in those that should have upheld
and defended the same." *

The philosophy of history blends the past with the present,
and combines the present with the future : each is but a por-
tion of the other ! The actual state of a thing is necessarily
determined by its antecedent, and thus progressively through
tlie chain of human existence ; while " the present is always
full of the future," as Leibnitz has happily expressed the idea.

A new and beautiful light is thus thrown over the annals
of mankind, by the analogies and tlie parallels of different
ages in succession. How the seventeenth century has
influenced the eighteenth ; and tlie results of the nineteenth
as they shall appear in the twentieth, might open a source of
predictions, to which, however difficult it might be to affix
their dates, there would be none in exploring into causes, and
tracing their inevitable ell'ects.

The multitude live only among the shadows of things in
the appearances of the pkksent ; the learned, busied witli the
PAST, can only trace whence and how all comes ; but he who
is one of the people, and one of the learned, the true philosG
pher, views the natural tendency and terminations which are
preparing for the fuxuee !

* Hooker wrote this about 1560, and he wrote before the Sidcle des Re-
volutions had begun, even among ourselves ! He penetrated into this im-
portant principle merely by the force of his own meditation. At (his
moment, after more practical experience in political revolutions, a very in-
telligent French writer, in a pamphlet, entitled "M. da Yillele," says,
"Experience proclaims a gieat truth — namely, that revolutions them-
selves cannot succeed, except when they are favoured by a portion of the
GovEnNMENT." He illustrates tlie axiom by the different revolutions
which have occurred in his nation withiu these thirty years. It is the
same truth, traced to its source by another road.

280

DEEAJIS AT THE DAWN OF PHILOSOPHY.

MoDEUN philosophy, theoretical or experimental, only amuses
^vhile the action of discovery is suspench.'d or advances ; the
interest ceases with the inquirer when the catastrophe is
ascertained, as in the romance whose denouement turns on a
mysterious incident, which, once unfolded, all future agitation
ceases. But in the true infancy of science, philosophei's were
as imaginative a race as poets : marvels and portents, unde-
monstrable and undefinable, with occult fancies, perpetually
beginning and never ending, were delightful as the shifting
cantos of Ariosto. Then science entranced the eye by its
thaumaturgy ; when they looked through an optic tube, they
believed they were looking into futurity ; or, starting at
some shadow darkening the glassy globe, beheld the absent
person ; while the mechanical inventions of art were toys and
tricks, with sometimes an automaton, which frightened them
with life.

The earlier votaries of modern philosophy only witnessed,
as Gaffarel calls his collection, " Unheard-of Curiosities."
This state of the marvellous, of which we are now for ever
deprived, prevailed among the philosophers and the virtuosi
:n Europe, and with ourselves, long after the establishment
of the Eoyal Societ3^ Philosophy then depended mainly on
authority — a single one, however, was sufficient : so that when
this had been repeated by fift}^ others, they had the authority
of fifty honest men — whoever the first man might have been !
They were then a blissful race of children, rambling here and
there in a golden age of innocence and ignorance, where at
every step each gifted discoverer whispered to the few, some
half-concealed secret of nature, or pla3^ed with some toy of
art ; some invention which with great difliculty performed
what, without it, might have been done with great ease.
The cabinets of the lovers of mechanical arts formed
enchanted apartments, where the admirers feared to stir or
look about tliem ; while the philosophers themselves half
imagined they were the very thaumaturgi, for which the
world gave them too much credit, at least for their quiet !
Would we run after the shadows in this gleaming land of
moonshine, or Ej)ort with these children in the fresh morning
of science, ere Aurora had scarcely peeped on the hills, we
must enter into their i'eelings, view with their eyes, and

Dreams at the Dawn of Philosop/i//. 281

believe all they confide to us; and out of these bundles of
dreams sometimes piek out one or two for our own dreaming.
They are the fairy tales and the Arabian Nights' entertain-
ments of science. But if the reader is stubbornly mathema-
tical and logical, he will only be holding up a great torch
against the muslin curtain, upon which the fantastic shadows
playing upon it must vanish at the instant. It is an amuse-
ment which can only take place by carefully keeping himself
in the dark.*

What a subject, were 1 to enter on it, would be the narra-
tives of magical writers ! These precious volumes have been
so constantly wasted by the profane, that now a book of real
magic requires some to Hnd it, as well as a great magician to
use it. Albertus Magnus, or Albert the Great, as he is erro-
neously styled — for this sage only derived this enviable epithet
fi'om his surname De Groot, as did Hugo Grotius — this sage,
in his " Admirable Secrets," delivers his opinion that these
books of magic should be most preciously preserved ; for, he
prophetically added, the time is arriving when they would be
understood ! It seems they were not intelligible in the thir-
teenth century; but if Albertus has not miscalculated, in the
present day they may be! Magical terms with talismanic
figures may yet conceal many a secret ; gunpowder came down
to us in a sort of anagram, and the kaleidoscope, with all its
interminable multiplications of forms, lay at hand for two
centuries in Eaptista Porta's "Natural Magic." The abbot
Trithemius, in a confidential letter, happened to call himself
a magician, perhaps at the moment he thought himself one,
and sent three or four leaves stuffed with the names of devils
and with their evocations. At the death of his friend these
leaves fell into the unworthy hands of the prior, who was so
frightened on the first glance at the diabolical nomenclature,
that he raised the country against the abbot, and Trithemius
was neai'ly a lost man ! Yet, after all, this evocation of devils
has reached us in his " Steganographia," and proves to be
only one of this ingenious al)bot's polygraphic attempts at
secret writinri ; for he had flattered himself that he had in-
vented a mode of concealing his thoughts from all the world,
while he communicated them to a friend, lioger Bacon pro-
mised to raise thunder and lightning, and disperse clouds by
dissolving them into rain. The first magical process has been

* Godwin's amusiug Lives of the Necromancers abound iu marvelloua
^^toriec of the siipernutural feats of these old studeutss.

282 Dreams at the Dawn of Philosophy.

obtained by Franklin ; and the otlier, of far more use to our
agriculturists, may percbance be found lurking in some corner
wbieh bas been overlooked in tlie " Opus majus" of our
" Doctor mirabilis." Do we laugb at tbeir magical works of
art ? Are we ourselves sucb indifferent artists ? Cornelius
Agrippa, before be wrote bis "Vanity of tlie Arts and Sciences,"
intended to reduce into a system and metbod tbe secret of
communicating witb spirits and demons.* On good autbority,
tbat of Porpbyrius, Psellus, Plotinus, Jamblicbus — and on
better, were it necessary to allege it — be was well assured
tbat tbe upper regions of tbe air swarmed witb wbat tbe
Gi'eeks called dcsmones, just as our lower atmosphere is lull of
birds, our waters of fisb, and our eartb of insects. Yet this
occult philosopher, who knew perfectly eight languages, and
married two wives, with whom he had never exchanged a
harsh word in any of them, was everywhere avoided as having
by his side, for bis companion, a personage no less than a
demon ! This was a great black dog, v/hom he suffered to
stretch himself out among his magical manuscripts, or lie on
his bed, often kissing and patting him, and feeding him on
choice morsels. Yet for this would Paulus Jovius and all the
world have had him put to the oi'deal of fire and fagot ! The
truth was afterwards boldly asserted by Wierus, his learned
domestic, who believed tbat his master's dog was really no-
thing more than what he appeared ! " I believe," says he,
" that be was a real natural dog ; be was indeed black, but of
a modei'ate size, and I have often led him by a string, and
called him by the French name Agrippa had given him,
Monsieur ! and he had a female who was called Mademoiselle!
I wonder how authors of such great character should write so
absurdly on his vanishing at his death, nobody knows bow!"
But as it is probable tbat Monsieur and Mademoiselle must
have generated some puppy demons, Wierus ought to have
been more circumstantial.

Albertus Magnus, for thirty years, had never ceased work-
ing at a man of brass, and had cast together tbe qualities of
bis materials under certain constellations, which threw such

* Agrippa was the most fortunate and honoured of occult philosophers.
He was lodged at courts, and favoured by all his contemporaries. Sclio-
lars like Erasmus spoke of him with admiration ; and royalty constantly
sought his powers of divination. But in advanced life he was accused of
Borcery, and died poor in 1534.

Dreams at the Dawn of Philosophy. 283

a spirit into his man of brass, that it was reported his growth
was visible ; his feet, legs, thighs, shoulders, neck, and head,
expanded, and made the city of Cologne uneasy at possessing
one citizen too mighty ibr them all. This man of brass, when
he reached his maturity, was so loquacious, that Albert's
master, the great scholastic Thomas Aquinas, one day, tired
of his babble, and declaring it was a devil, or devilish, with
his staff knocked the head off; and, what was extraordinary,
this brazen man, like any human being thus effectually silenced,
" word never spake more." This incident is equally historical
and authentic ; thougli whether heads of brass can speak, and
even prophesy, was indeed a subject of profound inquiry even
at a later period.* Naude, who never questioned their vocal
powers, and 3'et was puzzled concerning the nature of tliis new
species of animal, has no doubt most judicious!}' stated the
question. Whether these speaking brazen heads had a sensi-
tive and reasoning nature, or whether demons spoke in them ?
But brass has not the fixculty of providing its own nourish-
inent, as we see in plants, and therefore they were not sensi-
tive ; and as for the act of reasoning, these brazen heads pre-
sumed to know nothing but the future : with the past and
the present they seemed totally unacquainted, so that their
memory and their observation were very limited ; and as for
the future, that is always doubtful and obscure — even to
heads of brass ! This learned man then infers that " These
brazen heads could have no reasoning faculties, for nothing
altered their nature ; they said what they had to .say, wln'ch
no one could contradict ; and having said their say, you might
have broken the head for anything more that you could have
got out of it. Had they had any life in them, would they
not have moved as well as spoken ? Life itself is but mo-
tion, but they had no lungs, no spleen ; and, in fact, though
tliey spoke, they had no tongue. Was a devil in them ? I
think not. Yet why should men have taken all this trouble
to make, not a man, but a trumpet ?"

Our profound philosopher was right not to agitate the ques-
tion whether these brazen heads had ever spoken. Why

* One of the most popular of our old English prose romances, " The Histo-
rie of Fryer Bacon," narrates how he had intended to " wall England about
with brass," by means of such a brazen head, had not the stupidity of .1
servant prevented him. The tale may be read in Thorns' "Collection of
Early English Prose Eomauces."

284 Dreams at tlie Dawn, of Philosophy.

sliould not a man of brass speak, since a doll can whisper, a
statue play chess,* and brass ducks have pei'fbrmed the whole
process of digestion ?t Another magical invention has been
ridiculed with equal I'eason. A magician was annoyed, as
philosophers still are, by passengers in the street; and he.
particulai-l}^ so, by having horses led to drink under his win-
dow. iHe made a magical horse of wood, according to one
of the books of Hermes, which perfectly answered its pur-
pose, by frightening away the horses, or rather the grooms !
the wooden horse, no doubt, gave some palpable kick. The
same magical story might have been told of Dr. Franklin,
who finding that under his window the passengers had disco-
vered a spot which they made too convenient I'or themselves,
he charged it with his newly-discovered electrical fire. After
a few remarkable incidents had occurred, which at a former
l)eriod would have lodged the great discoverer of electricity
in the Inquisition, the modern magician succeeded just as
well as the ancient, who had the advantage of conning over
the books of Hermes. Instead of ridiculing these works of
magic, let us rather become magicians ourselves !

The works of the ancient alchemists have afforded number-
less discoveries to modern chemists : nor is even their grand
operation despaired of. If they have of late not heen so re-
nowned, this has arisen from a want of what Ashmole calls
"apertness;" a qualification early inculcated among these
illuminated sages. We find authentic accounts of some who
have lived three centuries, with tolerable complexions, pos-
sessed of nothing but a crucible and a bellows ! but they were
so unnecessarily mysterious, that whenever such a person

* The allusion here is to the automaton chess-player, first exhibited by
Keinpeleii (its inventor) in England about 1785. The figure was habited
as a Turk, and placed behind a cliest, this was opened by the exhibitor
to display the machinery, which seemed to give the figure motion, while
playing intricate games of chess with any of the spectators. But it has
been fully demonstrated that this chest could conceal a full-grown man,
•who could place his arm down that of the figure, and direct its movements
in the game ; the machinery being really constructed to hide him, and dis-
arm suspicion. As the whole trick has been demonstrated by diagrams,
the marvellous nature of the machinery is exploded.

+ This brass duck was the work of a very ingenious mechanist, M. Vau-
canson ; it is i-eported to have uttered its natural voice, moved its wings,
drank water, and ate corn. In 1738, he delighted the Parisians by u
figure of a shepherd which played on a pipe and beat a tabor ; and a flute-
player who performed twelve tunes.

Dreams at the Dutvn of Philosophy. 285

was discovered, he was sure in an instant to disappear, and
was never afterwards heard of.

In the " Liber Patris Sapientia)" this selfish cautiousness is
all along impressed on the student for the accoin])lisliment
of the great myster3\ In the commentary on this precious
woi'lc of the alchemist Norton, who counsels.

Be thou in a place secret, by thyself alone,
That no man see or hear what thou shalt say or done.
Trust not thy friend too much wheresoe'er thou go,
For he thou trustest best, sometyme may be thy foe ;

Ashmole observes, that " Norton gives exceeding good advici
to the student in this science where he bids liim be secret in the
carrying on of his studies and operations, and not to let any
one know of his undertakings but his good angel and himself:"
and .^ueh a close and retired breast had Norton's master, who,

When men disputed of colours of the rose,

He would not speak, but kept himself full close !

We regret that by each leaving all his knowledge to " his
good angel and himself," it has happened that " the good
angels" have kept it all to themselves !

It cannot, however, be denied, that if they could not always
extract gold out of lead, they sometimes succeeded in washino
away the pimples on ladies' faces, notwithstanding that Sir
Kenelm Digby poisoned liis most beautiful lady, because, as
Sancho would have said, he was one of those who would
" have his bread whiter than the finest wheaten." Van Hel-
mont, who could not succeed in discovering the true elixir of
life, however hit on the spirit of hartshorn, which for a o-ood
while he considered was the wonderful elixir itself, restorino"
to life persons who seemed to have lost it. And thou"-h this
delightful enthusiast could not raise a ghost, yet he thought
he had ; for he raised something aerial from spa-water, which
mistaking for a ghost, he gave it that very name ; a name
which we still retain in ffcm, from the German geist, or ghost !
Paracelsus carried the tin}'- spirits about him in the hilt
of his great sword ! Having first discovered the qualities of
laudanum, this illustrious quack made use of it as an universal
remedy, and disti-ibuted it in the form of pills, which he car-
ried in the basket-hilt of his sword ; the operations he per-
formed were as rapid as they seemed magical. Doubtless wo

286 Dreams at the Datvn of Philosophy.

have lost some inconceivable secrets by some unexpected
occurrences, which the secret itself it would seem ought to
have prevented taking place. When a philoso])her had disco-
vered the art of prolonging life to an indefinite period, it is
most provoking to find that he should have allowed himself
to die at an early age ! We have a very authentic history
from Sir Kenelm Digby himself, that when he went in dis-
guise to visit Descartes at his retirement at Egmond, lament-
ing the brevity of life, which hindered philosophers getting
on in their studies, the French philosopher assured him that
" he had considered that matter ; to render a man immortal
was what he could not promise, but that he was very sure it
was possible to lengthen out his life to the period of the
patriarchs." And when his death was announced to the
world, the Abbe Picot, an ardent disciple, for a long time
would not believe it possible ; and at length insisted, that if
it had occurred, it must have been owing to some mistake of
the philosopher's.

The late Holcroft, Loutherbourg, and Cosway, imagined
that they should escape the vulgar era of scriptural life by re-
organizing their old bones, and moistening their dry marrow;
their new principles of vitality were supposed by them to be
found in the powers of the mind ; this seemed more reason-
able, but proved to be as little efficacious as those other phi-
losophers, who imagine they have detected the hidden prin-
ciple of life in the eels frisking in vinegar, and allude to " the
bookbinder who creates the book-worm !"

Paracelsus has revealed to us one of the grandest secrets
of nature. When the world began to dispiate on the very
existence of the elementary folk, it was then that he boldly
offered to give birth to a fairy, and has sent down to pos-
terity the recipe. He describes the impurity which is to be
transmuted into such purity, tlie gross elements of a delicate
fairy, which, fixed in a phial, placed in fuming dung, will in
due time settle into a full-grown fairy, bursting through its
vitreous prison — on the vivifying principle by which the
ancient Egyptians hatched their eggs in ovens. I recollect,
at Dr. Farmer's sale, the leaf which preserved this recipe for
making a fairy, forcibly folded down by the learned commen-
tator ; from which we must infer the credit he gave to the
experiment. There was a greatness of mind in Paracelsus,
who, having furnished a recipe to make a fairy, had the deli-
cacy to refrain from its fonuation. Even lJaptii:;ta Porta,

Dreams at the Dawn of Philosophy. 287

one of the most enlightenecl philosophers, does not deny the
possibility of engendering creatures which, " at their full
growth, shall not exceed the size of a mouse ;" but he adds,
" they are only pretty little dogs to play with." Were these
akin to the fairies of Paracelsus ?*

They were well convinced of the existence of such elemental
beings ; frequent accidents in mines showed the potency of
the metallic spirits, which so tormented the workmen in some
of the German mines b}' blindness, giddiness, and sudden
sickness, that they have been obliged to abandon mines well
known to be rich in silver. A metallic spirit at one sweep
annihilated twelve miners, who were all found dead together.
The fact was unquestionable ; and the safety-lamp was un-
discovered.

Never was a philosophical imagination more beautiful than
that exquisite Fallngoiesis, as it has been termed from the
Greek, or a regeneration : or rather the apparitions of animals
and plants. Schott, Kircher, Gaffarel, Borelli, Digby, and
the whole of that admirable school, discovered in the ashes
of plants their primitive forms, which were again raised up
by the force of heat. Nothing, they say, perishes in nature ;
all is but a continuation, or a revival. The semina of resur-
rection are concealed in extinct bodies, as in the blood of
man ; the ashes of roses will again revive into roses, though
smaller and paler than if they had been planted ; unsub-
stantial and unodoriferous, they are not roses which grow on
rose-trees, but their delicate apparitions ; and, like appari-
tions, they are seen but for a moment ! The process of the
Palingenesis, this picture of immortality, is described. These
philosophers having burnt a flower, by calcination disengaged
the salts from its ashes, and deposited tiiem in a glass phial ;
a chemical mixture acted on it, till in the fermentation they
assumed a bluish and a spectral hue. This dust, thus excited
by heat, shoots upwards into its primitive forms ; by sym-
pathy the parts unite, and while each is returning to its
destined place, we see distinctly the stalk, the leaves, and
the tlower arise ; it is the pale spectre of a flower coming
slowly forth from its ashes. The heat passes away, the
magical scene declines, till the whole matter again precipi-
tates itself into the chaos at the bottom. This vegetable
phcenix lies thus concealed in its cold ashes till the presence

* This great charlatan, after mauy successful impositions, ended Lia
I'fe in poverty in the hospital at Saltzbourg, in 1541,

288 Dreams at the Davn of Philosophy.

of heat produces this resurrection — in its absence it returns
to its death. Thus the dead naturally revive ; and a corpse
may give out its shadowy re-animation when not too .deeply
buried in the earth. Bodies corrupted in their graves have
risen, particularly the murdered ; for murderers are apt to
bury their victims in a slight and hasty manner. Their
salts, exhaled in vapour by means of their fermentation, have
arranged themselves on the surface of the eartli, and formed
those phantoms, which at night have often terrified the pass-
ing spectator, as authentic history witnesses. They have
opened the graves of the phantom, and discovered the bleed-
ing corpse beneath ; hence it is astonishing how manj' ghosts
may be seen at night, after a recent battle, standing over
their corpses ! On the same principle, m}' old philosopher
Gaffarel conjectures on the raining of frogs; but these frogs,
we must conceive, can only be the ghosts of frogs ; and
GafFarel himself has modestly opened this fact by a " perad-
venture." A more satisfactory origin of ghosts modern
pliilosophy has not afforded.

And who does not believe in the existence of ghosts ? for,
as Dr. More forcibly says — " That there should be so uni-
versal a fame and fear of that which never was, nor is, nor
can be ever in the world, is to me the greatest miracle of all.
If there had not been, at some time or other, true miracles,
it had not been so easy to impose on the people by false.
The alchemist would never go about to sophisticate metals to
pass them off for true gold and silver, unless that such a thing
was acknowledged as true gold and silver in the world."

The i)h.armacopoeia of those times combined more of morals
with medicine than our own. They discovered that the agate
rendered a man eloquent and even witty ; a laurel leaf placed
on the centre of the skull fortified the memor}^ ; the brains
of fowls and birds of swift wing wonderfully helped the
imagination. All such specifics have now disappeared, and
have greatly reduced the chances of an invalid recovering
that which perhaps he never possessed. Lentils and rape-
seed were a certain cure for the small-pox, and very obviously
— their grains resembling the spots of this disease. They
discovered that those who lived on " fair" plants became fair,
those on fruitful ones were never barren : on the principle
that Hercules acquired his mighty strength by feeding on
the marrow of lions. But their talismans, provided they
were genuine, seem to have been wonderfully operative ; and

Dreams at the Dawn of Philosophy. 280

had we the same confidence, and melted down the guineas
we give ph^'sicians, engraving on them talismanic figures, I
would answer I'or the good efi'ects of the experiment. Naude,
indeed, has utterly ridiculed the occult virtues of talismans,
in his defence of Virgil, accused of being a magician : the
])oet, it seems, cast into a well a talisman of a horse-leech,
graven on a plate of gold, to drive away the great numljcr of
horse-leeches which infested Naples. Naude positively denies
that talismans ever possessed any such occult virtues : Gaifarel
regrets that so judicious a man as Naude should have gone
this lengtli, giving the lie to so many authentic authors ; and
Naudc's paradox is indeed as strange as his denial ; he sus-
I'ccts the thing is not true ])ecause it is so generally told !
" It leads one to suspect," says he, "as animals are said to
have been driven away from so many places by these talis-
mans, whether they were ever driven from any one place."
Galfarel, suppressing by his good temper his indignant feel-
ings at such reasoning, turns the paradox on its maker : —
" As if, because of the great number of battles that Hannibal
is reported to have fought with the Romans, we might not,
by the same reason, doubt whether he fought any one with
them." The reader must be aware that the strength of the
argument lies entirely with the firm believer in talismans.
Gadarel, indeed, who passed liis days in collecting " Curiosites
inouie.V is a most authentic historian of unparalleled events,
even in his own times ! Such as that heavy rain in Poitou,
which showered down " petites bestioles," little creatures like
bishops with their mitres, and monks with their capuchin:)
over their lieads ; it is true, afterwards they all turned into
butterfiies !

The nmseums, the cabinets, and the inventions of our
early virtuosi were the baby-houses of philosophers. 13aptista
Porta, Bishop Wilkins, and old Ashmole, were they now
living, had been enrolled among the quiet members of " The
Society of Arts," instead of fiying in the air, collecting "a
wing of the jjlioenix, as tradition goes ;" or catching the dis-
jointed syllables of an old doting astrologer. But these early
dilettanti had not derived the same pleasure from the useful
inventions of the aforesaid " Society of Arts" as they received
from what Cornelius Agrippa, in a lit of spleen, calls " things
vain and superlluous, invented to no other end but for pomp
and idle pleasure." Baplista Purta was more skilful in the
mysteries of art and nature than any man in his day. Having

VOL. IIT. U

290 Dreams at ilie Dawn of Philosophy.

founded the Academy de^li Oziosi, be held an inferior asso-
ciation in his own house, called di Secrcti, where none was
admitted hut those elect who had communicated some secret;
for, in the early period of modern art and science, the slightest
novelty became a secret, not to lie confided to the uniuitiated.
Porta was unquestionably a fine genius, as his works still
show; but it was his misfortune that he attributed his own
penetrating sagacity to his skill in the art of divination. He
considered himself a prognosticator ; and, what was more un-
fortunate, some eminent persons really thought he was.
Pi'cdictions and secrets are harmless, provided they are not
believed : but his Holiness finding Porta's were, warned him
that magical sciences were great hindrances to the study of
the Bible, and paid him the compliment to forbid his prophe-
sj'ing. Porta's genius was now limited to astonish, and
sometimes to terrily, the more ingenious part of / Secreti.
On entering his cabinet, some phantom of an attendant was
sure to be hovering in the air, moving as he who entered
moved ; or he observed in some mirror that his face was
twisted on the wrong side of his shoulders, and did not quite
think that all was right when he clapped his hand on it ; or
passing through a darkened apartment a magical landscape
burst on him, with human beings in motion, the boughs of
trees bending, and the very clouds passing over the sun ; or
sometimes banquets, battles, and himting-parties were in the
same apartment. " All these spectacles my friends have wit-
nessed !" exclaims the self-dehghted Baptista Porta. When
his friends drank wine out of the same cup which he had
used, they were mortified with wonder ; for he drank wine,
and they only water ! or on a summer's day, when all com-
plained of the sirocco, he would freeze his guests with cold
air in the room; or, on a sudden, let off a flying dragon to
sail along with a cracker in its tail, and a cat tied on his
hack ; shrill was the sound, and awful was the concussion ; so
that it required strong nerves, in an age of apparitions and
devils, to meet this great philosopher when in his besb
humour. Albei'tus Magnus entertained the Earl of Holland,
as that earl passed through Cologne, in a severe winter, with
a warm summer scene, luxuriant in i'ruits and flowers. The
fact is related by Trithemius — and this magical scene con-
nected with his vocal liend, and his books De iSccrefis Mulic'
rum, and De Mirahi/ibus, confirmed the accusations they
rai-sed against the great Albert for beinor a mauician. His

Dreams at the Dawn of Pkilosophij. 291

apoloijist, TliL'()i)liilus Hayiiaud, is driven so hard to dLfeiid
Alliertus, that he at once assorts the winter changed to sum-
mer and the speaking head to be two infjxmous flams ! He
will not believe these authenticated facts, although he credits
a miracle whicii j>roves the sanctity of Alhertus, — after three
centuries, the body of Albert the Great remained as sweet as
ever !

"Whether such enchauntments," as old Mandeville eau*
tiuusly observeth, two centuries preceding the days of Porta,
were " by craft or by nygroniancye, I wot uere." Uut that
they wt're not unknown to Chaucer, appears in his " Franke-
lein's Tale," where, minutely describing them, he communi-
cates the same ]ileasure he must himself have received from
the ocular illusions of "the Tregetoure," or " Jogelour."
Chaucer ascribes the miracle to a "naturall magique !" in
which, however, it was as unsettled whether the " Prince of
Darkness" was a party concerned.

For I am siker that there be sciences
By which men maken divers apparences
Swiche as thi.se subtil tregetoures play.
For oft at festes have I wel herd say
That tregetoures, within an halle hirge,
Have made come in a water and a barge.
And in the halle rowen up and doun.
Sometime hath semed come a grim leoun,
And sometime tluures spring a.s in a metle,
Sometime a vine and grapes white and rede,
Sometime a castel al of lime and ston,
And whan hem liketh voideth it anon :
Thus semeth it to every manues sight.

r.isliop Wilkins's museum was visited by Evelyn, who
descrilies the sort of curiosities which occupied and amused
the children of science. " Here, too, there was a hollow
statue, which gave a voice, and uttered words by a long con-
cealed pipe that went to its mouth, whilst one speaks through
it at a good distance:" a circumstance Avhieh, perhaps, they
were not then aware revealed the whole mystery of the ancient
oracles, which they attributed to demons rather than to
tubes, pulleys, and wheels. The learned Charles Patin, in
his scientitic travels, records, among other valuable produc-
tions of art, a cherry-stone, on which were engraven about a
dozen and a half of portraits ! Even the greatest of human
geniuses, Leonardo da Vinci, to attract the royal patronage,
oreated a lion whieli ran before the French monarch, dropping

IJ 2

292 Dreams at the Dawn of Philosophy.

jleurs de lit; from its shaggy breast. And another philosopher
who had a spinnet wliich played and stopped at command,
might have made a revolution in the arts and sciences, had
the half-stifled child that was concealed in it not been forced,
unluckily, to crawl into daylight, and thus it was proved that
a philosopher might be an impostor !

The arts, as well as the sciences, at the first institution of
the Royal Society, were of the most auiusing class. The
famous Sir Samuel Moreland had turned his house into an
enchanted palace. Everything was full of devices, which
showed art and mechanism in perfection : his coach carried a
travelling kitchen; for it had a fire-place and grate, with
which he could make a soup, broil cutlets, and roast an egg;
and he di'essed his meat by clock-work. Another of these
virtuosi, who is described as " a gentleman of superior order,
and whose house was a knickknackatory," valued himself on
his multifarious inventions, but most in " sowing salads in the
morning, to be cut for diimer." Tlie house of Winstanley,
who afterwards raised the first Eddystone lighthouse, nrust
Wave been the wonder of the age. If you kicked aside an old
slipper, purposely lying in yonr way, up started a ghost before
you ; or if you sat down in a certainchair, a couple of gigantic
arms would immediately clasp you in. There was an arbour in
the garden, by tlie side of a canal ; you had scarcely seated your-
.^elf when you were sent out afloat to the middle of the canal
— from whence you could not escape till this man of art and
science wound you up to the arbour. What was passing at the
" lloyal Society" was also occurring at the " Academic des
Sciences" at Paris. A great and gouty member of that phi-
losophical body, on the departure of a stranger, would point
to his legs, to show the impossibility of conducting him to
the door ; yet the astonished visitor never failed finding the
virtuoso waiting for him on the outside, to make his final
bow ! While the visitor was going down stairs, this inven-
tive genius was descending with great velocity in a machine
from the window : so that he proved, that if a man of science
cannot force nature to walk down stairs, he may drive her
out at the window !

If tbey travelled at home, they set 03" to note down prodi-
gies. Dr. Plott, in a magnificent project of jom-neying
through England, for the advantage of " Learning and
Trade," and tke discovery of " Antiquities and other Curiosi-
ties," for which he solicited the roval aid which Leland eu-

Dreams at iJic Dawn of Philosophy. 293

joyed, among other notable designs, discriminates a class
thus : " Next I shall inquire of animals ; and first of strange
people." — " Strange accidents that attend corporations or
families, as that the deans of Rocliester ever since the foun-
dation by turns have died deans and bishops ; the bird with a
white breast that haunts the family of Oxenliam near Exeter
just before the deatli of any of that famil}' ; the bodies of
trees that are seen to swim in a pool near Brercton in
Cheshire, a certain warning to the heir of that honourable
family to prepare for the next world." And such remarkablus
as "Number of children, such as the Lady Temple, who be-
fore she died saw seven hundred descended from her."* Tiiis
fellow of the Royal Society, who lived nearly to 1700, was
requested to give an edition of Pliny : we have lost tlie be-
nefit of a most copious commentary ! liishop Hall went to
"the Spa." The wood about that place was haunted not
only b\' " freebooters, but by wolves and witches ; although
these last are ofttimes but one." They were called loups-
garoiix ; and the Greeks, it seems, knew them by the name
of \vKavQpu)TToi, men-wolves : witches that have put on the
shapes of those cruel beasts. " We sawe a boy there, whose
half-face was devoured b}'^ one of them near the village ; yet
so, as that the eare was rather cut than bitten off." Humour
had spread that the boy had had lialf his face devoured ;
when it was examined, it turned out that his ear had only
been scratched ! However, there can be no doubt of the ex-
istence of " witch-wolves ;" ibr Hall saw at Limburgh " one
of those miscreants executed, who confessed on the wheel to
have devoured two-and-forty cliildren in that form." They
would probably have found it difficult to have summoned the
mothers who had lost the children. But observe our philo-
sopher's reasoning : " It would aske a large volume to scan
this problem of lycaniliropy.'" He had laboriously collected
all the evidence, and had added his arguments : the result
oilers a curious instance of acute reasoning on a wrong
principle.f

* Similar popular fallacies may be seen carefully noted in R. Burton's
"Admirable Curiosities, llarities, and Wonders in England, Scotland, and
Ireland," ltiiS4. It is one of tliose euri()us volumes of "folk-lore'' sent
out by Nat. Croucli the bookseller, under a tictitious name.

f Hair.s postulate is, that God's work could not admit of any substan-
tial change, which is above the reach of all infernal powers ; V>ut "Herein
the divell plays the double sopliLster ; the sorcerer with sorcerers. lUe
both d^'udes the witch's couce- 1 and the beholder's eyes." In a word, Hall

291 Drcdiiis at the Dawn of Philosophy.

Men of science and art then passed tlieir days in a bustle
of the marvellous. I will furnish a specimen of philosophical
correspondence in a letter to old John Aubrey. The writer
betrays the versatility of his curiosity by very opposite dis-
coveries. " ]\Iy hands are so full of work that I have no
time to transcribe for Dr. Henry More an account of the
r'arnstable apparition — Lord Keejier North would take it
kindly from you — g-ive a sight of this letter from Barnstable
to Dr. Whitcheot." He had lately heard of a Scotchman
who had been carried by fairies into France ; but the purpose
>)f his present letter is to comnumicate other sort of appari-
tions than the ghost of Barnstable. He had gone to Glas-
tonbury, " to pick up a few berries from the holy thorn wliich
llowered every Christmas day."* The original thorn had
been cut down by a military saint in the civil wars ; but the
trade of the place was not damaged, for they had contrived
not to have a single holy thorn, but several, " by grafting and
inoculation. "t He promises to send these "berries;" but
requests Aubrey to inform "that person of quality who had
rather have a hush, that it was impossible to get one for
him. I am told," he adds, "that there is a person about
Grlastonbury who hath a nursery of them, which he sells for
a crown a piece," but they are supposed not to be "of the
right kind."

The main object of this letter is the writer's " suspicion of
gold in this country;" for which he ofters three reasons.
Tacitus says there was gold in England, and that Agrippa
came to a spot where he had a prospect of Ireland — from

believes in what he cannot understand ! Yet Hall will not believe one of
the Catholic miracles of "the Virgin of Louvain," though Lipsius had
written a book to commemorate "the goddess," as Hall sarcastically calls
lier. Hall was told, with great indignation, in the shop of the bookseller
of Lipsius, that wlien James the First had just looked over this work, he
flung it down, vociferating "Damnation to him that made it, and to liim
that believes it !"

* Thousands flocked to see this " miracle" in the middle ages, and their
presence brought great wealth to the abbey. It was believed to have grown
Hiiraculously from the staff used by St. Joseph. It appears to have been
brought from Palestine, and merely to have flowered in accordance with
its natural season, though differing with ours.

+ Taylor, the water poet, in his "Wonders of the West," 1649, says
that a slip was preserved by a vintner dwelling at Glastonbury, when the
soldiers cut down the tree ; that he set it in his garden, "and he with others
did tell me that the same doth likewise bloom on the 25th day of Decem-
ber, yearly."

Dreams at the. Daiva of Philosophy. 205

which ])lafe lu' wiites; secondly, that '•'an lioiiost man" ha<l
ill tills spot found stones Irom which he had extracted good
gohl, and that he himself "had seen in the broken stones a
clear appearance of gold;" and thirdly, "there is a story
which goes by tradition in that part of the country, that in
the hill alluded to there was a door into a hole, that when
any wanted money they used to go and knock there, that a
woman used to appear, and give to such as came.* At a
time one by greediness or otherwise gave her offence, she
flung to the door, and delivered this old saying, still reinein-
bercd in the country :

'When all the Duns be gone and dead,
Thcu .... Hill sliall shine gokl red.'

My Gmey is, that this relates to an ancient family of this
name, of which there is now but one man left, and he not
likely to have any issue," These arc his three reasons; and
some mines have perhaps been opened with no better ones !
But let us not imagine that this great naturalist was cre-
dulous ; for he tells Aubrey that " lie thought it was but a
monkish tale ibrgcd in the abbey so famous in former time;
but as I have learned not to despise our Ibrefathers, I ques-
tion whether this may not refer to some rich mine in the hill,
formerly in use, but now lost. I shall shortly request you to
discourse with my lord about it, to have advice, &c. In the
mean time it will be best to keep all private for his majesty's
service, his lordship's, and perhaps some private person's
benefit." But he has also positive evidence : " A mason not
long ago coming to the renter of the abbey for a freestone,
and sawing it, out came divers pieces of gold of £3 \Qs.
value apiece, of ancient coins. The stone belonged to some
chimney-work ; the gold was hidden in it, perhaps, when the
Dissolution was near." This last incident of finding coins in
a chimney-piece, which he had accounted for very rationally,
serves only to confirm his dream, that they were coined out

* Many of these tales of treasures in hills, are now reduced to the sim-
ple facts of discoveries being made of coins and personal ornaments, in
tumuli of Human and Saxon settlers in Eii^laiid. In the British Museum
is a gold breastplate found in a grave at Mold, in Flintshire. The grave-
hills of Bohemia have furnished the museum at Vienna with a large number
of gold objects of great size and value. In Russia the dead have been
found placed between large plates of pure gold in the centre of such tumuli ;
and in Ireland very large and valuable gold personal ornaments have been
frequently found in grave-hills.

'^96 On Puck the Commentator.

^i the gold of the mine in the hill; and he becomes more
uro-ent for " a private search into these mines, which 1 have, I
think, a way to." In the postscript he adds an account of
a well, which by washing, wrought a cure on a person deep
in the king's evil. " I hope you don't forget yonv promise
to communicate whatever thing you have relating to your
Idea."

This promised Idea of Aubrey may be found in his MSS.,
under the title of " The Idea of Universal Education." How-
ever whimsical, one would like to see it. Aubrey's life might
Curnish a volume of tliese philosophical dreams : he was a
])erson who from his incessant bustle and insatiable curiosity
was called " The Carrier of Conceptions of the Royal Society."
Many pleasant nights were " privately" enjoyed by Aubrey
and his correspondent about the "Mine in the Hill;" Ash-
mole's manuscripts at Oxford contain a collection of man}^
secrets of the Rosicrucians ; one of the completest inventions
is " a Recipe how to walk invisible." Such were the fancies
which rocked the children of science in their cradles ! and so
I'eeble were the steps of our curious infancy ! — But I start
in my dreams ! dreading the reader may also have fallen
asleep !

" Measure is most excellent," saj^s one of the oracles ;
" to which also we being in like manner persuaded, 0 most
friendly and pious Asclepiades, here finish" — the dreams at
the dawn of philosophy' !

ON PUCK THE COMMENTATOR.

Lttepaet forgeries recently have been frequently indulged
in, and it is urged that they are of an innocent nature; but
impostures more easily practised than detected leave their
mischief behind, to take effect at a distant period ; and as I
shall show, may entrap even the judicious ! It may require
no high exertion of genius to draw up a grave account of an
ancient play-vvright whose name has never reached us, or to
give an extract I'rom a volume inaccessible to our inquiries •
and, as dulness is no proof of spuriousness, forgeries, in time,
mix v/ith authentic documents.*

* A remarkable instance is afifonlcd in tlie present work ; see tlie notv
to the article on Newspapers, in Vol. I., detailing one which has spread
falsity to ;in tnoiuious extent throughout our general literature.

On Puck the Commentator. ^97

We have ourselves witnessed versions of Spanish and Por-
tuguese poets, which are passed on their unsus])ieious readers
without diffieulty, hut in which no parts of tlie pretended
originals can be traced ; and to the ])resent hour, whatever
antiquaries may affirm, the poems of Chatterton* and Ossianf
are veiled in mystery !

If we possessed the secret history of the literary life of
Gcore;e Steevens, it would display an unj)aralleled series cf
arch deception and malicious ingenuity. He has been happily
characterised hy Girtbrd as "the Puck of Commentators!"
Steevens is a creature so spotted over with literary Ibrgeries
and adulterations, that any remarkable one about the time he
flourished may be attributed to him. They were the habits
of a depraved mind, and there was a darkness in his character
many shades deeper than belonged to Puck ; even in the play-
fulness of his invention there was usually a turn of personal
malignity, and the real object was not so much to raise a
laugh, as to "grin horribly a ghastly smile," on the indi-
vidual. It is more than rumoured that he carried his inge-
nious malignity into the privacies of domestic life ; and it is
to be regretted that Mr. Nichols, who might have furnished
much secret history of this extraordinary literary forger, has,
from delicacy, mutilated his collective vigour.

George Steevens usually commenced his operations by
opening some pretended discovery in the evening papers,
which were then of a more literary cast than they are at pre-
sent ; the *SY. James's Clironicle, the General Evening Post,
or the JV/iitehall, were they not dead in body and in spirit,
would now bear witness to his successful eftbrts. The late
Mr. Boswell told me, that Steevens frequently wrote notes on
Shakspeare, purposely to mislead or entrap Malone, and obtain
lor himself an easy triumph in the next edition ! Steevens
loved to assist the credulous in getting up for them some
strange new thing, dancing them, about with a AVill-o'-the-
wisp — now alarming them by a shriek of laughter ! and now
like a grinning Pigwigging sinking them chin-deep into a

* The pretended "antique manuscripts" preserved among the Chatter-
ton papers iu the British Museum, as well as the fac-simile of tne
" Yellow Roll," pulilishcd in the Cambridge edition of Chatterton's workS;
are, however, so totally unlike the writing of the era to which they pur-
port to belong, that no doubt need be entertained as to their falsity.

t They are, hnwcvir, so far determined by the frai^'mcnts of Gaelic ori-
ginals, since iniblished by Scottish antiquaries, that the amplifications of
Alacphersou can be detected,

298 Oil Puck the Coininentator.

quagmire ! Once he presented them with a fictitious portrait
ol' Shakspeare, and when the brotherhood were sufficiently
divided in their opinions, he pounced upon them with a de-
monstration, that every portrait of Shaks])eare jiai-toolc of the
same doubtful authority ! Steevens usually assumed a nom
lie guerre of Collins, a pseudo-commentator, and sometimes of
Amner, who w\as discovered to be an obscure puritanic minister
who never read text or notes of a play-wright, wlienever lie
explored into a " thousand notable secrets" with which he has
polluted the pages of Shakspeare ! The marvellous narrative
of the upas-tree of Java, which Darwin adopted in his {)lan ot
" enlisting imagination under the banner of science," appears
to have been another forgery which amused our " Puck." It
was first given in the London Magazine, as an extract from a
Dutch traveller, but the extract was never discovered in the
original author, and " the effluvia of this noxious tree, which
through a district of twelve or fourteen miles had killed all
vegetation, and had spread the skeletons of men and animals,
affording a scene of melancholy beyond what poets have
described, or painters delineated," is perfectly chimerical. A
splendid flim-flam! When Dr. Berkenhout was busied in
writing, without much knowledge or skill, a history of our
Engllsli authors, Steevens allowed the good man to insert a
choice letter by George Peele, giving an account of a " merry
meeting at the Globe," wherein Shakspeare said Ben Jonson
and Ned AUeyne are admirably made to perform their respec-
tive parts. As the nature of the " Blographia Literaria"
required authorities, Steevens ingeniously added, " Whence I
copied this letter I do not recollect." However, he well knew
it came from the "Theatrical Mirror," where he had first de-
posited tlie precious onginal, to which he had unguardedly
ventured to affix the date of 1600; unluckily, Peele was dis-
covered to have died two years before he wrote his own letter!
The date is adroitly dropped in lierkenhout ! Steevens did
not wish to refer to his original, which I have often seen
quoted as authority. One of these numerous forgeries of our
I'uck ajjpears in an article in Isaac Heed's catalogue, art. 870S.
" The Boke of the Soldan, conteyninge strange mattei's
touchynge his lyfe and deathe, and the ways of his course, in
two partes, 12nio," with this marginal note by Heed — "The
foregoing was written by George Steevens, Esq., from whom I
received it. It was composed merely to impose on ' a literary
friend,' and had its effect j for he was so far deceived as to its

()a Puck the CuiiLinciilatur. 299

authenticity, tiiat lie gave implicit credit to it, and put down
the person's name in whose jiossessiun the original books were
supposed to be."

One of the sort ol" iiiventii)ns whieh 1 attribute to Stee-
veiis has been got up with a deal of romantic eil'eet, to em-
bellish the poetical life of Milton ; and unquestionably must
have sadly per])lcxed his last matter-of-fact editor, who is not
a man to comprehend a ilim-llam ! — fur he has sanctioned the
whole hction, by preserving it in his biographical narrative !
The lirst impulse of INIilton to travel in Italy is ascribed to
the eireumstanee of his having been found asleep at the foot
of a tree in the vicinity of Cambridge, when two foreign
lailies, attracted by the loveliness of the youthful poet,
alighted from their carriage, and having admired him for
some time as they imagined unperceived, the youngest, who
was very beautiful, drew a pencil from her pocket, and
having written some lines, put the paper with her trembling
hand into his own ! But it seems, — for something was to
account how the sleeping youth could have been aware of
these minute particulars, unless he had been dreaming them, —
that the ladies had been observed at a distance by some
friends of INLilton, and they explained to him the whole silent
adventure. Milton on opening the paper read four verses
from Guarini, addressed to those "human stars," his own
eyes ! On this romantic adventure, IMilton set olf fur Italy,
to discover the fair '' incognita," to which undiscovered lady
we are told we stand indebted fur the most impassioned
touches in the Paradise Lost ! We know how IMilton passed
his time in Italy, with Dati, and Gaddi, and Frescobaldi, and
other literary iViends, amidst its academies, and often busied
in book-collecting. Had Milton's tour in Italy been an ad-
venture of knight-errantry, to discover a lady whom he had
never seen, at least he had not the merit of going out of the
direct road to Florence and Rome, nor of having once alluded
to this Dame de ses jjeiisees, in his letters or inquiries among
his friends, who would have thought themselves fortunate to
have introduced so poetical an adventure in the numerous
cauzonl they showered on our youthful poet.

This historiette, scarcely iitted for a novel, first appeared
where generally Steevens's literary amusements were carried
on, in the General Evenimj Fost, or the St. James's Chro-
nicle: and JNIr. Todd, in the improved edition of Milton's
Life, obtained this spurious original, where the reader may

300 On Puck the Commentator.

find it; but the more curious part of the story remaius to l>«
told. Mr. Todd proceeds, " The preceding highl^^-coloured
relation, however, is not singular ; my friend, Mr. Walker,
points out to me a counterpart in the extract from the pre-
face to Poesies de Marguerite-THleanore ClotilJe, depuis
Madame de Surville, JBoete Frangois dii -Z'F. Siecle. Far is,
1803."

And true enough we find among "the family traditions"
of the same Clotilde, that Justine de Levis, great-grand-
mother of this unknown poetess of the fiiteenth century,
walking in a forest, witnessed the same beautiful spectacle
which the Italian Unknown had at Cambridge ; never was
such an impression to be effaced, and she could not avoid
leaving her tablets by the side of the beautiful sleeper, de-
claring her passion in her tablets by four Italian verses !
The very number our Milton had meted to him ! Oh ! these
four verses ! they are as fatal in their number as the date of
Peele's letter proved to George Steevens ! Something still
escapes in the most ingenious fabrication which serves to de-
compose the materials. It is well our veracious historian
dropped all mention of Guarini — else that would have given
that coup de grace — a fatal anachronism ! However, his in-
vention supplied him. with more originality than the adoption
of this story and \X\Qfour verses would lead us to infer. He
tells us how Petrarch was jealous of the g(niius of his Clo-
tilde's grandmother, and has even pointed out a sonnet
which, "among the traditions of the family," was addressed
to her ! He narrates, that the gentleman, when he fairly
awoke, and had read the " four verses," set off for Itah%
which he run over till he found Justine, and Justine found
him, at a tournament at Modena! This parallel adventure
disconcerted our two grave English critics — they find a tale
which they wisely judge improbable, and because they dis-
cover the tale copied, they conclude that " it is not sin-
gular!" This knot of perplexity is, however, easily cut
through, if we substitute, which we are fully justified in,
for " Poete du XV. Siecle"— " du XIX. Siecle." The
"Poesies" of Clotilde are as genuine a fabrication as Chat-
terton's ; subject to the same objections, having many ideas
and expressions which were unknown in the language at tiie
time they arc pretended to have been composed, and exhibit-
ing many imitations of Voltaire and other poets. The pre-
sent story of the rouu Italian verses, and the beautilul

On Puck the Commentator. 301

Srf.'?/>f/-, would he (Hiitc sufficient evidence of the authenticity
oi "the lauiily traditions" ot" Clotilde, drpiiis Madame de
Survillo, and also of" Monsieur De Surville himself; a pre-
tencled editor, who is said to have found by mere accident the
precious manuscript, and while he was copying from the
j)ress, in 1793, these pretty poems, for such they are, of his
grande tante, was shot in the lleign of Terror, and so com-
pletely expired, that no one could ever trace his existence !
'J'he real editor, who we must presume to be the poet, pub-
lished them in 1803.

Such, then, is the liistory of a literary forgery ! A I'uck
composes a short romantic adventure, which is quietly thrown
out to the world in a newspaper or a magazine ; some col-
lector, such as the late Mr. Bindley, who procured for Mr.
Todd his original, as idle at least as he is curious, houses the
Ibrlorn fiction — and it enters into literary history ! A
French Chatterton picks up the obscure tale, and behold,
astonishes the literary inquirers of the very country whence
the imposture sprung ! But the four Italian verses, and the
Steeping Youtti ! Oh! Monsieur Vanderbourg ! for that
gentleman is the ostensible editor of Clotilde's poesies of the
fifteentli century, some ingenious persons are unlucky in this
world ! Perhaps one day we may yet discover that this
" romantic adventure" of Mitt on and Justine de Levis is not
so original as it seems — it may lie hid in the Astree of
D'Urle, or some of the long romances of the Scuderies,
whence the English and the French Chattertons may have
drawn it. To such literary inventors we say with Swift : —

Such are your tricks ;

But siuce you hatcb, pray owu your cLicks !

Will it be credited that for the enjoyment of a temporary
piece of malice, Steevens would even risk his own reputation
as a poetical critic ? Yet this he ventured, by throwing out
of his edition the poems of Shakspeare, with a remaricable
hyper-eriticism, that " the strongest act of parliament that
could be framed would fail to compel readers into their ser-
vice." Not only he denounced the sonnets of Shakspeare,
but the sonnet itself, with an absurd question, " What has
truth or nature to do with sonnets?" The secret history of
tiiis unwarrantable mutilation of a great author by his editor
was, as I was inlbrmed by the late Mr. Bos well, merely done
to spite his rival commentator Maloue, who had taken ex-

303 On Puck the Commentator.

traordlnavy pains In their elucidation. Steevens himself lia<l
formei-l}' reprinted them, but when Malone from these son-
nets claimed for himself one ivy leaf of a commentator's
l)ride, behold, Steevens in a rage would annihilate even
Shakspeare himself, that he might gain a triumph over
Malone ! In the same spirit, but with more caustic plea-
santry, he opened a controversy with Malone respecting
Shakspeare's wife ! It seems that the poet had forgotten to
mention his wife in his copious will ; and his recollection of
Mrs. Shakspeare seems to mark the slightness of his regard,
for he only introduced by an interlineation, a legacy to her of
his " second best bed with the furniture" — and nothing
more ! Malone naturally inferred that the poet had forgot
her, and so recollected her as more strongly to mark how
little he esteemed her. He had already, as it is vulgarly ex-
pressed, " cut her off, not indeed with a shilling, but with an
old bed!"* All this seems judicious, till Steevens asserts the
conjugal affection of the bard, tells us, that the poet having,
when in health, provided for her by settlement, or knowing
that her father had already done so (circumstances entirely
conjectural), he bequeathed to her at his death not merelij an
old piece of furniture, but, peehaps, as a mark of peculiar
tenderness,

The very bed that on his bridal night
Received him to the arms of Belvidera !

Steevens' severity of satire marked the deep malevolence of
his heart ; and INIurphy has strongly pourti'ayed him in his
address to the Malevoli.

Such another Puck was Horace Walpole ! The King of
Prussia's "Letter" to Rousseau, and " The Memorial" pre-
tended to have been signed by noblemen and gentlemen, were
fabrications, as he confesses, only to make mischief. It well
became him, whose happier invention, the Castle of Otranto,
was brought ibrward in the guise of forgery, so unfeelingly to
have reprobated the innocent inventions of a Chatterton.

We have Pucks busied among our contemporaries : whoever
shall discover their history will find it copious though
intricate ; the malignity at least will exceed tenfold the
merriment.

* Mr. Charles Knight, in his edition of Slialcspeare, first clearly pointed
ont the true nature of the bequest. The great poet's estates, with the
exception of a copyhold tenement, expressly mentioned in tlie will, woie

303

LITERARY FORGERIES.

TlIR precefliri!:^ article lias reminded me of a pubject by no
iiit'ans incurious to the lovei's of literature. A lar^-e volume
iiiii^lit be composed on literary iinjiostor.s ; their modes of
deception, however, were frequently repetitions ; particularly
those at the restoration of letters, when there prevailed u
mania for burying spurious auti([uities, that they might after--
uards be bruught to light to confound their contemporaries.
They even perplex us at the present day. More sinister
forgeries have been performed by Scotchmen, of whom Archi-
balil Bower, Lauder, and Macphcrson, are well known.

Even harndess impostures by some unexpected accident
have driven an unwary inquirer out of the course. George
Stcevens must again make his appearance for a memorable
trick played on the antiquary Gough. This was the famous
tombstone on which was engraved the drinking-horn of
Hardvknute, to indicate his last fatal carouse ; for this royal
Dane' died drunk ! To prevent any doubt, the name, in
Saxon characters, was sufficiently legible. Steeped in pickle
to hasten a precocious antiquity, it was then consigned to the
corner of a broker's shop, wliere the antiquarian eye of Gough
oiten pored on the venerable odds and ends ; it perfectly suc-
ceeded on the "Director of the Antiquarian Society." lie
purchased the relic for a trille, and dissertations of a due size
were i)rcparing for the Archajologia ! * Gough never forgave
himself nor Steevens for this flagrant act of inei)titude. On
every occasion in the Gentleman's Magazine, when compelled

freehold. Ills wife was entitled to doicer, or a life interest of one-third of
the ^iroceeds arising from lands or tenements the property of Siiiikspeare,
and which were of considerable value, she was thus amply provideil for by
the clear and undeniable operation of the law of Eii,i,daud. Mr. Ilalliwell
has farther proved that such bequests were the constant modes of showing
regard to sm-h relatives as were well provided for by the usual legal course
of events ; and he adds, " so far from this Ijequest being one of slight im-
portance, and exhibiting small esteem, it was the usual mode of expressing
a mark of great atlection."

* I have since been informed that this famous invention was originally
a tlimtlam of a Mr. Tliomas White, a noted oollcotor and dealer in anliqui-
ti<;s. But it was Steevens who placed it in tlie broker's shop, wliere lie was
certain of ratchiwi the antiquary. When the late Mr. TegL-e, a profound
Irothev, was preparing to write a dissert.Ttioii on it, the firs^t inventor of
the flam steiqied forward to save any further tragical termination ; the
wicked wit liad already succeeded too well.

304 Literary ^-rgeries.

to notice this illustrious imposition, be always struck out his
own name, and muffled himself up under his titular office of
"The Director!" Gough never knew that this "modern,
antique" was only a piece of retaliation. In reviewing
Masters' s Life of Baker he found two heads, one scrattLcC
down from painted glass Ly George Steevens, who would have
passed it off for a portrait of one of our kings. Gough, en
the watch to have a fling at George Steevens, attacked his
graphic performance, and reprobated a portrait which had
nothing human in it ! Steevens vowed, that wretched as
Gougli deemed bis pencil to be, it should make " The
Director " ashamed of his own eyes, and be fairly taken in by
something scratched much worse. Such was the origin of
his adoption of this fragment of a chimne3''-slab, which I have
seen, and with a better judge wondered at the injudicious
antiquaiy, who could have been duped by the slight and ill-
formed scratches, and even with a false spelling of the name,
which, however, succeeded in being passed off as a genuine
Saxon inscription : but he had counted on his man.* The
trick is not so original as it seems. One De Grassis had
engraved on marble the epitaph of a mule, which he buried
in his vine\'ard : some time after, having ordered a new plan-
tation on the spot, the diggers could not fail of disinterring
what lay ready for them. The inscription imported that one
Publius Grassus had raised this monument to his mule ! De
Grassis gave it out as an odd coincidence of names, and a
prophecy about his own mule ! It was a simple joke ! The
marble was thrown by, and no more thought of. Several
years after it rose into celebrity, for with the erudite it then

* The stone may be found in the British Museum. H ARDZNVT is the
reading on the Harthacnut stone ; but the true orthography of the name
is HAiiDAENVT. It was reported to have been discovered in Kennington-
lane, where tlie palace of the monarch was said to liave been located, and
the inscription carefully made in Anglo-Saxon characters, was to the efloct
that "Here Hardcnut di-auk a wine horn dry, stared about him, and
died."

Sylvanus Urban, my once excellent and old friend, seems a trifle un-
cuurteous on this grave occasion. — He tells us, however, that " The history
of this wanton trick, with a facsimile of Sclinebbelie's drawing, may be
seen in his volume Ix. p. 217." He says that this wicked contrivance of
George Steevens was to entrap this famous draughtsman ! Does Sylvanus
then deny that " tlie Director" was not also "entrapped ?" and that he
always struck out his own name in the proof-sheets of the Magazine, sub-
stituting his official designation, by which the whole society itself seemed
to screen "' the Director 1"

Literary Forgeries. 305

passed for an ancient inscription, and the antiquary Poracchi
inserted the epitaph in his work on "Burials." Thus Do
Grassis and liis mule, equally respectable, would have come
down to posterity, had not the story by son.e means got
wind ! An incident of this nature is recorded in Portuguese
history, contrived with the intention to keep up the national
spirit, and diffuse hopes of the new enterprise of Vasco de
Gama, who had just sailed on a voyage of discovery to the
Indies. Three stones were discovered near Cintra, bearino- ia
ancient characters a Latin inscription ; a sibylline oracle ad-
dressed prophetically " To the Inhabitants of the West ! "
stating that when these three stones shall be found, the
Ganges, the Indus, and the Tagus should exchange their
commodities! This was the pious fraud of a Portuo'uese
poet, sanctioned by the approbation of the king. When tho
.atones had lain a sufficient time in the damp earth, so as to
become apparently antique, our poet invited a numerous party
to a dinner at his country-house ; in the midst of the enter-
tainment a peasant rushed in, announcing the sudden dis-
covery of this treasure ! The inscription was j^laced amono
the royal collections as a sacred curiosity ! The prophecy
was accomplished, and the oracle was long considered
genuine !

In such cases no mischief resulted ; the annals of mankind
were not confused by si)urious dynasties and fabulous chrono-
logies ; but when literary forgeries are published by those
whose character liardly admits of a suspicion that they ai'e
themselves the impostors, the difficulty of assigning a motive
only increases that of forming a decision ; to adopt or reject
them may be equally dangerous.

In this class we must place Annius of Yiterbo,* who pub-
lished a pretended collection of historians of the remotest
antiquity, some of whose names had descended to us in the
works of ancient writers, while their works themselves had
been lo.st. Afterwards he subjoined commentaries to confirm
their authority by passages from known authors. These at
first were eagerly accepted by the learned ; tlie blunders of
the presumed editor, one of which was his mistaking the

* He wns a Dominican monk, his real name being Giovanni Nanni
wliicli he Latinized in conformity with the custom of his ei-a. He was boru
1432, and died 1502. His great work, Aniiquitalem Kuriwam, professes
to contain the works of Alaiietho, BerosiKs, and ulher authors of equal
aiitiquity.

VOL. III. X

306 lAterary Forcjeries.

rii^lit name of the historian he forged, were gradually detected,
till at length the imposture was apparent ! The ])retended
originals were more remarkable ior their number than their
volume ; for the whole eollection does not exceed 171 pages,
which lessened the difficulty of the forger}^ ; while the com-
mentaries which wave afterwards published must have heen
manufactured at the same time as tlie text. In favour of
Annius, the high rank he occupied at the Roman Court, his
irreproachable conduct, and his declaration that he had
recovered some of these fragments at Mantua, and that others
had come from Armenia, induced many to credit these
pseudo-historians. A literary war soon kindled ; Niceron has
discriminated between four parties engaged in this conflict.
One party decried the whole of the collection as gross
forgeries ; another obstinately supported their authenticity ; a
third decided that they were forgeries before Annius possessed
them, who was only credulous ; while a fourth party con-
sidered them as partly authentic, and ascribed their blunders
to the interpolations of the editor, to increase their import-
ance. Such as they were, they scattered confusion over the
whole i'ace of history. The false Berosus opens his history
before the deluge, when, according to him, the Chaldeans
through preceding ages had faithfully preserved their histori-
cal evidences ! Annius hints, in his commentar}', at the
archives and public libraries of the Babylonians : the days of
Noah comparatively seemed modern history with this dream-
ing editor. Some of the fanciful writers of Italy were duped :
Sansovino, to delight the Florentine nobility, accommodated
them with a new title of antiquity in their ancestor Noah,
Imperatore e monarcha delle genti, visse e morl in quelle parti.
The Spaniards complained that in foi'ging these fabulous
origins of different nations, a new series of kings from
the ark of Noah had heen introduced by some of their rhodo-
montade historians to pollute the sources of their history.
Bodin's otherwise valuable works are considerably injured by
Annius's supposititious discoveries. One historian died of
grief, for having raised his elaborate speculations on these
fabulous originals ; and their credit was at length so much
reduced, that Pignori and Maff'ei both announced to their
readers that they had not referred in their works to the pre-
tended writers of Annius ! Yet, to the present hour, these
presumed forgeries are not always given up. The problem
remains unsolved — and the silence of the respectable Annius,

Literary Forgeries. 307

in regard to tlie forgery, as well as what ho afTirmccl when
alive, leave us in doubt whether he really intended to laugh
at the world by these fairy tales of the giants of anti(|uity.
Sanehoniathon, as preserved by Eusebius, may be classed
among these ancient writings or forgeries, and has been
equally rejected and defended.

Another literary forgery, supposed to have been grafted on
those of Annius, involved the Inghirami iamily. It was by
diijo-ina: in their ^rounds tliat they discovered a number of
Etruscan antiquities, consisting of inscriptions, and also frag-
ments of a chronicle, pretended to have been composed si.xty
years before the vulgar era. The characters on the marbles
viGxe the ancient Etruscan, and the historical work tended to
confirm the pretended discoveries of Annius. 'f hey were
collected and enshrined in a magnificent folio by Curtius
Inghirami, who, a lew years after, puldislied a quarto volume
exceeding one thousand pages to support their authenticity.
Notwithstanding the erudition of the forger, these monu-
ments of antiquity betrayed their modern condiment.* There
were uncial letters which no one knew ; but these were said
to be undiscovered ancient Etruscan characters ; it was more
difficult to defend the small italic letters, for they were not used
in the age assigned to them ; besides that, there were dots on
the letter i, a custom not practised till the eleventh centuiy.
The style was copied from the Latin of the Psalms and the
Breviary ; but Inghirami discovered that there had been an
intercourse between the Etruscans and the Hebrews, and that
David had imitated the writings of Noah and his descendants !
Of Noah the chronicle details speeches and anecdotes !

The Romans, who have preserved so much of the Etrus-
cans, had not, however, noticed a single fact recorded in these
Etruscan antiquities. Inghirami replied that the manuscript
was the work of the secretary of the college of the Etrurian
augurs, who alone was permitted to di-aw his materials from
the archives, and who, it would seem, was the only scribe
who has favoured posterity with so much secret history. It
was urged in favour of the authenticity of these Etrusqan
monuments, that Inghirami was so young an antiquary^ at

* A forgery of a similar character has been recently effected in the debris
of the ChapeUe St. Eloi (Departenient de L'Eure, France), where many in-
scriptions connected with the early history of France were exhumed, which
a doputatidn of antiquaries, convened to examine their authenticity, have
sincu pronoiinocd to he forgeries !

x2

308 Literary Forgeries.

the time of the discovery, that he could not even explain
them; and that when fresh researches were made on the
spot, other similar monuments were also disinterred, where
evidently they had long lain ; the whole affair, however con-
trived, was confined to the Ingliirami famihj. One of them,
half a centur}' before, had been the librarian of the Vatican,
and to him is ascribed the honour of the forgeries whicli he
buried where he was sure they would be found. This, how-
ever, is a mere conjecture ! Inghirami, who published and
defended their authenticity, was not concerned in their fabri-
cation ; the design was probably merely to raise the antiquity
of Volaterra, the famil}' estate of the Inghirami ; and for this
purpose one of its learned branches had bequeathed his pos-
terity a collection of spurious historical monuments, which
tended to overturn all received ideas on the first ages of
history.*

It was probably such impostures, and those of false de-
cretals of Isidore, which were forged for the maintenance of
the papal supremacy, and for eight hundred years formed the
fundamental basis of the canon law, the discipline of the
church, and even the faith of Christianity, which led to the
monstrous pyrrhonism of father Hardouin, who, with immense
erudition, had persuaded himself that, excepting the Bible
and Homer, Herodotus, Plautus, Plin}' the elder, with frag-
ments of Cicero, Virgil, and Hoi-ace, all the remains of
classical literature were forgeries of the thirteenth and fom-
teenth centuries ! In two dissertations he imagined that he
had proved that the Ji]neid was not written by Virgil, nor tbo
Odes of Horace by that poet. Hardouin was one of those
wrong-headed men who, once having fallen into a delusion,
whatever afterwards occurs to them on their favourite subject
only tends to strengthen it. He died in his own faith ! He
seems not to have been aware that by ascribing such prodigal
inventions as Plutarch, Thucydides, Livy, Tacitus, and otlier
historians, to the men he did, he was raising up an unparal-
leled age of learning and genius when monks could only write
meagre chronicles, while learning and genius themselves lay
in an enchanted slumber with a suspension of all their vital
powers.

* The volume of these pretended Antiquities is entitled Etruscarum
Antiquitatum Prafjmenta, jo. Franc. 1637. That which Inghirami pub-
lished to defend their authenticity is in Italian, Di^rorso sopra I' Oii^iO'
aizioni futle uW Antichita 2'oscane, 4to, Firenze, 1G45.

Literary Forgeries. 309

There are nunn'rous instances of the forgc'rics of smaller
documents. The Prayer-book of Culinnbiis, presented to hhu
by the Pope, which the great discoverer of a new world
bequeathed to the Genoese republic^ has a codicil in his own
writhig, as one of the leaves testifies, but as volumes com-
posed against its authenticity deny. The famous description
ill Petrarch's Virgil, so often quoted, of his first rencontre
with Laura in the church of St. Clair on a Good Friday, Gth
April, 1)327, it has been recently attempted to be shown is a
forgery. By calculation, it appears that the (Jth April, 1327,
lull on a Monday ! The Good Friday seems to have been a
blunder of the manufacturer of the note. He was entrapped
by reading the second sonnet, as it appears in the printed
editions !

Era il giorno oh' al sol si scolorana

Per la pietii del suo fattore i mi.

'• It was on the day when the rays of the sun were obscured
by compassion for his Maker." The forger imagined this
description alluded to Good Friday and the eclipse at the
Crucifixion. Put how stands the passage in the MS. in
the Imperial Library of Vienna, wliich Abbe Costaing has
found i*

Era il giorno ch' al sol di color raro

Parve la pieta da suo fattore, ai rai

Quaiid lo fu preso ; e uon mi guardai

Che ben vostri occhi dentro mi legaro.

"It was on the day that I was captivated, devotion for its
Maker appeared in the rays of a brilliant sun, and I did not
well consider that it was your eyes that enchained me ! "

The first meeting, according to the Abbe Costaing, was
not in a church, but in a meadow — as appears by the ninety-
first sonnet. The Laura of Sade was not the Laura of
Petrarch, but Laura de Baux, unmarried, and who died
young, residing in the vicinity of Vaucluse. Petrarch had
often viewed her from his own window, and often enjo3'ed
her society amidst her famil3\* If the Abb6 Costaing's dis-

* I draw this information from a little "new year's gift," which my
loaintd friend, the llev. S. Weston, presented to his friends in 1822, en-
tilled "A Visit to Vaucluse," accompanied Iiy a Supplement. He derives
his account apparently from a curious publication of L'Abl'c Costaing de
I'usigner d'Avignon, which I with other inquirers have not been able to
])rocure, but which it is absolutely neces&iry to examine, before we can
decide on the very curious but unsatisfactory accounts we have hitherto
possessed of the Laura of Petrarch.

310 Literary Forgeries.

(I, wry be confirmed, llie uood name of Petrarcli is freed from
the idle romantic passion for a married woman. It would bo
curious if the famous story of the first meeting with Laura
in the church of St. Clair originated in the blunder of the
forger's misconception of a passage which was incorrectly
printed, as appears by existing marmscri])ts !

Literary forgeries have been introduced into bibliography ;
dates have been altered ; fictitious titles affixed ; and books
have been reprinted, either to leave out or to interpolate
whole passages ! I forbear entering minutely into this part
of the history of literary forgery, for this article has already
grown voluminous. When we discover, however, that one
of the most magnificent of amateurs, and one of the most
critical of bibliographers, were concerned in a forgery of this
nature, it may be useful to spread an alarm among collectors.
The Duke de la Valliere, and the Abbe de St. Leger once
concerted together to supply the eager purchaser of literary
rarities with a copy of I)e Tribus Impostorihus, a book, by
the date, pretended to have been printed in 1598, though
probably a modern forgery of 1698. The title of such a
work had long existed by rumour, but never was a copy seen
by man ! Works printed with this title have all been proved
to be modern fabrications. A copy, however, of the introuv-
alle original was sold at the Duke de la Valliere's sale ! The
history of this volume is curious. The Duke and the Abbe
having manufactured a text, had it printed in the old Gothic
character, under the title, De Tribus Impostor ibiis. They
proposed to put the great bibliopolist, De Bure, in good
humour, whose agency would sanction the imposture. They
were afterwards to dole out copies at twenty-five louis each,
which would have been a reasonable price for a book which
no one ever saw ! They invited De Bure to dinner, flattered
and cajoled him, and, as they imagined, at a moment they
liad wound him up to their pitch, they exhibited their manu-
facture ; the keen-eyed glance of the renowned cataloguer of
the " Bibliographic Listructive" instantly shot like lightning
over it, and, like lightning, destroyed the whole edition. He
not only discovered the forgery, but reprobated it ! He
refused his sanction ; and the forging Duke and Abbe, in
confusion, suppressed the livre introuvahle ; but they owed
a grudge to the honest bibliographer, and attempted to
write down the work whence the De Bures derive their
lame.

JAleiutnj Forycrk'n. 311

Among the extraortlinaiy literary impostors of our a2;o — if
we except Lauder, who, detected by the Ithuriel pen of liishop
Doug-las, lived to make his j)ublic recantation of liis audacious
forgeries, and Chatterton, who lias buried his inexplicable story
in his own grave, a tale, which seems but half told — we must
place a man well known in the literary world under the as-
sumed name of George Psalmanazar. He composed his auto-
biogi'aphy as the penance of contrition, not to be published
till he was no more, when all human motives have ceased
which might cause his veracity to be suspected. The life is
tedious ; but I have curiously traced the progress of the mind
in an ingenious imposture, which is worth preservation. The
present literary forgery consisted of personating a converted
islander of Formosa : a place then little known but by the
reports of the Jesuits, and constructing a language and a
history of a new people and a new religion, entirely of his
own invention! This man was evidently a native ot the south
of France; educated in some provincial college of the Jesuits,
where he had heard much of their discoveries of Japan ; he had
looked over their maps, and listened to their comments. He
forgot the manner in which the Japanese wrote; but supposed,
like orientalists, they wrote from the right to the left, which
he found difficult to manage. He set about excogitating an
alphabet ; but actually foi'got to give names to his letters,
which afterwards baffled him before literary men.

He fell into gross blunders ; having inadvertently affirmed
that the Formosans sacrificed eighteen thousand male infants
annually, he persisted in not lessening the number. It was
proved to be an impossibility in so small an island, without
occasioning a depopulation. He had made it a principle in
this imposture never to vary when he had once said a thing.
All this was projected in haste, iearful of detection by those
about him.

He was himself surprised at his facility of invention, and
the progress of his forgery. He had formed an alphabet, a
considerable portion of a new language, a grammar, a new
division of the year into twenty months, and a new n^ligion !
He had accustomed himself to write his language; but being
an inexpert writer with the unusual wa^' of wilting back-
wards, he found this so dillieult, that he was compelled to
change the complicated Ibrms of some of his letters. He now
linally quitted his home, assuming the character of a Formosan
convert, who had been educated by the Jesuits. He v>'as then

312 Literary Forgeries.

\\ his fiftccntli or sixteenth year. To support his new eha-
/acter, he practised some rehgious mummeries ; he was seen
worshipping the rising and setting sun. He made a prayer-
book with rude drawings of the sun, moon, and stars, to
which he added some gibberish j^rose and verse, written in his
invented character, muttering or chanting it, as the humour
took liim. His custom of eating raw flesh seemed to assist
his deception more than the sun and moon.*

In a gai-rison at Sluys he found a Scotch regiment in the
Dutch pay ; the commander had the curiosity to invite our
Formosan to confer with Innes, the chaplain to his regiment,
Tliis Innes was probably the chief cause of the imposture being
carried to the extent it afterwards reached. Innes was a
clergyman, but a disgrace to his cloth. As soon as he fixed
his eye on our Formosan, he hit on a project ; it was nothing
less than to make Psalmanazar the ladder of his own ambi-
tion, and the stepping-place for him to climb up to a good
living ! Innes was a worthless character ; as afterwards ap-
peared, when by an audacious imposition Innes practised on
the Bishop of London, he avowed himself to be the author of
an anonymous work, entitled " A Modest Inquiry after Moral
Virtue ;" for this he obtained a good living in Essex : the
real author, a poor Scotch clergyman, obliged him afterwards
to disclaim the work in print, and to pay him the profit of
the edition which Innes had made ! He lost his character,
and rehired to the solitude of his living ; if not penitent, at
least mortified.

Such a character was exactly adapted to become the foster-
father of imposture. Innes courted the Formosan, and easily
won on the adventurer, who had hitherto in vain sought for
a patron. Meanwhile no time was lost by Innes to inform
the unsuspicious and generous Bishop of London of the pi-ize
he possessed — to convert the Formosan was his ostensible
pretext ; to procure preferment his concealed motive. It is
curious enough to observe, that the ardour of conversion died
away in Innes, and the most marked neglect of his convei't
prevailed, while the answer of the bishop was proti'acted or
doubtful. He had at first proi)osed to our Formosan impostor
to procure his discharge, and convey him to England ; this
was eagerly consented to by our pliant adventurer. A few
Dutch schellings, and fair words, kept him in good humour ;

* For some further notices of Psalmanazar and Lis literary labours, we
may refer the reader to vol. i. p. 137, note.

Literary Forgeries. 313

but no letter coming from the bishop, there were fewer words,
and not a stiver ! This threw a new light over the character
of Innes to the inexperienced youth. Psalmanazar saga-
ciously nov; turned all his attention to some Dutch ministers;
Innes grew jealous lest tliey should pluck the bird which he
had already in his net. He resolved to baptize the impostor
■ — which only the more convinced Psalmanazar that Innes was
one himself; for before this time Innes had practised a stra-
tagem on him which had clearly shown what sort of a man
his Formosan was.

This stratagem was this : he made him translate a passage
in Cicero, of some length, into his pretended language, and
give it him in writing ; this was easily done, by Psahnanazar's
facility of inventing characters. After Innes had made him
con.<;true it, he desired to have another version of it on an-
other paper. The proposal, and the arch manner of making
it, threw our impostor into the most visible confusion. He had
had but a short time to invent tlie first paper, less to recollect
it ; so that in the second transcript not above half the words
were to be found which existed in the first. Innes assumed
a solemn air, and Psalmanazar was on the point of throwing
himself on his mercy, but Innes did not wish to unmask the
impostor; he was rather desirous of fitting the mask closer to
his face. Psalmanazar, in this hard trial, had given evidence
of uncommon facility, combined with a singular memory.
Innes cleared his brow, smiled with a friendly look, and only
hinted in a distant manner that he ought to be careful to be
better provided for the future! An advice which Psalmanazar
al'terwards bore in mind, and at length produced the forgery of
an entire new language ; and which, he remarkably observes,
" by what I have tried since I came into England, I cannot
say but 1 could have compassed it with less difficulty than
can be conceived had I api)lied closely to it." When a ver-
sion of the catechism was made into the pretended Formosau
I.;ng\uige, wliich was submitted to the judgment of the first
sehohirs, it appeared to them grammatical, and was pronounced
to be a real language, from the circumstance that it resembled
no other ! and they could not conceive that a strii)ling could
be the inventor of a language. If the reader is curious to ex-
amine tliis extraordinary imposture, I refer him to that lite-
rary curiosity, "An Historical and Geographical Description
of Formosa, with Accounts of the Ileligion, Customs and Man-
ners of the Inhabitants, by George Psalmanazar, a Native ol

314 Literary Forgeries.

Iho said Isle," 1704 ; witli numerous plates, wretclied inven-
tions ! of their dress ! religious ceremonies ! their tabernacle
and altars to the sun, the moon, and the ten stars ! their archi-
tecture! the viceroy's castle! a temple! a city house! a
countryman's house ! and the Formosan alphabet ! In his
conferences before the Royal Society with a Jesuit just re-
turned from China, the Jesuit had certain strong suspicions
that our hero was an impostor. The good father remained
obstinate in his own conviction, but could not satisfactorily
communicate it to others; and Psalmanazar, after politely ask-
ing pardon for the expression, complains of the Jesuit that
" HE lied most impudenthj^'' mentitur impudentissime ! Dr.
Mead absurdly insisted Psalmanazar was a Dutchman or a
German ; some thought him a Jesuit in disguise, a tool of
the non-jurors ; the Catholics thought him bribed by the
Protestants to expose their church ; the Presbyterians that
he was paid to explode their doctrine, and cry up episcopac^^ !
This fabulous history of Formosa seems to have been pro-
jected by his artful prompter Innes, who put Varenius into
Psalmanazar's hands to assist him ; trumpeted forth in the
domestic and foreign papers an account of this converted For-
mosan ; maddened the booksellers to hurry the author, who
was scarcely allowed two months to produce this extraordinary
volume ; and as the former accounts which the public pos-
sessed of this island were full of monstrous absurdities and
contradictions, these assisted the present imposture. Our
Ibrger resolved not to describe new and surprising things as
they had done, but rather studied to clash with them, pro-
bably that he might have an opportunity of pretending to
correct them. The first edition was immediately sold ; the
world was more divided than ever in opinion ; in a second
edition he prefixed a vindication ! — the unhappy forger got
about twenty guineas for an imposture, whose delusion spread
far and wide ! Some years afterwards Psalmanazar was en-
gaged in a minor imposture; one man had persuaded him to
father a white composition called the Formosan japan! which
was to be sold at a high price ! It was curious for its white-
ness, but it luid its faults. Theproject failed, and Psalmanazar
considered the miscarriage of the wJiite Formosan japan as a
providential warning to repent of all his impostures of
Formosa !

Among these literary forgeries may be classed several in-
genious ones fabricated for apolitical purpose. We had cer^

Literary Forgeries. 315

taiiily numerous ones during our civil wars in tlie rciyn of
Cliarles the First. This is not the placo to continue tl'e
controversy respecting' the mysterious J£ikon HasUike, which
has been ranked among them, I'rom the ambiguous claim of
Gauden.* A recent writer who would probably incline not
to leave the monarch, were he living, not only his head but
the little fame he might obtain by the " Verses" said to be
written by him at CarisbrooU Castle, would deprive him also
of these. Henderson's death-bed recantation is also reckoned
among them ; and we have a large collection of " I/etters of
Sir Henry Martin to his Lady of Delight," which were the
satirical effusions of a wit of tliat day, but by the price they
Inive obtained, are probably considered as genuine ones, and.
exhibit an amusing picture of his loose rambling life.f There
is a ludicrous speech of the strange Earl of Pembroke, which
was forged by the inimitable Butler. Sir Jolui Birkenhead,
a great humourist and wit, had a busy pen in these spurious
letters and speeches. J

* The question has been discussed with great critical acumeu by Dr,
Wordsworth.

•j- Since this was published I have discovered that Harry llartiu's Letters
are not forgeries, but I cannot immediately recover my authority.

:|; One of the most amusing of these tricks was perpetrated on William
Pryune, the well-known puritanic hater of the stage, by some witty cava-
lier. Pryune's great work, " Histriomastix, the Player's Scourge; or,
Actor's Tragedy," an immense quarto, of 1100 pages, was a complete
coudenination of all theatrical amusements ; but in 1649 appeared a tract
of four leaves, entitled ".Mr. William Prynne, his Defence of Stage
Playes ; or, a lletractatiou of a former Book of his called IIistriouiasti.\."
It must have astonished many readers in his own day, and would have
passed for his work in more modern times, but for the accidental preservation
of a single copy of a liandbill Prynne publislied disclaiming the whole
tiling. Uis style is mo.st amusingly imitated throughout, and his great
love fur quoting authorities in Ills margin. He is made to complain thai
"this wicked and tyrannical army did lately in a most inhumane, cruell,
rough, and barbai'ous manner, take away the poor players from their
blouses, being met there to discharge the duty of their callings : as if this
army were fully bent, and most trayterously and maliciously set, to put
down and depres.se all the King's friends, not only in the parliament but
in the very theatres; they have no cai'e uf covenant or any tiling el.se."
And lie is further maile to declare, in spite of " what the malicious, cla-
morous, and ohstrepurous i)eoplo" may ohject, that he once wrote
fitaiust .stagc-i)lays, — that it was " when I had not so clear a light as now
I have." We can fancy the amuscmciit this pamphlet must have been to
many readers during the great Civil War.

316

OF LITERARY FILCHERS.

An honest historian at times will have to inflict severe stroke
on his favourites. This has fallen to my lot, for in the course
of my researches, I have to record that we have both forgers
and purloiners, as well as other more obvious impostors, in
the republic of letters 1 The present article descends to re-
late anecdotes of some contrivances to possess our literary
curiosities by other means than by purchase ; and the only
a])ology which can be alleged for the spJendida lyeccata, as St.
Austin calls the virtues of the heathen, of the present inno-
cent criminals, is their excessive passion for literature, and
otherwise the respectability of their names. According to
Grose's "Classical Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue," we
have had celebrated collectors, both in the learned and vulgar
idioms. But one of them, who had some reasons too to be
tender on this point, distinguished this mode of completing
his collections, not by hook-stealing, but by hoolc-covetivg.
On some occasions, in mercy, we must allow of softening
names. Were not the Spartans allowed to steal from one
another, and the bunglers only punished ?

It is said that Pinelli made occasional additions to his lite-
rary treasures sometimes by his skill in an art which lay
much more in the hand than in the head : however, as Pinelli
never stirred out of his native city but once in his lifetime,
when the plague drove him from home, his field of action was
so restricted, that we can hardly conclude that he could have
been so gveat an enterpriser in this way. No one can have
lost their character by this sort of exercise in a confined
circle, and be allowed to prosper ! A light-fingered Mercury
would hardly iiaunt the same spot : however, this is as it may
be ! It is probable that we owe to this species of accumula-
tion many precious manuscripts in the Cottonian collection.
It appears by the manuscript note-book of Sir Nicholas Hyde,
chief justice of the King's Bench from the second to the
seventh year of Charles the First, that Sir Robert Cotton
had in his library, records, evidences, ledger-books, original
letters, and other state papers, belonging to the king ; for the
attorney-general of that time, to prove this, showed a copy
of the pardon which Sir Robert had obtained from King
James for emhezzling records, &c.*

* Lansdowne MSS. 888, in the former printed catalogue, art. 79.

Of Literary Filchers. 317

Goiii,'h li;vs more tlum insinuated that Rawlinson and liis
friend Umfreville " lie under very strong suspicions ;" and he
asserts that the colU'ctor of the Wilton treasures made as
free as Dr. Willis with his friend's coins.* But he has also
put fortli a declaration relating to Bishop More, the famous
collector, tliat " the bishop collected his library by plundcrinr/
those of the clergy in his diocese ; some he paid with sermons
or more modern books; others, less civilly, only with a quid
iUitcrati cum lihris /"' This plundering then consisted
rather of cajoling others out of what they knew not how to
value ; and this is an advantage which every skilful lover of
books must enjcy over those whose apprenticeshi]) has not
expired. I have myself been plundered by a very dear friend
of some such literary curiosities, in the days of my innocence
and of his precocity of knowledge. However, it does appear
that Bishop More did actually lay violent hands in a snug
corner on some irresistible little charmer ; which we gather
from a pi'ccaution ado[)ted by a friend of the bishop, who one
day was found busy in hidinrj his rarest hooks, and locking up
as many as he could. On being asked the reason of this odd
occupation, the bibliopolist ingenuously replied, " The Bishop
of Ely dines with me to-day." This fact is quite clear, and
here is another as indisputable. Sir Kobert Saville writing to
Sir Robert Cotton, appointing an interview with the founder
of the Bodleian Library, cautions Sir Robert, that " If he
lield any book so dear as that he would be loath to lose it, ho
should not let Sir Thomas out of his sight, but set ' the boke'
aside beibrehand." A surprise and detection of this nature
has been revealed in a piece of secret history by Amelot de la
Iloussaie, which terminated in very important political con-
sequences. He assures us that the personal dislike which
Pope Innocent X. bore to the French had originated in his
youth, when cardinal, from having been detected in the
library of an eminent French collector, of having purloined
a most rare volume. The delirium of a collector's rage over-
came even French politesse; the Frenchman not only openly
accused his illustrious culprit, but was resolved that he
should not quit the library without replacing the precious

* Coins are the most dangerous things which can be exhibited to &
professed collector. One of tiie fraternity, who died but a few years since,
alisolutely kept a record oi his pilferiugs ; he succeeded in improving his
collection by attending sales also, and changing his owu coins for others in
better piv-orvntion.

Sl8 Of Literary Filchers.

volume — from accusation and denial both resolved to try
their strength : but in this literary wi'estling-match the
book dropped out of the cardinal's robes ! — and from that
day he hated the French — at least their more curious
collectors !

Even an author on his dying bed, at those awful moments,
should a collector be by his side, may not be considered
secure from his too curious hands. Sir William Dugdale
possessed the minutes of King James's life, written by Cam-
den, till within a fortnight of his death ; as also Camden's
own life, which he had from Hacket, the author of the folio
life of Bishop Williams : who, adds Aubrey, " did Jllch it
from Mr. Camden, as he lay a dying!" He afterwards cor-
rects his information, by the name of Dr. Thorndyke, which,
however, equally answers our purpose, to prove that even
dying authors may dread such collectors !

The medalists have, I suspect, been more predatory than
these subtracters of our literary treasures ; not only from the
facility of their conveyance, but from a peculiar contrivance
which of all those things which admit of being secretly pur-
lioned, can only be practised in this department — for they
can steal and no human hand can search them with any pos-
sibility of detection ; they can pick a cabinet and swallow the
curious things, and transport them with perfect safety, to be
digested at their leisure. An adventure of this kind happened
to Baron Stosch, the famous antiquary. It was in looking
over the gems of the royal cabinet of inedals, that the keeper
perceived the loss of one ; his place, his pension, and his re-
putation were at stake : and he insisted that Baron Stosch
should be most minutely examined ; in this dilemma, forced
to confession, this erudite collector assured the keeper of the
roA'al cabinet, that the strictest search would not avail :
"Alas, sir! I have it here within," he said, pointing to his
breast — an emetic was suggested by the learned practitioner
himself, probably from some former experiment. This was
.not the first time that such a natural cabinet had been in-
dented ; the antiquary Vaillant, when attacked at sea by an
A.lgerine, zealously swallowed a whole series of Syrian kings ;
when he landed at Lyons, groaning with his concealed trea-
sure, he hastened to his friend, his physician, and his brother
antiquary Dufour, — who at first was only anxious to inquire
of his patient, whether the medals were of the higher empire ?
Vaillant showed two or three, of which nature had kindly re«

Of Literary Tilchers. 3 1 0

licvcil liiin. A collection of medals was left to the city of
Exeter, and the donor accompanied the bequest by a clause
in his will, that should a certain antiquary, his old iriend and
rival, be desirous of examining the coins, he should be watched
by two persons, one on each side. La Croze informs us in
his life, that the learned Charles Patin, who has written a
work on medals, was one of the present race of collectors :
Patin offered the curators of the public library at Basle to
draw up a catalogue of the cabinet of Amberback there pre-
served, containing a good number of medals ; but they would
have been more numerous, had the catalogue-writer not dimi-
nished both them and his labour, by sequestrating some of
the most rare, which was not discovered till this plunderer of
antiquity was far out of their reach.

When Gough touched on this odd subject in the first edi-
tion of his "British Topography," "An Academic" hi the
Grnflcman's Ilagazine for August 1772, insinuated that this
charge of literary pilfering was only a jocular one; on which
Oou"-h, in his second edition, observed that this was not the
case, and that " one might point out enough light-fingered
antiquaries in the present age, to render such a charge ex-
tremely probable against earlier ones." The most extraor-
dinary part of this slight history is, that our public de-
nouncer some time after proved himself to be one of these
"light-fingered antiquaries:" the deed itself, however, was
more singular than disgraceful. At the disinterment of the
remains of Edward tlie First, around which thirty years ago
assembled our most erudite antiquaries, Gough was observed,
as Steevens used to relate, in a wrapping great-coat of un-
usual dimensions; that witty and malicious "Puck," so
capable himself of inventing mischief, easily suspected
others, and divided his glance as much on the living piece of
antiquity as on the elder. In the act of closing up the relics
of royalty, there was found wanting an entire fore-finger of
Edward the First ; and as the body was perfect when
opened, a murmur of dissatisfaction was spreading, when
" Puck" directed their attention to the great antiquary in the
watchman's great-coat — from whence — too surely was ex-
tracted Edward the First's great fore-finger ! — so that " the
light-fingered antiquary" was recognised ten years after he
denounced the race, when he came to "try his hand."*

* It is probable that this story of Gongh's pocketing {he fore-finger c/
I'Mwanl the Fir.st, \v:i.s one of the nialioion.s inventions of George Steeveos,

830

OF LORD BACON AT HOME,

The history of Lord Bacon would be that of the intellectvial
faculties, and a theme so worthy of the philosophical biogra-
pher remains yet to be written. The personal narrative of
this master-genius or inventor must for ever be separated from
the scala inteUectus he was perpetually ascending : and the
domestic history of this creative mind must be consigned to
the most humiliating chapter in the volume of human life ; a
chapter already sufficiently enlarged, and which has irre-
lutably proved how the greatest minds are not freed from the
infirmities of the most vulgar.

The parent of our philosophy is now to be considered in a
new hght, one which others do not appear to have observed.
My researches into contemporary notices of Bacon have often
convinced me that his philosophical works, in his own days
and among his own countrymen, were not only not compre-
hended, but often ridiculed, and sometimes reprobated ; that
they were the occasion of many slights and mortifications
which this depreciated naan endured ; but that from a veiy
early period in his hfe, to that last record of his feelings
which appears in his will, this "servant of posterity," as he
prophetically called himself, sustained his mighty spirit with
the confidence of his own posthumous greatness. Bacon
vast his views through the maturity of ages, and perhaps
amidst the sceptics and the rejectors of his plans, may have
felt at times all that idolatry of fame, which has now conse-
crated his philosophical works.

At college. Bacon discovered how " that scrap of Grecian
knowledge, the peripatetic philosophy," and the scholastic
babble, could not serve the ends and purposes of knowledge;

aftor he discovered (iiat the antiquary was among the few admitted to the
untombingof the royal corpse ; Steevens himself was not there I Sylvaiius
Urban (the late re.'^pected John Nichols), who must know much more
than he cares to record of "Puck," — has, however, given the following
"secret history" of what he calls " ungentlemanly and unwarrantal^le
attacks" on Gough by Slccvens. It seems that Steevens was a collector
of the works of Hogarth, and while engaged in forming his collection,
wrote an abrupt letter to Gough to obtain from him some early impres-
sions, by purchase or exchange. Gough resented the manner of his ad-
dress by a rough refusal, for it is admitted to have been "a peremptory
one." Thus arose the implacable vengeance of Steevens, who used to
lioast that all the mischievous tricks he played on the grave antiquary,
who was rarely over-kind to any one, was but a ]ilc;i.sriiit kind of revenge.

Of Lord Bucun at Home. 321

fnat syllogisms were not things, and that a new logic iniglit
teai'h us to invent and judge by induction. He found tliat
theories were to be built ujjon experiments. When a young
man, abroad, he began to make those obsei-vations on nature,
which afterwards led on to the foundations of the new phi-
losophy. At sixteen, he philosophised ; at twenty-six, he had
framed his system into some form ; and after forty years of
continued labours, unfmished to his last hour, he left behind
him sufficient to found the great philosophical reformation.

On his entrance into active life, study was not however his
prime object. With his fortune to make, his court con-
nexions and his father's examijle opened a path for ambition.
lie chose the practice of common law as iiis means, while
his inclinations were looking upwards to political affairs as
his end. A passion for study, however, had strongly marked
him ; he had read much more than was required in his pro-
fessional character, and this circumstance excited the mesvn
jealousies of the minister Cecil, and the Attorne.y-General
Coke. Both were mere practical men of business, wliose
narrow conceptions and whose stubborn habits assume tliat
whenever a man acquires much knowledge foreign to his
profession, he will know less of professional knowledge than
he ought. These men of strong minds, yet limited capa-
cities, hold in contempt all studies alien to their habits.

Bacon early aspired to the situation of Solicitor-General ;
the court of Elizabeth was divided into factions ; Bacon
adopted the interests of the generous Essex, which were ini-
mical to the party of Cecil. The queen, from his boyhood,
was delighted by conversing with her '' young lord-keeper,"
as she early distinguished the precocious gravity and tho in-
genious turn of mind of the future philosopher. It was un-
questionably to attract her favour, that Bacon presented to
the queen his "Maxims and Elements of the Counnon Law,"
not published till after his death. Elizabeth suffered her
minister to form her opinions on the legal character of
Bacon. It was alleged that Bacon was addicted to more
general pursuits than law, and the miscellaneous books which
he was known to have read conlii'med the accusation. This
was urged as a reason why the j)ost of Solicitor-General
should not be conferred on a man of speculation, more likely
to distract than to direct her affairs. Elizabeth, in the
height of that political prudence which marked her cha-
racter, was swayed by the vulgar notion of Cecil, and be-
TOL. III. T

322 Of Lord Bacon al Home.

lieved that Bacon, who afterwards filled the situation both cf
Solieitor-General and Lord Chancellor, was "a man rather of
show than of depth." We have recently been told by a
great lawyer that " Bacon was a master."

On the accession of James the First, when Bacon still
found the same party obstructing his political advancement,
he appears, in some momentary lit of disgust, to have medi-
tated on a retreat into a foreign country ; a circumstance
which has happened to several of our men of genius, during
a fever of solitary indignation. He was for some time
thrown out of the sunshine of life, but he found its shade
more fitted for contemplation ; and, unquestionably, philo-
sophy was benefited by his solitude at Gray's Inn. His
hand was always on his work, and better thoughts will find
an easy entrance into the mind of those who feed on their
thoughts, and live amidst their reveries. In a letter on this
occasion, he writes, " My ambition now I shall only put upon
my PEN, whereby I shall be able to maintain memory and
merit, of the times succeedino." And many years after,
when he had finally quitted public life, he told the king, " I
would live to study, and not study to live : yet I am pre-
pared for date oholum Bclisario ; and, I that have borne a
bag, can bear a wallet."

Ever were the times succeedikg in his mind. In that
delightful Latin letter to Father Fulgentio, where, with tlie
simplicity of true grandeur, he takes a view of all his works,
and in which he describes himself as " one who served pos-
terity," in communicating his past and his future designs, he
adds that " they require some ages for the ripening of
tliem." There, while he despairs of finishing what was in-
tended for the sixth part of his Instauration, how nobly he
despairs 1 " Of the perfecting this I have cast away all
hopes ; but in future ages, perhaps, the design may bud
again." And he concludes by avowing, that the zeal and
constanc}'^ of his mind in the great design, after so many
years, had never become cold and indiiferent. He remem-
bers how, forty years ago, he had composed a juvenile work
about those things, which with confidence, but with too
])on)])ous a title, he had called Temporis I\nim Maximus ;
ilie great birth of time ! Besides tlie public dedication of
his Novum Orrjanum to James the First, he accompanied it
with a privale letter. He wishes the king's iavour to the
wiirk, which lie accounts as lauch us a hundred years' timej

OJ Lord Bacon at Home. 3:23

for ho adds, " I am persuaded the icorJc will yain upon vicn's
VI i lids in AGKS."

in his last will appears his remarkable lej^acy of fiimc.
" My name and memory I leave to foreij^n nations, and to
mine own eonntryinen, afteh some time be past oyeu."
Time seemed always personated in the imagination of our
l)hilosophcr, and with time he wrestled with a consciousness
of triuniiili.

1 shall now hring forward suflieient evidence to prove how
liiLle Bacon was understood, and how much he was even de-
spised, in his philosophical character.

In those prescient views by which the genius of Verulam
has often anticipated the institutions and the discoveries of
succeeding times, there was one important object which even
iiis foresight does not appear to have contemplated. Lord
IJacon did not foresee that the English language would
one day be capable of embalming all that philosophy can
discover, or poetry can invent ; that his country would at
length possess a national literature of its own, and that it
would exult in classical compositions which might be appre-
ciated with the finest models of antiquity. His taste was
far unequal to his invention. So little did he esteem the
language of his country, that his favourite works are com-
posed in Latin ; and he was anxious to have what he had
written in English preserved in that "universal language
which may last as long as books last." It would have sur-
j)rised Bacon to have been told, that the most learned men in
Europe have studied English authors to learn to think and to
wi-ite. Our pliilosopher was surely st)mewhat mortified,
when in his dedication of the Essays he observed, that "of
all my other works my Essays have been most current ; lor
that, as it seems, they come home to men's business and
l)(jsoms." It is too much to hope to find in a vast and pro-
found inventor a writer also who bestows immortality on his
language. The English language is the only object in his
great survey of art and of nature, whicli owes nothing of its
excellence to the genius of JJacon.

He had reason indeed to be mortified at the reception of
his i)hilo-Jophical works ; and Dr. Rawlcy, even some years
after the death of his illustrious master, had occasion to ob-
serve, tluit " His fame is greater and sounds louder in foreign
parts abroad than at hon\e in his own nation ; thereby verify-
ing that divine sentence, a prophet is not without honour,

Y 2

324 Of Lord Bacon at Home.

fuve in his own countrv and in Lis own house. Even the
men of genius, who ought to liave comprehended this new
source of knowledge thus opened to them, reluctantly entered
into it ; so repugnant are we suddenly to give up ancient
errors which time and habit have made a part of ourselves.
Harvey, who himself experienced the sluggish obstinacy of
tb.e learned, which repelled a great but a novel discovery,
could, however, in his turn deride the amazing novelty of
Bacon's Novum Orf/anum. Harvey said to Aubrey, that
*' Bacon was no great pliilosopher ; he writes pliilosophy like
a lord chancellor." It has been suggested to me that Bacon's
pliilosophical writings have been much overrated. — His expe-
rimental philosoph}' from the era in which thej^ were produced
must be necessarily defective: the time he gave to tliem could
only have been had at spare hours; but like the great prophet
on the mount, Bacon was doomed to view the land afar, which
he himself could never enter.

Bacon found but small encouragement for his new learning
among the most eminent scholars, to whom he submitted his
early discoveries. A very copious letter by Sir Thomas Bodley
on Bacon's desiring him to return the manuscript of the
Cogitaia et Visa, some portion of the Novum Organum, has
come down to us ; it is replete with objections to the new phi-
losophy. " I am one of that crew," sa\'s Sir Thomas, " that
say we possess a far greater holdfast of certainty in the sciences
than you will seem to acknowledge." He gives a hint too
that Solomon complained " of the infinite making of books in
his time;" that all Bacon delivers is only "by averment
without other force of argument, to disclaim all our axioms,
maxims, &c., left by tradition from our elders unto us, which
have passed all ])robations of the sharpest wits that ever
were ;" and he concludes that the end of all Bacon's philo-
sophy, by " a fresh creating new principles of sciences, would
be to be dispossessed of the learning we have ;" and he fears
that it would require as many ages as have marched before us
that knowledge should be perfectly achieved. Bodle}' truly
compares himself to "the carrier's horse which cannot blanch
the beaten way in which I was trained."*

Bacon did not lose heart by the timidity of the " carrier's
norse :" a smart vivacious note in return shows his quick
apprehension .

* This letter may be fouud in Reliquice Bodleiance, p. 369.

Of Lord Bacon at Home. 325

" As I am soing to my house in tlio country, I shall want
my papers, wliich 1 beg you therelore to return. You are
slothful, and you help me nothing, so that I am half in conceit
you alVect not the argument ; for myself I know well 3'^ou love
and affect. I can say no more, but non caniinus surdis,
respondent omnia sylvce. If you be not of the lodginr/s chalked
tip, whereof I sjieak in my preface, I am but to pass by
your door. But if I had you a fortnight at Gorhambury, 1
would make you tell another tale ; or else I would add a
cogitation against libraries, and be revenged on you that
way."

A keen but playful retort of a great author too conscious
of his own views to be angry with his critic ! The singular
phiase of the lodr/inc/s chalked vp is a sarcasm explained b\'
this passage in " Tlie Advancement of Learning." "As
Alexander Borgia was wont to say of the expedition of the
French for Naples, that they came with chalk in their bands
to mark up their lodgings, and not with weapons to fight ; so
I like better that entry of truth that cometh peaceably with
chalk to mark up those minds which are capable to lodge and
harbour it, than that which cometh with pugnacity and con-
tention."* The threatened agitation against libraries must
have caused Bodley's cheek to tingle.

Let us now turn from the scholastic to the men of the
world, and we shall see what sort of notion these critics en-
tertained of the philosophy of Bacon. Chamberlain writes,
" This week the lord chancellor hath set forth his new work,
called Instauratio Magna, or a kind of Novum Organum of
all i)hilosophy. In sending it to the king, he wrote that he
wished his majesty might be so long in reading it as he hath
been in composing and polishing it, which is well near tbirt}'
years. I have read no moi'c than the bare title, and am not
greatly encouraged by Mr. Cufl'e's judgment,t who having
long since perused it, gave this censure, that "a fool could not
have written such a work, and a wise man would not." A
month or two afterwards we find that " the king cannot
I'orbear sometimes in reading the lord chancellor's last book

* I have been favoured with this apt illustration by an anonymous com-
municator, who dates from the "London University." I rcjaest him to
accept my f^rateful acknowledgments.

t Henry Cufl'e, secretary to Robert, Earl of Essex, and execuleil, bein;;
concerned in his treason. A ni:in n -ted fur his chissioal acquirements and
hi.sjjuuius, who perished early in liie.

326 Of Lord Bacon at Home.

to ?ay, that it is like the peace of God, that siirpasseth all
understandincj y

Two years afterwards tlie same letter- writer proceeds witli
another hterarv paragraph about Bacon. " This lord busies
himself altogether about looks, and hath set out two lately,
Jlistoria Ventorum and De Vita et Morte, with promise ot
more. I have yet seen neither ol them, because 1 have not
leisure; but if "the Life of Henry the Eighth (the Seventh),
■wliich they say he is about, might covie out after his own
manner (meaning his Moral Essays), I should find time and
means enough to read it.'- When this history made its
ajjpearance, the same writer ol)serves, " My Lord Yerulam's
histor\^ of Henry the Seventh is come forth ; I have not read
much of it, but they say it is a very pretty book."*

Bacon, in his vast sm-vey of human knowledge, included
even its humbler provinces, and condescended to lbrn\ a col-
lection of apophtlicgms : his lordship regretted the loss of a
collection made by Julius Caesar, while Plutarch indiscrimi-
nately di-ew much of the dregs. The wits, who could not
always comprehend his plans, ridiculed the sage. I shall now
quote a contemporary poet, whose works, for by their size
they may assume that distinction, were never published. A
Dr. Andrews wasted a sportive pen on fugitive events ; but
though not always deficient in humour and. wit, such is the
freedom of his writings, that they will not often admit of
quotation. The following is indeed but a strange pun oh
Bacon's title, derived from the town of St. Albans and liis
collection of apophthegms : —

ON LORD BACON PtIBLISniNG APOPHTHEGMS.

When leai-ned Bacon wrote Essays,

He did deserve and liath the ])raisc ;

]]ut now he writes his Aimnhthcgms,

Surely lie dozes or he dreams;

One said, <S'^ Albans now is grown unahlo,

And is in tlie high-road way — to Dunstable [i. c, I>wnce-t\x!)le.]

To the close of his days were Lord Bacon's philosophical
pursuits still disregarded and depreciated by ignorance and

'' Chamberlain adds the price of this moderate- sized folio, which was
six shillings. It would be worth the while of some literary student to
note the prices of our earlier books, which are often found written upon
them by their original possessor. A rare tract first jnn-chased for two«
pence has often realized four guineas or more in modern lays.

Of Lord Bacon iil IJome. 327

envy, in the forms ol" fViuiKlsliip or rivality. I sliall now give
a reniarkahlc i'xani|)lt'. Sir Ivlwanl Cuke was a mere groat
lawyer, and, like all siu-li, had a mind so walled in hy law-
knowledge, that ill its hounded views it shut out the hori/on
ol" tlie intellri-tual i'acuUies, and the wlude of his i)hiloS(jphy
lay in the statutes. In the lihrary at llolkham there will he
Ibund a presentation eopy of Lord Bacon's Novum Orf/amim,
the Instaunitio Mai/iiK, 1G20. It was given to Coke, for it
hears the following note on the title-page, in the writing of
Coke : —

EJw. Coke, Ex, done authoris,

A iictori consilium

Instaurare paras vctcrum docuiaenla sophorum

Inslaura leges, juslitiamquc jprius.

Tlie verses not only reprove Bacon for going out of his profes-
sion, hut must have alluded to his character as a prerogative
lawyer, and his corrupt administration of the chancer}'. The
book was i)ublished in October, 1G20, a few months before
his impeachment. And so far one may easily excuse the
causticity of Coke ; but how he i-eally valued the philosophy
of Bacon appears by this : in this first edition there is a
device of a ship passing between Hercules's pillars ; the^;/«*
ultra, the jiroud exultation of our philosopher. Over this
device Coke has written a miserable distich in English, which
marks his utter contempt of the philosophical pursuits of his
illu.strious rival. This ship passing beyond the columns of
Hercules he sarcastically conceits as "The Ship of Fools,"
the famous satire of the German Sebastian Brandt, translated
by Alexander Barclay.

It deserveth not to be read in scliooh,
But to be frei(jhted in the Ship of Fools.

Such then was the fate of Lord Bacon ; a Jiistory not
written by his biographers, but which may serve as a com-
ment on that obscure passage dropped from the pen of his
chaplain, and already {quoted, that he was more valued abroad
thin at home.

S.'lS

SECRET HISTOKY OF THE DEATH OF QUEEN ELIZABETH.

It is an extraordinary circumstance in our history, tliat the
jccession to the English dominion, in two remarkable cases,
was never settled by the possessors of the throne themselves
during their lifetime ; and that there is every reason to believe
that this mighty transfer of three kingdoms becaine the sole
act of their ministers, who considered the succession merely
as a state expedient. Two of our most able sovereigns found
themselves in this predicament: Queen Elizabeth and the
Protector Cromwell ! Cromwell probably had his reasons not
to name his successor; his positive election would have dis-
satisfied the opposite parties of his government, whom he
only ruled while he was able to cajole them. He must have
been aware that latterly he liad need of conciliating all parties
to his usurpation, and was probably as doubtful on his death-
bed whom to appoint his successor as at any other period of
his reign. Ludlow suspects that Cromwell was " so discom-
posed in body or mind, that he could not attend to that matter;
and whether he named any one is to me uncertain." All
that we know is the report of the Secretary Thurlow and his
chaplains, who, when the protector lay in his last agonies,
suggested to him the propriety of choosing his eldest son,
and they tell us that he agreed to this choice. Had Cromwell
been in his senses, he would have probably fixed on Henry,
the lord-lieutenant of Ireland, rather than on Bichard, or
possibly had not chosen either of his sons !

Elizabeth, from womanish infirmity, or from state-reasons,
could not endure the thoughts of her successor ; and long
threw into jef)inrdy the politics of all the cabinets of Europe,
each of which luul its favourite candidate to support. The
legitimate heir to the throne of England was to be the crea-
ture of her breath, yet Elizabeth would not speak him into
existence ! This had, however, often raised the discontents
of tlie nation, and we shall see how it harassed the queen in
her dying hours. It is even suspected that the queen still
retained so much of the woman, that she could never over-
come her perverse dislike to name a successor ; so that,
according to this opinion, she died and left the crown to the
mercy of a party ! This would have been acting unworthy
of the magnanimity of her great character — and as it is
ascertained that the queen was very sensible that she lay in a

Secret History of the Deatli of Queen Elizabeth. 329

dying state several days before the natural catastro])he
occurred, it is difficult to believe that she totally disregarded
so important a circumstance. It is therefore, reasoning a
priori, most natiiral to conclude that the choice of a successor
must have occupied her thoughts, as well as the anxieties of
her ministers ; and that she would not have left the throne in
the same unsettled state at her death as she had persevered
in during her whole life. How did she express herself when
bequeathing the crown to James the Fir>t, or did she
bequeath it at all ?

in the popular pages of her female historian Miss Aikin,
it is observed that " the closing scene of the long and event-
ful lii'e of Queen Elizabeth was marked by that peculiarity of
character and destiny which attended her from the cradle,
and pursued her to the grave." The last days of Elizabeth
were indeed most melancholy — she died a victim of the
higher passions, and perhaps as much of grief as of age,
refusing all remedies and even nourishment. But in all thti
published accounts, I can nowhere discover how she con-
ducted herself respecting the circumstance of our present
inquiry. The most detailed narrative, or as Gray the poet
calls it, "the Earl of Monmouth's odd account of Queen
Elizabeth's death," is the one most deserving notice ; and
there we find the circumstance of this inquiry introduced.
The queen at that moment was reduced to so sad a state,
that it is doubtful whether her majesty was at all sensible of
the inquiries put to her by her ministers respecting the suc-
cession. The Eai-1 of Monmouth says, " On Wednesday, the
23rd of March, she grew speechless. That afternoon, by-
signs, she called for her council, and by putting her hand to her
head when the King of Scots was named to succeed her, thev
all knew he was the man she desired should reign after her."
Such a sign as that of a dying woman putting her hand to
lier head was, to say the least, a very ambiguous acknow-
ledgment of the riglit of the Scottish monarch to the English
throne. The " odd " but very naive account of Robert Car}-,
afterwards Earl of Monmouth, is not lurnished with dates,
nor with the exactness of a diary. Something might have
occurred on a preceding da}' which had not reached him.
Camden describes the death-bed scene of Elizabeth ; by this
authentic writer it appears that she had eontided her
state-secret of the succession to the lord admiral (the Earl of
N(iUingham); and when the <^arl found the queen almost at

330 Secret History of the heath of Queen Elizabeth.

her extremity, Jte communicated her majesfi/s secret to
tJie council, who commissioned the lord admiral, the lord
keeper, and the secretary, to wait on her majesty, and
acquaint her that they came in tlie name of the rest to learu
her ])leasure in reference to the succession. The queen
was then very weak, and answered them with a faint voice,
that she had already declared, that as she held a regal
sceptre, so she desired no other than a royal successor.
AVlien the secretary requested her to explain herself, the
queen said, " I would have a king succeed me ; and who
should that he hut my nearest kinsman, the King of Scots? "
Here this state conversation was put an end to by the inter-
ference of the archbishop advising her majesty to turn
her thoughts to God. "Never," she replied, "has my
mind wandered from him."

An historian of Camden's high hitegrity would hardly
have forged a fiction to please the new monarch : yet Camden
has not been referred to on this occasion by the exact Birch,
wlio draws hi? information from the letters of the French
ambassador, A"illei-oy ; information which it appears the
English ministers had confided to this ambassador; nor do we
get any distinct ideas from Elizabeth's more recent popular
historian, who could only transcribe the account of Cary.
He had told us a fact which he could not be mistaken in,
that the queen fell speechless on Wednesday, 23rd of March,
on which day, however, she called her council, and made thai
sign with her hand, which, as the lords choose to understand,
for ever united the two kingdoms. But the noble editor of
Cary's Memoirs (the Earl of Cork and Orrery) has observed
that "the speeches made for Elizabeth on her death-bed are
all forged." Echard, liapin, and a long string of historians,
make her say faintly (so faintly indeed that it could not pos-
silily be heard), "I will that a king succeed me, and who
should that be but my nearest kinsman, the King of Scots F"
A different account of this matter will be found in the follow-
ing memoirs. " She was speechless, and almost expiring,
when the chief councillors of state were called into her bed-
chamber. As soon as they were perfectly convinced that she
could not utter an articulate word, and scarce could hear or
understand one, they named the King of Scots to her, a
liberty they dared not to have taken if she had heen able to
speak ; she put her hand to her head, which was probably at

Secret IJislonj of ike Dealh of Qnccu Elizubeth. 3 31

that time iu af^oni.sing- pain. The lonh, icho hdcrprded licr
sif/iis just as tlitij phaacd, were iiiinit-'diatoly cunviucecl that
the motion of tier liand to her head was a dndarafiun of Jain cs
the !Sixth as her successor. What was this hut the unanimous
inter|)retation of persons who were aiUjrinj^ the rising; sun?"
This is lively and plausihle ; Imt the nohle editor (hd no^
recollect that " tlie speeches made hy Elizaheth on her deatli-
hed," which he deems " forgeries," in consequence of the cir-
cumstance he had found in Cary's Memoii-s, originate with
Camden, and were only repeated hy Uajiin and tlchard, &e.
1 am now to conlirm the narrative of the elder liistorian, as
well as the circumstance related hy Cary, descrihing the sign
of the queen a little dillerently, whicli "happened on Wednes-
day, 23rd. A hitherto unnoticed document pretends to give
a fuller and nu)re circumstantial account of this alfair, which
coumienced on the preceding day, when the queen retained
the power of speech ; and it will he confessed that the
language here used has all that loftiness and hrevity which
was the natural style of this queen. I have discovered a
curious document in a manuscript volume formerly in the
possession of Petyt, and seemingly in liis own handwriting.
1 do not douht its authenticity, and it could only have come
from some of the illustrious personages who were the actors
in that solemn scene, probably from Cecil. This memoran-
dum is entitled

" Account of the last words of Queen Elizabeth about her
Successor.

" On the Tuesday before her death, being the twenty-third
of IMarch, the admiral being on the right side of her bed, the
lord keeper on tlie Ici't, and Mr. Secretary Cecil (afterwards
Earl of Salisbury) at the bed's feet, all stanchng, the lord
admiral put her in mind of her speech concerning the succes-
sion liad at Wliitehall, and that thty, in the name of all the
rest of her council, came unto hor to know her pleasure who
should succeed; whereunto she thus replied:

^^ I told yon, my seat had been the seat of kinr/s, and I will
have no rascal to succeed me. And toho should succeed me
but a king f

" The lords not understanding this dark speech, and looking
one on the other ; at length jNlr. Secretary boldly asked her
what she meant by those words, that no rascal should succeed
her. AVhereto she replied, that Iter meaning was, that a king

332 Secrel History of the Death of Queen Elizabeth.

sJtould succeed : and who, quoth slie, should that he but our
cousin of Scotland?

" They asked her whether that were her absolute resolution ?
whereto she answered, 1 praij you trouble me no more ; for I
trill have none but him. With wdiich answer they departed.

"Notwithstanding, after again, about four o'clock in the
afternoon the next da}^ being Wednesday, after the Arch-
bishop of Canterbury and other divines had been with her,
and left her in a manner speechless, the three lords aforesaid
repaired unto her again, asking her if she remained in her
ibrmer resolution, and who should succeed her ? but not being
able to speak, was asked by Mr. Secretary in this sort, ' We
beseech 3'our majest}', if you remain in 3'our former resolu-
tion, and that you would have the King of Scots to succeed
you in your kingdom, show some sign unto us : whereat,
suddenly heaving herself upwards in her bed, and putting her
arms out of bed, she held her hands jointly over her head in
manner of a crown ; whence as they guessed, she signified
that she did not only wish him the kingdom, but desire con-
tinuance of his estate : after which they departed, and the
next morning she died. Immediately alter her death, all the
lords, as well of the council as other noblemen that were at
the court, came from Eichmond to Whitehall by six o'clock
in the morning, where other noblemen that were in London
met them. Touching the succession, after some speeches of
divers competitors and matters of state, at length the admiral
rehearsed all the aforesaid premises which the late queen had
spoken to him, and to the lord keeper, and Mr. Secretary
(Cecil), with the manner thereof ; which they, being asked,
did affirm to be true upon their honour."

Such is this singular document of secret history, I cannot
but value it as authentic, because the one part is evidently
alluded to by Camden, and the other is fully confirmed by
Cary ; and besides this, the remarkable expression of "ras-
cal " is found in the letter of the French ambassador. There
were two interviews with the queen, and Cary appears only to
have noticed the last on Wednesday, when the queen lay
speechless. Elizabeth all her life had persevered in an obsti-
nate mysteriousness respecting the "Hiccession, and it harassed
her latest moments. The second interview of her ministers
may seem to us quite supernumerary ; but Carv's " putting
her hand to her head," too meanly describes the "joining
her hands in manner of u crown."

333

JAMES THE FIRST AS A FATHER AND A HUSBAND.

Calumnies and sarcasms have reduced the character of James
the First to contempt among general readers ; while the nar-
rative of historians, who have related facts in spite of them-
selves, is in perpetual contradiction with their own opinions.
Perhaps no sovereign has suffered more by that art, which is
described by an old Irish proverb, of " killing a man by lies."
The surmises and the insinuations of one party, dissatisfied
with the established government in church and state ; the
misconceptions of more modern writers, who have not pos-
sessed the requisite knowledge ; and the anonymous libels,
sent forth at a particular period to vilify the Stuarts ; all
these cannot be treasured up by the philosopher as the
authorities of history. It is at least more honourable to
resist popular prejudice than to yield to it a passive obedience ;
and what we can ascertain it would be a dereliction of truth
to conceal. Much can be substantiated in favour of the
domestic aflections and habits of this pacific monarch ; and
tliose who are more intimately acquainted with the secret
history of the times will perceive how erroneously the personal
character of this sovereign is exhibited in our popular histo-
rians, and often even among the few who, with better infor-
mation, have re-echoed their preconceived opinions.

Confining myself here to his domestic character, I shall not
touch on the many admirable public projects of tiiis monarch,
which have extorted the praise, and even tlie admiration, of
some who have not spared tlieir pens in his disparagement.
James the First has been taxed with pusillanimity and fool-
ishness; this monarch cannot, however, be reproached with
liaving engendered them ! All his children, in whose educa-
tion their father was so deeply concerned, sustained through
life a dignified character and a high spirit. The short life of
Henry w^as i)assed in a school of prowess, and amidst an
academy of literature. Of the king's paternal solicitude, even
to the hand and the letter-writing of Prince Henry when
young, I have preserved a proof in the article of '' Tlie His-
tory of Writing-masters." Charles the First, in his youth
more particularly designed for a studious life, with a serious
character, was. however, never deficient in active bravery and
magnanimous fortitude. Of Elizabeth, the Queen of i3ohe-
mia, tried as she was by such vicissitudes of fortune, it is

331' James the First as a Falhcr and a Husband.

much to be regretted that the interesting story remains un-
told ; hor buoyant spirits rose always above the perpetual
changes of a princely to a private state — a queen to an
exile ! The father of such chikben derives some distinction
for capacity, in having reared such a noble oirspring ; and the
king's marked attention to the formation of liis children's
minds was such as to have been pointed out b}^ lien Jonson,
who, in his " Gipsies Metamorphosed," rightly said of James,
using his native term —

You are an honest, good man, and have Ciire of youii BiiARns (bairns).

Among the flouts and gibes so freely bespattering the per-
sonal character of James the First, is one of his coldness and
neglect of his queen. It would, however, be difficult to prove
by an 3^ known fact that James was not as indulgent a hus-
Itand as he was a father. Yet even a writer so well informed
as Daines Barrington, who, as a lawyer, could not refrain from
lauding the royal sage dming his visit to Denmark, on his
marriage, for having borrowed three statutes from the Danish
code, found the king's name so provocative of sarcasm, that
he could not forbear observing, that James " spent more time
in those com'ts of juthcature than in afiendiiif/ upon his des-»
tiued consort.^'' — " Men of all sorts have taken a pride to gird
at me," might this monarch have exclaimed. But ever}^-
thing has two handles, saith the ancient adage. Had an
austere pm-itan chosen to observe that James tlie First, when
abroad, had lived jovially ; and had this historian then di'opped
silently the interesting circumstance of the king's " spending
his time in the Danish com-ts of judicature," the fact would
have borne him out in his reproof; and Francis Osborne,
indeed, has censured James for giving marks of his uxorious-
iiess ! There was no delicient gallantry in the conduct of James
the First to his queen ; the very circumstance, tliat when the
Princess of Denmark was driven by a storm back to Norway,
the king resolved to hasten to her, and consummate his mar-
riage in J)enmark, was itself as romantic an expedition as after-
wards was that of his son's into S|)ain, and betraj^s no mark of
tliat tame ])usillanimity witli wdiich he stands overcharged.

The character of the queen of James the First is somewhat
obscure in our pubUc history, lor in it she makes no jjromi-
ncnt figure ; while in secret history she is more apparent.
Anno of Denmark was a spirited and enterprising woman;
and it appears from a passage in Sully, whose authority should

James the First as a Falher and a Ilasbuiul. S35

wpigh with us, although we ouglit to recollect that it is the
I'rench minister wlio writes, that she seems to have raised a
court faction against James, and inclined to favour the
Spanish and catholic interests ; yet it may he alleged as a
strong proof of James's ))olitical wisdom, that the queen was
never sullered to head a I'ormidahle Jiarty, though she latterl}''
might have engaged Prince Henry in that court opposition.
Tlie honliommie of the king, on this suhject, expressed with a
siniplioity of style which, though it may not he royal, is some-
thing better, appears in a letter to the queen, which has been
j)reserved iii the appendix to Sir David Dahymple's collec-
tions. It is without date, but written when in Scotland,
to quiet the queen's suspicions, that the Earl of ]\Iar, who
had the cai'e of Prince Henry, and whom she wished to take
out of his hands, had insinuated to the king that her majesty
v.-as strongly disposed to any "popish or Spanish course."
This letter coniirms the representation of Sully ; but the
extract is remarkable for the manly simplicity of style which
the king used.

" I say over again, leave these froward womanly apprehen-
sions, for I thank God I carry that love and respect unto
you which, by the law of God and nature, I ought to do to
my wife, and mother of my children ; but not for that ye are
a king's daughter ; for whether ye were a king's daughter, or
a cook's dangliter, ye must be all alike to me since my wife.
For the respect of your honourable birth and descent I mar-
ried you ; but the love and respect I now bear you is because
that ye are my married wife, and so partaker of my honour,
as of my other fortunes. I beseech you excuse my plainness
in this, for casting up of your birth is a needless impertinent
(tluit is, not pertinent) argument to me. God is my witness, I
ever preferred you to my bairns, much more than to a subject."

In an in^'enious historical dissertation, but one perfectly
tlieoretical, respecting that mysterious transaction the Gowrie
conspiracy, Pinkerton has attemjjted to show that Anne of
Denmark was a lady somewhat inclined to intrigue, and that
'• the king had cause to be jealous." He confesses that " he
cannot discover any positive charge of adultery against Anne
of l>enmark. but merely of coquetry."* To what these accu.sa-
tions amount it would be ditUcult to say. The progeny of

* Tlie liistorical dissertation i-s appemlcl to the first volume of Afr.
M.\1oilm Laiiiji's "History of Scotland," who thinks that "it has placed
that obscuro tran.saeliuu iu its ''Oiuiiuc li^ht."

336 James the First as a Father and a Husband.

James the First sufficiently bespeak tlieir family resemblance.
It' it be true, that " the king had ever reason to be jealous,"
and yet that no single criminal act of the queen's has been
recorded, it must be confessed that one or both of the parties
were singularly discreet and decent ; for the king never com-
plained, and the queen was never accused, if we except this
burthen of an old Scottish ballad,

0 the bonny Earl of Murray,
He was the queen's love.

Whatever may have happened in Scotland, in England the
queen appears to have lived occupied chiefly by the amuse-
ments of the court, and not to have interfered with the arcana
of state. She appears to have indulged a passion for the
elegancies and splendours of the age, as they were shown in
those gorgeous court masques with which the taste of James
harmonized, either from his gallantry for the queen, or his
own poetic sympathy. But this taste for court masques
could not escape the slur and scandal of the puritanic, and
these "high-flying fancies" are thus recorded by honest
Arthur Wilson, whom we summon into court as an indubi-
table witness of the mutual cordiality of this royal couple.
In the spirit of his party, and like Milton, he censures the
taste, but likes it. He says, " The court being a continued
maskarado, where she (the queen) and her ladies, like so
many sea-nymphs or Nereides, appeared often in various
dresses, to the ravishment of the beholders ; the king him-
self not being a little delighted with such fluent elegancies as
made the niglit more glorious than the day."* This is a
direct proof that James was by no means cold or negligent
in his attentions to his queen ; and the letter which has been
given is the picture of his mind. That James the First was
ibndly indulgent to his queen, and could perform an act of
chivalric gallantry with all the generosity of passion, and the
ingenuity of an elegant mind, a pleasing anecdote which I
have discovered in an unpublished letter of the day will show.
1 give it in the words of the writer.

^'■Aucjust, 1613.

" At their last being at Theobalds, about a fortnight ago,
jhe queen, shooting at a deer, mistook her mark, and killed

* See the article on CuuH Masques in the early pages of the present
volume for notices of the elaborate splendour and costliness of thea©
favourite displays.

The Man of One Book. 337

Je;ceJ,i\\c king's most principal and special hound; at which
he stormed exceedingly awhile ; but after ho knew who did
it, he was soon pacified, and with much kindness wished her
not to be troubled with it, for lie should love her iiever the
worse : and the next day sent her a diamond worth two thou-
sand pounds as a ^c(/aci/ from liis dead dog. Love and kind-
ness increased daily between them."

Such is the history of a contemporary living at court, very
0])posite to that representation of coldness and neglect with
which the king's temper has been so freely aspersed ; and such
too is the true portrait of James the First in domestic life.
His first sensations were thoughtless and impetuous; and
he would ungracefully thunder out an oath, which a puritan
would set down in his " tables," while he omitted to note
that this king's forgiveness and forgetfulness of personal
injuries were sure to follow the feeling they had excited.

THE MAJJ OF ONE BOOK.

Mr. Maubice, in his animated Memoirs, has recently
acquainted us with a fact which may be deemed important in
the life of a literary man. He tells us, " We have been just
informed that Sir William Jones invariahly read through
ever}' year the works of Cicero, whose life indeed was the great
exemplar of his own." The same passion for the works of
Cicero has been participated by others. When the best means
of forming a good style were inquired of the learned Ar-
nauld, he advised the daily study of Cicero ; but it was
observed that the object was not to form a Latin, but a French
style : " In that case," replied Arnauld, " you must still read
Cicero."

A predilection for some great author, among the vast num-
ber which must transiently occupy our attention, seems to bo
the happiest preservative for our taste : accustomed to that
excellent author whom we have chosen for our favourite, we
may in this intimacy possibly resemble him. It is to be
I'eared that, if we do not form such a ])ermanent attachment,
we may be acquiring knowledge, while our enervated taste
becomes less and less lively. Taste embalms the knowledge
whicli otherwise cannot pivserve itself. He who has long been
intimate with one great author will always be Inund to be a
formidable antagonist ; he has saturat'-d his mind with the

VOL. 111. «

338 The Man of One Booh

excellences of genius ; he has shaped his faculties insensibly
to himself by liis model, and he is like a man who ever sleeps
in armour, ready at a moment ! The old Latin proverb
reminds us of this fact, Cave ah homine unius lihri: J3e cau-
tious of the man of one hook !

Pliny and Seneca give ver}^ safe advice on reading : that we
should read much, but not many books — but tliey had no
"monthly list of new publications!" Since their days others
havefavom-ed us with " INIethodsof Study," and "Catalogues
of Books to be Read." Vain attempts to circumscribe that
invisible circle of human knowledge which is perpetually en-
larging itself! The multiplicity of books is an evil for
tbe many ; for we now find an lielluo librorum not only
among the learned, but, with their pardon, among the un-
learned ; for those who, even to the prejudice of their healtb,
persist only in reading the incessant book-novelties of our
own time, will after many years acquu'e a sort of learned
ignorance. AVe are now in want of an art to teach how books
are to be read, rather than not to read them : such an art is
practicable. But amidst this vast multitude still let us he
"the man of one book," and preserve an uninterrupted inter-
course with that great author with whose mode of thinking
we sj'mpathise, and whose charms of composition we can
habitually retain.

It is remarkable that every great wi'iter appears to have a
predilection for some favomite author ; and, with Alexander,
had they possessed a golden casket, would have enshrined the
works they so constantly turned over. Demosthenes felt such
delight in the history of Thucj'dides, that, to obtain a familiar
and perfect mastery of his style, he re-copied his history eight
times ; while Brutus not only was constantly perusing Poly-
hius, even amidst the most bus}' periods of his life, but was
abridging a copy of that author on the last awful night of his
existence, when on the following day he was to tr^^ his fate
against Antony and Octavius. Selim the Second had the
Commentaries of Ctesar translated for his use ; and it is
recorded that his military ardour was heightened by the
perusal. We are told that Scipio Africanus was made a hero
by the writings of Xenophon. When Clarendon was em-
])loyed in writing his history, he was in a constant study of
Livy and Tacitus, to acquire the full and flowing style of the
one, and the portrait-painting of the other : he records this
cii'cumstance in a letter. Voltaire had usually on his table

The Man of One Book. 339

tlie AthaJie of Racine, and the Petit Careme of Massillon ;
the tragedies of the one wei'e the finest model of Freneli
verse, tlie sermons of the other of French prose. " Were I
obliged to sell m}' library," exclaimed JUderot, "I would
kee]) back Moses, Homer, and Richardson ;" and, by the
ilof/e which this enthusiastic writer composed on our English
novelist, it is doubtl'ul, had the Frenchman been obliged to
have lost two of them, whether Richardson had not been the
elected favourite. ]\Ionsieur Thomas, a French writer, who
at times displays high eloquence and profound thinking,
Herault de Sechelles tells us, studied chiefly one author, but
that author was Cicero ; and never went into the country un-
accompanied by some of his works. F6nelon was constantly
employed on his Homer ; he left a translation of the greater
part of the Odyssey, without any design of publication, but
merely as an exercise for style. Montesquieu was a constant
student of Tacitus, of whom he must be considei-cd a forcible
imitator. He has, in the manner of Tacitus, characterised
Tacitus : " That historian," he says, " who abridged every-
thing, because he saw everything." The famous Bourda-
loue re-perused every year Saint Paul, Saint Chrysostom, and
Cicero, "These," says a French critic, " were the sources of
his masculine and solid eloquence." Grotius had such a taste
for Lucan, that he always carried a pocket edition about him.
and has been seen to kiss his hand-book with the rapture of a
true votary. If this anecdote be true, the elevated sentiments
of the stern Roman were probably the attraction with the Ba-
tavian republican. The diversified reading of Leibnitz is well
known ; but he still attached himself to one or two fixvour-
ites : Virgil was always in his hand when at leisure, and
Leibnitz had read Virgil so often, that even in his old age he
could repeat whole books by heart ; Barclay's Argenis was his
model for prose ; when ho was found dead in his chair, the
Ai-genis had fallen from his hands. Rabelais and jMai'ot were
the perpetual favourites of La Fontaine ; from one he bor-
rowed his humotn-, and front the other his style. Quevedo
was so passionately fond of the Don Quixote of Cervantes,
that often in reading that unrivalled work he felt an impulse
tt) burn his own inferior comi)ositions : to be a sincere admirer
and a hopeless rival is a case of authorship the hardest ima-
ginable. Few writers can venture to anticipate the award
of posterity ; yet perhaps Quevedo had not even been what
ho was without the perpetual excitement he reicived from his

z2

340 A Bibliognoste.

great master. Horace was the friend of his heart to Mal-
herbe ; he laid the Roman poet on his pillow, took him in the
fields, and called his Horace his breviary. Plutarch, Montaigne,
and Locke, were the three authors constantly in the hands of
Eousseau, and he has drawn from them tlie groundwork of
his ideas in his Emile. The favourite author of the great Earl
of Chatham was Barrow ; and on his style he had formed his
eloquence, and had read his great master so constantly, as to
be able to repeat his elaborate sermons from memory. The
great Lord Burleigh always carried Tally's Oflices in his
pocket ; Charles V. and Buonaparte had Machiavel frequently
in their hands ; and Davila was the perpetual study of
Hampden : he seemed to have discovered in that historian of
civil wars those which he anticipated in the land of his fathers.
These facts sufficiently illustrate the recorded circumstance
of Sir William Jones's invariable habit of reading his Cicero
through every year, and exemplify the happy result for him,
who, amidst the multiplicit}' of his authors, still continues in
this way to be "the man of one book."

A BIBLIOGNOSTE.

A STAETLING literary prophecy, recently sent forth from
our oracular literature, threatens the annihilation of public
libraries, which are one day to moulder away !

Listen to the vaticinator ! "As conservatories of mental
treasures, their value in times of dai'kness and barbarity was
incalculable ; and even in these happier days, when men are
incited to explore new regions of thought, they command
respect as depots of methodical and well-ordered references
for the researches of the curious. But what in one state of
society is invaluable, may at another be worthless ; and the
progress which the world has made within a very few cen-
turies has considerably reduced the estimation which is due
to such establisliments. We will say more — "* but enough !
This idea of striking into dust " the god of his idolatry,", the
Dagon of his devotion, is sufficient to terrify the bibliographer,
who views only a blind Samson pulling down the pillars of
his temple !

Tins future universal inundation of books, this superfluity
of knowledge, in l)illions and trillions, overwhelms the imn'^i-

* " Edinburgb Review," vol. xxxiv. 3S4.

A Bihliognoste. 311

nation ! It is now about four liundrecl years since tlie art of
niultiijlyin<^ books has been discovered; and an aritlimetician
lias attempted to calculate the incalculable of these four ages
of t^-po^n-aphy, which he discovers have actually produced
3,G11,{)G0 works ! Taking each work at three volumes, and
reckoning only each impression to consist of three hundred
copies, which is too little, the actual amount from the presses
of Europe will give to ISIG, 3, 277, 701,000 volumes ! each
of which being an inch thick, if placed on a line, would cover
GOGl) leagues ! Leibnitz facetiously maintained that such
would be the increase of literature, that future generations
would find whole cities insullicient to contain their libraries.
We are, however, indebted to the patriotic endeavours of
our grocers and trunkmakers, alchemists of literature ! they
annihilate the gross bodies without injuring the finer spirits.
We are still more indebted to that neglected race, the biblio-
gi-aphers !

The science of books, for so bibliography is sometimes
dignified, may deserve the gratitude of a public, who are yet
insensible of the useful zeal of those book-practitioners, the
nature of whose labours is yet so imperfectly comprehended.
Who is this vaticinator of the uselessness of public libraries ?
Ts he a hiblioffJiosfe, or a hibJiographc, or a hihliomane, or a
hibliophile, or a hihliotaphe ? A hihliotliecaire, or a hiblio-
fole^ the prophet cannot be ; for the bibUolhecaire is too
delightfully busied among his shelves, and the bibliopole is
too profitably concerned in furnishing perpetual additions to
admit of this hyperbolical terror of annihilation ! *

Unawares, we have dropped into that professional jargon
which was chielly forged by one who, though seated in the
" scorner's chair," was the Thaumaturgus of books and
manuscripts. The Abbe Rive had acquired a singular taste
and curiosity, not without a fermenting dash of singular
charlittanerie, in bibliography : the httle volumes he occa-
sionally put forth are things which but few hands have
touched. He knew well, that for some books to be noised
about, they should not be read : this was one of those recon-
dite mysteries of his, which we may have occasion farther to

* Will this writer pardon me for ranking him, for a moment, amore
those " generalisers" of the age who excel in what a critical friend has
happily discriniinated as ambitious writiiuj ? that is, writing on any topic,
and not least strikingly on that of whicii tliey know least ; men otherwise
of tine taste, and who excel in every charm of composition.

3 12 A Bihliognoste.

reveal. This bibliographical hero was librarian to the most
iiiagnillceut of book-collectors, the Duke de la Valliero. The
Abbe Eive was a strong bnt ungovernable brute, rabid, surly,
but tres-mordanf. His master, whom I have discovered to
have been the partner of the cur's tricks, would often pat
him ; and when the hihliognostes, and the hibliomanes were
in the heat of contest, let his " bull-dog" loose among them,
as the duke affectionately called his librarian. The " bull-
dog" of bibliography appears, too, to have had the taste and
appetite of the tiger of politics, but he hardly lived to join
the festival of the guillotine. I judge of this by an expression
he used to one complaining of his parish priest, whom he
advised to give " une messe dans son ventre !" He had tried
to exhaust his genius in La Cliasse aux Bihliographes et aux
Antiquaires mal avises, ii\\<\ acted Cain with his brothers!
All Europe was to receive from him new ideas concerning
books and manuscripts. Yet all his mighty promises fumed
away in projects ; and though he appeared for ever correcting
the blunders of others, this French Eitson left enough of his
own to afford them a choice of revenge. His style of criti-
cism was perfectly Bitsonian. He describes one of his rivals
as Vinsolent et tres-insense auteur de V Almanack de Gollia,
on the simple subject of the origin of playing-cards !

The. Abbe Eive was one of those men of letters, of whom
there are not a few who pass all their lives in preparations.
Dr. Dibdin, since the above was written, has witnessed the
confusion of the mind and the gigantic industry of our lihlio-
fpioste, which consisted of many trunks full of memoranda.
The description will show the reader to what hard hunting
these book-hunters voluntaiily doom themselves, with little
hope of obtaining fame ! " In one trunk were about six
lliousand notices of MSS. of all ages. In another were
wedged about twelve thousand descri^jtions of books in all
languages, excc])t those ol" Fi-ench and Italian ; sometimes
with critical notes. In a third trunk was a bundle of ])apers
relating to the Ilistori/ of the Trouhadours. In a fourth
was a collection of memoranda and literary sketches con-
nected with the invention of arts and sciences, with pieces
exclusively bibliogra]jhical. A liitli trunk contained between
two and three thousand cards, written upon each side, respect-
ing a collection of prints. In a sixth trunk were contained
his papers respecting earthquakes, volcanoes, and geographical

A Bihlioi/voffe. ?y\:^

f ;il>iecis.''* This Ajitx JhiijdVifc.r of the bil)liogvapIiif;d
tribe, who was, as Dr. Dibdin observes, " the terror of his
aequaiiitaiicc, and the pride of his patron," is said to have
been in private a very dilferent man from his puVjlic cha-
racter ; all which may be true, without altering a shade of
that public character. The French Revolution showed how
men, mild and even kind in domestic life, were sanguinary
and ferocious in their public.

The rabid Abbe Hive gloried in terrifying, without eu-
bghtening his rivals; he exulted that he was devoting to
" the rods of criticism and the laughter of Europe the hibVio-
'poles,^' or dealers in books, who would not get by heart his
'* Catechism" of a thousand and one questions and answers:
it broke the slumbers of honest De liure, who had found
life was already too short for his own " Bibliographic In-
structive."

The Abbe Hive had contrived to catch the shades of the
ap])ellatives necessary to discriminate book amateurs; and of
the lirrft term he is acknowledged to be the inventor.

A bibliognoste, from the Greek, is one knowing in title-
]i;igc.s and coloplions, and in editions; the place and year
when printed; the presses whence issued; and all the
miniiticB of a book.

A hihliofiraphe is a describer of books and other literary
arrangements.

A bibliomaiie is an indiscriminate accumulator, who blun-
ders faster than lie buys, cock-brained, and purse-heavy !

A bibliophile, the lover of books, is the only one in tlie
class who appears to read them for his own pleasure.

A bibliotaphe buries his books, by keeping them under
lock, or framing them in glass cases.

I shall catch our biblioi/nos/e in the hour of book-ra[)ture !
It .will i)roduee a collection of bibliographical writers, and
show to the second-siglited Edinl)urgher what human con-
trivances have been raised by the art of more painful writers
than liimsclf - either to postpone the day of universal annihi-

* The late Win. Upcott possessed, in a large Jegree, a similar t.ast« for
miscellaneous collections. He never threw an old hat away, but used it
as a receptacle for certain " cuttings" from bnoks and periodicals on some
pcciliar subjects. He had filled a room with hats and trunks thus
crammed ; but they were sacrificed at bis death for want of necessary
uraugement.

344 A Bibliognoste.

Nation, or to preserve for our ]:)osterity, three centuries hence,
the knowledge which now so husily occupies us, and transnut
to them something more than what Bacon calls " Inven-
tories" of our literary treasures.

"Histories, and literary bihlio/heques (or hihliothecas), will
ohvays present to us," says La Rive, " an immense harvest of
errors, till the authors of such catalogues shall he fully im-
])rcsscd by the importance of their art ; and, as it were, reading
in the most distant ages of the future the literary good and
evil which they may produce, force a triumph from the pure
devotion to truth, in spite of all the disgusts which their
])rofessional tasks involve; still patiently enduring the heavy
chains which bind down those who give themselves up to this
jausuit, with a passion which resembles heroism.

'■ The catalogues of hihUothequesJixes (or critical, historical,
and classified accounts of writers) have engendered that enor-
mous swarm of bibliographical errors, which have spread their
roots, in greater or less quantities, in all our bibliographers."
He has here furnished a long list, which I shall preserve in
the note.*

The list, though curious, is by no means complete. Such
are the men of whom the Abbe Kive speaks with more re-
spect than his accustomed courtesy. " If such," says he,
'■ cannot escape from errors, who shall ? I have only marked
them out to prove the importance of bibliographical history.
A writer of this sort must occupy himself with more regard
for his reputation than his own profit, and yield himself up
entirely to the study of books."

The mere knowledge of books, which has been called an
erudition of title-pages, may be sufiicient to occupy the life
of some ; and while the wits and "the million" are ridiculing
these hunters of editions, who force their passage through
secluded spots, as well as course in the open fields, it will be
Ibund that this art of book-knowledge may turn out to be a
very philosophical pursuit, and that men of great name have

* Gessner — Simler — Bellarmin — L'Abbe — Mabillon — Montfaucon —
IVForcri — Bayle — Baillet — Niceron — Dnpin — Cave — Warton — Casirnir
Oudin — Le Long — Guujet — Wolfius — John Albert Fabricius — Argelati- —
'i'iiaboschi — Nicholas Antonio — Walchius — Struvius — Brucker — Scheuch-
zer — Linna3us-^Seguier — Haller — Adamson — Mauget — Kestner — Eloy — ■
^Jouglas — Weidler — Hailbronner — Montucla — Lalande — Bailly — Quadrio
— Worhoff — Stollius — Funccius — Schelliorn — Eugles — Beyer — Gerdesius —
\'ogts — Freytag — David Clement — Clievillier — Maittaire — Orlandi — Pros-
per Marchand — Sclioeplin — De Boze — Abbe Sallier — and de Saint Leger.

A Bihliognoste. 315

devoted tliomsclvos to labours more frequently contenii.id
tliun comprelieiuleil. Apostolo Zeiio, Ji poet, a critic, and a
true man of letters, considered it as no small portion of his
plory to have annotated Fontanini, who, himself an eminent
prelate, had passed his life in forming his BibJiotheca Itctliana.
Zeno did not consider that to correct errors and to enrich hv
information this catalcyuo of Italian writers was a mean task.
1'he enthusiasm of the Abbe liivc considered bibhography as
a sublime ])ursuit, exclaiming on Zeno's conunentary on Fon-
tanini— " He chained together the knowledge of whole gene-
i-ations for posterity, and he read in i'uture ages."

There are few things by which we can so well trace the
history of the human mind as by a classed catalogue, with
dates of the first publication of books ; even the relative prices
of books at dilferent periods, their decline and then their rise,
and again their ftill, form a chapter in this history of the
human mind ; we become critics even by this literary chro-
nology, and this appraisement of auctioneers. The favourite
book of every age is a certain pictiu'c of the people. The
gradual depreciation of a great author marks a cliange in
knowledge or in taste.

But it is imagined that we are not interested in the history
of indiH'erent writers, and scarcely in that of the secondary
ones. If none but great originals should claim our attention,
in tlie course of two thousand years we should not count
twenty authors ! Every book, whatever be its character, may
be considered as a nev/ experiment made by the human un-
derstanding ; and as a book is a sort of individual representa-
tion, not a solitary volume exists hut may be personified, and
described as a hiunan being. Hints start discoveries : they
are usually found in very ditferent authors who could go no
further ; and the historian of obscure books is often preserving-
fur men of genius indications of knowledge, which without his
intervention we should not possess ! Many secrets we dis-
cover in bibliography. Great writers, unskilled in this science
of books, have frequently used defective editions, as Hume did
the castrated Whitelocke ; or, like Robertson, they are ignorant
of even the sources of the knowledge they would give the
)jublie ; or they compose on a subject which too late they
discover had been anticipated. Bibliograph}'^ will show what
has been done, and suggest to our invention what is wanted.
IMany have often protracted their journey in a road which
had already been worn out by the wheels which had tra-

316 Secret TT'i story of an Elective Monarchy.

Vf rscd it : bibliography unrolls the whole map of the country
wc purpose travelling over — the post-roads and the by-paliis.

Every half-century, indeed, the obstructions multiply ; and
the Edinburgh prediction, should it approximate to the event
it has foreseen, may more reasonably terrify a far distant pos-
terity. Mazzuchelii declared, after liis laborious researches in
Italian literatm'e, that one of his more recent predecessors,
■vvlio had commenced a similar work, had collected notices of
forty thousand writers — and yet, he adds, my work must in-
crease that number to ten thousand more ! Mazzuchelii said
this in 1753 ; and the amount of nearly a century must now
be added, for the presses of Italy have not been inactive.

But the literatm'e of Germany, of France, and of England
has exceeded the multiplicity of the productions of Italy, and
an aj)palling population of authors swarm before the imagina-
tion.* Hail then the peaceful spirit of the literary historian,
which sitting amidst the night of time, by the monuments of
genius, trims the sepulchral lamps of the human mind! Hail
to the literary lleaumur, who by the clearness of his glasses
makes even the minute interesting, and reveals to us the
world of insects ! These are guardian spirits who, at the close
of every century standing on its ascent, trace out the old
roads we had pursued, and with a lighter line indicate the
new ones which are opening, from the imperfect attempts,
and even the errors of our predecessors !

SECRET HISTORY OF AN ELECTIVE MONARCHY.

A POLITICAL SKETCH.

PoT-AND, once a potent and magnificent kingdom, when it
sunk into an elective monarchy, became "venal tlirice an
age." That country must have exhibited many a diplomatic
scene of intricate intrigue, which although they could not
a])pear in its public, have no doubt been often consigned to
its secret, history. With us the corruption of a rotten bo-
rough has sometimes exposed the guarded proffer of one party,
and the dexterous chaffering of the other : l)ut a masterpiece
of diplomatic finesse and political invention, electioneering
viewed on the most magnificent scale, with a kingdom to be

* TLe British Museum Library now numbers more tban 500,000 vo-
lumes. The catalogue alone forms a small library.

Scrrcl I lis lory of an Elective MnnarrJnj. ?>[7

ctiiivasscd, and a crown to be won ami lost, or lost and won in
the course of a single day, exhibits a political drama, which,
for the honour and happiness of mankind, is of rare and
strange occurrence. There was one scene in this drama which
might appear somewhat too large for an ordinary theatre ; the
actors apparently were not less than fifty to a hundi'ed tliou-
sand ; twelve vast tents were raised on an extensive plain,
a hundi'ed thousand horses were in the environs — and pala-
tines and castellans, the ecclesiastical orders, with the am-
bassadors of the royal competitors, all agitated by the
ceaseless motion of dillerent factions during the six weeks of
the election, and of many jjreceding months of preconcerted
measures and vacillating opinions, now were all solemnly
assembled at the diet. — Once the poet, amidst his gigantic
conception of a scene, resolved to leave it out :

So vast a thi-ong the stage can ne'er contain —
Then build a new, or act it in a plain I

exclaimed "La Mauclia's knight," kindling at a scene so
novel and so vast !

Such an electioneering negotiation, the only one 1 am
acquainted with, is opened in tiie " Discours" of Choisin, the
secretary of Montluc, Jjishop of Valence, the confidential
agent of Catharine de' Medici, and who was sent to intrigue
at the Polish diet, to obtain the crown of Poland for her son
the Duke of Anjou, afterwards Henry the Third. This bold
enterprise at first seemed hopeless, and in its progress encoun-
tered growing obstructions ; but Montluc was one of the most
finished diplomatists that the genius of the Gallic cabinet
ever sent forth. He was nicknamed in all the courts of
Kurope, from the cu-cumstance of his limping, " le Boiteux;"
our political bishop was in cabinet intrigues the Talleyrand
of liis age, and sixteen embassies to Italy, CJerniany, England,
Scotland, and Turkey, had mad(> this "connoisseur en jionunes"
an extraordinary politician !

Catliarine de' Medici was infatuated with the dreams of
judicial astrology ; her pensioned oracles had declared tliat
siie should live to see each of her sons crowned, by which
]vi-('diition probably tliey had only ]>nrposed to flatter her
pride and her love of dominion. They, however, ended in
terrifying the credulous queen ; and she, dreadiiig to witness a
throne in France, disputed jjerhaps by fratricides, anxiously
sought a separate crown for each of her three sons. She had

348 Secret History of an Elective Monarchy.

been trifled with in her earnest negotiations with our Eliza-
beth ; twice had she seen herself baffled in her views in the
Dukes of Alengon and of Anjou. Catharine then projected a
new empire for Anjou, by incorporating into one kingdom
Algiers, Corsica, and Sardinia ; but the other despot, he of
Constantinople, Selim the Second, dissipated the brilliant
speculation of om* female Machiavel. Charles the Ninth was
sickly, jealous, and desirous of removing from the court the
Duke of Anjou, whom two victories had made popular,
though he afterwards sunk into a Sardana]jalus. Montluc
penetrated into the secret wishes of Catharine and Charles,
and suggested to them the possibility of encircling the brows
of Anjou with the diadem of Poland, the Polish monarch
then being in a state of visible decline. The project was
approved ; and, like a profound politician, the bishop prepared
for an event which might be remote, and always problema-
tical, by sending into Poland a natural son of his, Balagny,
as a disguised agent ; his youth, his humble rank, and his
love of pleasure, would not create any alarm among the
neighbouring powers, who were alike on the watch to snatch
the expected spoil ; but as it was necessary to have a more
dexterous politician behind the cm-tain, he recommended his
secretary, Choisnin, as a travelUng tutor to a youth who ap-
peared to want one.

Balagny proceeded to Poland, where, under the veil of dis-
sipation, and in the midst of splendid festivities, with his
trusty adjutant, this hair-brained boy of revelry began to
weave those intrigues which were afterwards to be knotted,
or untied, by IMontluc himself. He had contrived to be so
little suspected, that the agent of the emperor had often dis-
closed important secrets to bis young and amiable friend. On
the death of Sigismond Augustus, Balagn}', leaving Choisnin
behind to trumpet forth the virtues of Anjou, hastened to
Paris to give an account of all which he had seen or heard.
But poor Choisnin found himself in a dilemma among those
who had so long listened to his panegyrics on the humanity
and meek character of the Duke of Anjou ; for the news of
St. Bartholomew's massacre had travelled faster than the
post ; and Choisnin complains that he was now treated as an
impudent liar, and the French prince as a monster. In vain
he assm'ed them that the whole was an exaggerated account,
a mere insurrection of the people, or the effects of a few pri-
vate enmities, praying the indignant Poles to suspend their

Secret History of an Elective Monarchy. 341)

decision till the bishop came : " Attendez le Boitcux!" cried
he, ill agony.

Meanwhile, at Paris, the choice of a proper person for this
embassy luid been dillieult to settle. It was a business of
intrigue more than of form, and required an orator to make
speeches and addresses in a sort of popular assembly ; for
though the people, indeed, had no concern in the diet, yet the
greater and the lesser nobles and gentlemen, all electors, were
reclconed at one hundred thousand. It was supposed that a
lawyer who could negotiate in good Latin, and one, as the
French ])roverb runs, who could aller et ixirler, would more
elfectually puzzle their heads, and satisfy their consciences to
vote for his client. Catharine at last fixed on Montluc him-
self, from the superstitious prejudice, which, however, in this
case accorded with philosophical e.xperience, that " Montluc
had ever been lucky in his negotiations."

Montluc hastened his departure from Pans ; and it appears
that our political bishop had, by his slulful penetration into
the French cabinet, foreseen the horrible catastrophe whieh
occurred very shortly after he had left it ; for he had warned
the Count de Eochefoucault to absent himself ; but this lord,
like so many others, had no suspicions of the perfidious pro-
jects of Catharine and her cabinet. Montluc, however, had
not long been on his joui-ney ere the news reached him, and
it occasioned innumerable obstacles in his progress, which
even his sa-aeity had not calculated on. At Strasburgh he
had appointed to meet some able coadjutors, among whom
was the famous Joseph Scaliger; but they were so terrified
by Les Ilaliiiees Paridenncs, that Scaliger ilew to Geneva, and
would not budge out of that safe corner : and the others ran
liome, not imagining that Montluc would ventiu'e to pass
through Germany, where the protestant indignation had
made the roads too hot for a catholic bishop. But Montluc
had set his cast on the die. lie had already passed through
several hair-breadth escapes from the stratagems of the Guise
faction, who more than once attempted to hang or drown the
bishop, who, they cried out, was a Calvinist ; the fears and
jealousies of the Guises had been roused by this political
mission. Among all these troubles and delays, ]\[ontluc was
most alU'ctcd by the rumour that the election was on the
point of being made, and that the plague was universal
througlu)ut Fuhuid, so that he must have felt that he mi"lit
I'u too late lor the one, and too early ibr the other.

850 Secret History of an "Elective Monarchy.

At last Montluc arrived, and found that the whole weight
of this negotiation was to fall on his single shoulders ; and
further, that he was to sleep every night on a pillow of
thorns. Our bishop had not only to allaj^ the ferment of the
popular spirit of the evangelicals, as the protestants were
then called, but even of the more rational catholics of Po-
land. He had also to face those haughty and feudal lords, of
• whom each considered himself the equal of the sovereign
whom he created, and whose avowed principle was, and many
were incorrupt, that tlieir choice of a sovereign should be
regulated solely by the pubhc interest ; and it was hardly to
be expected that the emperor, the czar, and the King of
Sweden would prove unsuccessful rivals to the cruel, and vo-
luptuous, and bigoted duke of Anjou, whose political inte-
rests were too remote and novel to have raised any faction
among these independent Poles.

The crafty politician had the art of dressing himself up in
all the winning charms of candour and loyalty ; a sweet flow
of honeyed words melted on his lips, while his heart, cold
and immovable as a rock, stood unchanged amidst the most
unforeseen difficulties.

The emperor had set to work the Abbe Cyre in a sort of
ambiguous character, an envoy for the nonce, to be acknow-
ledged or disavowed as was convenient ; and by his activity
he obtained considerable influence among the Lithuanians, the
Wallachians, and nearlj^ all Prussia, in favour of the Arch-
duke Ernest. Two Bohemians, who had the advantage of
sj)eaking the Polish language, had arrived with a state and
magnificence becoming kings rather than amljassadors. The
Muscovite had written letters full of golden promises to the
nobihty, and was supported by a palatine of high character ;
a perpetual peace between two such great neighbours was
too inviting a project not to find advocates ; and this party,
Choisnin observes, appeared at first the most to be feared.
The King of Sweden was a close neighbour, who had mai-ried
the sister of their late sovereign, and his son urged his family
claims as superior to those of foreigners. Among these par-
ties was a patriotic one, who were desirous of a Pole for
their monarch ; a king of their fatherland, speaking their
inother-tongiie, cue who would not strike at the mdepcn-
dcnce of his country, but preserve its integrity from the
stranger. This popular party was even agreeable to several
of the foreign ])owers themselves, who did not like to sec a

Secret History of an Elective Monarcln/. 351

rival power strengthening itself by so strict a union witli
Poland ; but in this choice of a sovereign from among them-
selves, there were at least thirty lords who etjually thought
that they were the proper wood of which kings should bo
carved out. The Poles therefore could not agree on the Pole
wlio deserved to be a Piaste ; an endearing title for a native
monarcli, which originated in the name of the family of the
Piastis, who had reigned happily over the I'olish people for
the space of live centuries ! The remembrance of their vu*-
tues existed in the minds of the honest Poles in this aflec-
tionate title, and their pai'ty were called the Piastis.

JMontluc had been dei)rived of the assistance he had
depended on from many able persons, whom the massacre of
St. IJarlholomew had IVigliteucd away from every French
]»olitieal eoimexion. He Ibuiid that he had himself only to
depend on. We are told tliat he was not provided with the
usual means which are considered most ellieient in elections,
nor possessed tlie interest nor the splendour of his powerful
competitors : he was to derive all his resources from diploma-
tic hnesse. The various ambassadors had fixed and distant
residences, that they might not hold too close an intercourse
with the Polish nobles. Of all things, he was desirous to
obtain an easy access to these chiel's, that he might observe,
and that they might listen. He who would seduce by his
own ingenuity must come in contact with the object he would
corrupt. Yet Montluc persisted in not approaching them
without being sought after, which answered his purpose in the
end. One favourite argument which our Talleyrand had set
adoat, was to show that all the benefits which the ditferent
competitors had promised to the Poles were accompanied by
otlier circumstances wliich could not fail to be ruinous to the
country: while tlie offer of his master, whose interests were
remote, coukl not be adverse to tliose of the Polish nation : so
that much good might be expected from him, without any
fear of accuinpanyiiig evil. Montluc procured a clever
Frenchman to be the bearer of his first despatch, in Latin,
to the diet ; which had hardly assembled, ere suspicions and
jealousies were already breaking out. Tiie emperor's ambas-
Fadors had oll'ended the pride of the Polish nobles by travelling
about the country without leave, and resorting to the infanta ;
and besides, in some intercepted letters the Polish nation was
designated as fjrnt< harhara et r/oia inrpla. ''1 do not think that
the said letter was really written by tiie said amb.assadors,

352 iSecret History of an Elective Monarchy.

who were statesmen too politic to employ such unguarded
language," veiy ingeniously writes the secretary of Montluc.
iowever, it was a blow levelled at the imperial ambassadors ;
while the letter of the French bishop, composed '■ in a humble
and modest style," began to melt their proud spirits, and two
tliousand copies of the French bishop's letter were eagerly
spread.

" But this good fortune did not last more than four-and
twenty hours," mournfully writes our honest secretar}' ; "for
suddenly the news of the fatal da}' of St. Bartholomew
arrived, and every Frenchman was detested."

Montluc, in this distress, published an apology for les
JSLatinees Pmnsiennes, which he reduced to some excesses of
the people, the result of a conspiracy plotted by the protes-
tants ; and he adroitly introduced as a personage his master
Anjou, declaring that " he scorned to oppress a party whom
he had so often conquered with sword in hand." This
pamphlet, which still exists, must have cost the good bishop
some invention ; but in elections the lie of the moment serves
a pm-pose ; and although Montluc was in due time bitterly
recriminated on, still the apology served to divide public
opinion.

Montluc was a whole cabinet to himself: he dispersed
another tract in the character of a Polish gentleman, in which
the French interests were urged by such arguments, that the
leading chiefs never met without disputing ; and Montluc
now found that he had succeeded in creating a French party.
The Austrian then employed a real Polish gentleman to write
for his part}'^ ; but this was too genuine a production, for the
writer wrote too much in earnest ; and in politics we must not
be in a passion.

The mutual jealousies of each party assisted the views of
our negotiator ; they would side with him against each other.
The archduke and the czar opposed the Tm-k ; the Muscovite
could not endure that Sweden should be aggrandised by this
new crown ; and Denmark was still more uneasy. Montluc
Iiad discovered how every party had its vulnerable point, by
which it could he managed. The cards had now got fairly
shuffled, and he depended on his usual good play.

Our bishop got hold of a palatine to write for the French
cause in the vernacular tongue ; and appears to have held a
more mysterious intercourse with another palatine, Albert
Lasky. ^Mutual accusations wei'e made in the oj)en diet ; the

Secret Hhlunj of a a Elective Monarchy. 353

Poles accused some Lltlmani:iii lords of luiving contraetecl
certain engagvnicnts with the czar; these in return accused
the Poles, and particularly this Lasky, with being corrupted
by the gold of France. Another circumstance afterwards
arose ; the Spanisli ambassador had foi-t}' thousand thalers
sent to him, but which never passed the frontiers, as this
fi'csh supply arrived too late for the election. " I believe,"
writes our secretary with great simplicity, "that this money
was only designed to distribute among the trumpeters and
the tabourincs." The usual expedient in contested elections
was now evidently introduced; our secretary acknowledging
that Montluc daily acquired new supporters, because he did
not attempt to gain them over vierely by promises — resting
Ills whole cause on this argument, that the interest of the
nation was concerned in the French election.

Still would ill fortune cross our craity politician wlien
everything was proceeding smoothly. The massacre was
refreshed with more damning particulai's ; some letters wero
forged, and others were but too true ; all parties, with rival
intrepidity, were carrying on a complete scene of deception.
A rumour spi-ead that the French king disavowed his accre-
dited agent, and apologised to the emperor for having yielded
to the im])ortunities of a political speculator, whom he was
now resolved to recall. This somewhat paralysed the exertions
of those palatines who had involved themselves in the
intrigues of Montluc, who was now forced patiently to wait
for the arrival of a courier with renewed testimonials of his
diplomatic character from the French com't. A great odium
was cast on the French in the course of this negotiation by a
distribution of prints, which exposed the most inventive
cruelties practised by the Catholics on the Reformed ; such as
women cleaved in half in the act of attempting to snatch
their children from their butchers ; while Charles the Ninth
and the Duke of Anjou were hideously represented in their
persons, and as spectators of such horrid tragedies, with
words written in labels, complaining that the executioners
wcye not zealous enough in this holy work. These prints,
accompanied by libels and by horrid narratives, inllamed tho
popular indignation, and more particularly the women, who
ivere affected to tears, as if these horrid scenes had been pass-
ing before their eyes.

Montluc replied to the libels as f\ist as they appeared,
while he skilfully introduced the most elaborate panegyrioa

YOL, IIJ. ' A A

?51' Secret History of an Elective Monarchy.

oil tl;e Dulcc of Aiij(m ; and in return for tlic caricatures, he
distributed two portraits of tlie king and the duke, to show
the ladies, if not the diet, that neither of these princes had
such ferocious and inhuman faces. Such are the small means
by which the politician condescends to work his great designs ;
and the very means by which his enemies thought they
should ruin his cause, Montluc adroitly turned to his own ad-
vantage. Anything of instant occurrence serves electioneer-
ing purposes, and Montluc eagerly seized this favourable
occasion to exhaust his imagination on an 'deal sovereign,
and to hazard, with address, anecdotes, whose authenticity he
could never have proved, till he perplexed even unwilling
minds to be uncertain whether that intoleront and inhuman
duke was not the most heroic and most merciful of princes.
It is probable that the Frenchman abused even the license oi
the Fj'ench eloge, for a noble Pole told Montluc that he was
always amplifying his duke with such ideal greatness, and
attributing to him such immaculate purity of sentiment, thai
it was inferred there was no man in Poland who cou\d
possibly equal him ; and that his declaration, that the duke
was not desirous of reigning over Poland to possess the wealth
and grandeur of the kingdom, and that he was solely
ambitious of the honour to be the head of such a great and
virtuous nobilit}', had offended many lords, who did not be-
lieve that the duke sought the Polish crown merely to be the
sovereign of a virtuous people.

These Polish statesmen appear, indeed, to have been more
enlightened than the subtle politician perhaps calculated on ;
for when Montluc was over anxious to exculpate the Duke of
Anjou from having been an actor in the Parisian massacre,
a noble Pole observed, " That he need not lose his time at
framing any apologies ; for if he could prove that it was the
interest of the country that the duke ought to be elected
their king, it was all that was required. His cruelty, were it
true, would be no reason to prevent his election, for we have
notliing to dread from it : once in our kingdom, he will have
more reason to fear us than we him, should he ever attempt
our lives, our property, or our liberty."

Another Polish loi'd, whose scruples were as pious as his
patriotism was suspicious, however observed that, in his con-
ferences with the French bishop, the bishop had never once
mentioned God, whom all parties ought to implore to touch
the hearts of the electors in the choice of God's "anointed."

Secret Hislonj of an Elective Monurchtj. 355

Moiitluc ml-^'ht have felt liiinst'ir unexpectedly enibaiTiis.sed
at the reHgious scruples of this lord, hut tlie politician was
never at a fault. " Speaking to a man of letters, as his lord-
ship was," replied the French bishop, "it was not for him to
remind his lordship what he so well knew ; but since he had
touched on the subject, he would, however, say, that were a
sick man desirous of having a physician, the friend wlio un-
dertook to procure one would not do his duty should he say
it was necessary to call in one whom God had chosen to
restore his health ; but another who should say that the most
learned and skilful is ho whom God has chosen, would be
doing the best for the patient, and evince most judgment.
By a parity of reason we must believe that God will not send
an angel to point out the man whom he would liave his
anointed ; suilicient for us that God has given us a knowledge
of the requisites of a good king ; and if the Polish gentlemen
choose such a sovereign, it will be him wliom God has chosen."
This shrewd argument delighted the Polish lord, who repeated
the story in dilferent companies, to the honour of the bishop.
" And in this manner," adds the secretary with great naivete,
" did the sieur, strengthened by good arguments, divulge his
opinions, which were received by many, and run from hand
to hand."

Montluc had his inferior manoeuvres. He had to equipoise
the opposite interests of the Catholics and the Evangelists,
or the Keformed : it was mingling fire and water without
suffering them to hiss, or to extinguish one another. When
the imperial ambassadors gave fetes to the higher nobility
only, they conse(iuently oflended the lesser. The Frenchman
gave no banquets, but his house was open to all at all times,
who were equally welcome. " You will see that i\\o. fetes of
the imperialists will do them more harm than good," observed
^lontluc to his secretary.

Having gained over by every possible contrivance a number
of the Polish nobles, and showered his courtesies on those of
the inferior orders, at length the critical moment approached,
and tlie thiishing hand was to be put to the work. Poland,
with the appearance of a popular government, was a singular
aristocracy of a hundred thousand electors, consisting of the
higher and the lower nobility, and the gentry ; the peoi)le
had no concern with the government. Yet still it was to bo
treated by the politician as a popular government, where
those who possessed the greatest intluence over such largo

A a2

35G Secret History of an Elective Monarchy.

assemblies were orators, and lie who delivered himself with the
most fluency and the most pertinent arguments would infal-
libly bend every heart to the point he wished. The French
bishop depended greatly on the effect which his oration was
to produce when the ambassadors were respectively to he heard
before the assembled diet; the great and concluding act of so
man}' tedious and dilHcult negotiations—" which had cost my
master," writes the ingenuous secretary, " six months' daily
and nightly labours ; he had never been assisted or com-
forted by an}^ but his poor servants, and in the course of these
six months had written ten reams of paper, a thing which
for forty years he had not used himself to."

Every ambassador was now to deliver an oration before the
assembled electors, and thirty-two copies were to be printed,
to present one to each palatine, who in his turn was to com-
municate it to his lords. But a fresh difficulty occurred to
the French negotiator ; as he trusted greatly to his address
influencing the multitude, and creating a popular opinion in
his favour, he regretted to And that the imperial ambassador
would deliver his speech in the Bohemian language, so that
he would be understood by the greater part of the assembly ;
a considerable advantage over Montluc, who could only address
them in Latin. The inventive genius of the French bishop
resolved on two things which had never before been practised :
first, to have his Latin translated into the vernacular idiom ;
and, secondly, to print an edition of fifteen hundred copies in
both languages, and thus to obtain a vast advantage over the
other ambassadors, with their thirty-two manuscript copies,
of which each copy was used to be read to 1200 persons.
The great difliculty was to get it secretly translated and
printed. This fell to the management of Choisnin, the
secretary. He set off to the castle of the palatine, Solikotski,
who was deep in the French interest ; Solikotski despatched
the version in six days. Hastening with the precious MS.
to Cracow, Choisnin flew to a trusty printer, with whom
he was connected ; the sheets were deposited every night at
Choisnin's lodgings, and at the end of a fortnight the diligent
secretary conducted the 1500 copies in secret triumph to
Warsaw.

Yet this glorious labour was not ended ; Montluc was in
no haste to deliver his wonder-working oration, on which the
fate of a crown seemed to dejjend. When his turn came to
be h^iard, lie suddenly fell sick ; the fact was, that he wished

Secret History of an Elective Monarclnj. 3j7

to speak last, which would give him the advantage of replying
to any objection raised by his rivals, and admit also of au
attack on tlicir weak points.

He contrived to obtain copies of their harangues, and dis-
covered five points which struck at tlie French interest. Our
poor bishop had now to sit up through the night to re-write
live leaves of his printed oration, and cancel live which had
l)eer printed ; and worse ! he had to get them by heart, and
to iKive them translated and inserted, by employing twenty
scribes day and night. " It is scarcely credible wliat my
master went throu<i;li about this time," saith the historian of
his "gestes.

The council or diet was held in a vast plain. Twelve pavi-
lions were raised to receive the Polish nobility and the am-
bassadors. One of a circular form was supported by a singla
mast, and was large enough to contain 60U0 persons, without
any one approaching the mast nearer than by twenty steps,
Leaving this space void to preserve silence ; the different orders
■were placed around ; the archbishop and the bishops, the
j^alatines, the castellans, each according to their rank. During
the six weeks of the sittings of the diet, 100,000 horses were
in tlie environs, yet forage and every sort of provisions
abounded. There were no disturbances, not a single quarrci
occurred, although there wanted not in that meeting foi-
enmities of long standing. It was strange, and even awful,
to view such a mighty assembly preserving the greatest order,
and every one seriously intent on this solemn occasion.

At length the elaborate oration was delivered : it lasted
three hours, and Choisnin assures us not a single auditor felt
weary. " A cry of jo}' broke out from the tent, and was re-
echoed through the plain, wlien Montlue ceased : it was a
public acclamation ; and had the election been fixed for that
moment, when all hearts were warm, surely the duke had
been chosen without a dissenting voice." Thus writes, in
rapture, the ingenuous secretary ; and in the spirit of the
times comin.uiicates a delightful augury attending thi"? speech,
by which evidently was foreseen its happ}' termination
'' Those who disdain all things will take this to be a mere
invention of mine," says honest Choisnin : " but true it is, that
while the said siV»r delivered his harangue, a lark was seen all
the while upon the mast of the pavilion, singing and warbling,
v/hich was remarked by a great number of lords, because the
lark IS accustomed only to rest itself on the earth : the most

358 Secret History of an Elective Monarchy.

impartial confessed this to be a good augury.* Also it was
observed, that when the other ambassadors were speaking, a
hare, and at anotlier time a hog, ran through the tent ; and
when the Swedish ambassador spoke, the great tent fell half-
way down. This lark singing all the while did no little good
to our cause ; for many of the nobles and gentry noticed this
curious particularity^ because when a thing which does not
commonly happen occurs in a public affair, such appearances
give rise to hopes either of good or of evil."

The singing of this lark in favour of the Duke ol Anjou is
not so evident as the cunning trick of the other French
agent, the political Bishop of Valence, who now reaped the
full advantage of his 1500 copies over the thirty-two of his
rivals. Every one had the French one in hand, or read it to
his friends ; while the others, in manuscript, were confined to
a very narrow circle.

The period from the 10th of April to the 6th of May,
when they proceeded to the election, proved to be an interval
of infinite perplexities, troubles, and activity ; it is probable
that the secret history of this period of the negotiations was
never written. The other ambassadors were for protracting
the election, perceiving the French interest prevalent : but
delay would not serve the purpose of Montluc, he not being
so well provided with friends and means on the spot as the
others were. The public opinion which he had succeeded in
creating, by some unforeseen circumstance might change.

During this interval, the bishop had to put several agents
of the other parties liors de combat. He got rid of a formi-
dable adversary in the Cardinal Commendon, an agent of the
pope's, whom he proved ought not to be present at tlie elec-
tion, and tlie cardinal was ordered to take his departure. A
bullying colonel was set upon the French negotiator, and
went about from tent to tent with a list of the debts of tlio
Duke of Anjou, to show that the nation could expect nothing
profitable from a ruined spendthrift. Tlie page of a Polish
count flew to Montluc for protection, entreating permission to
accompany the bishop on his return to Paris. The servants
of the count pm-sued the page ; but tliis young gentleman
had so insinuated himself into the favour of the bishop, that

* Our honest secretary reminds me of a passage in Gcoft'rey of Mon*
moutli, who says, "At this place an earjle spoke while the wall of the ^owa
was building ; and indeed I should not have failed transmittivg (he iiicech
io posta-ity had I thought it true as the rest of the liistory."

Secret Hialory of an l^Iedive Monarchy. 359

he was suffered to remain. The next day the page desired
Montluc would grant him tlie full liherty_ of his religion,
being an evangelical, that he might communicate this to liii
friends, and thus lix them to the French party. Montluc
was too penetrating for this young political agi-nt, whom he
discovered to be a sjjy, and the pursuit of his fellows to have
been a farce ; he sent the page back to his master, the evan-
gelical count, observing that such tricks were too gross to be
])layed on one who had managed atl'airs in all the courts of
Europe before he came into Poland.

Another alarm was raised by a letter from the grand vizier
of SeHm the Second, addressed to the diet, in wliich he re-
quested that they would either choose a kin^ Irom among
themselves, or elect the brother of the King of France.
Some zealous Frenchman at the Sublime Porte had officiously
procured this recommendation from the enemy of Chris-
tianity ; but an alliance with Mahometanism did no service
to Montluc, either with the catholics or the evangelicals.
The bishop was in despair, and thought that his handiwork
of six months' toil and trouble was to be shook into pieces in
an liour. Montluc, being shown the letter, instantly insisted
that it was a forgery, designed to injure his master the duke.
The letter was attended by some suspicious circumstances ;
and the French bishop, quick at expedients, snatched at an
advantage which the politician knows how to lay hold of in
the chapter of accidents. " The letter was not sealed with
the golden seal, nor enclosed in a silken purse or cloth of
gold ; and farther, if they examined the translation," he said,
"they would find that it was not written on Turkish
paper." This was a piece of the sieur's good fortune, for the
letter was not forged ; but owing to the circumstance that
the Boyar of Wallachia had taken out the letter to send a
translation with it, which the vizier had omitted, it arrived
without its usual accompaniments ; and the courier, when
inquired after, was kept out of the way : so that, in a few
days, nothing more was heard of the great vizier's letter.
" Such was our ft)rtunate escape," says the secretary, " irom
the friendly but fatal interference of the sultan, than which
the sieur dreaded nothing so much."

Many secret agents of the diilerent powers were spinning
their dark intrigues ; and often, when discovered or discon-
certed, the creatures were again at their " dirty work."
These agents were conveniently disavowed or acknowlo(l;^ed

3G0 Secrci History of cm Elective MonarcJiy,

by their employers. The Abbe Cyre was an active agent of
the emperor's, and though not pubhely accredited, was still
liovering about. In Lithuania he had contrived matters so
^vell as to have gained over that important province for the
archduke ; and was passing throiigh Prussia to hasten to
communicate with the emperor, but " some honest men,"
quelquen hons 2)(^yson)Wf/es, says the IVench secretar}'', and no
doubt some good friends of his master, " took him by sur-
prise, and laid him up safely in the castle of Marienburgh,
where truly he was a little imcivilly used by the soldiers,
who riilcd his portmanteau and sent us his papers, when we
discovered all his foul practices." The emperor, it seems,
was angry at the arrest of his secret agent ; but as no one
had the power of releasing the Abbe Cyre at that moment,
what with receiving remonstrances and furnishing replies,
the time passed awa}', and a very troublesome adversary was
in safe custody during the election. The dissensions between
the catholics and the evangelicals were always on the point
of breaking out ; but Montluc succeeded in quieting these
inveterate parties by terrifying their imaginations with san-
guinary civil wars, and invasions of the Turks and the Tar-
tars. He satisfied the catholics with the hope tliat tim,9
would pvit an end to heresy, and the evangelicals were glad
to obtain a truce from persecution. The day before the elec-
tion Montluc found himself so confident, that he despatched
a courier to the French court, and expressed himself in the
true style of a speculative j^olitician, that des douze tables da
Damier nous en avons les Neiifs assures.

There were preludes to the election ; and the first was
probably in acquiescence with a saturnalian humour prevalent
in some countries, where the lower oi'ders are only allowed
to indulge their taste for the mockery of the great at stated
times and on fixed occasions. A droll scene of a mock elec-
tion, as well as combat, took place between the numerous
Polish pages, v.ho, saitli the grave secretary, are still more
mischievous than our own : these elected among themselves
four competitors, made a senate to burlesque the diet, and
went to loggerheads. Tliose who represented the archduke
were well beaten, the Swede was hunted down, and for the
I^iasf is, ihcy seized on a cart belonging to a gentleman, laden
with provisions, broke it to pieces, and burnt the axle-tree,
which in that country is called a j^insti, and cried out Tke
I'iasti is burnt 1 nor could the senators at the diet tliat day

Secret History of an Elective Monar Jiy. 3C1

command any order or silence. The French party wore
white handkerchiefs in their hats, and tliey were so nume-
rous as to defeat the others.

'J'he next day, however, opened a different scene ; " the
nobles ])repared to deliberate, and each palatine in his quar-
ters was with his companions on their knees, and many witli
tears in their eyes, chanting a hymn to the Holy Ghost ; it
)nnst be confessed that this looked like a work of God," says
our secretar}', who probably understood the manoeuvring of
the mock combat, or the mock prayers, much better than we
may. Everything tells at an election, burlesque or solem-
nity !

The election took place, and the Duke of Anjou was pro-
claimed King of Poland — but the troubles of Montluc did
not terminate. When they presented certain articles for his
signature, the bishop discovered that these had undergone
material alterations from the proposals submitted to him
before the proclamation ; these alterations referred to a dis-
avowal of the Parisian massacre ; the punishment of its
authors, and toleration in religion. Montluc refused to sign,
and cross-examined his Polish friends about the original pro-
posals ; one party agreed that some things had been changed,
but that they were too trivial to lose a crown for ; others
declared that the alterations were necessary to allay the
fears, or secure the safet}^ of the people. Our Gallic diplo-
matist was outwitted, and after all his intrigues and cunning,
he found that the crown of Poland was only to be delivered
on conditional terms.

In this dilemma, with a crown depending on a stroke of
his pen, — remonstrating, entreating, arguing, and still delay-
ing, like '■' Ancient Pistol" swallowing his leek, he witnessed
with alarm some preparations for a new election, and his
rivals on the watch with their protests. IMontluc, in despair,
signed the conditions — " assured, however," says the secretary,
who groans over this. Jinale, " that when the elected moiiarch
should arrive, the states would easily bo induced to correct
them, and place things in stain quo, as before the proclama*
tion. I was not a witness, being then despatched to Paris
with the joyful news, but I heard that the sieur evesgue it
was thought would have died in this agony, of being reduced
to the hard necessity either to sign, or to lose the fruits of
his labours. The conditions were afterwards for a long while
(lisputed in France." De Thou informs us, in lib. Ivii. of his

362 Secret History of an Elective Monarchy.

history, that Montluc after signing these conditions wrote id
his master, that he was not bound by them, because they did
not concern Poland in general, and that thc}^ had compelled
him to sign, what at the same time he had informed them
his instructions did not autliorise. Sucli was the true Jesuitic
conduct of a grey-haired politician, who at length found that
honest plain sense could embarrass and finally entrap the
creatui'e of the cabinet, the artificial genius of diplomatic
finesse.

Tlie secretary, however, views nothing but his master's
glory in the issue of this most difficult negotiation ; and the
triumph of Anjou over the j'outhful archduke, wliom the
Poles might have moulded to tlieir will, and over the King of
Sweden, who claimed the crown by his queen's side, and had
offered to unite his part of Livonia with tliat which the
Poles possessed. He labom-s hard to prove that the palatines
and the castellans were not i^ratiques, i.e., had their votes
bought up by Montluc, as was reported ; from their number
and their opposite interests, he confesses that the sieur evesque
slept little, while in Poland, and that he only gained over
the hearts of men by that natural gift of God which acquired
him the title of tlie happy ambassador. He rather seems to
regret that Fr?4nce was not prodigal of her purchase-money,
than to affirm that all palatines were alike scrupulous of their
honour.

One more fact may close this political sketch ; a lesson of
the natm'e of court gratitude ! The French court affected to
receive Choisnin with favour, but tlieii* suppressed discontent
was reserved for "the happy ambassador!" Affairs had
changed ; Charles the Ninth Avas dying, and Catharine de'
Medici in despair for a son to whom she had sacrificed all ;
while Anjou, already immersed in the wantonness of youth
and pleasure, considered his elevation to the throne of Poland
as an exile which separated him from his depraved enjo}'-
ments ! Montluc was rewarded only by incurring disgi'ace ;
Catharine de' Medici and the Duke of Anjou now looked
coldly on him, and expressed their dislike of his successful
mission. " The mother of kings," as Choisnin designates
Catharine de' Medici, to whom he addi-esses his memoii's,
with the hope of awakening her recollections of the zeal, the
genius, and the success of his old master, had no longer any
use for her favourite ; and Montluc found, as the commentator

Build'mys in the Metro2)oHs, S^c. 363

of Choisnin expresses in a few words, an important truth in
political morality, that " at court the interest of the uwment
is the measui-e of its affections and its hatreds."*

BUILDINGS IN THE METROrOLIS, AND RESIDENCE IN
THE COUNTRY,

Recently more tlian one of our learned judges from the
bench have perhaps astonished their auditors by impressing
them with an old-fashioned notion of residing more on their
estates than the fashionable modes of life and the esprit de
socie/e, now overi)owering all other esjyrit, will ever admit.
These opinions excited my attention to a curious circumstance
in tlie liistory of our manners — the great anxiety of our
government, from the days of Elizabeth till much later than
those of Charles the Second, to preserve the kingdom from
the evils oi" an overgrown metropolis. The people themselves
indeed jmrticipated in the same alarm at the growth of the
city ; while, however, they tliemselves were perpetuatuig the
grievance which they complained of.

It is amusing to observe, that although the government
was frequently employing even theii' most forcible acts to
restrict the limits of the metropolis, the suburbs were gra-
dually incorporating with the city, and Westminster at length
united itself to London. Since that happy marriage, their
fertile progenies have so blended together, that little Londons
are no longer distinguishable from the ancient parent ; we
have succeeded in spreading the capital into a county, and
hdvo verified the prochction of James the First, "that Eng-
land will shortly be London, and London England."

" I think it a great object," said Justice Best, in delivering
his sentiments in favour of the Game Laws, " tliat gentlemen
fshould have a temptation io reside in the country, amongst
their neigliboitrs and tenantry, ivhose interests viitst he mate-
rially advanced hy such a circumstance. Tlie links of
Bociety are thereby better preserved, and the mutual adcan-

* I have drawn up this article, for the curiosity of its subject and its
details, from the " Discours au vray de tout ce qui s'est fait et passe pour
I'entiere Negociation de I'Eleetion du Roi de Pologne, divises en trois
livres, par Jehan Choisnin du Chatelleraud, nagucrcs Secr^t^-.ire de M.
I'Evesque de Valence," 1574,

oGi Buihlings in the Metropolis,

fagcs and dependence oftlic liirjlier and lower classes on one
another are better maintained. The baneful effects of our
present system we have lately seen in a neighbom-ing comitry
and an ingenious French writer has latel}^ shown the ill con-
sequences of it on the continent."*

These sentiments of a living luminary of the law afford
some reason of policy for the dread which our government
long entei-tained on account of the perpetual growth of the
metropolis ; the nation, like a hypochondriac, was ludicrously
terrified that their head was too monstrous for their body,
and that it drew all the moisture of life from the middle and
the extremities. Proclamations warned and exhorted ; but
the very interfei'ence of a royal prohibition seemed to render
the crowded city more charming. In vain the statute against
new buildings was passed by Elizabeth ; in vain during the
reigns of James the First and both the Charleses we find
proclamations continually issuing to forbid new erections.

James was apt to throw out his opinions in these frequent
addresses to the people, wlio never attended to them : his
majesty notices " those swarms of gentry, who through the
instigation of their wives, or to new-model and fashion their
daughters (who if they were unmarried, marred their reputa-
tions, and if married, lost them), did neglect their country
hosjntalit}^, and cumber the city, a general nuisance to the
kingdom." — He addi'essed the Star Chamber to regulate " the
exorbitancy of the new buildings about the city, which were
but a shelter for those who, when they had spent their estates
in coaches, lacqueys, and fine clothes like Frenchmen, lived
miserably in their houses like Italians ; but the honoui* of
the English nobility and gentry is to be hospitable among
their tenants." Once conversing on this subject, the monarch
threw out that happy illustration, which has been more than
once noticed, that " Gentlemen resident on their estates were
like shijjs in port ; their value and magnitude were felt and
acknowledged ; but when at a distance, as their size seemed
insignificant, so their worth and importance were not duly
estimated."t

* Mornivrj Clironiclc, January 23, 1820,
f A proclamation was issued in the first year of King James, " co;n«
nanding gentlemen to depai-t the court and city," because it hinders hos-
pitality and endangers the people near tlieir own residences, "who liad from
Buch lionses much comfort and case toward their living." The King gra-
ciously says : — "He tooke no small contentment in the resort of gentle*

and Residence in the Country. 305

A manuscript writer of the times complains of tliu brealiing
up of old family cstublislunents, all crowding to " upstart
London." Every one strives to be a Diogenes in his house,
and au emperor in the streets ; not caring if they sleep in a
tub, so they may be hurried in a coach : giving that allow-
ance to horses and mares that formerly maintained houses
full of men ; pinching man}' a belly to paint a few backs, and
burying all the treasures of the kingdom into a few citizens'
coll'ers ; their woods into wardrobes, their leases into laces,
and their goods and chattels into guarded coats and gaudy
toys." Such is the representation of an eloquent contempo-
rary ; and however contracted might have been his knowledge
of the principles of political economy, and of that prosperity
which a wealth}'- nation is said to derive from its consumption
of articles of luxury, the moral effects have not altered, nor
has the scene in reality greatly changed.

The government not only frequently forbade new buildings
within ten miles of London, but sometimes ordered them to
be pulled down — after they had been erected for several years.
Eveiy six or seven years proclamations were issued. In
Charles the First's reign, offenders were sharply prosecuted
by a combined operation, not only against Jioiises, but against
persons* Many of the nobility and gentry, in 1632, were
informed against for having resided in the city, contrary to
the late proclamation. And the Attorney-General was then
fully occupied in filing bills of indictment against them, as
well as ladies, for staying in town. The following curious
"information" in the Star Chamber will serve our purpose.

The Attorney-General informs his majesty that both Eliza-
beth and James, by several proclamations, had commanded
that " persons of livelihood and means should reside in their
counties, and not abide or sojom'u in the city of London,

men, and otlier our subjects coining to visit us, holding their affectionate
desire to see our person to be a certaine testimouie of their inward love ;"
but he says lie must not "give way to so great a luischiefe as the con-
tinuall resurt may breed," and that therefore all that have no special cause
of attendance must at once go back until the time of his coronation, when
they may "returue until the solemnity be passed ;" but only for that time,
for if the proclamation be slighted he shall " make them an example of
ecutempt if we shall fiude any making slay here contrary to this direc-
tion." Such proclamations wore from time to time issued, and though
Bometimes evaded, were frequently enforced by fines, so that living in
Loudon was a risk and danger to country gentlemen of fortune.
♦ Bushworth, vol. ii. p. 283.

36G Buildings in the Metropolis^

so that counties remain nuserved." These prochimations wore
renewed by Charles the First, who had observed " a greater
number of nobihty and gentry, and abler sort of people, with
their families, had resorted to the cities of London and West-
minster, residing there, contrary to the ancient usage of the
English nation" — "by their abiding in their several counties
where their means arise, they would not only have served his
majest}'^ according to their ranks, but by their housekeeping
ill tlione parts the meaner sort of people formertij were guidfil,
directed, and relieved.'^ He accuses them of wasting tiieir
estates in the metropolis, which would employ and relieve
the common people in their several counties. The loose and
disorderly people that follow them, living in and about the
cities, are so numerous, that they are not easily governed by
the ordinary magistrates : mendicants increase in great num-
ber— the prices of all commodities are highly raised, «fcc. The
king had formerly proclaimed that all ranks who were not
connected with public offices, at the close of forty days' no-
tice, should resort to their several counties, and with their
families continue theii residence there. And his majesty further
warned them " Not to put themselves to unnecessary charge
in providing themselves to return in winter to the said cities,
as it was the king's lirm resolution to withstand such great
and growing evil." The information concludes with a most
copious list of offenders, among whom are a great number of
nobility, and ladies and gentlemen, who were accused of
having lived in London for several months after the given
warning of forty da3^s. It appears that most of them, to
elude the grasp of the law, had contrived to make a show of
quitting the metropolis, and, after a short absence, had
again returned ; " and thus the service of your majesty and
your people in the several counties have been neglected and
undone."

Such is the substance of this curious information, which
enables us at least to collect the ostensible motives of this
singular prohibition. Proclamations had hitherto been consi-
dered little more than the news of the morning, and three
days afterwards were as much read as the last week's news-
papers. They were now, however, resolved to stretch forth
the strong arm of law, and to terrify by an example. The
constables were commanded to bring in a list of the names of
strangers, and the time they proposed to fix their residence
in their parishes. A remarkable victim on this occasion was a

and Residence in the Cuioilry. 3G7

Mr. Palmer, a Sussex gentleman, who was brought ore tenus
into the Star Chamber fur disobeying tlio proclamation fur
living in tlio country. Palmer was a squire of lOOU/. jier
annum, then a considerable income. He appears to have been
some rich bachelor; for in his defence he alleged that he had
never been married, never was a housekeeper, and had no
house iitting for a man of his birtli to reside in, as his man-
sion in the country had been burnt down within two years.
These reasons ai)peared to his judges to aggravate rather tlian
extenuate his ollence ; and after a long rei)rinuuid for having
deserted his tenants and neighbours, they heavily fined him
in one thousand pounds.*

The condemnation of this Sussex gentleman struck a terror
through a wide circle of sojourners in the metropolis. I find
accounts, pathetic enough, of their " packing away on all sides
for fear of the worst ;" and gentlemen " grumbling that they
should be confined to their houses :" and this \vas sometimes
backed too by a second proclamation, respecting " their wives
and families, and also widows," which was " durus sermo to
the women. It is nothing pleasing to all," says the letter-
writer, " but least of all to the women." " To encourage
gentlemen to live more willingly in the country," says an-
other letter-writer, " all game-lbwl, as pheasants, partridges,
ducks, as also hares, are this day by proclamation forbidden
to be dressed or eaten in any inn." Here we find realized
the argument of Mr. Justice Best in favour of the game-
laws.

It is evident that this severe restriction must have pro-
duced great inconvenience to certain persons who found a
residence in London necessary for their pursuits. This ap-
pears from the manuscript diary of an honest antiquary, Sir
Symonds D'Esves ; he has preserved an opinion which, no
doubt, was spreading fast, that such prosecutions of the
Attorney-General were a violation of the liberty of the sub-
ject. " Most men wondered at Mr. Noy, the Attorney-
General, being accounted a great lawyer, that so strictly took
away men's Jiberiies at one hloic, confining them to reside at
their own houses, and not permitting them freedom to live
where they pleased within the king's dominions. I was
to%'£olf a little startled upon the first coming out of the pro-
clamation ; but having first spoken with the Lord Coventry,

* From a manuscript letter from Sir George Gresley to Sir Tliomaa
Puckering, Nov. 1032.

3GB BuUduigs in Che Metropolis,

Lord Keeper of the Great Seal, at Ibliiig'ton, when I visited
him ; and afterwards with Sir William Jones, one of the
King's Justices of the Bench, about my condition and resi-
dence at the said town of Islington, and they both agreeing
that I was not within the letter of the proclamation, nor the
intention of it neither, I rested satisfied, and thought myself
secure, laying in all my provisions for housekeeping for the
3'^ear ensuing, and never imagined myself to be in danger, till
this unexpected censure of Mr. Palmer passed in the Star
Chamber ; so, having advised with my friends, I resolved for
a remove, being much troubled not only with my separation
from llecordes, but with my wife, being great with child,
fearing a winter journey might be dangerous to her."* He
left Islington and the records in the Tower to return to his
country-seat, to the great disturbance of his studies.

It is, perhaps, difficult to assign the cause of this marked
anxiety of the government for the severe restriction of the
limits of the metropolis, and the prosecution of the nobility
and gentry to compel a residence on their estates. Whatever
were the motives, they were not peculiar to the existing
sovereign, but remained transmitted from cabinet to cabinet,
and were even renewed under Charles the Second. At a time
when the plague often broke out, a close and growing metro-
polis might have been considered to be a great evil; a terror
expressed by the manuscript-writer before quoted, complaining
of " this deluge of building, that w^e shall be all poisoned with
breathing in one another's faces." The police of the metro-
polis was long imbecile, notwithstanding their " strong
watches and guards" set at times ; and bodies of the idle and
the refractory often assumed some mysterious title, and were
with difficulty governed. We may conceive the state of the
police, when " London appi'entices," growing in number and
insolence, frequently made attempts on Bridewell, or pulled
down houses. One day the citizens, in proving some ord-
nance, terrified the whole court of James the First with a
panic that there was " a rising in the city." It is possible
that the government might have been induced to pursue this
singular conduct, for I do not know that it can be paralleled,
of pulling down new-built houses by some principle of poli-
tical economy which remains to be explained, or ridiculed, by
our modern adepts.

» Harl. MSS. 6. fo. 153,

and Residence in the Counlnj. 300

It would hardly be supposed tliat the present suhjfct may
be enlivened by a jioem, the elegance and freedom of wliieh
may even now be admired. It is a great literary curiosity,
and its length may be excused for several remarkable points.

AN ODE,

BT SIR HICHAIID FANSHAW,

Upon Occasion of his Majestifs Proclamation iii the Year 1630, com-
manding the Gentry to reside upon their Estates in the Couniri/.

Now war is all tlie world about,
And everywhere Eriiinys reigns;
Or of the torch so late put out

The stench reiuaius.
Holland for many years hath been
Of Christian tragedies the stage,
Yet seldom hath she played a scene

Of bloodier rage:
And France, that was not long compos'd,
With civil drums again resounds,
And ere the old are fully clos'd,

Receives new wounds.
The great Gustavus in the west
Plucks the imperial eagle's wing,
Than whom the earth did ne'er invest

A fiercer king.
Only the island which we sow,
A world without the world so far,
From present wounds, it cannot show

An ancient sear.
White peace, the beautifull'st of things,
Seems here her everlasting rest
To fix and spread tlie downy wings

Over the nest.
As when great Jove, usurping reign, /

From the plagued world did her exile,
And tied her with a golden chain

To one idest isle,
Wliicli in a sea of plenty swam.
Ami turtles sang on every bough,
A Kife retreat to all that came,

As ours is now ;
Yet we, as if some foe were here,
Leave the despised fields to clowns,
And come to save ourselves, as 'twere

In walled towns.
Hither we bring wives, babes, rich clol'ics,
And gems — till now my soveraign
Tlie growing evil doth oppose :

Cjunting in vain
VOT,. Ttl. r 1J

370 Buildings in the Metropolis, i^c.

His cave preserves us from annoy
Of enemies bis realms to invade,
Unless lie force us to enjoy

The peace he made,
To roll themselves in envied leisure ;
He therefore sends the landed heirs,
Whilst he proclaims not his own pleasure

So much was theirs.
The sap and blood of the land, which fled
Into tlie root, and clicked the heart.
Are bid their quick'uing power to spread

Through every part.
0 'twas an act, not for my muse
To celebrate, nor the dull age,
Until the country air infuse

A purer rage.
And if the fields as thankful prove
For benefits received, as seed.
They will to 'quite so great a love

A Virgil breed.
Nor let the gentry grudge to go
Into those places whence they gi'ew,
But think them blest they may do so.

Who would pursue
The smoky gloi-y of the town.
That may go till his native earth.
And by the shining fire sit down

Of his own hearcb,
Free from the griping scrivener's bands,
And the more biting mercer's books;
Free from the bait of oiled hands,

And painted looks ?
The country too even chops for rain ;
You that exhale it by your power,
Let the fat drops fall down again

In a full shower.
And you bright beauties of the time.
That waste yourselves here in a blaze.
Fix to your orb and proper clime

Your wandering rays.
Let no dark comer of the land
Be unembellish'd with one gem,
And those which here too thick do stand

Sprinkle on them.
Believe me, ladles, you will find
In that sweet light more solid joys,
More true contentment to the mind

Than all town-toys,
.^cr Cupid there less blood doth spill.
But heads his shafts with cliaster love,
Not feather'd with a sparrow's quill.

But of a dove.

Royal Proclamations. Z7\

There you shall hear the nightingale,
The harmless syren of the wooJ,
How prettily she tell.s a t;ile

Of rape and blood.
The lyric lark, with all lieside
Of A'ature's featlior'il rjuire, ami all
The cominouwealth of flowers in 'ts pride

Behold you shall.
The lily queen, the royal ruse,
Tlic gilly-tli)wcT, prince of the bluud !
The courtier tulip, gay in clotlie>.

The regal bud ;
The violet purple senator,
How tliey do mock the pomp of state,
And all that at the surly door

Of great ones wait.
Plant trees you may, and see them shoot
Up with your children, to be served
To your clean boards, and the fairest fruit

To be i)rcserved ;
And learn to use their several gums;
'Tis innocence in the sweet blood
Of cheiTy, apricocks, and phims,

To be imbrued.

ROYAL PROCLAMATIONS,

The satires and the comedies of the age have been consulted
by the historian of our manners, and the fcatui'es of the times
have been traced from those amusing records of folly. Daines
Barrinton enlarged this field of domestic history in his very
entertaining " Observations on the Statutes." Another source,
which to me seems not to have been explored, is the procla-
mations whicli have frequently issued from our sovereigns, and
were produced by the exigencies of the times.

These proclamations or royal edicts in our country were
never armed with the force of laws — only as they enforce the
execution of laws already established ; and tlic proclamation
of a British monaix-h may become even an illegal act, if it be
in opposition to the law of the land. Once, indeed, it was
enacted under the arbitrar}' government of Henry the Eighth,
by the sanction of a pusillanimous parliament, that the force
of acts of parliament should be given to the king's proclama-
tions ; and at a much later period the chancellor, Lord Elles-
merc, was willing to have advanced the king's proclamations
into laws, on the sophistical maxim that " all precedents had

i; v. 2

Z72 Royal Proclamations.

a time when they began;" but this chaneelloi' argued ill, as
lie was told with spirit by Lord Coke, in the presence of
James the Fu'st,* who probably did not think so ill of the
chancellor's logic. Blackstone, to whom on this occasion I
could not fail to turn, observes, on the statute under Henry
the Eighth, that it would have introduced the most despotic
tyranny, and must have proved fatal to the liberties of this
kingdom, had it not been luckily repealed in the minority of
his successor, whom he elsewhere calls an amiable prince — all
oiu* 3'oung princes, we discover, were amiable ! Blackstone
has not recorded the subsequent attempt of the lord chan-
cellor under James the First, which tended to raise proclama-
tions to the nature of an ukase of the autocrat of both the
Rnssias. It seems that our national freedom, notwithstand-
ing our ancient constitution, has had several narrow escapes.

Royal proclamations, however, in their own nature are
innocent enough ; for since the manner, time, and circum-
stances of putting laws in execution nmst frequently be left
to the discretion of the executive magistrate, a proclamation
that is not adverse to existing laws need not create any
alarm ; the only danger they incur is that they seem never
to have been attended to, and rather testified the wishes of
the government than the compliance of the subjects. They
were not laws, and were therefore considered as sermons or
pamphlets, or anything forgotten in a week's time !

These proclamations are frequently alluded to by the letter-
writers of the times among the news of the day, but usually
their royal virtue hardly kept them alive beyond the week.
Some on important subjects are indeed noticed in our history.
Many indications of the situation of affairs, the feelings of
the peojjle, and the domestic history of our nation, may be
drawn from these singular records. I have never found them
to exist in any collected form, and they have been probably
only accidentally preserved.f

The proclamations of every sovereign would characterize

* The whole story is in 12 Co. 746. I owe this curious fact to the
author of Eunomus, ii. 116.

+ A quarto volume was published by Barker, the king's iirinter, and
is entitled "A Booke of Proclamations Published since the begiuning
of his Jlajestie's most happy Keign over England, until this present month
of Feb, 1G09." It contains 110 in all. The Society of Antiquaries of
London possesses at the present time the largest and most perfect collec-
tion of royal iirochimations in existence, brought together since the above
was written. They arc on separate broadhheets, as issued.

RoydJ Pi-ochiuudions. 373

his veign, and open to us some of tlie interior operations o(
the cabinet. The despotic will, j-et vacillating conduct ol
Henry the Eighth, towards the close of his reign, may be
traced in a proclamation to abolish the translations of tho
scriptures, and even the reading of Bibles by the people;
coniiuanding all printers of English books and pamphlets tG
aflix their names to them, and forbidding the sale of any
English books jtrinted abroad.* When the people were not
sutiered to publish their opinions at home, all the opposition
flew to foreign presses, and their writings were then smuggled
into the country in which they ought to have been printed.
Hence, many volumes printed in a foreign type at this period
are found in our collections. The king shrnidc in dismay
from that spirit of reformation whieli had only been a party
business with him, and making himself a pope, decided that
nothing should be learnt but what he himself deigned to teach !
The antipathies and jealousies which our populace too long
indulged, by their incivilities to all foreigners, are charac-
terised by a proclamation issued by Mary, commanding her
subjects to behave themselves peaceably towards the strangers
coming with King Philip ; that noblemen and gentlemen
should wai-n their servants to refrain iVom " strife and con-
tention, either by outward deeds, taunting words, unseemly
countenance, by n'limicklng them, &c." The punishment not
only " her grace's displeasure, hut to be comuntted to prison
without bail or mainprise."

* In 1529 the king had issue J a prochunation for resisting and with-
standing of most dainpnable heresyes sowcn within the realme hy the dis-
cyples of Luther and other heretykes, perverteis of Christes relygyon."
In June, 1530, this was followed l^y the prochimatidn " for dampniiig (or
condemning) of erruuious bokes and heresies, and prohibitinge the havinge
of holy scripture translated into the vulgar tongcs of englishe, frenche, or
dutelie," he notes many bookes " printed beyonde the see" which he will
not allow, " that is to say, the boke called the wicked Mammona, the boke
named the Obedience of a Christen Man, the Supplication of Beggars, and
the boke called the llevelatiou of Antichrist, the Summary of Scripture,
and divers other bukcs made in the Englishe tongue," in fact all books in
the vernacular not issued by native printers. "And that having respect
to the malignity of this present tyme, with the inclination of people to
erronious opinions, the translation of the ncwe testament and the old into
the vulgar tongo of englysshe, shulde rather be the occasion of coutynuance
or increase of errours amonge the said people, than any benefit or com-
niodite toward the wealc of their soules," and he determines therefore
that the scriptures shall only be expounded to the people as heretofore, and
that these books " be clerely exterinynate and exiled out uf thi> realnie of
Ecglaude for ever."

37i' Royal Proclamations.

The proclamations of Edward the Sixth curiously exhibit
tlie unsettled state of the reformation, where the rites and
ceremonies of Catholicism were still practised by the new
religionists, while an opjjosite party, resolutely bent on an
eternal separation from Kome, were avowing doctrines which
afterwards consolidated themselves into puritanism, and while
others were hatching up that demoralising ianaticism which
subsequently shocked the nation with those monstrous sects,
the indelible disgrace of our country ! In one proclamation
the king denounces to the people " those who despise the
sacrament by calling it idol, or such other vile name."
Another is against such " as innovate any ceremony," and
who are described as " certain private preachers and other
laiemen, who rashly attempt of their own and singular ivit
and mind, not only to persuade the people from the old and
accustomed rites and ceremonies, but also themselves bring
in new and strange orders according to their phantasies.
The which, as it is an evident token of pride and arrogancy,
so it tendeth both to confusion and disorder." Another
proclamation, to pres? " a godly conformity throughout his
realm," where we learn the following curious hict, of " divers
unlearned and indiscreet priests of a devilish mind and intent,
teaching that a man may forsake his wife and marry another,
his first wife yet living ; likewise that the wife may do the
same to the husband. Others, that a man may have two
tvives or more at once, for that these things are not pro-
hibited by God's law, but by the Bishop of Eome's law ; so
that by such evil and fantastical opinions some have not
been afraid indeed to marry and keep two loives." Here, as
in the bud, we may unfold those subsequent scenes of our
story which spread out in the following century ; the branch-
ing out of the non-conformists into their various sects ; and
the indecent haste of our reformed priesthood, who, in their
zeal to cast off the yoke of Rome, desperately submitted to
the liberty of having "two wives or more!" There is a
proclamation to abstain from flesh on Fridays and Saturdays ;
exhorted on the principle, not only that " men should abstain
on those days, and forbear their pleasures and the meats
wherein they have more delight, to the intent to subdue
their bodies to the soul and spirit, but also for toorldly policg.
To use fish for the benefit of the commonwealth, and prolit
of many who be fishers and men using that trade, unto the
which this realm, in every part environed with the seas, and

Royal Proclamations. ^"^

eo pl(?ntiful of fresh waters, be increasctl the nourishment of
the land by saving ilesh." It did not seem to ocrur to the
king in couneil tliat the butchers might have had eause to
petition against this monopoly of two days in the week
granted to the fishmongers; and much less, that it was
better to let the j)eople eat Ilesh or fish as suited their con-
veniency. In respect to the religious rite itself, it was evi-
dently not considered as an essential point of faith, since the
king enforces it on the principle, " for the profit and com-
modity of his realm." Burnet has made a just observation
on religious fasts.*

A proclamation against excels of apparel, in the reign of
Elizabeth, antl renewed many years alter, shows the luxury of
dress, which was indeed excessive.f There is a curious one
against the iconoclasts, or imaf/e-lreakers and picture-
destroyers, for which the antiquary will hold her in high
reverence. Her majesty informs us, that " several persons,
ignorant, malicious, or covetous, of late years, have spoiled
and broken ancient monuments, erected only to show a
onemory to posterity, and not to nourish any kind oi^ supersti-
tion." The queen laments that what is Ijroken and spoiled
would be now hard to recover, but advises her good people to
repair them ; and commands them in iuture to desist from
conunitting such injuries. A more extraordinary circum-
stance than the proclamation itself was the manifestation of
her majesty's zeal, in subscribing her name with her own
liand to every proclamation dispersed throughout England.
These image-breakers first appeared in Elizabeth's reign ;

* History of the Reformation, vol. ii. p. 9C), folio.
t In June, 157-1, tlie queen issued from her " Mnuour of Greenwich"
this proclamation airainst " excesse of apparel, and the superfluitie of uu-
necessarye forui;iu wares thereto belongin;;e," which is declared to have
" growen by sulVeranoe to such an extremetic, that the manifest decay, not
only of a great part of the wealth of the whole rcMlme generally, is like to
follow by bringing into the realme such superfluities of silkes, clothes of
gold, sylver, and other most value devices, of so greate coste for the quan-
titie thereof ; as of uecessitie the moneyes and treasure of the realme is,
and must be, yeerely conveyed out of the same." This is followed by three folio
leaves minutely describing what raay be worn on the dresses of every grade
of persons ; descending to such miuutia as to note what classes are not to
be allowed to put lace, or fringes, or borders of velvet upon their gown.s
and petticoats, under pain of fine or punishment, because improper for
their station, and above their means. The order appears to iiave been
evaded, for it was followed by another in February, 15S0, which lecapitU'
lftt?s these prohibitions, and readers them more strinireijt,

376 Koijul ProclaDiutions.

it was afterwards that tliey flourished in all the perfection
of their handicrai't, and have contrived that these monu-
ments of art shall carry down to posterity the memory of
their shame and of their age. These image-hreakers, so
i'amous in our histoiy, had already appeared under Henry
the Eighth, and continued their practical zeal, in spite of
proclamations and remonstrances, till they had accomplished
their work. In 16il an order was puhlished by the Com-
mons, that they should " take away all scandalous pictures
out of churches :" but more was intended than was expressed;
and we are told that the people did not at first carry their
barbarous practice against all Art to the lengths which they
afterwards did, till they were instructed hj private informa-
tion I Dowsing's Journal has been published, and shows what
ihe order meant! He was their giant destroyer! Such are
the INIachiavelian secrets of revolutionary governments ; they
give a puhlio order in moderate words, but the secret one, for
the deeds, is that of extermination ! It was this sort of meii
uho discharged their prisoners by giving a secret sign to lead
them to their execution !

The proclamations of James the First, by their number,
are said to have sunk their value with the people.* He was
fond of giving them gentle advice ; and it is said by Wilson
that there was an intention to have this king's pi'inted pro-
clamations bound up in a volume, that better notice might be
taken of the matters contained in them. There is more than
one to warn the people against " speaking too freely of
matters above their reach," prohibiting all "undutiful
speeches." I suspect that many of these proclamations ai'e

* The list of a very few of those issued at the early part of his reign
may illustrate this. In 1604 was published a "Proclamation for the true
winding or folding of wools," as well as one " For the due regulation of
prices of victuals within the verge of Kent." In 1605, " Against certain
calumnious surmises concerning the church government of Scotland." lu
1608, "A proclamation against making starch." In 1612, " That none buy
or sell any bullion of gold and silver at higher jirices than is appointed to
be paid fo.' the same." Another against dying silk witli slip or any corrupt
EtLiff. In 1613, for "Prohibiting the untimely bringing in of wines," as
well as for "Prohibiting the publishing of any reports or writings of
duels," and also "The importation of felt hats or caps." In 1G15,
"Prohibiting the making of glass with timber or wood," because "of late
yceres the waste of wood and timber hath been exceeding great and into-
lerable, by the glassehouses and glassewurkes of late in divers parts
erected," and which his majesty fears may have the effect of depriving
England of timber to construct her navy !

Royal Proclantafions. 377

the composition of tlio king's own liund ; lie was often his
own secrutarv. There is an admirable one against private
duels and challenges. The curious one respecting Cowell's
" Interpreter " is a sort oi" royal review of some of the arcana
of state : I refer to the quotation.*

I will preserve a passage of a proclamation " against exces.s
of lavish and licentious speech." James was a king of
words !

Although the coimraixture of nations, confluem^c of ambaf-sadors, and tlie
relation which the ailaii-s of our kingdoms liave had towards the business
and interests of foreign states have caused, during our regiment (govern-
ment) a greater openness and liberty of discourse, even concerning mat-
ters OF STATE (which are no (hemes or subjects Jit for vuhjar persons or
common inectin(/s), than hath been in former times used or permitted ; and
although in our own nature and judgment we do well allow of convenient
freedom of speech, esteeming any over-curious or restrained hands canied
in that kind rather as a weakness, or else over-much severity of govern-
ment than otherwise ; yet for as much as it is come to our ears, by common
report, that there is at this time a more licentious passage of lavish dis-
course and bold censure in matters of state than is fit to be suffered : We
give this warning, &c., to take heed how they intermeddle by pen or speech
with causes of state and secrets of empire, either at home or abroad, but
contain thfmselves witliiu that modest and reverent regard of matters
above their reach and calling ; nor to give any manner of ajjplause to such
discourse, without acquainting one of our privy council within the space
of twenty-four hours."

It seems that " the hold speakers," as certain persons were
then denominated, practised an old artifice of lauding his
majesty, while they severely arraigned the counsels of the
cabinet ; on this James observes, " iSTeither let any man mis-
take us so much as to think that by giving fair and specious
attributes to our person, they cover the scandals which they
otherwise lay upon our government, but conceive that we
make no other construction of them but as fine and artificial
glosse:% the better to give passage to the rest of their impu-
tations and scandals."

This was a proclamation in the eighteenth year of liis
reign ; he repeated it in the nineteenth, and he might have
proceeded to "the crack of doom" with the same effect !

llushworth, in his second volume of Historical Collections,
has preserved a considerable number of the proclamations of
Charles the First, of which many are remarkable ; but latterly
they mark the feverish state of his reign. One regulates
access for cure of the king's evil — by wliich his majesty, it

* I have noticed it in Calamities of Authors.

378 Royal Proclamations.

appears, "hatli had good success therein ; " but though ivady
and wiUing as any king or queen of this reahn ever was to re-
lieve tlie distresses of his good subjects, '"his majesty com-
mands to change the seasons for his ' sacred touch ' from
Easter and Whitsuntide to Easter and Michaehnas, as times
more convenient for the temperature of the season," &c.
Another against "departure out of the reahii without license."
One to erect an office " for the suppression of cursing and
swearing," to receive the forfeitures ; against " hbellous and
seditious pamphlets and discourses from Scotland," framed by
factious spirits, and republished in London — this was in 1640;
and Charles, at the crisis of that great insurrection in which
he was to be at once the actor and the spectator, fondly
imagined tliat the possessors of these "scandalous" pamphlets
would bring them, as he proclaimed " to one of his majesty's
justices of peace, to be by him sent to one of his principal
secretaries of state ! "

On the Ixestoration, Charles the Second had to court his
people by his domestic regulations. He early issued a re-
markable proclamation, which one would think reflected on
his favourite companions, and which strongl}^ marks the
moral disoi-ders of tliose depraved and wretched times. It is
against "vicious, debauched, and profane persons!" who are
thus described : —

"A sort of men of whom we have heard much, and are sufficiently
ashamed ; who spend iheir time in taverns, tij^pling-houses and de-
bauches ; giving no other evidence of their affection to us bat in drinking
our heedth, and inveighing against all others who are not of their own
dissolute temper ; and who, in truth, have inore discredited our cause, by
the license of their manners and lives, than they could ever advance it by
their affection or courage. We hope all persons of honour, or in place and
authority, will so far assist us in discountenancing such men, that their
discretion and shame will persuade them to reform what their conscience
would not ; and that the displeasure of good men towards them may
supply what the laws have not, and, it may be, cannot well provide
against ; there being by the license and corruption of the times, and the
depraved nature of man, many enormities, scandals, and impieties in prac-
tice and manners, which laivs cannot ivcll describe, and consequently not
cnouf/h provide against, which may, by the example and severity of vir-
tuous men, be easily discountenanced, and by degrees suppressed."

Surely the gravity and moral severity of Clarendon dictated
this proclamation ! which must have afforded some mirth to
the gay, debauched circle, the loose cronies of royalty !

It is curious that, in IGOO, Charles the Second issued a long
proclamation for the strict observance of Lent, and alleges for

Royal Proclamalions. 379

it the same reason as we found in Edward the Sixth's pro-
clamation, "foi-tlie jTood it procUiccs in the employment of
Jhhennen.'" No ordinaries, taverns, &c., to make any supper
on Friday nights, either in Lent or out of Lent.

Charles the Second issued proelamations " to repress the
excess of gilding of coaches and chariots," to restrain the
waste of gold, which, as they supposed, by the excessive use
of gilding, had grown scarce. Against '■ tlie exportation and
the buying and selling of gold and silver at higher rates than
in our mint," alluding to a statute made in the ninth year of
Edward the Third, called the Statute of Money. Against
building in and about London and Westminster, in IGGl :
" The inconveniences daily growing by increase of new build-
ings are, that the people increasing in such great numbers,
are not well to be governed by the wonted officers : the prices
of victuals are enhanced ; the health of the subject inhabiting
the cities much endangered, and many good towns and
horoughs unpeopled, and in their trades much decayed — fre-
•quent fires occasioned by timber-buildings." It orders to
'build with brick and stone, "which would beautify, and make
an uniformity in the buildings ; and which are not only more
■durable and safe against fu'c, but by experience are found to
he of little more if not less charge than the huikling with
timber." We must infer that, by the general use of timber,
it had considerably risen in price, while brick and stone not
then being generally used, became as cheap as wood! *

The most remarkable i)roclamations of Charles the Second
are those which concern the regulations of eotlee-houses, and
one for putting them down ; f to restrain the spreading of

• Lilly, the astrologer, in his memoirs, notes that Thomas Howard, Earl
of Ariuulel (the famous collector of the Aruuclflian marbles now at O.t'
ford), "brought over the new way of building with brick in the city,
greatly to the safety of the city, and preservation of the wood of this na-
tion."

t This proclamation "for the suppression of coffee-houses" bears date
December 20, 1G75, and is stated to have been issued because " the mul-
titude of coffee-houses, lately set up and kept within this kingdom, and
the great resort of idle and dissipated persons to them, have produced very
evil and dangerous effects," particularly in spreading of rumours, and in-
ducing tradesmen to neglect their calling, tending to the danger of the
commonweal, by the idle waste of time and money. It therefore orders
all coffee-house keepers " tliat they, or any of them, do not presume from
and after the tenth day of January next ensuing, to keep any publick
coffee-house, or utter, or sell by retail, in his, her, or their house, or
houses (to be spent or consumed within the same), any collee, chocolate,
ebei'bett, or tea ; as they will answer it at their utmost peril. ''

880 True Sources of Secret History.

false news, and lieentiovis talking of state and government, the
speakers and the hearers were made alike punishahle. This
\vas highl)' resented as an illegal act by the friends of civil
freedom ; who, however, succeeded in obtaining the freedom of
the colfee-houses, under the promise of not sanctioning trea-
sonable speeches. It was urged b}' the court lawyers, as the
high Tory, lloger North, tells us, that the retailing coff'ee
might be an innocent trade, when not used in the nature of a
common assembly to discourse of matters of state news and
great persons, as a means " to discontent the people." On
the other side, Kennet asserted that the discontents existed
before they met at the coffee-houses, and that the proclama-
tion was only intended to suppress an evil which was not to
be prevented. At this day we know which of those two
historians exercised the truest judgment. It was not the
coffee-houses which produced political feeling, but the reverse.
Whenever government ascribes effects to a cause quite inade-
quate to produce them, they are only seeking means to hide
the evil which they are too weak to suppress.

TKUE SOURCES OF SECRET HISTORY.

This is a subject which has been hitherto but imperfectly
comprehended even by some historians themselves ; and
has too often incurred the satire, and even the contempt, of
those volatile spirits who play about the superficies of truth,
wanting the industry to view it on more than one side, and
those superficial readers who imagine that every tale is told
when it is written.

Secret history is the supplement of history itself, and is its
great corrector ; and the combination of secret with public
history has in itself a perfection, wliich each taken sepa-
rately has not. The popular historian composes a plausible
rather than an accurate tale ; researches too fully detailed
would injure the just proportions, or crowd the bold design, of
the elegant narrative ; and facts, presented as they occurred,
would not adapt themselves to those theoretical writers of
histoiy who arrange events not in a natural, but in a sys-
tematic order. But in secret history we are more busied in
observing what passes than in being told of it. We are
transformed into the contemporaries of the writers, while we
are standing on the "vantage ground" of their posterity;

True Sources of Secret History. 381

and thus what to them appeared ambiguous, to us has
become unquestionable ; wliat was secret to them has been
eunfided to us. Tliey mark the beginnings, and we the ends.
From the fuhiess of their accounts we recover nmch which
had been lost to us in the general views of history, and it is
by this more intimate acquaintance with persons and circum-
stances that we are enabled to correct the less distinct, and
sometimes the fallacious appearances in the page of the popu-
lar historian. He who only views things in masses will have
no distinct notion of any one particular; he maybe a fanciful
or a passionate historian, but he is not the historian who will
enlighten while he charms.

But as secret history ai)pears to deal in minute things, its
connexion with great results is not usually suspected. The
circumstantiality of its story, the changeable shadows of its
characters, the redundance of its conversations, and the many
careless supertluities which egotism or vanity may throw out,
seem usually confounded with that small-talk familiarly
ievmed (/ossipiny. But the ffosdping of a profound politi-
cian or a vivacious observer, in one of their letters, or in their
memoirs, often, by a spontaneous stroke, reveals the indi-
vidual, or by a simple incident unriddles a mysterious event.
We may discover the value of these pictures of human nature,
with which secret history abounds, by an observation which
occurred between two statesmen in oflice. Lord Kaby, our
ambassador, apologised to Lord Bolingbroke, then secretary
of state, for troubling him with the minuter circumstances
which occurred in his conferences ; in reply, the minister
reqiiests the ambassador to continue the same manner of
writing, and alleges an excellent reason: "Those minute cir-
cumstances give very great light to the general scope and
design of the persons negotiated with. And I own that
nothing pleases me more in that valuable collection of the
Cardinal D'Ossat's letters, than the naive descriptions which
he gives of the looks, gestures, and even tones of voice, of the
persons he conferred with." I regret to have to record the
opinions of another noble author, who recently has thrown
out some degrading notions of secret history, and particularly
of the historians. " I would have silently passed by a vulgar
writer, superficial, prejudiced, and uninformed, but as so
many are yet deficient in corrcc't notions of secret histort/, it
is but justice that their rejjrese.itative should be hoard before
thev are condemned.

382 True Sources of Secret History.

His lordship says, that " Of hxte tlie appetite for Bemains
of all kinds has surprisingly^ increased. A story repeated by
the Duchess of Portsmouth's waiting-woman to Lord
llochester's valet forms the subject of investigation for a
philosoj^hical historian ; and you may hear of an assembly of
scholars and authors discussing the validity of a piece of
scandal invented by a maid of honour more than two centu-
ries ago, and repeated to an obscure writer by Queen Eliza-
beth's housekeeper. It is a matter of the greatest interest to
See the letters of every busy trifler. Yet who does not laugh
at such men?" This is the attack! but as if some half
truths, like light through the cranny in a dark room, had
just darted in a stream of atoms over this scoffer at secret
history, he suddenly views his object with a very different
appearance — for his lordship jusUy concludes that " It must
be confessed, however, that knowledge of this kind is very
entertaining ; and here and there among the rubbish we find
hints that may give the philosopher a clue to important facts,
and afford to the moralist a better analysis of the human
mind than a whole library of metaphysics !" The pliilosopher
may well abhor all intercourse with wits ! because the facult}'
of judgment is usually quiescent with them ; and in their
oi-gasm they furiously decry wdiat in their sober senses they
as eagerly laud ! Let me inform his lordship, that " the
waiting-woman and the valet " of eminent persons are some-
times no unimportant personages in history. By the
Memoires de Mons. de la Forte, f vernier valet-de-cliamhre de
Louis XIV., we learn what before " the valet " wrote had
not been known — the shameful arts which Mazarin allowed
to be practised, to give a bad education to the prince, and to-
manage him by depraving his tastes. Madame de Motleville,
in her Memoirs, " the waiting lady " of our Henrietta, has
preserved for our own English history some facts which have-
been found so essential to the narrative, that they are referred
to by our historians. In Gui Joh/, the humble dependant of
Cardinal de Ketz, we discover an unconscious but a useful
commentator on the memoirs of his master ; and the most'
affecting personal anecdotes of Charles the First have been
preserved by Thomas Ilerhert, his gentleman in waiting;.
Clcry, the valet of Louis the Sixteenth, with pathetic faithful-
ness, has shown us the man in the monarch whom he served I

Of SECiiET iiisToiiY there are obviously two species ; it i*
positive, or it is relative. It is positive, when the facts arc

True Sources of Secret History. 333

first given to the world ; a sort of knowledge wliicli can only be
drawn from our own personal experience, or iVom contempo-
rary documents preserved in their manuscript state in public
or in private collections ; or it is relative, in proportion to the
knowledge of those to whom it is communicated, and will be
more or less valued according to the acquisitions of the
reader ; and this inferior species of secret history is drawn
i'rom rare and obscure books and other published authorities,
often as scarce as manuserijtts.

Some experience I have had in those literary researches,
where cusiosity, ever wakeful and vigilant, discovers among
contemporary manuscripts new iacts ; illustrations of old
ones ; and sometimes detects, not merely by conjecture, the
concealed causes of many events ; often opens a scene in
which some well-known personage is exhibited in a new
character ; and tlius penetrates beyond those generalising
representations which satisfy the superficial, and often cover
the page of history with delusion and liction.

It is only since the latter institution of national libraries
that these immense collections of manuscripts have been form-
ed ; with us they are an undescrlbable variety, usually classed
under the vague title of " state-papers."* The instructions
of ambassadors, but more particularly their own dispatches ;
charters and chronicles brown with antiquity, which preserve
a world which had been else lost for us, like the one before the
deluge ; series upon series of private correspondence, among
which we discover the most confidential communications,
designed by the writers to have been destroyed by tlie hand
which received them ; memoirs of individuals by themselves
or by their friends, such as are now publislied by the pomp of
vanity, or the faitb.lessness of their possessors ; and the mis-
cellaneous collections formed by all kinds of persons, charac-
teristic of all countries and of all eras, materials for the history
of man ! — records of the force or of the feebleness of the human
understanding, and still the monuments of their passions.

The original collectors of these dispersed manuscripts were
a race of ingenious men, silent benefactors of mankind, to
whom justice has not yet been fully awarded ; but in their
fervour of accumulation, everything in a manuscript state

* The farge mass of important documents in tlie National State-paper
Office lias receutly been niaJe available to tlie use of the historic student,
y-\\\\ the best results, and cannot fail to have iiuportaut influence on tho
future historic literature of the country.

38-l< True Sources of Secret History.

bore its spell ; acquisition was tlie sole point aimed at by oui
early collectors, and to tliis these searching s])irit3 sacrificed
their fortunes, their ease, and their days; but life would have
been too short to have decided on the intrinsic value of the
manuscripts flowing in a stream to the collectors ; and sup-
pression, even of the disjointed reveries of madmen, or the
sensible madness of projectors, might have been indulging a
capricious taste, or wdiat has proved more injurious to histo-
rical pursuits, that ]mrty-feeling which has frequently anni-
hilated the memorials of their adversaries.*

These manuscript collections now assume a formidable
appearance. A toilsome march over these " Alps riging over
Alps !" a voyage in " a sea without a shore !" has turned away
most historians from their severer duties ; those who have
grasped at earlj^ celebrity have been satisfied to have given a
new form to, rather than contributed to the new matter of
history. The very sight of these masses of history has ter-
rified some modern historians. When Pere Daniel undertook
a history of France, the learned Boivm, the king's librarian,
oj)ened for his inspection an immense treasure of charters,
and another of royal autograph letters, and another of pri-
vate correspondence ; treasures reposing in fourteen hundred
folios ! The modern historian passed two hours impatiently
looking over them, but frightened at another ])lunge into the
gulf, tills Curtius of history would not immolate himself for
his country! He wrote a civil letter to the librarian for his
"supernumerary kindness," but insinuated that he could
write a very readable history without any further aid of such
liaperasses or "paper-rubbish." Pere Daniel, therefore,
"quietly sat down to his history," copying others — a com-
pliment which was never returned by any one : but there was
this striking novelty in his "readable history," that according
to the accurate computation of Count Boulainvilliers, Pere
Daniel's history of Prance contains ten thousand blunders !
The same circumstance has been told me by a living histo-
rian of the late Gilbert Stuart ; who, on some manuscript
volumes of letters being pointed out to him when composing
his history of Scotland, confessed that " what was already
printed was more than he was able to read!" and thus much
for his theoretical history, written to run counter to another
theoretical history, being Stuart vei'sus liobertson ! They

* See -what I have said of " Suppressors and Dilapidatora of Maau*
scripts," vol. ii. p. 413.

7\ue Sources of Secret Ilhfonj. 383

equally depend on the simplicity of their readers, and the
charms of style ! Another historian, Anquetil, the author of
L' Esprit de la Ligite, has described his embarrassment at an
inspection of the contemporary manuscripts of that period.
After thirteen years of researches to glean whatever secret
history printed books afforded, the author, residing in the
country, resolved to visit the royal library at Paris. Mon-
sieur Mclot receiving him witli that kindness which is one
of the official duties of the public librarian towards the stu-
dious, opened the cabinets in which were deposited the
treasures of rrench history. — " This is what you require !
come here at all times, and you shall be attended!" said the
librarian to the young historian, who stood by with a sort of
shudder, while he opened cabinet after cabinet. The intrepid
investigator repeated his visits, looking over tlio mass as
chance directed, attacking one side, and then Hying to an-
other. The historian, who had felt no weariness during
thirteen years among printed books, discovered that he was
now engaged in a task apparently always beginning, and
never ending! The "Esprit de la Ligue" was liowevcr en-
riched by labours which at the moment appeared so barren.

The study of these paperasses is not perhaps so disgusting
as the impatient Pere Daniel imagined ; there is a literary
fascination in looking over the same papers which the great
characters of history once held and wrote on ; catching from
themselves their secret sentiments ; and often detectin"- so
many of their unrecorded actions ! By habit the toil be-
comes light ; and with a keen inquisitive spirit even delight-
ful ! For what is more delightful to the curious than to
make Iresh discoveries every day ? Addison has a true and
pleasing observation on such pursuits. " Our employments
are converted into amusements, so that even in those objects
which were indillerent, or even displeasing to us, the mind
not only gradually loses its aversion, but conceives a certain
fondness and aftection for them." Addison illustrates this
case by one of the gi'catest geniuses of the age, who by habit
took incredible pleasure in searching into rolls and records,
till he prel'erred them to Virgil and Cicero! The faculty of
curiosity is as fervid, and even as retined in its search after
tinith, as tliat of taste in the objects of imagination ; and the
more it is indulged, the more exquisitely it is enjoyed !

The popular historians of England and of France have, in
truth, made little use of manuscript researches. Life is veiy

TOL. III. 0 c

386 True Sources of Secret History,

jshort for long histories ; and those who rage with au avidity
of fame or profit will gladly taste the fruit which they cannot
mature. Researches too remotely sought after, or too slowly
acquired, or too fully detailed, would be so many obstructions
in the smooth texture of a narrative. Our theoretical histo-
rians write from some particular and preconceived result ;
unlike Liv}', and De Thou, and Machiavel, who describe
events in their natural order, these cluster them together by
the fanciful threads of some political or moral theory, by
which facts are distorted, displaced, and sometimes altogether
omitted ! One single original document has sometimes
shaken into dust their Palladian edifice of history. At the
moment Hume was sending some sheets of his history to
press, Murdin's State Papers appeared. And we are highly
amused and instructed b}'' a letter of our historian to his
rival, Robertson, who probably found himself often in the
same forlorn situation. Our historian discovered in that col-
lection what compelled him to retract his preconceived system
— he hm'ries to stop the press, and paints his confusion and
his anxiety with all the ingenuous simplicity of his nature.
"We are all in the wrong!" he exclaims. Of Hume I have
heard that certain manuscripts at the State Paper Office had
been prepared for his inspection during a fortnight, but he
never could muster courage to pay his promised visit. Satis-
fied with the common accounts, and the most obvious sources
of history, when librarian at the Advocates' Library, where
yet may be examined the books he used, marked by his hand,
he spread the volumes about the sofa, from which he rarely
rose to pursue obscure inquiries, or delay by fresh diffi-
culties the page which every day was growing under his
charming pen. A striking proof of his careless happiness I
discovered in his never referring to the perfect edition of
'•"VVhitelocke's Memorials" of 1732, but to the old truncated
find faithless one of 16S2,

Dr. Birch was a wi'iter with no genius for composition, but
one to whom British history stands more indebted than to
any superior author ; his incredible love of labour, in tran-
scribing with his own hand a large librar}"- of manuscripts
from originals dispersed in public and in private repositories,
has enriched the British Museum by thousands of the most
authentic documents of genuine secret historj'. He once pro-
jected a collection of original historical letters, for which lie
had prepared a preface, where I find the following passage:

True Sources of Secret Hlstori/. 387

— " It is a move important service to tlie pul)lic to contribute
soinelhing not before known to the general fund of liistory,
than to give new form and colour to what we are already
possessed of, by superadding relinement and ornament, whicK
too often tend to lUnguise the real state of the facts ; a fault
not to be atoned for by the pomp of style, or even the fine
eloquence of the historian." This was an oblique stroke
aimed at Robertson, to whom Birch had generously opened
the stores of history, for the Scotch historian had needed all
his charity; but Robertson's attractive inventions and highly-
linished composition seduce the public taste; and we may
forgive the latent spark of envy in the honest feelings of the
man, who was profoundly skilled in delving in the native
beds of ore, but not in fashioning it ; and whose own
neglected historical works, constructed on the true principles
of secret history, we may often turn over to correct the
erroneous, the prejudiced, and the artful accounts of
those who have covered their faults by "the pomp of style,
and the eloquence of the historian."

The large manuscript collections of original documents,
from whence may be drawn what I have called positive secret
history, are, as I observed, comparatively of modern existence.
Formerly they were widely dispersed in private hands ; and
the nature of such sources of historic discovery but rarely
occurred to our writers. Even had thc}^ sought them, their
access must have been partial and accidental. Lord Ilard-
wicke has observed, that there are still many untouched ma-
nuscript collections within these kingdoms, which, through
the ignorance or inattention of their owners, are condemned
to dust and obscurity; but how valuable and essential they
may be to the interests of authentic history and of sacred
truth, cannot be more strikingly demonstrated than in the
recent publications of the Marlborough and the Shrewsbuiy
Papers by Archdeacon Coxe.* The editor was fulh' autho-

* The " Conw.ay Papers" remain unpublished. From what I have al-
ready been favoured with the sight of, I may venture to predict that our
history may receive from them some important accession. The reader may
tind a lively summary of the contents of these Papers in Horace Walpole'a
account of his visit to Kagky, in his letter to George Montague, 20th
August, 175S. The Right Hon. John Wilson Croker, with whom the
Marquis of Hertford had placed the disposal of the Conway Papers, is also
in possession of the Throckmorton Papers, of which the reader may like-
wise observe a particular notice in Sir Henry Wotton's will, in liaak
Walton's Lives. Unsunned treasures lie in the State-paper office.

c c 2

388 True Sources of Secret History.

rised to observe, " It is singular that those transactions
should either have been passed over in silence, or imperfectly
represented by most of our national historians," Our modern
history would have been a mere political romance, without
the astonishing picture of William and his ministers, exhi-
bited in those unquestionable documents. Burnet was
among the first of our modern historians who showed the
world the preciousness of such materials, in his " History of
the Reformation," which he largely drew from the Cottonian
collection. Our early historians only repeated a tale ten
times told. Milton, who wanted not for literary diligence,
Jiad no fresh stores to open for his " History of England ;"
while Hume despatches, comparatively in a few pages, a sub-
ject which has atforded to the fervent diligence of my learned
friend Sharon Turner volumes precious to the antiquary, the
lawyer, and the philosopher.

To illustrate my idea of the usefulness and of the absolute
necessity of secret history, I fix first on a public event,
and secondly on a jiublic character ; both remarkable in our
own modern history, and both serving to expose the falla-
cious appearances of popular history by authorities indis-
putably genuine. The event is the liestoration of Charles
the Second ; and the cliaractev is that of Mary, the queen of
AVilliam the Third.

In history the Restoration of Charles appears in all its
splendour — the king is jo^^fully received at Dover, and the
shore is covered by his subjects on their knees — crowds of
the great hurry to Canterbury — the army is drawn up, in
number and with a splendour that had never been equalled —
his enthusiastic reception is on his birthday, for that was
the lucky day fixed on for his entrance into the metropolis —
in a word, all that is told in history describes a monarch the
most powerful and the most happy. One of the tracts of the
day, entitled "England's Triumph," in the mean quaintness
of the style of the times, tells us that " The soldiery, who had
hitherto made cluhs trump, resolve now to enthrone the Icing
oflieartsP Turn to the faithful memorialist, who so well
knew the secrets of the king's heart, and who was himself an
actor behind the curtain ; turn to Clarendon, in his own Life,
and we shall find that the power of the king was then a*
dubious as when he was an exile : and his feelings were so
much racked, that he had nearly resolved on a last flight.

<'larendon, in noticing the temper and .spirit of that time,

True Sources of Secret JT'tstory. 380

observes, " Whoever reflects upon all this composition of con-
tradictory wishes and expectations, must confess that the
king was not yet the master of the kingdom, nor his autho-
rity and securiti/ such as the general noise and accla^nation,
the hells and the bonfires, proclaimed it to he. ^'' — "The first
mortification the king met with as soon as he arrived at Can-
terbiuy, within three hours after he landed at Dover." Cla-
rendon then relates how many the king found there, who,
while they waited with joy to kiss his hand, also came with
importunate solicitations for themselves ; forced him to give
them present audience, in which they reckoned up the insup-
portable losses undergone b}^ themselves or their fathers ;
demanding some grant, or promise of such or such offices ;
some even for more ! " pressing for two or three with sucli
confidence and importunity, and with such tedious discourses,
that the king was extremely nauseated with their suits,
though his modesty knew not how to break from them ; that
he no sooner got into his chamber, which for some hours he
was not able to do, than he lamented the condition to ivhich
he found he must he subject ; and did, in truth, from that
minute, contract such a prejudice against some of those per-
sons." But a greater mortification was to follow, and one
which had nearly thrown the king into despair.

General Monk had from the beginning to this instant acted
very mysteriously, never corresponding with nor answering a
letter of the king's, so that his majest}' was frequently doubtful
whether the general designed to act for himself or for the
king : an ambiguous conduct which I attribute to the power
his wife had over him, who was in the opposite interest. The
general, in his rough way, presented him a large paper, with
about seventy names for his privy council, of which not more
than two were acceptable. "The king," says Clarendon,
" was in more than ordinari/ confusion, for he knew not well
what to think of the general, in whose absolute power he
was — so that at this moment his majesty was almost alarmed
at the demand and appearance of things." The general
afterwards undid this unfavourable appearance, by acknow-
ledging that the list was drawn up by his wife, who had made
him promise to present it ; but he permitted his majesty to
act as he thought proper. At that moment General Monk
was more king than Charles.

We have not yet concluded. When Charles met the army
at Blackheath, 00,000 strong, " he knew well the ill consti-

390 True Sources of Secret History.

tution of the army, the distemper iiud murmuring that was
in it, and how many diseases and convulsions their infant
loyalty was subject to ; that how united soever their inclina-
tions and acclamations seemed to he at Hiackheath, their
affections were not the satne — and the vert/ countenances there
of many officers^ as well as soldiers, did sufficiently manifest
that they were drawn thither to a service they were not
delighted in. The old soldiers had little regard for th.e\rneio
officers; and it quickly appeared, b}' the select and affected
mixtures of sullen and melancholic parties of officers and
soldiers." — And then the chancellor of human nature adds,
" And in this melancliolic and perplexed condition the king
and all his hopes stood, ivhen he appeared most gay and ex-
alted, and ivore a pleasantness in his face that became him,
and looked like as full an assurance of his security as was
possible to put on." It is imagined that Louis the Eighteenth
would be the ablest commentator on this piece of secret his-
tory, and add another twin to Pierre de Saint Julien's " Ge-
melles ou Pareiles," an old French treatise of histories which
resemble one another : a volume so scai'ce, that I have never
met with it.

Burnet informs us, that when Queen Mary held the ad-
ministration of government during the absence of William, it
was imagined by some, that as " every woman of sense loved
to be meddling, they concluded that she had but a small por-
tion of it, because she lived so abstracted from all affiiirs."
He praises her exemplary behaviour ; " regular in her devo-
tions, much in her closet, read a great deal, was often busy at
work, and seemed to employ lier time and thoughts in any-
thing rather than matters of state. Her conversation was
lively and obliging ; everything in her was easy and natural.
The king told the Earl of Shrewsbury, that though he could
not hit on the right way of pleasing England, he was confi-
dent she would, and that we should all be veiy happy under
her." Such is the miniature of the queen which Burnet
offers ; we sec nothing but her tranquillity, her simplicity,
and her carelessness, amidst the important transactions passing
under her eye ; but I lift the curtain from a larger picture.
The distracted state amidst which the queen lived, the vexa-
tions, the secret sorrows, the agonies and the despair of Mary
in the absence of William, nowhere appear in history ! and as
we see, escaped the ken of the Scotch bishop ! They were
reserved for the curiosity and instruction of posterity ; and

True Sources of Secret Ilislorij. 391

were found by Ualrymple, in the letters of Mary to her hus-
Lancl, in King William's cabinet. It will be well to place
under the eye of the i-eader the suppressed cries of this
aiUicted queen at the time when " everything in her was
so easy and natural, employing her time and thoughts in
anything rather than matters of state — often busy at work!"

[ shall not dwell on the pangs of the queen for the fate of
William — or her deadly suspicions that many were unfaithful
about her ; a battle lost might have been fatal ; a conspiracy
might have undone what even a victory had obtained ; the
continual terrors she endured were such, that we might be at
a loss to determine who suil'ered most, those w'ho had been
expelled from, or those who had ascended the throne.

So far was the queen from not " employing her thoughts"
on "matters of state," that every letter, usually written
towards evening, chronicles the conflicts of the day ; she
records not only events, but eveu dialogues and personal cha-
racteristics ; hints her suspicions, and multiplies her fears ;
her attention was incessant — "I never write but what 1
think others do not ;" and her terrors were as ceaseless, — " I
pray God send you back quickly, for I see all breaking out
into flames." The queen's dilHculties were not eased b}' a
single confidential intercourse. On one occasion she observes,
" As I do not know what I ought to speak, and when not, I
am as silent as can be." " 1 ever fear not doing well, and
trust to what nobody says but you. It seems to me that
every one is afraid of themselves. — I am very uneasy in one
thing, which is want of somebody to speak my mind Ireely to,
for it's a great constraint to think and be silent ; and there is
so much matter, that I am one of Solomon's fools, who am
ready to burst. I must tell you again how Lord Monmouth
endeavours to frighten me, and indeed things have but a
melanelioly prospect." She had indeed reasons to fear Lord
Monmouth, who, it appears, divulged all the secrets of the
royal councils to Major ^\'ildman, who was one of our old
republicans ; and, to spread alarm in the privy council, con-
veyed in lemon-juice all their secrets to France, often on the
very day they had passed in council ! They discovered the
fact, and every one suspected the other as the traitor ! Lord
Lincoln even once assui-ed her, that " the Lord President and
all in general, who are in trust, were rogues." Her council
was composed of factions, and the queen's suspicions were
rather general than particular: for she observes on them,

oO:i True Sources of Secret History.

" Till now I thoiTght you had given me wrong characters of
men ; but now I see they answer my expectation of being as
little of a mind as of a body." — For a final extract, take this
full picture of royal misery — " I must see company on my set
days ; I must play twice a week ; nay, I must laugh and talk,
though never so much against my will : I believe I dissemble
very ill to those who know me ; at least, it is a great constraint
to myself, yet I must endure it. All my motions are so
watched, and all I do so observed, that if I eat less, or speak
less, or look more grave, all is lost in the opinion of the
world ; so that I have this misery added to that of your
absence, that I must grin when my heart is ready to break,
and talk when my heart is so oppressed that I can scarce
breathe. I go to Kensington as often as I can for air ; but
then I never can be quite alone, neither can I complain —
that would be some ease ; but I have nobody whose humour
and circumstances agree with mine enough to speak my mind
freely to. Besides, I must hear of business, which being a
thing I am so new in, and so unfit for, does but break my
brains the more, and not ease my heart."

Thus different from the representation of Bm-net was the
actual state of Queen Mary : and I suspect that our warm
and vehement bishop had but little personal knowledge of her
majesty, notwithstanding the elaborate character of the queen
which he has given in her funeral eulogium. He must have
known that she did not always sympathise with his party-
feelings : for the queen writes, " The Bishop of Salisbury has
made a long thundering sermon this morning, which he has
been with me to desire to print ; which I could not refuse,
though I should not have ordered it, for reasons which I
told him." Burnet (whom I am very far from calling what
an inveterate Tory, Edward Earl of Oxford, does in one of
his manuscript notes, "that lying Scot") unquestionably
has told many truths in his garrulous page; but the cause in
which he stood so deeply engaged, coupled to his warm sam
guine temper, may have sometimes dimmed liis sagacity, so
as to have caused him to have mistaken, as in the present case,
a mask for a face, particularly at a time when almost every
individual appears to have worn one !

Both these cases of Charles the Second and Queen Mary
show the absolute necessity of researches into secret history,
to correct the appearances and the fallacies which so oftea
deceive us in public history.

True Sources of Secret History. 393

" The appetite for Remains," as the noble author whom I
have ah-eady alluded to calls it, may then be a very whole-
come one, if it provide the only materials by which our
popular histories can be corrected, and since it often infuses a
freshness into a story which, after having been copied from
book to book, inspires another to tell it for the tenth time !
Thus are the sources of secret history unsuspected by the
idler and the superficial, among those masses of untouched
manuscripts — that subterraneous history ! — which indeed may
terrify the indolent, bewilder the inexperienced, and confound
the injudicious, if they have not acquired the knowledge
wliich not only decides on facts and opinions, but on the
authorities which have furnished them. Popular historians
have written to their readers ; each with different views, but
all alike form the open documents of history ; like feed advo-
cates, they declaim, or like special pleaders, they keep only on
one side of their case : they are seldom zealous to push on
their cross-examination ; for they come to gain their cause,
and not to hazard it !

Time will make the present age as obsolete as the last, for
our sons will cast a new light over the ambiguous scenes
which distract their fathei's ; they will know how some things
happened for which we cannot account ; they will bear wit-
ness to how many characters we have mistaken ; they will be
told many of those secrets which our contempoi-aries hide from
us ; they will pause at the ends of our beginnings ; they will
read the perfect story of man, which can never be told while
it is proceeding. All this is the possession of posterity,
because they will judge without our passions ; and all this we
ourselves have been enabled to possess by the secret history
of the last two ayes .Z*

■■■ Since tliis article Las been sent to press I rise from reading one in tlie
Edinhunjh Review on Lord Orford's and Lord Waldegrave's JNIemoirs,
This is one of the very rai-e articles which could only come from the hand
of a master long exercised in the studies he criticises. The critic, or
rather the historian, observes, that "of a period remarkable for the esta-
blishment of our present system of government, no authentic materials had
yet appeared. Events of public notoriety are to be found, though often
inaccurately told, in our common histories ; but the secret springs of ac-
tion, the private views and motives of individu.als, &c., are as little known
to us as if the events to which they relate had taken place in China or
Japan." The clear, connected, dispassionate, and circumstantial nar-
rative, with which he has enriched the stores of English history, is drawn
from the sources of secret history ; from jnilliished memoirs and cow
Umporary corresjiondence.

394

LITERARY KESIDENCES.

Men of genius have usually been condemned to compose
their finest v/orks, which are iisually their eai'liest ones,
under the roof of a garret ; and few literaiy characters have
lived, like Pliny and Voltaire, in a villa or chateau of their
own. It has not therefore often happened that a man of
genius could raise local emotions by his own intellectual sug-
gestions. Ariosto, who built a palace in his verse, lodged
himself in a small house, and found that stanzas and stones
were not put together at the same rate : old Montaigne has
left a description of his library ; " over the entrance of my
house, where I view my court-yards, and garden, and at once
survey all the operations of my family!"

There is, however, a feeling among literary men of build-
ing up their own elegant fimcies, and giving a permanency to
their own tastes ; we dwell on their favourite scenes as a sort
of portraits, and w^e eagerly collect those few prints, which
are their only vestiges. A collection might be formed of
such literary residences chosen for their amenity and their
retirement, and adorned by the objects of their studies ; from
that of the younger Plin}-, who called his villa of literary-
leisure by the endearing term of vilhila, to that of Cassio-
dorus, the prime minister of Theodoric, who has left so
iTiagnificent a description of his literary retreat, where all
the elegancies of life were at hand : where the gardeners and
the agriculturists laboured on scientific principles ; and where,
amidst gardens and parks, stood his extensive library, with
scribes to multiply his mauusci-ipts : — from Tycho Brahe's,
who built a magnificent astronomical house on an island,
which he named after the sole objects of his musings Ura-
nienburgh, or the Castle of the Heavens ; — to that of Evelyn,
who first began to adorn Wotton, by building " a little
study," till many years after he dedicated the ancient house
to contemplation, among the " delicious streams and venerable
woods, the gardens, tlie fountains, and the groves, most
tempting for a great person and a wanton purse ; and indeed
gavt! one of the first examples to that eleganc}' since so much
in vogue." — From Pope, whose little garden seemed to mul-
tiply its scenes by a glorious union of nobility and literaiy
men conversing in groups ; — down to lonely Shenstone, whose

Literary Residences. 395

" rural elegance," as he entitles one of his odes, compelled
him to mourn over his hard late, when

EXPKNSE

Had lavish'il thoiisaml ornaments, and taught
Convenience to perplex him, Art to pall,
Pomp to deject, and Beauty to displease.

"We have all by heart the true and delightful reflection of
Johnson on local associations, when the scene we tread sug-
gests to us the men or the deeds, wliich have left their cele-
brity to the spot. AVe are in tlie presence of their fame,
and feel its influence !

A literary friend, whom a hint of mine had induced to
visit the old tower in the garden of Buftbn, where the sage
retired every morning to compose, passed so long a time in
that lonely apartment as to have raised some solicitude among
the honest follis of Montbard, who having seen the " EngHsh-
nian" enter, but not return, during a heavy thunder-storm
which had occurred in the interval, informed the good mayor,
who came in due form, to notify the ambiguous state of the
stranger. My friend is, as is well known, a genius of that
cast who could pass two hours in the Tower of Biiffon,
without being aware that he had been all that time occupied
by suggestions of ideas and reveries, which in some minds such
a locahty may excite. He was also busied with his pencil ; for
he has favoured me with two drawings of the interior and
the exterior of this old toicer in ilie garden : the nakedness
within can only be compared to the solitude without. Such
was the studying-room of liufibn, where his eye, resting on no
object, never interrupted the unity of his meditations on nature.

In return for my friend's kindness, it has cost me, I think,
two hours in attempting to translate the beautiful picture of
this literary retreat, which Yicq d'Azyr has finished with all
the warmth of a votar}'. '' At Montbard, in the midst of an
ornamented garden, is seen an antique tower ; it was there
that Buffbn wrote the History of Nature, and from that spot
his fame spread through the universe. There he came at sun-
rise, and no one, however importunate, was suflered to trouble
him. The calm of the morning hour, the first warbling of
the birds, the varied aspect of the country, all at that mo-
ment which touched the senses, recalled him to his model.
Free, independent, he wandered in his walks ; there was he
seen with quickened or with slow steps, or standing wrapped
iu thought, sometimes with his eyes fixed on the heavens in

396 " Literary Residences.

the moment of inspiration, as if satisfied with the thought
that so profoundly occupied his soul ; sometimes, collected
within himself, he sought what would not alwaj's he found ;
or at the moments of producing, he wrote, he effaced, and re-
wrote, to eiface once more ; thus he harmonised, in silence,
all the parts of his composition, which he frequently repeated
to himself, till, satisfied wdth his corrections, he seemed to
repay himself for the pains of his beautiful prose, by the
pleasui-e he found in declaiming it aloud. Thus he engraved
it in his memory, and would recite it to his friends, or induce
some to read it to him. At those moments he was himself a
severe judge, and would again I'e-compose it, desirous of attain-
ing to that perfection which is denied to the impatient writer."
A curious chcumstance, connected with local associations,
occurred to that extraordinary oriental student, Fourmont.
Originally he belonged to a religious community, and never
failed in performing his ofiices : but he was expelled by the
superior for an irregularity of conduct not likel}' to have
become contagious through the brotlierhood — he frequently
prolonged his studies far into the night, and it was possible
that the house might be burnt by such superfluity of learning.
Fourmont reti'eated to the college of Montaign, where he
occupied the very chambers which had formerly been those of
Erasmus ; a circumstance which contributed to excite his
emulation, and to hasten his studies. He who smiles at the
force of such emotions, only proves that he has not expe-
rienced what are real and substantial as the scene itself — for
those who are concerned in them. Pope, who had far more
enthusiasm in his poetical disposition than is generally under-
stood, was extremely susceptible of the literary associations
v.'ith localities : one of the volumes of his Homer was begun
and finished in an old tower over the chapel of Stanton Har-
court ;* and he has perpetuated the event, if not consecrated
the ]:)lace, by scratching with a diamond on a pane of stained
glass this inscription : —

In tlie year 1718,
Alexander Pope
Finished here the f . . . .
fifth volume of HoiiER.f

* The room is a small wainscoted apartment in the second floor, com-
manding a pleasant view.

t The above inscription is a fac-simile of that upon the glass. The
word ftftli in the third line has been erased by Pope for want of room to

Literary Residences. 397

It was the same feeling which induced him one day, when
taking his usual walk with Harte in the Haymarkct, to
desire Ilarte to enter a little shop, where going up three pair
of stairs into a small room, Pope said, " In this garret Addi-
son wrote his Campaign ! " Nothing less than a strong
feeling impelled the poet to ascend this garret — it was a con-
secrated spot to his eye ; and certainly a curious instance of
the power of genius contrasted with its miserable locality !
Addison, whose mind had fought through "a campaign! " in
a garret, could he have called about him " the pleasures of
imagination," had probably planned a house of literary repose,
where all parts would have been in harmony with his mind.

Such residences of men of genius have been enjoyed by
some ; and the vivid descriptions which they have left us con-
vey something of the delightfulness which charmed their
studious repose.

The Italian, Paul Jovius, has composed more than three
hundred concise eulogies of statesmen, warriors, and literary
men, of the fourteenth, fifteenth, and sixteenth centuries ; but
the occasion which induced him to compose them is perhaps
more interesting than the compositions.

Jovius had a villa, situated on u penhisula, bordered by the
Lake of Como. It was built on the ruins of the villa of Pliny,
and in his time the foundations were still visible. When the
surrounding lake was calm, the sculptured marbles, the
trunks of columns, and the fragments of those pyramids
which had once adorned the residence of the friend of Trajan,
were still viewed in its lucid bosom. Jovius was the enthu-
siast of literature, and the leisure which it loves. He was an
historian, with the imagination of a poet, and though a
christian prelate, almost a worshiitper of the sweet fictions of
pagan mythology ; and when his pen was kept pure from
satire or adulation, to which it was too much accustomed, it
became a pencil. He paints with rapture his gardens bathed
by the waters of the lake ; the shade and freshness of his
woods ; his green slopes ; his sparkling fountains, the deep

lence and calm of his solitude ! A statue was raised in his
gardens to Nature ! In his hall stood a fine statue of Apollo,
and the IMuses aromid, with their attributes. His library
was guarded by a JMercury, and there was an apartment

complete it properly. It is scratched on a small pane of red glass, aud
has been removed to Nuneham Courtney, the seat of the Harcourt family,
on the banks of the Thames, a few miles from Oxford.

398 Literary Residences.

adovned with Doric columns, and with pictures of the most
pleasing subjects dedicated to the Graces ! Such was the
interior! Without, the transparent lake here spread its
broad mirror, and there was seen luminously winding by
banks covered \vith olives and laurels ; in the distance, towns,
promontories, hills rising in an amphitheatre, blushing with
vines, and the first elevation of the Alps, covered with woods
and pasture, and sprinkled with herds and flocks.

It was in a central spot of this enchanting habitation that
a cabinet or gallery was erected, where Jovius had collected
with prodigal cost the portraits of celebrated men ; and it was
to explain and to describe the characteristics of these illustri-
ous names that he had composed his eulogies. This collec-
tion became so remarkable, that the great men his contem-
poraries presented our literary collector with their own
portraits, among whom the renowned Fei'nandez Cortes sent
Jovius his before he died, and probably others who were less
entitled to enlarge the collection ; but it is equally probable
that our caustic Jovius would throw them aside. Our
historian had often to describe men more famous than virtuous ;
sovereigns, politicians, poets, and philosophers, men of all
ranks, countries, and ages, formed a crowded scene of men of
genius or of celebrity ; sometimes a few lines compress their
character, and sometimes a few pages excite his fondness. If
he sometimes adulates the living, we may pardon the illusions
of a contemporary ; but he has the honour of satirising some
by the honest freedom of a pen which occasionally broke out
into premature truths.

Such was the inspiration of literature and leisure which
had embellished the abode of Jovius, and had raised in the
midst of the Lake of Como a cabinet of portraits ; a noble tri-
bute to those who are "the salt of the earth."

We possess prints of Eubens's house at Antwerp. That
princely artist perhaps first contrived for his studio the
circular apartment with a dome, like the rotunda of the
Pantheon, where the light descending from an aperture or
window at the top, sent down a single equal light, — that per-
fection of liglit which distributes its magical effects on the
objects beneath.* Bellori describes it mw« stanza rotonda con
un solo occhio in cima ; the solo occhio is what the French

* Ilarrewjms published, in 1684, a .series of interesting \'iews of the
house, and some of the apartments, including tliis domeil one. The series
are upon one folio sheet, now vcrj rare.

Literarij Residences. 399

term ceil de hcevf; we ouriclvod want this sinrjJe ej'e in our
technical language of art. This was his precious museum,
wlicre he had collected a va>t number of books, which were
intermixed with his marbles, statues, cameos, intaglios, and
all tliat variety of the riches of art which he had drawn from
Home : * but the walls did not yield in value ; for they were
covered by pictures of his own composition, or copies by his
own hand, made at Venice and Madrid, of Titian and Paul
Vei-onese. No foreigners, men of letters, or lovers of the arts,
or even princes, would pass through Antwerp without visiting
the house of Rubens, to witness the animated residence of
genius, and the great man who had conceived the idea. Yet,
great as was his mind, and splendid as were the habits of his
life, he could not resist the entreaties of the hundred thousand
llorins of our Duke of Buckingham, to dispose of this studio.
The great artist could not, however, abandon for ever the de-
lightful contemplations he was depriving himself of ; and as
substitutes for the miracles of art he had lost, he solicited and
obtained leave to replace them by casts which were scru-
pulously deposited iu the places where the originals had
stood.

Of this feeling of the local residences of genius, the Italians
appear to have been not perhaps more susceptible than other
people, but more energetic in their enthusiasm. Florence
exhibits many monuments of this sort. In the neighbour-
hood of Santa Maria Novella, Zimmerman has noticed a
house of the celebrated Viviani, which is a singular monu-
ment of gratitude to his illustrious master, Galileo. The
front is adorned with the bust of this father of science, and
between the windows are engraven accounts of the discoveries
of Galileo ; it is the most beautiful biography of genius ! Yet
another still more eloquently e.xcites our emotions — the house
of Michael Angelo : his pupils, in perpetual testimony of their
admiration and gratitucU;, have ornamented it with all the
leading features of his life ; the very soul of this vast genius
put in action : this is more than biography ! — it is living as
with a contemporary !

* Kubcns was an ardent collector, and lost no chance of increasing his
stores ; in the appendi.K to Carpenter's " Pictorial Notices of Vandyke" is
pi-inted the correspondence between himself and Sir D. Carleton, offering to
exchange some of his own pictures for antiijues in possession of the latter,
who was ambassador from England to Holland, and who collected also for
the Eurl of Arundel.

400

WHETHER ALLOWABLE TO RUIN ONESELF ?

The political economist replies that it is !

One of our old dramatic writers, who witnessed the singu-
lar extravagance of dress among the modellers of fashion, our
nobility, condemns their " superfluous bravery," echoing the
popular cry —

There are a sort of men, whose coining heads
Are mints of all new fashions, that have done
More hurt to the kingdom, by superfluous braverj',
Which the foolish gentry imitate, than a war
Or a long famine. All the treasure hy
This foul excess is fjot into the merchants' ,
Evibroiderers\ silhncn^s, jeiceUers', tailors^ hands,
And the third part of the land too! the nobility
Engrossing titles only."

Our poet might have been startled at the reply of our
political economist. If the nobility, in follies such as these,
only preserved their "titles," while their "lands" were dis-
persed among the industrious classes, the people were not
sufferers. The silly victims ruining themselves by their
excessive luxury, or their costly dress, as it appears some
did, was an evil which, left to its own course, must checli
itself; if the rich did not spend, the poor would starve.
Luxury is the cure of that unavoidable evil in society — great
inequality of fortune ! Political economists therefore tell us
that any regulations would be ridiculous which, as Lord
Bacon expresses it, should serve for " the repressing of waste
and excess by sumptuary laics.'" Adam Smith is not only
indignant at " sumptuary laws," but asserts, with a demo-
cratic insolence of style, that " it is the highest impertinence
and presumption in kings and ministers to pretend to watch
over the economy of private people, and to restrain their
expense by sumptuary laws. They are themselves always
the greatest spendthrifts in the societ}^ ; let them look well
after their own expense, and they may safely trust private
people with theirs. If their own extravagance does not ruin
the state, that of their subjects never will." We must there-
foi-e infer that governments by extravagance may ruin a state,
but that individuals enjoy the remarkable privilege of ruining
themselves without injuring society! Adam Smith after-

Whether allovihlc to T},iin OnrsclJ? 401

wards distinguishes two sorts of luxury : the one exhausting
itself in " durable conimoditics, as in buildings, furniture,
books, statues, pictures," will increase "the opulence of a
nation;" but of the other, wasting itself in dress and equi-
pages, in frivolous oriKunents, jewels, baubles, trinkets, &c.,
he acknowledges " no trace or vestige would remain ; and the
effects of ten or twenty years' profusion would be as com-
pletely annihilated as if they had never existed." There is,
therefore, a greater and a lesser evil in this important subject
of the opulent, unrestricted by any law, ruining his whole
generation.

AVhere " the wealth of nations" is made the solitary
standard of their prosperity, it becomes a fertile source of
errors in the science of morals; and the happiness of the
individual is then too frequently sacrificed to what is called
the prosperity of the state. If an individual, in the pride
of luxury and selfism, annihilates the fortunes of his whole
generation, untouched by the laws as a criminal, he leaves
behind him a race of the discontented and the seditious, who,
having sunk in the scale of society, have to reaseend fivjm
their degradation by industry and" by humiliation ; but for
the work of industry their habits have made them inexpert ;
and to humiliation their very rank presents a perpetual
obstacle.

Sumptuary laws, so often enacted and so often repealed,
and always eluded, were the perpetual, but ineffectual,
attempts of all governments to restrain what, perhaps,
cannot be restrained — criminal folly ! And to punish a man
for having ruined himself would usually be to punish a most
contrite penitent.

It is not surprising that before " private vices were con-
sidered as public benefits," the governors of nations insti-
tuted sumptuary laws — for the passion for pageantry and an
incredible prodigality in dress were continually impoverishing
great families — more equality of wealth has now rather sub-
dued the form of private ruin than laid this evil domestic
spirit. The incalculable expenditure and the blaze of splen-
dour of our ancestors may startle the incredulity of our
ilegaJites. "We find men of rank exhausting their wealth
and pawning their castles, and then desperately issuing from
them, heroes for a crusade, or brigands ibr their neighbour-
hood ! — and this frequently from the simple circumstance of
having for a short time maintained some gorgeous chivalric

YOL. III. n D

403 Whether alloivabk to Ruin OneselJ ?

festival on their own estates, or from having melted thoii-
Bands of acres into cloth of gold ; their sons were left to beg
their bread on the estates which they were to have inherited.

It was when chivalry still charmed the world by the re-
mains of its seductive splendom-s, towards the close of the
fifteenth centmy, that I find an instance of this kind occur-
ring in the Pas de Sandricourt, which was held in the
neighbourhood of the sieur of that name. It is a memorable
afi'air, not only for us curious inquirers after manners and
morals, but for the whole family of the Sandricourts ; for
though the said sieur is now receiving the immortality we
bestow on him, and la dame who presided in that magnificent
piece of chivah'y was infinitely gratified, yet for ever after
was the lord of Sandricourt ruined — and all for a short,
romantic three months !

This story of the chivalric period may amuse. A pas
d'armes, though consisting of military exercises and deeds
of gallantry, was a sort of festival distinct from a tourna-
ment. It signified a ^ja^ or passage to be contested b}^ one
or more knights against all comers. It was necessary that
the road should be such that it could not be passed without
encountering some guardian knight. The chevaliers who
disputed the pas hung their blazoned shields on trees, pales,
or posts raised for this purpose. The aspirants after chivah'ic
honours would strike with then* lance one of these shields,
and when it rung, it instantly summoned the owner to the
challenge. A bridge or a road would sometimes serve for
this military sport, for such it was intended to be, whenever
the heat of the rivals proved not too earnest. The sieur of
Sandricourt was a fine dreamer of feats of chivalry, and in
the neighboui'hood of his castle he fancied that he saw a very
spot adapted for every game ; there was one admirably fitted
for the barrier of a tilting-match ; another embellished by a
solitary pine-tree ; another which was called the meadow of
the Thorn; there wcs a carrefuiir, where, in four roads, lour
knights might meet ; and, above all, there was a forest called
devoyahle, having no path, so favourable for errant knights
who might there enter for strange adventures, and, as chance
directed, encountcjr others as bewildered as themselves. Our
chivalric Sandricourt found nine young seirjneurs of the court
of Charles the Eighth of France, who answered all his wishes.
To sanction this glorious feat it was necessary to obtain leave
from the king, and a herald of the Duke of Orleans to distri-

Whether allowable to Ruin Oneself? 403

bute the cartel or challenge all over France, announcing that
from such a day ten young lords would stand ready to com-
bat, in those difterent places, in the neighbourhood of Saudri-
court's chateau. The names of this llower of cliivalry have
been i'aithfully registered, and they were sueh as instautl}"- to
tlirow a spark into the heart of every lover of arms ! The
world of fashion, that is, the chivalric world, were set in
motion. Four bodies of assailants soon collected, each con-
sisting of ten combatants. The herald of Orleans having
examined the arms of these gentlemen, and satislied himself
of their ancient lineage and tlieir military renown, admitted
their claims to the proll'ered honour. Sandrieourt now saw
with rapture the numerous shields of the assailants placed on
the sides of his portals, and corresponding with those of the
challengers which hung above them. Ancient lords were
elected judges of the feats of the knights, accompanied by
the ladies, for whose honom' only the combatants declared
they engaged.

The herald of Orleans tells the history in no very intel-
ligible verse ; but the burthen of his stanza is still

Du jpas d'armcsda chasteau Sandrieourt.

He sings, or says,

Oncques, depuis le tempts du roi Artus,
Ne furent tant les armes exaulcees —
Maint chevaliers et preux eiitrepreiiaus—
Princes plusieurs out terres deplacees
Pour y venir donner coups et poussees
Qui out ete la tenus si de court
Que par force u'oiit prises ct p.assces
Les barriers, eutrces, et passees
Du pas des armes du chasteau Sandrieourt.

Doubtless there many a Roland met with his Oliver, and
could not pass the barriers. Cased as they were in steel, de
pied en cap, we presume that they could not materially injure
themselves; yet, when on foot, the ancient judges discovered
such symptoms of peril, that on the following day they
advised our knights to satisfy themselves by lighting on
horseback. Against this prudential counsel for some time
they protested, as an inferior sort of glory. However, ou
the next day, the horse combat was appointed in the carre-
Juiir, by the pine-tree. On the following day they tried
theii' lances in the meadow of the Thorn ; but, though on

D D 2

404 IVhefhcr alloicahk to Rnin O/ieself?

horseback, the judges deemed their attacks were so fierce
that this assault was hkewise not without peril ; for some
liorses were killed, and some knights were thrown, and lay
bruised by their own mail ; but the bai-bed horses, wearing
only dcs cTiamf reins, head-pieces magnificently caparisoned,
found no protection in their ornaments. The last days were
passed in combats of two to two, or in a single encounter,
a-foot, in the foret devoyahle. These jousts passed without
any accident, and the prizes were awarded in a manner equally
gratifying to the claimants. The last day of the festival
was concluded with a most sumptuous banquet. Two noble
knights had undertaken the humble office of mcdtres-d' hotel ;
and while the knights were parading in the fbret devoyahle
seeking adventures, a hundred servants were seen at all
points, carrying white and red hypocras, and juleps, and sirop
de violars, sweetmeats, and other spiceries, to comfort these
wanderers, who, on returning to the cliasteau, found a grand
and plenteous banquet. The tables were crowded in the court
apartment, where some held one hundred and twelve gentle-
men, not including the dames and the demoiselles. In the
halls, and outside of the chasteau, were other tables. At
that festival more than two thousand persons were magnifi-
cently entertained free of every expense ; their attendants,
their armourers, their ^jZwjwrtSA'iers, and others, were also
present. La Dame de Sandricoiirf, " fut moult aise d'avoir
donne dans son chasteau si belle, si magnifique, et gorgiasse
fete." Historians are apt to describe their personages as
they appear, not as they are : if the lady of the Sieur Sandri-
court really was " moult aise" during these gorgeous days,
one cannot but sympathise with the lady, when her loyal
knight and spouse confessed to her, after the departure of
the mob of two thousand visitors, neighbours, soldiers, and
courtiers, — the knights challengers, and the knights assailants,
and the fine scenes at the pine-tree ; the barrier in the meadow
of the Thorn; and the horse-combat at the c«rr^«<r; and
the jousts in the foret devoyahle ; the carousals in the castle
balls ; the jollity of the banquet tables ; the morescoes danced
till they were reminded " how the waning night grew old !" —
in a word, when the costly dream had vanished, — that he was
a ruined man for ever, by immortalising his name in one
grand chivalric festival ! The Sieur de Sandricourt, like a
great torch, had consumed himself in his own brightness ;
and the veiy land on which the famous Fas de Sandricourt

Whether allowable to liuia Oneself? 405

was held — liacl passed away witli it ! Thus one man sinks
generations by that wastefulness, which a political economist
would assure us was committin<^ no injury to society! The
moral evil goes for nothing in financial statements.

Similar instances of ruinous luxury we may fmd in the
prodigal costliness of dross througli the reigns of Elizabeth,
James the First, and Charles the First. Not only in their
massy grandeur they outweighed us, but the accumulation
and variety of their wardrobe displayed such a gaiety of fancy
in their colours and their ornaments, that the drawing-room
in those days must have blazed at their presence, and changed
colours as the crowd moved. But if we may trust to royal
proclamations, the ruin w-as general among some classes.
Elizabeth issued more than one proclamation against " the
excess of apparel 1" and among other evils which the govern-
ment imagined this passion for dress occasioned, it notices
" the wasting and undoing of a great number of young gentle-
men, otherwise serviceable ; and that others, seeking by show
of apparel to be esteemed as gentlemen, and allured by the
vain show of these things, not only consume their goods and
lands, but also run into such debts and shifts, as they cannot
live out of danger of laws without attempting of unlawful
acts." The queen bids her own household "to look unto it
for good example to the realm ; and all noblemen, archbishops
and bishops, all mayors, justices of peace, &c., should see them
executed in their private households." The greatest difficulty
which occiu-red to regidate the wear of apparel was ascertain-
ing the incomes of persons, or in the words of the proclama-
tion, " finding that it is very hard for any man's state of
living and value to be truly undei-stood by other persons."
They were to be regulated as they appear " sessed in the
subsidy books." But if persons chose to be more magnificent
in their dress, they were allowed to justify their means : iu
that case, if allowed, her majesty would not be the loser ; for
they were to be rated in the subsidy books according to such
values as they themselves offered as a qualification for the
splendour of their dress !

In my researches among manuscript letters of the times, I
have had frequent occasion to discover how persons of con-
siderable rank appear to have carried their acres on their
backs, and with their ruinous and fantastical luxuries sadly
pinched their hospitality. It was this which so frequently
cast them into the rets of the '-goldsmiths," and other

406 Whether aUoivable to Ruin Oneself?

trading usurers. At the coronation of James the First, I
iind a simple kniglit whose cloak cost him five hundred
pounds; but this was not uncommon.* At the marriage of
Elizabeth, the daughter of James the First, " Lady Wotton
Vad a gown of which the embroidery cost fifty pounds a yard.
The Lady Arabella made four gowns, one of which cost 15007.
The Lord Montacute (Montague) bestowed 1500/. in apparel
for his two duughters. One lady, under the rank of baroness,
was furnished with jewels exceeding one hundred thousand
pounds ; "and the Lady Arabella goes beyond her," says the
letter-writer. " All this extreme costs and riches makes us
all poor," as he imagined ! t I have been amused in observing
grave writers of state-dispatches jocular on any mischance or
mortification to which persons are liable whose happiness
entirely depends on their dress. Sir Dudley Carleton, our
minister at Venice, communicates, as an article worth trans-
mitting, the great disappointment incurred by Sir Thomas
Glover, " who was just come hither, and had appeared one day
like a comet, all in crimson velvet and beaten gold, but had all
his expectations marred on a sudden by the news of Prince
Henry's death." A similar mischance, from a different cause,
was the lot of Lord Haj^ who made great preparations for his
embassy to France, which, however, Avei'e chiefly confined to his
dress. He was to remain there twenty days ; and the letter-
writer maliciously observes, that "He goes with twenty special
suits of apparel for so many days' abode, besides his travelling
robes ; but news is very lately come that the French have
lately altered their fashion, where])y he must needs be out

* The famous Puritanic writer, Philip Stubbes, who published his
"Anatomic of Abuses" in 1593, declares that he "has heard of shirtes
that have cost some ten shillings, some tweutie, some fortie, some five
pound, some twentie nobles, and (whicii is horrible to heare) some tenne
pounde a peece." His book is filled with similar denunciations of abuses; in
whicli he is followed by other satirists. 'J'hey appear to have produced
little effect in the way of reformation ; for in the days of James I- John
Taylor, the Water poet, similarly laments the wastefulness of those who —

Wear a farm in shoe-strings edged with gold,

And spangled garters worth a copyhold ;

A hose and doublet which a lordship cost ;

A gaudy cloak, three manors' price almost ;

A beaver band and feather for the head

Priced at the church's tythe, the poor man's bread.
+ It IS not unusual to find in inventories of this era, the household
effects rated at much less than the wearing apparel, of the person whose
property is thus valued.

Whether allowable to Rum Oneself? 407

of countenance, if lie be not set out alter the last edition !"
To find himself out of fashion, with twenty suits for twenty
days, was a mischance his lordship had no right to count on!

"The glass of i'ashion" was unquestionably hi.'ld up by two
very eminent characters, Rawleigh and Buckingham ; and the
authentic facts recorded of their dress will sudicicntly ac-
count for the frequent "Proclamations" to control that ser-
vile herd of imitators — the smaller gentry !

There is a i-emarkable picture of Sir Walter, which will at
least serve to convey an idea of the gaiety and splendour of
his dress. It is a white satin pinked vest, close sleeved to
the wrist ; over the body a brown doublet, finely Howered and
embroidered with jjcarl. In the feather of his hat a large
ruby and pearl drop at the bottom of the sprig, in place of a
button ; his trunk or breeches, with his stockings and riband
garters, fringed at the end, all white, and butt' shoes with
white riband. Oldys, who saw this picture, has thus described
the dress of Rawleigh. But I have some important additions;
for I find that Rawlcigh's shoes on great court days were so
gorgeously covered with precious stones, as to have exceeded
the value of six thousand six hundred pounds : and that he
had a suit of armour of solid silver, with sword and belt
blazing with diamonds, rubies, and pearls, whose value was
not so easily calculated. Eawleigh had no patrimonial in-
heritance ; at this moment he had on his back a good portion
of a Spanish galleon, and the profits of a monopoly of trade
lie was carrying on with the newly discovered Virginia. Pro-
bably he placed all his hopes in his dress ! The virgin queen,
when she issued proclamations against " the excess of apparel,"
pardoned, by her looks, that promise of a mine which blazed
in Pawleigh's; and, parsimonious as she was, forgot tiie three
thousand changes of dresses which she herself left in the royal
wardrobe.

Buckingham could afibrd to have his diamonds tacked so
loosely on, that when he chose to shake a few off' on the
ground, he obtained all the fame he desired from the pickers-
up, who were generally les dames de la cow ; for our dulrj
never condescended to accept what he himself had dropp'xl.
His cloaks were trimmed with great diamond buttons, and
diamond hatbands, cockades, and ear-rings yoked with great
roi)es and knots of pearls. This was, however, but for ordi-
nary dances. " He had twenty-seven suits of clothes made, the
richest that embroidery, lace, silk, velvet, silver, gold, and gema

408 Discoveries of Secluded Men.

could contribute ; one of which was a white uncut velvet, set
all over, both suit and cloak, with diamonds valued at four-
score thousand pounds, besides a great feather stuck all over
with diamonds, as were also his sword, girdle, hat, and spurs."*
In the masques and banquets with which Buckingham enter-
tained the court, he usually expended, for the evenuig, from
one to five thousand pounds. To others I leave to calculate
the value of money : the sums of this gorgeous wastefulness,
it must be recollected, occurred before this million age of ours.
If, to provide the means for such enormous expenditure,
Buckingham multiplied tlie grievances of monopolies ; if he
pillaged the treasury for his eighty thousand pounds' coat ; if
Eawleigh was at length driven to his last desperate enter-
prise to relieve himself of his creditors for a pair of six thou-
sand pounds' shoes — in both these cases, as in that of the
chivalric Sandrieourt, the political economist may perhaps
acknowledge that there is a sort of luxury higlily criminal.
All the arguments he may urge, all the statistical accounts
he may calculate, and the healthful state of his circulating
medium among " the merchants, embroiderers, silkmen, and
jewellers" — will not alter such a moral evil, which leaves an
eternal taint on " the wealth of nations !" It is the principle
that " private vices are public benefits," and that men may
be allowed to ruin their generations without committing any
injury to society.

DISCOVERIES OF SECLUDED MEN.

Those who are unaccustomed to the labours of the closet arc
unacquainted with the secret and silent triumphs obtained in
the pursuits of studious men. That aptitude, which in poetry
is sometimes called ins2)i ration, in knowledge we may call
sagacity; and it is probable that the vehemence of the one
does not excite more pleasure than the still tranquillity of
the other : they are both, according to the strict signification
of the Latin term from whence we have borrowed ours of in-
vention, a finding out, the result of a combination which no
other has formed but ourselves.

I will produce several remarkable instances of the felicity

* The Jesuit Drexelius, in oue of his Religious Dialogues, notices the fact ;
but I am referring to an Haileiau manuscript, which confir^.s the infor-
mation of the Jesuit.

Discoveries of Secluded Men, 409

of this aptitude of the learned in making discoveries wliich
could only have been efll'ctuated by an uninterrupted inter-
course with the objects of their studies, making things re-
mote and dispersed familiar and present.*

One of ancient date is better known to the reader than
those I am preparing for him. When the magistrates of
Syracuse were showing to Cicero the curiosities of the place,
he desired to visit the tomb of Archimedes ; but, to his sur-
prise, they acknowledged that they knew nothing of any such
tomb, and denied that it ever existed. The learned Cicero,
convinced by the authorities of ancient writers, by the verses
of the inscription which he remembered, and the circumstance
of a sphere with a cylinder being engraven on it, requested
them to assist lum in the search. They conducted the illus-
trious but obstinate stranger to their most ancient burying-
ground : amidst the number of sepulchres, they observed a
small column overhung with brambles — Cicero, looking on
while they were clearing away the rubbish, suddenly ex-
claimed, " Here is the thing we are looking for !" His eye
had caught the geometrical figures on the tomb, and the in-
scription soon confirmed his conjecture. Cicero long after
exulted in the triumph of this discover}'. " Thus !" he saj'-s,
" one of the noblest cities of Greece, and once the most
learned, had known nothing of the monument of its most
deserving and ingenious citizen, had it not been discovered
to them by a nativeof Arpinum !"

The great French antiquary, Pcirese, exhibited a singular
combination of learning, patient thought, and luminous saga-
city, which could restore an "airy nothing" to "a local
habitation and a name." There was found on an amethyst,
and the same afterwards occurred on the I'ront of an ancient
temple, a number of marks, or indents, which had long per-
plexed inquirers, more particularly as similar marks or in-
dents were frequently observed in ancient monuments. It
was agreed on, as no one could understand them, and all
would be satisfied, that they were secret hieroglypliics. It
occurred to Peiresc that these marks were nothing more
than holes for small nails, which had formerly fastened little

• The remarkable clue to the reading of the hieroglyphic language of
anciL'iit Egypt perfected in our own times is a striking iustauce of this ; as
well as the investigations now proceeding in Babylonian inscriptions, which
promise to enable us to comprehend a language that was once considered as
hopelessly lost.

410 Discoveries of Secluded Men.

lamince, which represented so many Greek letters. This hint
of his own suggested to him to draw lines from one hole to
another ; and he beheld the amethj^st reveal the name of the
sculptor, and the frieze of the temple the name of the god !
This curious discovery has been since frequently applied ; but
it appears to have originated with this great antiquary, who
by his learning and sagacity explained a supposed hiero-
glyphic, which had been locked up in the silence of seventeen
centuries.*

Learned men, confined to their study, have often rectified
the errors of travellers ; they have done more, they have found
out paths for them to exjjlore, or opened seas for them to
navigate. The situation of the vale of Tempe had been mis-
taken by modern travellers ; and it is singular, observes the
Quarterly Reviewer, yet not so singular as it appears to that
elegant critic, that the only good directions for finding it
had been given by a person who was never in Greece. Arthur
Browne, a man of letters of Trinity College, Dublin — it is
gratifying to quote an Irish philosopher and man of letters,
from the extreme rarity of the character — was the first to
detect the inconsistencies of Pococke and Busching, and to
send future travellers to look for Tempe in its real situation,
the defiles between Ossa and Olympus ; a discovery subse-
quently realised. When Dr. Clarke discovered an inscription
purporting that the pass of Tempe had been fortified by
Cassius Longinus, Mr. Walpole, with equal felicity, detected,
in Cajsar's " History of the Civil War," the name and the
mission of this very person.

A living geographer, to whom the world stands deeply in-
debted, does not read Herodotus in the original ; yet, by the
exercise of his extraordinary aptitude, it is well known that
he has often corrected the Greek historian, explained obscu-
rities in a text which he never read, by his own happ}' con-
jectm*es, and confirmed his own discoveries by the subsequent
knowledge which modern travellers have afforded.

Gray's perseverance in studying the geography of India
and of Persia, at a time when our country had no immediate
interests with those ancient empires, would have been placed
by a cynical observer among the curious idleness of a mere

* The curious reader may view the marks, and the manner in which
the Greek characters were made out, in the preface to Hearne's ' ' Curious
Discourses." The amethyst proved more difficult than the frieze, from the
circumstance, that in engraving on the stone the letters must be reversed.

Discoveries of Secluded Men. 411

man of letters. These studios were indeed prosecuted, an
IMr. INFathias observes, " on the disinterested principles of
liberal investigation, not on those of ])olicy, nor of the regu-
lation of trade, nor of the extension of empire, nor of perma-
nent establishments, but simply and solely on the grand view
of what is, and of what is past. They were the researches of
a solitary scholar in academical retirement." Siiice the time
of Gray, these very pursuits have been carried on by two
consummate geographers. Major Eennel and Dr. Vincent,
■who have opened to the classical and the political reader all
lie wished to learn, at a time when India and Persia had be-
come objects interesting and important to us. The fruits of
Grny's learning, long after their author was no more, became
valuable !

The studies of the " solitary scholar" are always useful to
the world, although they may not always be timed to its
]>resent wants ; with him, indeed, they are not merely de-
signed for this purpose. Graj'^ discovered India for himself;
but the solitary pursuits of a great student, shaped to a parti-
cular end, will never fail being useful to the world ; though
it may happen that a century may elapse between the
periods of the discovery and its practical utility.

Halley's version of an Arabic IMS. on a mathematical sub-
ject offers an instance of the extraordinary sagacity I am
alluding to ; it may also serve as a demonstration of the
jteculiar and supereminent advantages possessed by mathema-
ticians, observes Mr. Dugald Stewart, in their fixed relations,
which form the objects of their science, and the correspondent
])recision in their language and reasoning : — as matter of
literary history it is highly curious. Dr. Bernard acciden-
tally discovered in the Bodleian Library an Arabic version of
Aj)ollonius (fe Sectione Hationis, which he determined to
translate in Latin, but only finished about a tenth part.
Halley, extremely interested by the subject, but with an
entire ignorance of the Arabic language, resolved to complete
the imperfect version ! Assisted only by the manuscript
v>hlch Bernard had left, it served him as a key for investi-
gating the sense of the original ; he first made a list of iliose
words wherever they occurred, with the train of reasoning in
which they were involved, to decipher, by these very slow
degrees, the import of the context ; till at last Halley suc-
ceeded in mastering the whole work, and in bringing the
translation, without the aid of any one, to the form in which

412 Discoveries of Secluded Men.

he gave it to the public ; so that we have here a difficult
work translated from the Arabic, by one who was in no
manner conversant with the language, merely by the exertion
of his sagacity!

I give the memorable account, as Boyle has delivered it,
of the circumstances which led Harvey to the discovery of
the circulation of the blood.

" I remember that when I asked our famous Harvey, in
the only discourse I had with him, which was but a little
while before he died, what were the things which induced
him to think of a circulation of the blood, he answered me,
that when he took notice that the valves in the veins of so
many parts of the body were so placed that they gave free
passage to the blood towards the heart, but opposed the
passage of the venal blood the contrary way, he was invited
to think that so provident a cause as nature had not placed
so many valves without design ; and no design seemed more
probable than that, since the blood could not well, because
of the interposing valves, be sent by the veins to the limbs,
it should be sent through the arteries and return through
the veins, whose valves did not oppose its course that way."

The reason here ascribed to Haiwey seems now so very
natural and obvious, that some have been disposed to question
his claim to the high rank commonly assigned to him among
the improvers of science ! Dr. AVilliam Hunter has said that
after the discovery of the valves in the veins, which Harvey
learned while in Italy from his master, Fabricius ab Aquapen-
dente, the remaining step might easily have been made by
any person of common abilities. " This discovery," he ob-
serves, " set Harvey to work upon the tise of the heart and
vascular system in animals ; and in the course of some years,
he was so happy as to discover, and to prove beyond all
possibility of doubt, the circulation of the blood." He after-
wards expresses his astonishment that this discovery should
have been left for Harvey, though he acknowledges it occu-
pied " a course of years ;" adding that " Providence meant
to reserve it for Jtini, and would not let men see what teas
lefore them, nor nnderstand ichat they read.'''' It is remark-
able that when great discoveries are effected, their simplicity
always seems to detract from their originality: on these occa-
sions we are reminded of the e^^ of Columbus !

It is said that a recent discovery, which ascertains that
the i^iger emptiiis itself into the Atlantic Ocean, was really

Discoveries of Secluded Men. 413

anticipated by the gcograpliical acumen ol' a student at
Glasgow, who arrived at the same conclusion by a most per-
sevei'ing investigation ot" the works of travellers and geogra-
])hers, ancient and modern, and by an examination of African
captives ; and had actually constructed, for the inspection of
government, a map of Africa, on which he had traced the
entire course of the Niger from the interior.

Franklin conjectured the identity of lightning and of elec-
tricity, before he had realised it by decisive experiment. The
kite being raised, a considerable time elapsed before there was
any appearance of its being electrified. One very promising
cloud had })assed over it without any effect. Just as he was
beginning to despair of his contrivance, he observed some
loose threads of the hempen string to stand erect, and to avoid
one another, just as if they had been suspended on a common
conductor. Struck with this promising appearance, he imme-
diately presented his knuckle to the key ! And let the reader
judge of the exquisite pleasure he must have felt at that mo-
ment when the discovery was complete! We owe to Priestley
this admirable narrative ; the strong sensation of delight
which Franklin experienced as his knuckle touched the key,
and at the moment when he felt that a new world was open-
ing, might have been equalled, but it was probably not sur-
passed, when the same hand signed the long-disputed inde-
pendence of his coimtry !

\Vhen Leibnitz was occupied in his philosophical reasonings
on his Law of Conti/uiif I/, his singular sagacity enabled him
to predict a discovery which afterwards was realised — he
imagined the necessary existence of the polypus !

It has been remarked of Newton, that several of his slight
hints, some in the modest form of queries, have been as-
certained to be predictions, and among others that of the
inilammabilit}' of the diamond ; and many have been eagerly
seized upon as indisputable axioms. A hint at the close of
his Optics, that " If natural philosophy should be continued
to be improved in its various branches, the bounds of moral
philosophy would be enlarged also," is perhaps among the
most important of human discoveries — it gave rise to Hartley's
JP/ii/6iolor/ical Theorij of the 2Iind. The queries, the hints,
the conjectures of Newton, display the most creative sagacity ;
and demonstrate in what manner the discoveries of retired
men, while they bequeath their legacies to the world, aiford
to themselves a frequent source of secret and silent triumphs.

414

SENTIMENTAL BIOGRAPHY.

A PEEIODICAL critic, probably one of the juniors, has thrown
out a startling observation. " There is," says this literary
senator, " something melanchoh^ in the study of biography,
because it is — a history of the dead!" A truism and a
falsity mixed up together is the temptation with some modern
critics, to commit that darling sin of theirs — novelty and
originality ! But we really cannot condole with the readers
of Plutarch for their deep melancholy ; we who feel our spirits
refreshed, amidst the mediocrity of society, when we are re-
called back to the men and the women who were ! illustrious
in every glory ! Biography with us is a re-union with human
existence in its most excellent state ! and we find nothing
dead in the past, while we retain the sympathies which only
require to be awakened.

It would have been more reasonable had the critic dis-
covered that our country has not yet had her Plutarch, and
that our biography remains still little more than a mass of
compilation.

In this study of biography there is a species which has
not yet been distinguished — biographies composed by some
domestic friend, or by some enthusiast who works with love.
A term is unquestionably wanted for this distinct class. The
Germans seem to have invented a Platonic one, drawn from
the Greek, psyche, or the soul; for they call this the pst/cholu-
f/ical life. Another attempt has been made, by giving it the
scientific term of idiosyncrasi/, to denote a peculiarity of
disposition. I would call it sentimental biography !

It is distinct from a chronoloyical biography, for it searches
for the individual's feelings amidst the ascertained facts of his
life ; so that facts, which occuri'ed remotely from each other,
are here brought at once together. The detail of events
which completes the chronological biography, contains many
which are not connected with the peculiarity of the character
itself. The sentimental is also distinct from the auto-
hiography, however it may seem a part of it. Whether a man
be entitled to lavish his panegyric on himself, I will not
decide ; but it is certain that he risks everything by appealing
to a solitary and suspected witness.

We have two Lives of Daute, one by Boccaccio and th«

Sentimental Biography. 415

other by Leonardo Arotino, both interesting : but Boccaccio's
is the sentimental life !

Aretino, indeed, finds fault, but with all the tenderness
possible, with lioceaooio's affectionate sketch, Orir/ine, Vita,
Studi e C'ostumi del clarissiyno Dante, &c. " Ori<;in, Life,
Studies and Manners, of the illustrious Dante," &c. "It
seems to me," he says, "that our Boccaccio, dolcissimo e
suavissimo tiomo, sweet and delightful man ! has written the
life and manners of this sublime poet as if he had been com-
posing the Filocolo, the Filostrato, or the Fiamelta," the
romances of lioccaccio — " for all breathes of love and sighs,
and is covered with warm tears, as if a man were born in this
world only to live among the enamoured ladies and the
gallant youths of the ten amorous days of his hundred
novels."

Aretino, who wanted not all the feeling requisite for the
delightful "costumi e studi" of Boccaccio's Dante, modestly
requires that his own life of Dante should be considered as
a supplement to, not as a substitute lor, ]3occaccio's. Pathetic
with all the sorrows, and eloquent with all the remonstrances
of a fellow-citizen, Boccaccio, while he wept, hung with anger
over his country's shame in its apathy lor the honour of its
long-injured exile. Catching inspiration from the breathing
pages of Boccaccio, it inclines one to wish that we possessed
two biographies of an illustrious favourite character ; the one
strictly and fully historical, the other fraught with those very
feelings of the departed, which we may have to seek in vain
for in the circumstantial and chronological biographer.
Boccaccio, indeed, was overcome by his feelings. He either
knew not, or he omits the substantial incidents of Dante's
life ; while his imagination throws a romantic tinge on occur-
rences raised on slight, perhaps on no foundation. Boccaccio
narrates a drean\ of the mother of Dante so fancifully poetical,
that probably Boccaccio forgot that none but a dreamer could
have told it. Seated under a high laurel-tree, by tlie side of
a vast Ibuntain, the mother dreamt that she gave birth to her
son ; she saw him nourished by its fruit, and refreshed by the
clear waters ; she soon beheld him a shepherd ; approaching
to pluck the boughs, she saw him fall ! When he rose he
had ceased to be a man, and was translbrmcd into a peacock !
Distm'bcd by her admiration, she suddenly awoke ; but when
the latiier found that he really had a son, in allusion to tiin
dream h^ '\alled him Daute — or ffivcii I e meritamente ;

416 Sentimental Biography.

pcroeche ottimamente, siccome si vedra procedendo, seyui id
name V ejfetto : '•' aucl deservedly ! for greatly, as we shall see,
the effect followed the name ! " At nine years of age, on a
jMa^'-day, whose joyous festival Boccaccio beautifully describes,
when the softness of the heavens, re-adorning the earth with
its mingled flowers, waved the green boughs, and made ali
things smile, Dante mixed with tlie boj^s and girls in the
house of the good citizen who on that day gave the feast, be-
held little Brice, as she was familiarly called, but named
Beatrice. The little Dante might have seen her before, but
he loved her then, and from that day never ceased to love ;
and thus Dante nella pargoletta eta fatto J' aviore ferventis-
simo servidore ; so fervent a servant to love in an age of
childhood ! Boccaccio appeals to Dante's own account of his
long passion, and his constant sighs, in the Vita Nuova. No
look, no word, no sign, sullied the purity of his passion ; but
in her twenty -fourth year died "la bellissima Beatrice."
Dante is then described as more than inconsolable ; his eyes
were long two abundant fountains of tears ; cai'eless of life, he
let his beard grow wildl}^ and to others appeared a savage
meagi'e man, whose aspect was so clianged, that while this
weeping life lasted, he was hardly recognised b\' his friends ;
all looked on a man so entirely transformed with deep
compassion. Dante, won over by those who could console
the inconsolable, was at length solicited b}' his relations to
marry a lady of his own condition in life ; and it was suggested
that as the departed lady had occasioned him such heavy
griefs, the new one might open a source of delight. The
relations and friends of Dante gave him a wife that his tears
for Beatrice might cease.

It is supposed that this marriage proved vmhappy. Boc-
caccio, like a pathetic lover rather than biographer, exclaims,
Oh menti cieche ! Oh tenehrosi intelletti! Oh arc/omenti vani
di molti mortali, quante sono le ruiscite in assai cose contrarie
o' nostri avvisi ! &c. " Oh blind men ! Oil dark minds ! Oh
vain arguments of most mortals, how often are the results
contrar}^ to our advice ! Frequently it is like leading one
who breathes the soft air of Italy to refresh himself in the
eternal shades of the llhodopean mountains. What physician
would expel a burning fever with fire, or put in the shiverinf.'
marrow of the bones snow and ice ? So certainly shall it fare
witli him who, with a new love, thinks to mitigate the olci.
Those who believe this know not the nature of love, nor hov

Sentimental Biography. 417

much a second passion adfls to the first. In va'n would we
assist or advise this foreei'ul passion, if it has struck its root
near the heart of him who long has loved."

13ocuaccio has beguiled my pen for half-an-hour with all
the loves and fancies which sprung out of liis own affectionate
and romantic heart. AVhat airy stuff has lie woven into the
"Vita" of l^ante ! this sentimental hiograpliy I Whether
lie liiiew hut little of the personal history of the great man
whom he idolised, or whether the dream of the mother — the
May-day interview with the little Briee, and the rest of the
children — and the clTusion on Uante's marriage, were grounded
on tradition, one would not harshly reject such tender inci-
dents.* Uut let it not be imagined that the heart of
Boccaccio was only susceptible to amorous impression.s —
bursts of enthusiasm and eloquence, which only a man of
genius is worthy of receiving, and only a man of genius is
capable of bestowing — kindle the masculine patriotism of his
bold, indignant spirit !

Half a centuiy had elapsed since the death of Dante, and
still the Florentines showed no sign of repentance for their
ancient hatred of their persecuted patriot, nor any sense of
the memory of the creator of their language, whose immor-
tality had become a portion of their own glor}'. Boccaccio,
impassioned by all his generous nature, though lie regrets he
could not raise a statue to Dante, has sent down to posterity
more than marble, in the " Life." I venture to give the lofty
and bold apostrophe to his fellow-citizens ; but I feel that even
the genius of our language is tame by the side of the har-
monised eloquence of the great votary of Dante !

" Ungrateful country ! what madness urged thee, when thy
dearest citizen, thy chief benefactor, thy only poet, with un-
accustomed cruelty was driven to llight ! If this had
happened in the general terror of that time, coming from evil
counsels, thou mightest stand excused ; but when the passion
ceased, didst thou repent ? didst thou recall him ? Bear with
me, nor deem it irksome from me, who am thy son, that thus

* "A Comment on the Divine CoineJy of Dante," in Englisb, printed ia
Italy, has just reached me. I am delighted to find that this hiography of
Love, however romantic, is true ! In his iiiatli. year, Dante was a lover
and a poet ! The tender sonnet, free from all obscurity, which he com-
posed on Beatrice, is preserved in the above singular vulume. There can
be no longer any doubt of the story of Beatrice ; but the sonnet ar.d the
passion must be " classed among curious njitural phenomena, " or how fur
iipocryphai, remains for future iuqujry.

YOL. Iir. E B

418 Sentimental Biography.

I collect what just inclii^natiou prompts me to speal?, as a man
more desirous of" witnessing your amendment, than of
beholding you punished ! Seems it to you glorious, proud of
so many titles and of such men, that the one whose like no
neighbouring city can show, you have chosen to chase from
among you ? With what triumphs, with what valorous citi-
zens, are you splendid ? Your wealth is a removable and
uncertain thing ; your fragile beauty will grow old ; your
delicacy is shameful and feminine ; but these make you
noticed by the false judgments of the populace ! Do you
glory in your merchants and your artists ? I speak im-
prudently ; but the one are tenaciously avaricious in their
servile trade ; and Art, which once was so noble, and became
a second nature, struck by the same avarice, is now as cor-
rupted, and nothing worth ! Do you glory in the baseness
and the listlessness of those idlers, Avho, because their
ancestors are remembered, attempt to raise up among you a
nobility to govern you, e-ver by robber^'-, by treachery, by
falsehood ! Ah ! miserable mother ! open thine eyes ; cast
them with some remorse on what thou hast done, and blush,
at least, reputed wise as thou art, to have had in your errors
BO fatal a choice ! Why not rather imitate the acts of those
jities who so keenly disputed merely for the honour of the
birth-place of the divine Homer ? Mantua, our neighbour,
counts as the greatest fame which remains for her, that Virgil
was a Mantuan ! and holds his very name in such reverence, that
not only in public places, but in the most private, we see his
sculptured image ! You only, while you were made famous
by illustrious men, j'ou only have shown no care for your
great poet. Your Dante Alighieri died in exile, to which 3^ou
unjustly, envious of his greatness, destined him ! A crime
not to be remembered, that the mother should bear an
envious malignity to the virtues of a son ! Now cease to be
unjust ! He cannot do you that, now dead, which living he
never did do to you ! He lies under another sky than yours,
and you never can see him again, but on that day, when all
your citizens shall view him, and the great Remunerator
shall examine, and shall punish ! If anger, hatred, and
enmity are buried with a man, as it is believed, begin then to
return to yourself; begin to be ashamed to have acted against
your ancient humanity ; begin, then, to wish to appeara mother,
and not a cold negligent step-dame. Yield your tears to your
Bon ; yield 3'our maternal piety to him wliom once you re-

Sentimental Biography. 419

pulsed, and, living, cast away from you ! At least think of
possessing him dead, and restore your citizenship, your
award, and your grace, to his memory. He was a son who
held you in reverence, and though long an exile, he always
called himself, and would be called a Florentine ! lie held
you ever above all others ; ever he loved you ! What will
you then do ? Will you remain obstinate in iniquity ? Will
you practise less humanity than the barbarians ? You wish
that the world should believe that you are the sister of
famous Troy, and the daughter of Ivome ; assuredly the
children should resemble their fathers and their ancestors.
Priam, in his misery, bought the corpse of Hector with guld ;
and Home would possess the bones of the first Seipio, and
removed them from Linternum, those bones, which, dying, so
justly he had denied her. Seek then to be the true guardian
of your Dante, claim him ! show this humane feeling, claim
him ! you may securely do this : I am certain he will not be
returned to you ; but thus at once you may betray some
mark of compassion, and, not having him again, still enjoy
your ancient cruelty ! Alas ! what comfort am I bringing
you ! I almost believe, that if the dead could feel, the body
of Dante would not rise to return to you, for he is lying in
Kavenna, whose hallowed soil is everywhere covered w'ith the
ashes of saints. AVould Dante quit this blessed company to
mingle with the remains of those hatreds and iniquities which
gave him no rest in lile ? The relics of Dante, even among
the bodies of emperors and of martyrs, and of their illus-
trious ancestors, is prized as a treasure, for there his works
are looked on with admiration ; those works of which you
have not yet known to make yourselves worthy. His birtli-
place, his origin remains for you, spite of your ingratitude !
and this llavenna envies you, while she glories in your
honours which she has snatched from you through ages yet
to come !'*

Such was the deep emotion which opened Boccaccio's heart
in this sentimental biography, and which awoke even shame
and confusion in the minds of the Florentines ; they blushed
for their old hatreds, and, with awakened sympathies, they
hastened to honour the memory of their great bard. By
order of the city, the Divina Commedia was publicly read and
ex])lained to the people. Boccaccio, then sinking under the
infirmities of age, roused his departing genius : still was there
marrow in the bones of the aged lion, and he engaged in the

E E 2

420 Sentimental Biorjrcqihy.

task of composing his celebrated Commentaries on the Divina
Comniedia.

In this class of sentimental hloqrapln/ 1 would place a species
vhich the historian Carte noticed in his literary travels on the
Continent, in pursuit of his historical design. He found, pre-
served among several ancient families of France, their
domestic annals. '• "With a warm, patriotic s):iii'it, worthy of
imitation, the}' have often carefully preserved in their families
the acts of their ancestors." This delight and pride of the
modern Gauls in the great and good deeds of their ancestors,
preserved in domestic archives, will be ascribed to their folly
or their vanity ; yet in that folly there may be so much
wisdom, and in that vanity there may be so much greatness,
that the one will amply redeem the other.

This custom has been rarely adopted among ourselves ; we
have, however, a few separate histories of some ancient
families, as those of Mordaunt, and of Warren. One of the
most remarkable is " A Genealogical History of the House
of Yvery, in its different branches of Yvery, Luvel, Perceval,
and Gournay." Two large volumes, closely printed,* expa-
tiating on the characters and events of a single family with
the grave pomp of a herald, but more particularly the idolatry
of the writer for ancient nobility, and his contempt for that
growing rank in society whom he designates as " New Men,"
provoked the ridicule at least of the aspersed. f This extra-
ordinary work, notwithstanding its absurdities in its general
result, has left behind a deep impression. Drawn from the
authentic family records, it is not without interest that we toil
through its copious pages ; we trace with a romantic sympa-

* This work was published in 1742, and the scarcity of these volumes
was felt in Granger's day, for they obtained then the considerable price of
four guineas ; some time ago a fine copy was sold for thirty at a sale, and
a cheap copy was offered to me at twelve guineas. These volumes should
contain seventeen portraits. The first was written by Mr. Anderson, who,
dying ];efore the second appeared, Lord Egmont, from the materials An-
derson had left, concluded his family history — con amore.

+ Mr. Anderson, the writer of the first volume, was a feudaJ enthu-
siast ; he has thrown out an odd notion that the commercial, or the
wealthy class, had intruded on the dignity of the ancient nobility ; but as
wealth has raised such high prices for labour, commodities, kc, it had
reached its ne plus ultra, and commerce could be carried on no longer 1
He has ventured on this amusing prediction, "As it is therefore evident
that KEw MKN will never rise again in any age with such advantages of
wealth, at least ia considerable numbers, their party will gradually d©-
Mia^Ki."

Sentimental Biography. 421

thy tlic fortunes of the descendants of tlie House of Yvcry,
Imni tliat not-fori^otten licro Ic vaiUant Perceval chci'alirr do
la Table lionde, to the Norman Baron Assehn, surnamcd tho
Wolf, for his bravery or his ferocity ; thence to tlie CavaHef
of Charles the First, Sir Pliilip Perceval, who, having
gloriously defended his castle, was at length deprived of his
lordly possessions, but never of his loyalty, and died obscurely
in the metropolis of a broken heart, till we reach the polished
nobleman, the Lord Egmont of the Georges.

The nation has lost many a noble example of men and
women acting a great part on great occasions, and then re-
treating to the shade of privacy ; and we may be confident that
many a name has not been inscribed on the roll of national
glory only from wanting a few drops of ink ! Such domestic
amials may yet be viewed in the iamily records at Appleby
Castle ! Anne, Countess of Pembroke, was a glorious woman,
the descendant of two potent northern families, the Veteri-
])onts and the Clitfords. — She lived in a state of regal magni-
iicence and independence, inhabiting live or seven castles ;
yet though her magnificent sjjirit poured itself out in her ex-
tended charities, and though her independence mated that of
monarchs, 3'et she herself, in her domestic habits, lived as a
hermit in her own castles ; and though only acquainted with
her native language, she had cultivated her mind in many
parts of learning ; and as Donne, in his way, observes, " she
knew how to converse of everything, from predestination to
slea-silk." Her favourite design was to have materials col-
lected for the history of those two potent northern families
to whom she was allied ; and at a considerable expense she
emplo^'ed learned persons to make collections for this pur-
pose Irom the records in the Tower, the liolls, and other
depositories of manuscripts : Gilpin had seen three large
volumes fairly transcribed. Anecdotes of a great variety of
characters, who had exerted themselves on very important
occasions, compose these family records — and induce one to
wish that the public were in possession of such annals of the
domestic life of heroes and of sages, who have only failed in
obtaining an historian I*

A biographical monument of this nature, whieh has passed
through the press, will sulliciently prove the utility of this

* Jfucli curious matter about the old Countess of Westmorelaiul and her
seveu castles may be found iu \Yhitaker's History of Craven, and iu Pcu-
naut.

422 Sentimental Biography.

class of sentimental hiograplnj. It is the Life of Robert Price,
a AVelsh lawyer, and an ancestor of the gentleman whose in-
genuity, in our days, has refined the principles of the Pictu-
resque in Art. This Life is announced as " printed by the
appointment of the family ;" bvit it must not be considered
merely as a tribute of private affection ; and how we are at this
day interested in the actions of a Welsh lawyer in the reign
of William the Third, whose name has probably never been
consigned to the page of history, remains to be told.

Kobert Price, after having served Charles the Second, lived
latterly in the eventful times of William the Third — he was
probably of Tory principles, for on the arrival of the Dutch
prince he was removed from the attorney-generalship of
Glamorgan. The new monarch has been accused of favourit-
ism, and of an eagerness in showering exorbitant grants on
some of his foreigners, which soon raised a formidable oppo-
sition in the jealous spirit of Englishmen. The grand
favourite, William Bentinck, after being raised to the Earl-
dom of Portland, had a grant bestowed on him of three
lordships in the county of Denbigh. The patriot of his
native country — a title which the Welsh had already con-
ferred on Eobert Price — then rose to assert the rights of his
fatherland, and his speeches are as admirable for their know-
ledge as their spirit. " The submitting of 1500 freeholders
to the will of a Dutch lord was," as he sarcastically declared,
" putting them in a worse posture than their former estate,
when under AVilliam the Conqueror and his Norman lords.
England must not be tributary to strangers — we must, like
patriots, stand by our country — otherwise, when God shall
send us a Prince of Wales, he may have such a present of a
crown made him as a Pope did to King John, who was sur-
named Sans-terre, and was by his father made Lord of
Ireland, which grant was confirmed by the Pope, who sent
him a crown of peacocks' feathers, in derogation of his power,
and the poverty of his country." Robert Price asserted that
the king could not, by the Bill of Rights, alien or give away
the inheritance of a Prince of Wales without the consent of
parliament. He concluded a copious and patriotic speech, by
proposing that an address be presented to the king, to put an
immediate stop to the grant now passing to the Earl of Port-
land for the lordships, &c.

This speech produced such an effect, that the address was
carried unanimously; and the king, though he highly resented

Sentimental Biographrj. 423

the speech of Robert Price, sent a civil messnsje to the com-
mons, declaring that he should not have given Lord Portland
those lands, had he imagined the House of Commons could
have been concerned ; " I will therefore recall the grant 1"
On receiving the royal message, Robert Price drew up a reso-
lution to wliich the house assented, that " to procure or pass
exorbitant grants by any member of the privy council, &e.
was a high crime and misdemeanour." The speech of Robert
Price contained truths too numerous and too bold to suffer
the light during that reign ; but this speech against foreigners
was printed the year after King William's death, with this
title, " Gloria Cambi'icr, or the sjieech of a bold Briton in
parliament, against a Dutch Prince of Wales," with this
motto, Opposiiit et Vicit. Such was the great character of
Robert Price, that he was made a Welsh judge by the very
sovereign whose favourite plans he had so patriotically
thwarted.

Another marked event in the life of this Englisli patriot
was a second noble stand he made against the royal authority,
when in opposition to the public good. The secret history of
a quarrel between George the First and the Prince of Wales,
afterwards George the Second, on tlie birth of a son, appears
in this life ; and when the prince in disgrace loft the i)alace,
his royal highness proposed taking his children and the
princess with him ; but the king detained the children, claim-
ing the care of the royal offspring as a royal prerogative. It
now became a legal point to ascertain " whether the educa-
tion of his majesty's grandchildren, and the care of their
marriages, &c., belonged of right to his majesty as king of
this realm, or not ?" Ten of the judges obsequiously allowed
of the prerogative to the full. Robert Price and another
i«dge decided that the education, &c., was the right of the
father, although the marriages was that of his majesty as
king of this realm, yet not exclusive of the prince, their
father. He assured the king, that the ten obsequious judges
had no authority to support tlieir precipitate opinion ; all the
br.oks and precedents cannot form a prerogative for the king
of this realm to have the care and education of his grand-
children during the life and without the consent of their
father — a prerogative unknown to tlie laws of England !
He pleads for the rights of a father, with the spirit of one
who feels them, as well as with legal science and histoi'ical
knowledge.

424 Sentimental Biography/.

Such were tlic two great incidents iu the Hfe of this
Welsh judge ! Yet, had tlie family not found one to comme-
morate these memorahle events in tlie life of their ancestor,
we had lost the nohle picture of a constitutional interpreter
of tlie laws, an independent country gentleman, and an
Englishman jealous of the excessive predominance of minis-
terial or royal influence.

Cicero, and others, have informed vis that the ancient his-
tory of Eome itself v.'as composed out of such accounts of
private families, to which, indeed, we must add those annals
or registers of public events which unquestionably were pre-
served in the archives of the temples by the priests. But
the history of the individual may involve public interest,
whenever the skill of the writer combines with the import-
ance of the event. Messala, the orator, gloried in having
composed many volumes of the genealogies of the nobility
of Eome; and Atticus wrote the genealogy of Brutus, to
prove him descended from Junius Brutus, the expulser of the
Tarquins, and founder of tlie llepublic, near five hundred
years before.

Another class of this sentimental lio[/rapliy was projected
by the late Elizabeth Hamilton. This was to have consisted
of a series of what she called comparative hiograpluj, and an
ancient character was to have been paralleled by a modern
one. Occupied by her historical romance with the character
of Agrippina, she sought in modern history for a partner of
her own sex, and " one who, like her, had experienced vicissi-
tudes of fortune;" and she found no one better qualified
than the princess palatine, Elizaheth, the daughter of James
the First. Her next life was to have been that of Seneca,
with " the scenes and persons of which her Life of Agrippina
had familiarised her ;" and the contrast or the parallel was
to have been Loclcc ; which, well managed, she thought
would have been sufficiently striking. It seems to me that
it would rather have allbrded an evidence of her invention !
Such a biographical project reminds one of Plutarch's Paral-
lels, and might incur the danger of displaying more ingenuity
tlian truth. The sage of Cheronca must olten have racked
his invention to help out his parallels, bending together, to
make them similar, the most unconnected events and the most
distinct feelings ; and, to keep his parallels in two straight
lines, he probably made a free use of augmentatives and dimi-

Lilcrary Parallels. 425

nutives to help out liis pair, who might liave been equal,
and yet not alike !

Our fatherland is prodigal of immortal names, or names
uliicli might be made immortal ; Gibbon onee contemplated
with eompiacency, the very ideal of skntimkntalbioohaphy,
and we may regret tliat he has only left the projeet ! " I
have long revolved in my mind a volume of biographical
writing ; the lives or rather the characters of the most emi-
nent persons in arts and arms, in church and state, who have
flourished in Britain from the reign of Henry the Eighth to
the present age. The subject would afford a rich display of
human nature and domestic history, and powerfully address
itself to the feelings of every Englishman."

LITERARY PARALLELS.

An opinion on this subject in the preceding article has led me
to a further investigation. It may be right to acknowledge
that so attractive is this critical and moral amusement of
comparing great characters with one another, that, among
others, ]Jishop llurd once proposed to write a hooJc of
FaraUels, and has I'urnished a specimen in that of Petrarch
and Ttousseau, and intended for another that of Erasmus
with Cicero. It is amusing to observe how a lively and
subtle mind can strike out resemblances, and make conti-aries
accord, and at the same time it may show the pinching dith-
culties through which a parallel is pushed, till it ends in a
paradox.

Hurd says of Petrarch and Eousseau — " Both were impelled
by an equal enthusiasm, though directed towards different
objects : Petrarch's towards the glory of the Ivoman name,
Rousseau's towards his idol of a state of nature ; the one
religious, the other un esprit Jort ; but may not Petrarch's
spite to Babylon be considered, in his time, as a species of
free-thinking" — and concludes, that "both were mad, but of
a different nature." Unquestionably there were features
much alike, and almost peculiar to these two literary cha-
racters ; but I doubt if Hurd has comprehended them in tiie
parallel.

I now give a specimen of tho?e parallels which have done
60 much mischief in the literary world, when drawn bj' a

426 Literary Parallels.

hand which covertly leans on one side. An elaborate one of
this sort was composed by Longolius or Longuel, between
Budaeus and Erasmus.* This man, though of Dutch origin,
affected to pass for a Frenchman, and, to pa}^ his court to his
chosen people, gives the preference obliquely to the French
Budreus; though, to make a show of impartiality, he acknow-
ledges that Francis the First had awarded it to Erasmus ; but
probably he did not infer that kings were the most able
reviewers ! This parallel was sent forth during the Hfetime
of both these great scholars, who had long been correspon-
dents, but the publication of the parallel interrupted their
friendly intercourse. Erasmus returned his compliments and
thanks to Longolius, but at the same time insinuates a gentle
hint that he was not overpleased. "What pleases me most,"
Erasmus writes, "is the just preference you have given
Budajus over me ; I confess you are even too economical in
your praise of him, as you are too prodigal in mine. I thank
you for informing me what it is the learned desire to find in
me ; my self-love suggests many little excuses, with which, you
observe, I am apt to favour my defects. If I am careless, it
arises pai'tly from my ignorance, and more from my indolence ;
I am so constituted, that I cannot conquer my nature ; I pre-
cipitate rather than compose, and it is far more irksome for
me to revise than to write."

This parallel between Erasmus and Budaeus, though the
parallel itself was not of a malignant nature, yet disturbed
the quiet, and interrupted the friendship of both. When
Longolius discovered that the Parisian surpassed the Hol-
lander in Greek literature and the knowledge of the civil law,
and worked more learnedly and laboriously, how did this de-
tract from the finer genius and the varied erudition of the
more delightful writer ? The parallelist compares Erasmus to
" a river swelling its waters, and often overllowing its banks ;
Budaeus rolled on like a majestic stream, ever restraining its
waves within its bed. The Frenchman has more nerve, and
blood, and life, and the Hollander more fulness, freshness, and
colour."

The taste for hiograpldeal parallels must have reached ns
from Plutarch ; and there is something malicious in our
natiu'e which inclines us to form comiMrative estimates,
usually with a view to elevate one great man at the cost of

• It is noticed by Jortin in liis Life of Erasmus, vol. i. p. 160.

The Pearl Bibles and Six Thousand Errata. 427

another, whom we would secretly cleprcciatc. Our political
parties at home liave often indulgecl in these fallacious paral-
lels, and Pitt and Fox once halaneed the scales, not hy the
standard weights and measures wliich ought to have hcen
used, hut by the adroitness of the hand that pressed down
the scale. In literature, these comparative estimates have
proved most prejudicial. A finer model exists not than the
parallel of Dryden and Pope, hy Johnson ; for, without de.'-ign-
ing any undue preference, his vigorous judgment has analysed
them hy his contrasts, and has rather sliown their distinctness
than their similarity. But literary parallels usually end in
producing parties ; and, as I have elsewhere observed, often
originate in undervaluing one man of genius, for his defi-
ciency in some eminent quality possessed by the other man of
genius; they not un frequently proceed from adverse tastes,
and are formed with the concealed design of establishing some
favourite one. The world of literature has been deepl}'^ in-
fected with this folly. Vii'gil probably was often vexed in his
days by a parallel with Hom.er, and the Ho7nerians combated
with the Virgilians. Modern Italy was long divided into
such literary sects : a perpetual skirmishing is carried on be-
tween the Ariostoists and the Tassoists ; and feuds as dire as
those between two Highland clans were raised concerning the
Petrarchists, and the Chiahrerists. Old Corneille lived tc
bow his venerable genius before a parallel with Pacinc ; and
no one has suffered more unjustly by such arbitrary criticism:-
than Pope, for a strange unnatural civil war has often been
renewed between the Dri/denists and the Popeists. Two mer
of great genius should never be depreciated by the misapplied
ingenuity of a parallel ; on such occasions we ought to con-
clude magis pares rj^iiam similes.

THE PEARL BIBLES AND SIX THOUSAND ERRATA.

As a literary curiosity, I notice a subject which might
rather enter into the history of religion. It relates to the
extraordinary state of our English Bibles, which were for
some time suffered to be so corrupted that no books ever yet
swarmed with such innumerable errata!

These errata unquestionabl)- were in great part voluntary
commissions, passages interpolated, and meanings forged for
certain purposes ; sometimes to sanction the new creed of a

428 The Pearl Bibles and Six Thousand Errata.

half-liatchcd sect, and sometimes with an intention to destroy
all scriptural authority by a confusion, or an omission of texts
' — the whole was left open to the option or the malignity of
the editors, who, probably, like certain ingenious wine-
merchants, contrived to accommodate "the waters of life" to
their customers' peculiar taste. They had also a project of
printing Bibles as cheaply and in a form as contracted as they
possibly could for the common people ; and they proceeded
till it nearly ended with having no Bible at all : and, as
Fuller, in his " Mixt Contemplations on Better Times,"
alludingtothis circumstance, with not one of his lucky quibbles,
observes, "The small price of the Bible has caused the small
prizing of the Bible."

This extraordinary attempt on the English Bible began
even before Charles the First's dethronement, and probably
arose from an unusual demand for Bibles, as the sectarian
fanaticism was increasing. Printing of English Bibles was
an article of open trade; every one printed at the lowest price,
and as fast as their presses would allow. Even those who
wore dignified as "his Majesty's Printers" were among these
manufacturers ; for we have an account of a scandalous omis-
sion by them of the important negative in the seventh com-
mandment ! The printers were summoned before the Court
of High Commission, and this not served to bind them in a
line of three thousand pounds ! A prior circumstance, indeed,
had occurred, which induced the government to be more vigi-
lant on the Biblical Press. The learned Usher, one day hasten-
ing to preach at Paul's Cross, entered the shop of one of the
stationers, as booksellers were then called, and inquiring for a
Bible of the London edition, when he came to look for his
text, to his astonishment and horror he discovered that the
verse was omitted in the Bible ! This gave the first occasion
of complaint to the king of the insufferable negligence and
incapacity of the London press : and, sa^'s the manuscript
writer of this anecdote, first bred that great contest which
followed, between the University of Cambridge and the Lon-
don stationers, about the right of printing Bibles.*

The secret bibliographical history of these times would
show the extraordinary state of the press in this new trade of
Bibles. The writer of a curious pamphlet exposes the com-
bination of those called the king's printers, with their contri-

* Ilarl. MS. C395.

The Pearl Bibles and Six Thousand Errata. 4-2&

vanccs to keep u]) tlie prices of IJiblcs ; their correspondence
with the boukscllers of ScoUund and Dublin, by wliich means
the}' retained the privile(,'e in their own liands : the kinf,''s
London printers got Bibles printed cheaper at Edinburgh.
In 1U29, when folio Bibles were wanted, the Cambridge
printers sold them at ten shillings in quires ; on this the
Londoners set six printing-houses at work, and, to annihilate
the Cambridgians, printed a similar /oZ/o Bible, but sold with
it five hundred quarfo\\om:\\\ Bibles, and live hundred qumio
English, at five shillings a book ; which proved the ruin of
the folio Bibles, by keeping them down under the cost price.
Another competition arose among those who printed Eng-
lish Bibles in Holland, in duodecimo, with an English
colophon, for half the price even of the lowest in London.
Twelve thousand of these duodecimo Bibles, with notes, fiibri-
cated in Holland, usually by our fugitive sectarians, were
seized by the king's printers, as contrary to the statute.*
Such was this shameful war of Bibles — folios, quartos, and
duodecimos, even in the days of Charles the First. The
public spirit of the rising sects was the real occasion of these
increased demands for Bibles.

During the civil wars they carried on the same open trade
nnd competition, besides the private ventures of the smuggled
Bibles. A large impression of these Dutch English Bibles
were burnt by order of the Assembly of Divines, for these
three errors : —

Gen. xxxvi. 24. — This is that ass that found rulers in the
wilderness — for mule.

Ruth iv. 13. — The Lord gave her corruption — for concep-
tion.

Luke xxi. 28. — Look up, and lift up your hands, for your
condemnation draweth nigh — for redemption.

These errata were none of the printer's ; but, as a writer
of the times expresses it, " egregious blasphemies, and dam-
nable cri-ata " of some sectarian, or some Bellamy editor of
that day !

The printing of Bibles at length was a privilege conceded

• "Scintilla, or a liglit broken into dnrke Warehouses; of some
Printers, sleeping Stationer?, and combining Booksellers ; in which is only
a touch of their forestalling and ingrossing of Books iu Patients, and rays-
ing them to excessive prises. Left to the consideration of the high au<l
honourable House of Parliament, pow assembled. LouUon : Nowhei-e t*
be sold, but somewhere to be given." 1641.

430 TJie Pearl Bibles and Sii' Thousand Errata.

to one William Bentley ; but he was opposed by Hills aud
Field ; and a paper war arose, in which they mutually
recriminated on each other, with equal truth.

Field printed, in 1653, what was called the Pearl Bible ;
alluding, I suppose, to that diminutive type in printing, for
it could not derive its name from its worth. It is in twenty-
fours ; * but to contract the mighty book into this dwarfish-
ness, all the original Hebrew text prefixed to the Psalms, ex-
plaining the occasion and the subject of their composition, is
wholly expunged. This Pearl Bible, which may be inspected
among the great collection of our English Bibles at the
British Museum, is set off by many notable errata, of which
these are noticed : —

Romans vi. 13. — Neither yield ye your members as instru-
ments of rir/liteousness unto sin — for unrighteousness.

First Corinthians vi. 9. — Know ye not that the un-
righteous sJudl inherit the kingdom of God ? — for shall 7wt
inherit.

This erratu7n served as the foundation of a dangerous
doctrine ; for many libertines urged the text from this corrupt
Bible against the reproofs of a divine.

This Field was a great forger ; and it is said that he
received a present of 1500Z. from the Independents to cor-
rupt a text in Acts vi. 3, to sanction the right of the people
to appoint their own pastors.f The corruption was the
easiest possible ; it was only to put a ye instead of a we ; so
that the right in Field's Bible emanated from the people,
not from the apostles. The only account I recollect of this
extraordinary state of our Bibles is a happy allusion in a line
of Butler :—

Religion spawn'd a various rout,
Of petulant, capricious sects,
The maggots of corrupted texts.

In other Bibles by Hills and Field we may find such abun-
dant errata, reducing the text to nonsense or to blasphemy,
making the Scriptures contemptible to the multitude, who
came to pray, and not to scoff.

* A technical printing-term for a sheet containing twenty-four pages.

f The passage is as follows, and is aclLlressed by the apostles to "the
multitude of the disciples," who desired an improved clerical rule : —
*' Wiierefore, brethren, look ye out among you seven men of lionest report,
full of the Holy Ghost and wisdom, whom we may appoint over this
business."

Tlie Pearl Bibles and Six Thousand Errata. 131

It is affirmed, in the manuscript account already referred
to, that one Bible swarmed with six thousand faults ! Indeed,
from another source we discover that " Sterne, a solid scholar,
was the first who summed up the three thousand and six
hundred faults that were in our printed Bibles of London,"*
If one book can be made to contain near four thousand errors,
little ingenuity was required to reach to six thousand ; but
perhaps this is the first time so remarkable an incident in the
history of literature has ever been chronicled. And that
famous edition of the Vulgate, by Pope Sixtus the Fifth, a
memorable book of blunders, which commands such high
prices, ought now to fall in value, before the peaj'l Bible, in
twentj'-fours, of ^Messrs. Hills and Field !

Mr. Field and his worthy coadjutor seem to have carried
the favour of the reigning powers over their opponents ; for I
laid a piece of their secret history. They engaged to pay
500Z. per annum to some, " whose names I forbear to men-
tion," warily observes the manuscript writer; and above 100/.
per annum to Mr. Marchmont Xeedham and his wife, out of
the profits of the sales of their Bibles ; deriding, insulting,
and triumphing over others, out of their confidence in their
great friends and purse, as if they were lawless and free, both
from oli'ence and punishment. f This Marchmont Needham
is sufiiciently notorious, and his secret history is probably
true ; for in a Mcrcurius I'oliticus of this unprincipled
Cobbetc of his day, I found an elaborate puff of an edition
published by the annuity-granter to this worthy and his
wife!

Not only had the Bible to suffer these indignities of size
and price, but the Prayer-book was once printed in an
illegible and worn-out type ; on which the printer beino-
complained of, he stoutly replied, that "it was as good as
the price afforded ; and being a book which all persons
ought to have by heart, it was no matter whether it was
read or not, so tliat it was worn out in their hands." The
puritans seem not to have been so nice about the source of
purity itself.

These hand-bibles of the sectarists, with their six thousand
errata, like the false Duessa, covered their crafty deformit}'
with a fair raiment ; for when the great SeKlen, in the
assembly of divines, delighted to confute them in their own

* G. G.irrard's Letter to the Earl of Strafford, vol. i. p. 205,
t Harl. MS, 75S0.

432 The Pearl Bibles and Six Thousand Errata.

learning, lie would say, as Whitelock re])orts, when they had
cited a text to prove their assertion, " Perhaps in your little
pocket-bihle with gilt leaves," which they wovdd often pull
out and read, "the translation may be so, but the Greek or
the Hebrew signifies this."

While these transactions were occurring, it appears that
the autlientic translation of the Bible, such as w-e now have
it, by the learned translators in James the First's time, was
suffered to lie neglected. The copies of the original manu-
script were in the possession of two of the king's printers,
who, from cowardice, consent, and connivance, suj)pressed
the publication ; considering that the Bible full of errata,
and often, probably, accommodated to the notions of certain
sectarists, was more valuable than one authenticated by
the hierarchy ! Such was the state of the English Bible
till 16G0 ! *

The proverbial expression of cliapter and verse seems pecu-
liar to ourselves, and, I suspect, originated in the puritanic
period, probably just before the civil wars under Charles the
First, from the frequent use of appealing to the Bible on the
most frivolous occasions, practised by those whom South calls
" those mighty men at cliapter and verse. ^^ With a sort of
religious coquetry, they were vain of perpetually opening
their gilt pocket Bibles ; they perked them up with such
self-sufficiency and perfect ignorance of the original, that the
learned Selden found considerable amusement in going to
their " assembly of divines," and puzzling or confuting them,
as we have noticed. A ludicrous anecdote on one of these
occasions is given by a contemporary, which shows how
admirably that learned man amused himself with this
"assembly of divines!" They were discussing the distance
between Jerusalem and Jericho, with a perfect ignorance of
sacred or of ancient geography ; one said it was twenty miles,
another ten, and at last it was concluded to be only seven,
for this strange reason, that fish was brought from Jericho
to J(!rusalem market ! Selden observed, that " possibly the
fish in question was salted," and silenced these acute dis-
putants.

It would probably have greatly discomposed these " chapter
and verse" men to have informed them that the Scriptures
had neither chapter nor verse ! It is by no means clear how

• See the London Printers' Lamentation on the Press Oj^pressed. Hi^rL
Coll. iil. 2S0,

St (lie oj Hell (/ion in oiii' Civll irurs. 433

the holy writings were ancienUy divided, and still loss how-
quoted or referred to. The lionour of the invention of the
present arrangement of the Scriptures is ascribed to Ivobert
StepluMis, by his son, in the preface to his Concordance, a
task which he performed during a journey on horseback from
Paris to London, in 1551 ; and whether it was done as Yorick
would in his Siiandcan manner lounging on his mule, or at
iiis intermediate baits, he has received all possible thanks for
this employment of his time. Two years afterwards he con-
cluded with the Bible. But that the honour of every inven-
tion may be disputed, Sanctus Pagninus's Bible, printed at
Lj'ons ill 1527, seems to have led tlie way to these convenient
divisions ; Stephens, however, improved on Pagninus's mode
of paragraphical marks and marginal verses ; and our i^resent
" chapter and verse," more numerous and more commodiously
nund)ered, were the project of this learned printer, to reeovi'
mend his edition of tlie liihle ; trade and learning were once
combined ! Whether in this arrangement any disturbance of
the continuit}^ of the text has followed, is a subject not fitted
for my inquiry.

VIEW OF A PARTICULAR PERIOD OF THE STATE OP
RELIGION IN OUR CIVIL WARS.

LoOKllTG over the manuscript diary of Sir Symonds D'Ewes,
I was struck by a picture of the domestic religious life which
at that period was prevalent among families. Sir S\'monds
was a sober antiquary, heated with no fanaticism, yet I dis-
covered in his diary that he was a visionary in his constitu-
tion, macerating his body by private fasts, and spiritualising
in search of secret sicjns. These ascetic penances were after-
wards succeeded in the nation by an era of hypocritical
sanctity ; and we may trace this last stage of insanity and of
immorality closing with impiety. This would be a dreadful
picture of religion, if for a moment wo supposed that it were
religion ; that consolatory power which has its source in our
feelings, and according to the derivation of its expressive
term, hinds men tor/etlwr. With us it was sectarism, whose
origin and causes we shall not now touch on, which broke
out into so many monstrous sliapes, when every pretended
reibnner was guided by his own peculiar fancies : we havo
lived to prove that folly and wickedness are I'arely obsolete,
vol. 111. r 1

434 View of a Particular Period of the

The age of Sir Symonds D'Ewes, who lived through the
times of Charles the First, was religious ; for the character
of this monarch had all the seriousness and piety not found
in the lonliomie and careless indecorums of his father, whose
manners of the Scottish court were moulded on tlie gaieties
of the French, from the ancient intercourse of the French
and Scottish governments. But this religious age of Charles
the First presents a strange contrast with the licentiousness
which subsequently prevailed among the people : there seems
to be a secret connexion between a religious and an irreligious
period : the levit}'' of popular feeling is driven to and fro by
its reaction ; when man has been once taught to contemn his
mere humanity, his abstract fancies open a secret bye-path
to his presumed salvation ; he wanders till he is lost — he
trembles till he dotes in melancholy — he raves till truth
itself is no longer immutable. The transition to a very
opposite state is equally rapid and vehement. Such is the
history of man when his rehgion is founded on misdirected
feelings ; and such, too, is the reaction so constantly operating
in all human affairs.

The writer of this diary did not belong to those noncon-
formists who arranged themselves in hostility to the esta-
blished religion and political government of our country. A
private gentleman and a phlegmatic antiquary. Sir Symonds
withal was a zealous Cliurch of England protestant. Yet
amidst the mystical allusions of an age of religious contro-
versies, we see these close in the scenes we are about to open,
and find this quiet gentleman tormenting himself and liis
lady by watching for " certain evident marks and signs of an
assurance for a better life," with I know not how many dis-
tinct sorts of " Graces."

I give an extract from the manuscript diarj' : —

"I spent tliis day cliiefly m private fastinrj, prayer, aud other roliyions
exercises. This was tlie first time that I ever practised this duty, having
always before declined it, hy reason of the papists' superstitious abuses of
it. I had partaken furmerly of puhlic fasls, but never knew the use aud
benefit of the same duty performed alone in secret, or with others of mine
own family in private. In these jmrticulars, I had my knowledge much
enlarged by the religious converse I enjoyed at Albury Lalge, for there also
I shortly after entered upon franiinrj an evidence of marks and siijns for
my assurance of a hotter life.

" I found much benefit of my secret fasliny, from a learned discourse on
fasting by Mr. Henry Mason, and observed his rule, that Christians ought
to sit sometimes apart for tlieir ordinary humiliation and fasting, and so
intend to continue the same course as lung as my health will jiermit ire.

State of Religion in our Civil Wars. 435

Yet did I vary the times and duration of my fasting. At first, before I
had finished the marks and sir/ns of my assurance of a better life, which
scrutin;/ and search cost me some tlircc-scorc days of fasti ny, I pcrririucd
it sometimes twice in the space of five weeks, then once each month, or a
little sooner or later, and then .also I sometimes ended the duties of the
day, and took some little food about three of the clock in the afternoon.
But for divers years last past, I constantly abstained from all food the
■whole day. I fasted till supper-time, about six in the evcnin;;, and spent
ordinarily about eight or nine hours in the i)erformance of religious duties ;
one part of which was jwaycr and confession of sins, to which end I
wrote down a catalogue of all my knoicn sins, orderly. These were all
sins of infirmity ; fur, through God's grace, I was so far from allowing
myself in the practice and commission of any actual sin, as I durst not
take upon me any controversial sins, as usury, carding, dicing, mixt danc-
ing, and the like, because I was in mine own judgment persuaded they
were unlawful. Till I had finished my assurance first in English and af-
terwards in Latin, with a large and an elaborate preface in Latin also to
it ; I spent a great part of the day at that work, &c.

"Saturday, December ], IG'27, I devoted to my usu.al course of sec7'ct
fastinrj, and drew divers siyns of my assurance of a better life from the
grace of repentance, having before gone through ihc graces of knowledge,
faith, hope, love, zeal, patience, humility, and joy ; and drawing several
marks from them on like days of humiliation for the greater part. My
dear wife beginning also to draw most certain signs of her own future
happiness after death from several graces.

•'January 19, 1G2S. — Saturday I spent in secret humiliation and fastings,
and finished my whole assui-ance to a belter life, consisting of tiikeb
SCORE and four signs, or marks drawn from several graces. I made some
small alterations in the signs afterwards ; and when I turned them into the
Latin tongue, I enriched the niargcnt with further ^))"oo/^' and authorities.
I found much comfort and rcposedncss of spirit from them, which sliows
the devilish sophisms of the papists, anabaptists, and pseudo-Lutherans,
and profane atheistical men, who say that assurance brings forth presump-
tion, and a careless wicked life. True, when men pretend to the end, and
not use the means.

"My wife joined with me in a private day of fasting, and drew several
sir/ns and marks by my help and assistance, for her assurance to a better
life."

This was an era of religious diaries, particularly among the
nonconformi.sts ; but they were, as we see, used by others.
Of the Countess of Warwick, who died in 1G7S, we are told
that " she kej^t a diary, and took counsel with two persons,
whom she called her souTs friends.'^ She called prayers
heart's ease, for such she found them. " Her own lord, know-
ing her hours of prai/rrs, once conveyed a godly minister into
a secret j^^ace within hearing, who, being a man very able to
judge, much admired her humble fervency ; for in praying
she prayed aloud ; but when she did not with an audible
voice, her sighs and groans might be heard at a good distance
Crom the closet." We are not siirprised to discover tliis

F F 2

436 Vieiv of a Particular Period of the

practice of ivligious diaries among the more puritanic sort :
what thty were we may gather from tliis description of one.
]\Ir. John Janeway " kept a diary, ni whicli he wrote down
every evening what iha frame of his spirit had heen all that
day ; he tooli notice what incomes he had, what 'profit he
received in his spiritual traOic : what returns came from tliat
far country ; what answers of prayer, what deadness and flat-
ness of spirit," &c. And so we find of Mr. John Carter, that
" He kept a day-look and cast up Ids accounts with God every
day."* To sucli worldly notions had they humiliated the
spirit of religion ; and tliis style, and this mode of religion,
has long been continued among us even among men of superior
acquisitions : as witness the " Spiritual Diar}'- and Soliloquies"
of a learned physician within our own times, Dr. Rutty, which
is a great curiosity of the kind.

Such was the domestic state of many well-meaning families ;
they were rejecting with the utmost abhorrence every resem-
blance to what they called the idohitry of Home, wliile, in
fact, the gloom of the monastic cell was settling over the
houses of these melancholy puritans. Private fasts were more
than ever practised ; and a lady, said to be eminent for her
genius and learning, who outlived this era, declared that she
had nearly lost her life tln-ough a prevalent notion that no fat
person could get to heaven ; and thus spoiled and wasted her
body through excessive fastings. A quaker, to prove the text
that " Man shall not live hy bread alone, but by the word of
God," persisted in refusing his meals. The literal text proved
for him a dead letter, and this practical commentator died by
a metaphor. This quaker, however, was not tlie only victim
to the letter of the text ; for the famous Origen, by inter-
preting in too literal a way the 12th verse of the 19th of
St. INlatthew, which alludes to those persons who become
eunuchs for tlie kingdom of heaven, with his own hands
armed himself against himself, as is sufficiently known.
'^ Hetournons a nos moiitons f The parliament afterwards
had both periodical and occasional fasts ; and Charles the
First opposed " the hypocritical fast of every Wednesday in
the month, by appointing one for the second Friday;" the
two unhappy parties, who were hungering and thirsting for
each other's blood, were fasting in spite one against the
otlier !

* " The Lives of Sundry Eminent Persons in tbis Later Age ;" by Samuel
Clarke. Folio, l'J83 A rare volume, with curious portraits.

State of Rvl'uj'ion in our C'n'il JJ'arff. 437

Without inquiriiii^' into tlio ciiuses, oven if \vc tliouglit tluit
we could ascertain thcni, of that rrightful dissolution of reli-
gion which so long prevailed in our country, and of which
the very corruj)tion it has left beliind still breeds in mon-
strous shapes, it will be suHicient to observe that the destruc-
tion of the monarchy and the ecclesiastical order was a moral
earthquake, overturning all minds, and opening all changes.
A theological logomachy was substituted by the sullen and
proud ascetics who ascended into power. These, without
wearying themselves, wearied all others, and triumphed over
each otlier b}' their mutual obscurity. The two great giants
in this theological war were tbo famous Richard Baxter and
Dr. Owen. They both wrote a library of books ; but the
endless controversy between them was the extraordinary and
incomprehensible subject, whether the death of Christ was
solutio eJKsJcm, or onl}' iantundem; that is, whether it was
a payment of the very thing, which b}' law we ouglit to have
paid, or of something held by God to be equivalent. Sucli
was the point on which this debate between Owen and Baxter
lasted without end.

Yet these metaphysical absurdities were harmless, compared
to what was passing among the more hot fanatics, who were
for acting the wild fancies which their melancholy brains
engendered ; men, who from the places into which they had
thrust themselves, might now be called " the higher orders
of society!" These two parties alike sent forth an evil spirit
to walk among the multitude. Every one v/ould become his
own law-maker, and even his own prophet ; the meanest
aspired to give his name to his sect. All things were to be
put in motion according to the St. Vitus's dance of the last
new saint. " Away with the Law ! which cuts oil" a man's
legs and then bids him walk !" cried one from his pulpit.
" Let believers sin as fast as they will, they have a fountain
open to wash them," declared another teacher. "We had the
Uroicnists, from Eobei't Brown, the Vaneists, from Sir Harry
Vane, then we sink down to Mr. Traske, Mr. Wilkinson, Mr.
Robinson, and II. N., or Henry Nicholas, of the Family of
Love, besides Mrs. Hutchinson, and the Grlndletonian family,
who preferred " motions to motives," and conveniently as-
sumed that " their spirit is not to be tried by the Scripture,
but the Scripture by their spirit." Edwards, the author of
" Gangrajna," the adversary of Milton, whose work may still
be preserved for its curiosity, though immortalised by the

438 View of a Particular Period of the

scourge of genius, has furnished a list of about two hundred
of such sects in these times. A divine of the Church of
England observed to a great sectarj^, " You talk of the idolatry
of Home : but each of you, whenever you have made and set
up a calf, will dance about it."*

This confusion of rehgions, if, indeed, these pretended
modes of faith could be classed among religions, disturbed the
consciences of good men, who read themselves in and out of
their vacillating creed. It made, at least, even one of the
puritans tliemselves, who had formerly complained that they
had not enjoyed sufficient freedom under the bishops, cry out
against "this cursed intolerable toleration." And the fact is,
that when the presbyterians had fixed themselves into the
government, they published several treatises against tolera-
tion ! The parallel between these wild notions of reform, and
those of another character, run closely together. About this
time, well-meaning persons, who were neither enthusiasts from
the ambition of founding sects, nor of covering their immo-
rality by their impiety, were infected by the religiosa insania.
One case may stand for many. A Mr. Greswold, a gentleman
of Warwickshire, whom a Brownist had by degrees enticed
from his parish church, was afterwards persuaded to return
to it — but he returned with a troubled mind, and lost in
the prevalent theological contests. A horror of his future
existence shut him out, as it were, fi'om his present one : re-
tiring into his own house, with his children, he ceased to
communicate with the living world. He had his food put in
at the window; and when his children lay sick, he admitted
no one for their relief. His house at length was forced open,
and they found two chikh-en dead, and the Aither confined to
his bed. He had mangled his Bible, and cut out the titles,
contents, and everything but tlie very text itself; for it seems
that he thought that everything human was sinful, and he
conceived that the titles of the books and the contents of
the chapters were to be cut out of the sacred Scriptures, as
having bc^en compcsed b}' men.f

More terrible it was when the insanity, which had hitherto
been more confined to the better classes, burst forth among
the common people. Were we to dwell minutely on this

* Alexander Ross'-s kboilous "View of all Religions" may also be con-
siiUcd with advantage by those who would study this subject.

t " The Ilyi ocritp Discovered and Cured," by Sam. Torshall, 4to. 1614.

state of Rellyion in our Civil Wars. 4-39

perioil, we should start from tlie i)ioture with iiorror: we
might, perhaps, console ourselves with a dishcliefot' its truth;
but the drug, though bitter in the mouth, we must some-
times digest. To observe the extent to which the populaco
can proceed, disfranchised of law and religion, will always
leave a memorable recollection.

What occm-red in the French Ilevolutiun had happened hero
— an age of impiet}' ! Society itself seemed dissolved, for every
tie of private affection and of public duty was unloosened.
Even nature was strangely vit)lated! From the first oi)po-
sition to the decorous ceremonies of the national church, by
the simple puritans, the next stage was that of ridicule, and
the last of obloquy. They began by calling the surplice a
linen rag on the back ; baptism a Christ's cross on a baby's
face ; and the organ was likened to the bellow, the grunt,
and the barking of the respective animals. They actually bap-
tized horses in churches at the fonts ; and the jest of that
day was, that the Ileformation was now a thorough one in
England, since our horses went to church.* St. Paul's cathe-
dral was turned into a market, and the aisles, the communion-
table, and the altar, served for the foulest purposes. f The
liberty which every one now assumed of delivering his own
opinions, led to acts so execrable, that I can find no parallel
for them except in the mad times of the French llevolution.
Some maintained that there existed no distinction between
moral good and moral evil ; and that ever}^ man's actions
were prompted b}' the Creator. Prostitution was professed
as a religious act ; a glazier was declared to be a prophet, and
the woman he cohabited with was said to be ready to lie in of

* There is a paiuplilot which rccorJs a strange fact. "News from
Powles : or the new Refoimatiou of the army, with a true Rehttion of a
Colt that was foaled in the Cathedral Church of St. Paul, in London, and
how it was publiquely baptised, and the name (i)ecause a bald colt) was
called Baal-Kex !" 1(J49. The water they sprinkled from tiie soldier's
helmet on this occasion is described. The same occurred elsewhere. Seo
Foulis's History of the Plots, &c., of our pretended Saints. These men,
•who baptized horses and pigs in the name of the Trinity, sang psalms
■when they marched. One cannot easily comprehend the nature of fana-
ticism, except when we learn that they refused to pay rents !

+ That curious compilation by Pruno Eyves, published in 1046, with
the title " Jfercurius Rusticus, or the conntriu'a comidaint of the barbarous
outrages committed by the secU-uies of this late flourishing kingdon)," fur-
nishes a fearful detail of "sacrileges, profanations, and pluudcrings com-
mitted in the cuthedrali churches."

410 View of a Particular Period of the

the Messiah. A man married his father's wife. Murders of
the most extraordinary nature were occurring- ; one woman
.t!-ucified her mother ; another, in imitation of Abraham, sacri-
ficed her child; we hear, too, of parricides. Amidst the
shuighters of civil wars, spoil and blood had accustomed the
people to contemplate the most horrible scenes. One mad-
man of the many, we find drinking a health on his knees, in
the midst of a town, "to the devil! that it might be said
that his fiimily should not be extinct without doing some
infamous act." A Scotchman, one Alexander Agnew, com-
monly called "Jock of broad Scotland," whom one cannot
call an atheist, for he does not seem to deny the existence of
the Creator, nor a future state, had a shrewdness of local
humour in his strange notions. Omitting some offensive
things, others as strange may exhibit the state to which the
reaction of an hypocritical system of religion had driven the
connnon people. "Jock of broad Scotland" said he was no-
thing in God's common, for God had given him nothing ; he
was no more obhged to God than to the devil ; for God was
\ery greedy. Neither God nor the devil gave the fruits of
the ground ; the wives of the country gave him his meat.
"When asked wherein he believed, he answered, " He believed
in white meal, water, and salt. Christ was not God ; for he
came into the world after it was made, and died as other
men." He declared that " he did not know whether God or
the devil had the greatest power ; but he thought the devil
was the greatest. When I die, let God and the devil strive
for my soul, and let him that is strongest take it." He no
doubt had been taught by the presbytery to mock religious
rites ; and when desired to give God thanks for his meat, he
said, "Take a sackful of prayers to the mill and grind them,
and take your breakfast of them." To others he said,
" I will give you a two-pence, to pray until a boll of meal,
and one stone of butter, fall from heaven through the house
rigging (roof) to you." "When bread and cheese were laid
on the ground by him, he said, " If I leave this, I will long
cry to God before he give it me again." To others he said,
" Take a bannock, and break it in two, and lay down one
half thereof, and you will long pray to God before he w^ill
put the other half to it again !" He seems to have been an
anti-trinitarian. He said he received everything from nature,
which had ever reigned and ever would. He would not con-

Slate of RcH(/io/i in our Civil Wars. 441

form to any religious system, nor name the three Persons, —
" At all these things I have long shaken my cap," he said.
"Jock of hroad Scotland" seems to have been one of those
who imagine that God should have furnished them with ban-
nocks ready baked.

The extravagant fervour then working in the minds of the
people is marked by the story told by Clement Walker of the
soldier who entered a church with a lantern and a candle
burning in it, and in the other hand four candles not lighted.
He said he came to deliver his message from God, and show
it by these types of candles. Driven into the churchyard,
and the wind blowing strong, he could not kindle his candles,
and the new prophet was awkwardly compelled to conclude
liis live denouncements, abolishing the Sabbath, tithes, mi-
nisters, magistrates, and, at last, the Bible itself, without
putting out each candle, as he could not kindle them ; ob-
serving, however, each time — " And here I should put out
the first light, but the wind is so high that I cannot
kindle it."

A perfect scene of the effects which the state of irreligious
society produced among the lower orders I am enabled to
give from the manuscript life of John Shaw, vicar of Kother-
ham ; with a little tediousness, but with infinite naivete, he
relates what ha]>pened to himself This honest divine was
puritanically inclined, but there can be no exaggeration in
these unvarnished facts. He tells a remarkable story of the
state of religious knowledge in Lancashire, at a place called
Cartmel : some of the people appeared desirous of religious
instruction, declaring that they were without any minister,
and had entirely neglected every religious rite, and therefore
pressed him to quit his situation at Lymin for a short period.
He may now tell his own story.

"I fuund a very large spacious church, scarce any seats ia it ; a people
very ignorant, and yet willing to learn ; so as I had frequently some thou-
sands of bearers, I catechised in season and out of season. The churolios
were so thronged at nine in the morning, that I had much ado to get to
the pulpit. One day, an old man about sixty, sensible enough in other
tilings, and living in the parish of Cartmel, coming to me on some busi-
ness, I told him that lie belonged to my care and charge, and I desired to
be informed of his knowledge in religion. I asked him how many (iod.s
there were ? lie said he knew not. I informing liiin, asked again how he
thought to be saved ? lie answered he could not tell. Yet thought that
was a harder question than the other. I told him that the way to sal-
vation was by Jesus Christ, God-man, who as he was man shed his blood

4-l'2 State of Religion in our Cicil IVars, ^c.

for us on the cross, kc. Oli, sir, said ho, I tliink I heard of that man you
speak of once in a plaj' at Kendall, called Corpus-Christ's play,* where
there was a man on a tree and Ijlood run down, &c. And afterwards he
professed he could not remember that he ever heard of salvation Ly Jesus,
but in that play."

The scenes passing in the metropoHs, as well as in the
country, are opened to us in one of the chronicling poems
of George Witliers. Our sensible rhymer wrote in Novem-
ber, 1G52, " a Darke Lanthorne" on the present subject.

After noticing that God, to mortify us, had sent preachers
from the "shop-board and the plough,"

Such as we seem justly to contemn,

As making truths abhorred, which come from them ;

he seems, however, inclined to think that these self-taught
"Teachers and Prophets" in their darkness might hold a
certain light within them :

Children, fools,

Women, and madmen, we do often meet
Preachiug, and threatening judgments in the street,
Yea by strange actions, postures, tones, and cries.
Themselves they oifer to our eai's and eyes

As signs unto this nation.

They act as men in ecstacies have done

Striving their cloudy visions to declare,

Till they have lost the notions which they had,

And want but few degrees of being mad.t

Such is the picture of the folly and of the wickedness,
which, after having been preceded by the piety of a religious
age, were succeeded by a dominion of hypocritical sanctity,
and then closed in all the horrors of immorality and impiety.
The parliament at length issued one of tlieir ordinances for

* The festival of Corpus Christi, held on the first Thursday after Trinity
Sunday, was the period chosen in old times for the performances of
miracle-plays by the clergy, or the guilds of various towns ; for an account
of them see vol. i.p. 352—362.

■f" There is a little " Treatise of Humilitie, published by E. D. — Parson,
Eequestered " — 1654 ; in which, while enforcing the virtue which his book
defend':, he with much naivete gives a strong ojiinion of his oppressors.
"We acknowledge the justice and mercy of the Lord in punishing us, so
we take notice of his wisdom in choosing such instruments to punish us,
tnen of mean and lotv ranh, and of common parts and abilities. By
these he doth admonish all the honourable, valiant, learned, and wise men
of this nation ; and as it were write our sin, in the character of our punish-
ment ; and in the low condition of these instruments of his anger and dis-
pleasure, the rod of his wrath, he would abate and punish our great
pride "

Buckingham's Political Coquetry, i^c. 41o

"punishing blasphemous and execrable ojiinions," and this
was enforced with gn^ater power than tlie slighted proclama-
tions of James and Charles ; but the curious wording is a
comment on our present subject. Tlie preamble notices that
" men and women had lately discovered monstrous opinions,
even such as tended to t/ie dissolution of human society, and
have abused, and turned into licentiousness, the liherti/ (jiven
in matters of relif/ion.'^ It punishes au}^ person not distem-
pered in his brains, who shall maintain any mere creature to
be God ; or that all acts of unrighteousness are not forbidden
in the Scriptures; or that God approves of them; or that
there is no real dillerence between moral good and evil," &c.
To this disordered state was the public mind reduced, for
this proclamation was only describing what was passing
among the people! The view of this subject embraces more
than one point, which I leave for the meditation of the poli-
tician, as well as the religionist.

BUCKINGHAM'S POLITICAL CO(iUETRY WITH THE TURITANS.

BuCKlNGKAW, observes Hume, "in order to foi'lify himself
against the resentment of James" — on the conduct of the
duke in the Spanish match, when James was latterly hearing
ever}'' day Ijuekiiigham against Bristol, and Bristol against
Buckingham — '• had atrected popularity, and entered into the
cabals of the puritans ; but afterwards, being secure of the
conlidence of Charles, he had since abandoned this party; and
on that account was the more exposed to their hatred and
resentment."

The political coquetry of a minister coalescing with an
opposition party, when he was on the point of being dis-
graced, would doubtless open an involved scene of intrigue ;
and what one exacted, and the other was content to yield,
towards the mutual accommodation, might add one more ex-
ample to the large chapter of political infirmity. Both
workmen attempting to convert each other into tools, by
first trying their I'espective malleability on the anvil, are
liable to be disconcerted b}' even a slight accident, whenever
that proves, to perfect conviction, how little they can depend
on each other, and that each party comes to cheat, and not
to be cheated !

This piece of secret history is in part recoverable from

444 Bucki.'i///ta)/i's Political Coquetry

good authority. The two great actors were the Duke of
Buckingham and Dr. Preston, the master of Emnianual Col-
lege, and the head of the puritan part3^

Dr. Preston was an eminent character, who from liis youth
was not without ambition. His scholastic learning, the sub-
tilty of his genius, and his more elegant accomplishments, had
attracted the notice of James, at whose table he was perhaps
more than once honoured as a guest ; a suspicion of his puri-
tanic principles was perhaps the only obstacle to his court
preferment ; yet Preston unquestionably designed to play a
political part. He retained the favour of James by the king's
hope of withdrawing the doctor from the opposition part}'',
and commanded the favour of Buckingham by the fears of
that minister ; when, to employ the quaint style of Hacket,
the duke foresaw that " he might come to be tried in the
furnace of the next sessions of parliament, and he had need
to make the refiners his friends :" most of these " refiners "
were the puritanic or opposition party. Appointed one of the
chaplains of Prince Charles, Dr. Preston had the advantage of
being in frequent attendance ; and as Hacket tells us, " this
politic man felt the pulse of the court, and wanted not the
intelligence of all dark mysteries through the Scotch in his
highness's bed-chamber." A close communication took place
between the duke and Preston, who, as Hacket describes, was
" a good crow to smell carrion." He obtained an easy admis-
sion to the duke's closet at least thrice a week, and their
notable conferences Buckingham appears to have communi-
cated to his confidential friends. Preston, intent on carrying
all his points, skilfully commenced with the smaller ones.
He winded the duke circuitously, — he worked at him subter-
raneously. This wary politician was too sagacious to propose
what he had at heart — the extirpation of the hierarchy ! The
thunder of James's voice, " No bishop ! no king !" in the
conference at Hampton Court, still echoed in the ear of the
puritan. He assured tlie duke that the love of the people
was his only anchor, which could only be secured by the most
popular measures. A new sort of reformation was easy to
execute. Cathedrals and collegiate churches maintained by
vast wealth, and the lands of the chapter, only fed " fat, lazy,
and unprofitable drones." The dissolution of the foundations
of deans and chapters would open an ample source to pay the
king's debts, and scatter tlie streams of patronage. " You
would then become the darling of the commonwealth ;" I

With the Puritans. 445

give the words as I iind lliem in Hacket. " If a crumb stick
in the tliroat of any considerable man that attempts an oppo-
sition, it will be easy to wash it down with manors, woods,
royalties, tythes, &c." It would be furnishiui^ the wants of
a number of gentlemen ; and he quoted a Greek proverb,
" that when a great oak falls, every neighbour mav scufHc for
a faggot."

Dr. Preston was willing to perform the part which Knox
had acted in Scotland ! Pic might have been certain of a
party to maintain this national violation of property ; for he
who calls out " Plunder!" will ever Iind a gang. These acts
of national injustice, so much desired by revolutionists, are
never beneficial to the people ; they never partake of the
spoliation, and tlie whole terminates in the gratification of
private rapacit}'.

It was not, however, easy to obtain such perpetual access to
the minister, and at the same time escape from the watchful.
Archbishop Williams, the lord keeper, got sufficient hints
from the king ; and in a tedious conference with the duke,
he wished to convince him that Preston had only oifered him
"fiitten milk, out of which he should churn nothing!" The
duke was, however, smitten by the new project, and made a
remarkable answer : " You lose yourself in generalities : make
it out to me, in particular, if you can, that the motion you
pick at will find repulse, and be baffled in the House of Com-
mons. I know not how you bishops may struggle, but I am
much deluded if a great part of the knights and burgesses
would not be glad to see this alteration." We are told on
this, that Archbishop Williams took out a list of the mem-
bers of the House of Commons, and convinced the minister
that an overwhelming majority w.iuld oppose this projected
revolution, and that in consequence the duke gave it up.

But this anterior decision of the duke may be doubtful,
since Preston still retained the high f\ivour of the minister,
after the death of James. When James died at Theobalds,
where Dr. Preston happened to be in attendance, he had the
hono\ir of returning to town in the new king's coach witli
the Duke of Buckingham. The doctor's servile adulation of
the minister gave even great oll'enee to tlie over-zealous puri-
tans. That he was at length discarded is certai'A ; but this
was owing not to any deficient subserviency on the side of
our politician, but to one of those unlucky circumstances
'.vhich have often put an end to temporary political cou-

4JG Coke's Exceptions ai/ainst High Sheriff's Oath,

nexions, by enabling- one part}- to discover wbat the other
tliinks of him.

I draw this curious fact from a manuscript narrative in
the handwriting of the learned William Wotton. When the
puritanic party foolishly became jealous of the man who
seemed to be working at root and branch for their purposes,
they addressed a letter to Preston, remonstrating with him
for "his servile attachment to the minister; on which he con-
fidently returned an answer, assuring them that he was as
fully convinced of the vileness and proiligacy of the Duke of
Buckingham's character as any man could be, but that there
was no way to come at him but by the lowest flattery, and
that it was necessary for the glory of God that such instru-
ments should be made use of as could be had ; and for that
reason, and that alone, he showed that respect to the reigning
favourite, and not for any real honour that he had for him.
This letter proved fatal ; some officious hand conveyed it to
the duke ! When Preston came, as usual, the duke took his
opportunity of asking him what he had ever done to disoblige
him, that he should describe him in such black characters to
his own party ? Preston, in amazement, denied the fact, and
poured forth professions of honour and gratitude. The duke
showed him his own letter. Dr. Preston instantaneously
felt a political apoplexy ; the labours of some years were lost
in a single morning. The baffled politician was turned out
of AVallingford House, never more to see the enraged minister !
And from that moment Buckingham wholly abandoned the
puritans, and cultivated the friendship of Laud. This hap-
pened soon after James the First's death. Wotton adds,
" This story I had from one who was extremely well versed
in the secret history of the time."*

SIR EDWARD COKE'S EXCEPTIONS AGAINST THE HIGH
SHERIFF'S OATH.

A cumous fact will show the revolutionary nature of human
events, and the necessity of correcting our ancient statutes,
which so frequently hold out punishments and penalties for
objects which have long ceased to be criminal ; as well as for

* Wotton delivered this niemoraudum to the literary antiquary, Thomas
Baker ; and Kennet transcribed it in his Manuscript Collections. Lans-
downe MSS. No. 932—88. The life of Dr. Preston, in Chalmers's Bio-
grajihical Dictionary, may be consulted with advantage.

Cokeys Exceptions against High Sheriff's Oalh. 447

persons against wlioin it would be barbarous to allow some
''tirepeak'd statute to operate.

When a political stratagem was practised by Charles the
First to keep certain members out oC the House of Commons,
by pricking them down as sherilFs in their dillerent counties,
among them was the celebrated Sir Edward Coke, whom the
government had made High Sherili" for Bucks. It was
necessary, perhaps, to be a learned and practised law^-er to
discover the means he took, in the height of his resentment,
to elude the insult. This great lawyer, who himself, perhaps,
had often administered the oath to the shcrifTs, which had,
century after century, been usual for them to take, to the sur-
prise of all persons drew up Exceptions against the Sheriff's
Oath, declaring that no one could take it. Coke sent his
Exceptions to the attorne^'-gcneral, who, by an immediate
order in council, submitted them to "all the judges of Eng-
land." Our legal luminary had condescended only to some
ingenious cavilling in three of his exceptions ; but the fourth
was of a nature which could not be overcome. All thejudges
of England assented, and declared, that there was one part of
this ancient oath which was perfectly irreligious, and must
ever hereafter be left out ! This article was, " That yow shall
do all your pain and diligence to destroy and make to cease
all manner of heresies, commonly calhjd Lollaries, within your
bailiwick, &c."* The Lollards were the most ancient of pro-
tcstants, and had practised Luther's sentiments ; it was, in
fact, condemning the established religion of the counti'y !
An order was issued from Hampton Court, for the abrogation
of this part of the oath ; and at present all high sheriffs owe
this obligation to the resentment of Sir Edward Coke, for
having been pricked down as Sheriff of Bucks, to be kept out
of parliament ! The merit of having the oath changed, in-
stantcr, he was allowed ; but he was not excused taking it,
after it was accommodated to the conscientious and lynx-eyed
dc-ttrCcion of our enraged lawyer.

* RushwovtU's Ilisturioal L'ullectiuus, vol. i. p. 199.

us

SECRET HISTORY OF CHARLES THE FIRST AND HIS FIgfcT
PARLIAMENTS.

The reigu of Charles the First, succeeded by the Common-
wealth of England, forms a period unparalleled by any jH-e-
ccding one in the annals of mankind. It was for the English
nation the great result of all former attempts to ascertain and
to secure the just freedom of the subject. The prerogative of
the sovereign and the rights of the people were often
imagined to be mutual encroachments, and were long involved
in contradiction, in an age of unsettled opinions and disputed
principles. At length the conflicting parties of monarchy
and democracy, in the weakness of their passions, discovered
how much each required the other for its protector. This age
ofters the finest speculations in human nature ; it opens a
protracted scene of glory and of infamy ; all that elevates,
and all that humiliates our kind, wrestling together, and ex-
piring in a career of glorious deeds, of revolting crimes, and
even of ludicrous infirmities !

The Frencli Eevolution is the commentary of the English ;
and a commentary at times more important than the text
which it elucidates. It has thrown a freshness over the
antiquity of our own history ; and, on returning to it, we seem
to possess the feelings, and to be agitated by the interests, of
contemporaries. The circumstances and the persons which so
manyimagine had passed away, have been reproduced under our
own eyes. In other histories we accept the knowledge of the
characters and the incidents on the evidence of the historian ;
but here we may take them from our own conviction, since
to extinct names and to past events wc can apply the reality
which we ourselves have witnessed.

Charles the First had scarcely ascended the throne ere he
discovered that in his new parliament he was married to a
sullen bride : the youthful monarch, with the impatience of a
lover, warm with hope and glory, was ungraciously repulsed
even in the first favours ! The prediction of his father
remained, like the handwriting on the wall ; but, scate'i
on the throne, Hope was more congenial to youth tlian
Prophecy.

As soon as Charles the First could assemble a parliament,
he addressed them with an earnestness, in which the simplicity
of words and thoughts strongly contrasted with the oratorical

Secret History of Charles the First, ^c. 449

harangues of the late rnonarcli. It cannot be allep^cd against
Charles the First, lluit he preeedcd the parliament in the war
of words. He courted their affections ; and even in this
manner of reception, amidst the dignity of the regal office,
studiously showed his exterior respect by the marked solemnity
of their first meeting. As yet uncrowned, on the day on
wliich he first addressed the Lords and Commons, he wore
his crown, and vailed it at the opening, and on the close of
his speech ; a circumstance to which the parliament had not
been accustomed. Another ceremony gave still greater
solemnity to the meeting ; the king wouM not enter into
business till they had united in prayer. He commanded the
doors to be closed, and a bishop to perform the office. The
suddenness of this unexpected command disconcerted the
catholic lords, of whom the less rigid knelt, and the moderate
stood : there was one startled papist who did nothing but
cross himself!*

The speech may be found in Rushworth ;. the friendly tone
must be shown here.

I hope that you do remember that you were pleased to employ me to
advise my fallior to break off the treaties (with Spain). I came into this
business willingly and freely, like a young man, and consequently rashly ;
but it was by your interest — your engagement. I pray you to remember,
that this being my first action, and begun by your advice and entreaty,
what a great dishonour it were to you and me that it should fail for that
assistance you are able to give me !

This effusion excited no sympathy in the house. They
voted not a seventh part of the expenditure necessary to
proceed with a war, into which, as a popular measure, they
themselves had forced the king.

At Oxford the king again reminded them that he was
engaged in a war " from their desires and advice." He expresses
his disappointment at their insufficient grant, " far short to
set forth the navy now preparing." The speech preserves
the same simplicity.

Still no echo of kindness responded in the house. It was,
however, asserted, in a vague and quibbling manner, that
" though a former parliament did engage the king in a war,
yet, (if things were managed by a contrary design, and the
treasure misemployed) this parliament is not hound by another
parliament:'" and they added a cruel mockery, '"that the
king should help the cause of the Palatinate with his own

* From manuscript letters of the times.
VOL. Til. O O

450 Secret History of Charles the First

tnoneif V — this foolish war, which James and Charles had so
long borne their reproaches for having avoided as hopeless,
but which the puritanic party, as well as others, had con-
tinually virged as necessary for the maintenance of the pro-
testtint cause in Europe.

Still no supplies ! but protestations of duty, and petitions
about grievances, which it had been difficiilt to specify. In
their " Declaration " they style his Majesty " Our dear and
dread sovereign," and themselves " his poor Commons :" but
they concede no point — they offer no aid ! The king was not
3'et disposed to quarrel, though he had in vain pressed for
dispatch of business, lest the season should be lost for the
navy; again reminding them, that "it was i\{Q first request
that he ever made unto thein !" On the pretence of the plague
at Oxford, Charles prorogued pai-liament, with a promise to
reassemble in the winter.

There were a few whose hearts had still a pulse to vibrate
with the distresses of a youthful monarch, perplexed by a war
which they themselves had raised. But others, of a more
republican complexion, rejected " Necessity, as a dangerous
counsellor, which would be always furnishing arguments for
supplies. If the king was in danger and necessity, those
ought to answer for it who have put both king and kingdom
into this peril : and if the state of things would not admit a
redress of grievances, there cannot be so much necessity for
ononeyP

The first parliament abandoned the king!
Charles now had no other means to despatch the army and
fleet, in a bad season, but Ijy borrowing money on privy seals :
these were letters, where the loan exacted was as small as the
style was humble. They specified, " that this loan, without
inconvenience to any, is only intended for the service of the
public. Such private helps for public services which cannot
be deferred," the king premises, had been often resorted to;
but this " being the first time that we have required anything
in this kind, we require but that sum which few men would
deny a friend.^^ As far as I can discover, the highest sum
assessed from great personages was twenty pounds ! The
king was willing to suffer any mortification, even that of a
charitable solicitation, rather than endure the obdurate insults
of parliament ! All donations were received, from ten pounds
to five shillings : this was the mockery of an alms-basket !
Yet with contributions and savings so trivial, and exacted

a7id his First Parliuvicnts. 451

with such a warm appeal to their feehng;s, was the king to
seud out a fleet with ten thousand men — to take Cadiz!

Tiiis expedition, Hke so many simihir attempts :rom the
da3's of Ciiarles the First to tiiose of tlie ^reat Lord Chatham,
and to our own — concluded in a nullity ! Charles, disap-
pointed in this predatory attempt, in despair called his second
parliament — as he says, " in the midst of his necessities — •
and to learn from them how he was to frame hia course and
counsels."

The Commons, as dut(!ously as ever, profess that " No
king was ever dearer to his people, and that they really
intend to assist his majesty in such a way as may make him
safe at home and feared abroad" — but it was to be on con-
dition that he would be graciously pleased to accept " the
information and advice of parliament in discovering the causes
of the great evils, and redress their grievances." The king
accepted this "as a satisfactory answer;" but Charles com-
prehended their drift — " You specially aim at the Duke o.
Buckingham ; what he hath done to change j'our minds I
wot not." The style of the king now first betra3^s angered
feelings ; the secret cause of the uncomplying conduct of the
Commons was hatred of the favourite — but the king saw that
they designed to control the executive government, and he
could ascribe their antipathy to Buckingham but to the
capriciousness of popular favour ; for not long ago he had
heard Buckingham hailed as " their saviour." In the zeal
and firmness of his affections, Charles always considered that
he himself was aimed at in the person of his confidant, his
companion, and his minister !

Some of " the bold speakers," as the heads of the oppo-
sition are frequently designated in the manuscript letters,
have now risen into notice. Sir John Eliot, Dr. Turner, Sir
Dudley Digges, Mr. Clement Coke, poured themselves forth
in a velieinent, not to say seditious style, with invectives
more daring than had ever before thundered in the House of
Commons 1 The king now told theui — " I come to show
your errors, and, as I may call it, unparUamentarij proceed-
ings of parliament.'" The lord keeper then assured them,
that " when tlie irregular humours of some j^ariiciilar per-
sons were settled, the king would hear and answer all just
grievances ; but the king would have them also to know
that he was equally jealous to the contempt of his royal
rights, which his majestv would not sufier to be violated by

G o 2 ■

452 Secret History of Charles the First

ail}' pretended course of parliamentar}'^ liberty. The Icing
considered the parliament as his council ; but there was a
difference between councilling and controlling, and between
liberty and the abuse of liberty." He finished by noticing
their extraordinary proceedings in their impeachment of
Buckingham. The Icing, resuming his speech, remarkably
reproached the parliament —

Now that you have all things according to your wishes, and that I am
so far engaged that you think there is no retreat, noiv you hcgin to set the
dice, and make yoitr own game. But I pray you be not deceived ; it is
not a parliamentary way, nor is it a way to deal with a king. Mr. Cle-
ment Coke told you, " It was better to be eaten up by a foreign enemy
than to be destroyed at home !" Indeed, I think it more honour tor a king
to be invaded and almost destroyed by a foreign enemy than to he despised
iy his own subjects.

The king concluded by asserting his privilege to call or to
forbid parliaments.

The style of " the bold speakers" appeared at least as early
as in April ; I trace their spirit in letters of the times, which
furnish facts and expressions that do not appear in our printed
documents.

Among the earliest of our patriots, and finally the great
victim of his exertions, was Sir John EHot, vice-admiral of
Devonshire. He, in a tone which " rolled back to Jove his
own bolts," and startled even the writer, wdio was himself
biassed to the popular party, " made a resolute, I doubt
whether a timely, speech." He adds Eliot asserted that
" They came not thither either to do what the king should
command them, nor to abstain when he forbade them ; they
came to continue constant, and to maintain their privileges.
They would not give their posterit}' a cause to curse them
for losing their privileges by restraint, which their forefathers
had left them."*

On the 8th of May the impeachment of the duke was
opened by Sir Dudley Digges, who compared the duke to a
meteor exhaled out of putrid matter. He was followed by
Glanville, Selden, and others. On this first day the duke
sat out-facing his accusers and out-braving their accusations,
which the more highly exasperated the house. f On the fol-

* SloaneMSS. 4177. Letter 317.
+ The kinc; had said in his speech to parliament, "I must let you know
I will nut allow any of my servants to be questioned among you, much
less such as are of eminent place, and near unto me ;" hence the security
of Buckingham, who showed the most perfect contempt for the speakers
wl;o thus violently attacked him.

and his First Parliaments. 453

lowing day the duke was absent, when the epilogue to this
mighty piece was ehiborately delivered by Sir Jolm Eliot,
with a force of declamation and a boldness of personal allu-
sion which have not been surpassed in the invectives oi" the
modern Junius.

Eliot, after expatiating on the favourite's ambition in pro-
curing and getting into his hands the greatest ofhces of
strength and power in the kingdom, and the means hy which
he had obtained them, drew a picture of " the inward cha-
racter of the duke's mind." The duke's plurality of offices
reminded him " of a chimerical beast call(;d by tbe ancients
Stellionatus, so blurred, so spotted, so full of foul lines that
they knew not what to make of it ! In setting up himself
he hath set upon the kingdom's revenues, the fountain of
supply, and the nerves of the land. He intercepts, consumes,
and exhausts the revenues of the crown ; and, by emptying
the veins the blood should run in, he hath cast the kingdom
into a high consumption." He descends to criminate the
duke's magnificent tastes ; he who had something of a con-
genial nature ; for Eliot was a man of fine literature. " Infi-
nite sums of money, and mass of land exceeding the value of
money, contributions in parliament have been heaped upon
him ; and how have they been employed ? Upon costly
furniture, sumptuous feasting, and nuignilicent building, the
visible evidence of the express exhausting of the state T'

Eliot eloquently closes —

Your lordships have an idea of the man, what he is in himself, what
in his affections ! You have seen his power, and some, I fear, have felt it.
You have known his practice, and have heard the eflects. Being such,
what is he in reference to king and state ; hew compatible or incompatible
with either ? In reference to the king, he must be styled the canker in liis
treasure ; in reference to the state the moth of all goodness. I ain hardly
find him a parallel ; but none were so like him as Sejanus, who is d'j-
scrilted by Tacitus, Axulax ; swi obtcgens, in alios criminatur ; jiuUc
adulatio et supcrbia. Sejanus's pride was so excessive, as Tacitus saiili,
that he neglected all councils, mixed his business and service with tlie
prince, seeming to confound their actions, and was often styled Imperatoris
laborum socius. Doth not this man the like ? Ask England, Scotland,
and Ireland — and they will tell you ! How lately and how often hath
this man commixed his actions in discourses with actions of the king's !
My lords ! I have done — you see the man 1

The parallel of the duke with Sejanus electrified the house ;
and. as we shall see, touched Charles on a convulsive nerve.

Tlie kino-'s conduct on this speech was the beginning of his
troublco, and the liri,t of his more open alLempts to crush the

454 Secret History of Charles iJie First

popular party. In the House of Lords the king defended the
duke, and informed them, " I have thought fit to take order
for the pimisJnncj some insolent speeches Lately spoken." I
find a piece of secret history enclosed in a letter, with a
solemn injunction that it might he hurnt. " The king tliis
morning complained of Sir John Eliot for comparing the duke
to Sejanus, in which he said implicitly he must intend me
ior Tiberius!'' On that day the prologue and the epilogue
orators — Sir Dudley Digges, who had opened the impeach-
ment against the duke, and Sir John Eliot, who had closed
it — were called out of the house hy two messengers, who
showed their warrants for committing them to the Tower.*

On this memorable day a philosophical politician might
have presciently marked the seed-plots of events, which not
many years afterwards were apparent to all men. The
passions of kings are often expatiated on ; but, in the present
anti-monarchical period, the passions of parliaments are not
imaginable ! The democratic party in our constitution, from
the meanest of motives, from their egotism, their vanity, and
their audacity, hate kings ; they would have an abstract
being, a chimerical sovereign on the throne — like a statue,
the mere ornament of the place it fills, — and insensible, like a
statue, to the invectives they would heap on its pedestal !

The commons, with a fierce spirit of reaction lor the king's
"punishing some insolent speeches," at once sent up to the
lords for the commitment of the duke ! t But when the}"-
learnt the fate of the patriots, they instantaneously brolce up !
In the afternoon they assembled in Westminster-hall, to
interchange their private sentiments on the fate of the two
imprisoned members, in sadness and indignation. ij;

The following day the commons met in their own house.
When the speaker reminded them of the usual business, they

* Our printed historical documents, Kennett, Fraukland, &c., are con-
fused in tlieir details, and facts seem misplaced for want of dates. Thoy
all equally copy Rusliworth, the only source of our history of this period.
Even Hume is involved in the obscurity. The king's speech was on the
eleventh of May. As Rushworth has not furnis-hed dates, it would seem
that the two orators had been sent to the Tower before the Idtnjs speech to
the lords.

+ The king attended the House of Lords to explain his intentions verbally,
taking the minister with him, though under impeachment. "Touching
the matters against him," said the king, "I myself can be a witness to
clear him in every one of them."

J They decided on stopping all busiue^'s till satisfaction was given them,
H'hich ended in the release of Digges and Eliot in a few days.

and his Fir si Parliaments. 455

all cried out, " Sit clown ! sit down ! " They would toucli on
no business till they were " riglited in their liberties ! "* An
open eommittee of the wliole house was formed, and no mem-
ber suffered to quit the house ; but either they were at a loss
how to commenee this solemn conference, or expressed their
indignation by a sullen silence. To soothe and subdue " the
bold speuiiers " was the unfortunate attempt of the vice-
chamberlain. Sir Dudley Carleton, who had long been one of
our foreign and)assadors ; and who, having witnessed the
despotic governments on the continent, imagined that there was
no delieiency of liberty at home. " 1 find," said the vice-cham-
berlain, " by the great silence in this house, that it is a tit time
to be heard, if you will grant me the patience." Alluding to
one of the- king's messages, where it was hinted that, if there
was " no correspondency between him and the parliament, he
should be forced to use new counsels,'^ "1 pray you consider
what these new counsels are, and may be : I fear to deelaro
those I conceive ! " However, Sir Dudley plainly hinted at
them, when he went on observing, that " when monarchs
began to know their own strength, and saw the turbulent
spirit of their parliaments, they had overthrown them in all
Europe, except here only with us." Our old ambassador
drew an amusing picture of the effects of despotic govern-
ments, in that of France — " If VQU knew the subjects in
foreign countries as well as myself, to see them look, not like
our nation, with store of llesh on their backs, but like s«
many ghosts and not men, being nothing but skin and bones,
with some thin cover to their nakedness, and wearing only
wooden shoes on their feet, so that they cannot cat meat, or
wear good clothes, but they must pay the king for it ; this is
a misery beyond expression, and that which we are yet free
from!" A long residence abroad had deprived Sir Dudley
Carleton of any sympathy with the high tone of freedom, and
the proud jealousy of their privileges, which, though yet un-
ascertained, undefined, and .still often contested, was breaking
forth among the commons of England. It was fated that
the celestial sjiirit of our national freedom should not descend
among us in the form of the mystical dove 1

Hume observes on this speech, that " these imprudent sug*

♦ Frankland, an inveterate royalist, in copying Riisliw orth, inserts
"their pretended liberties;" exactly the style of catholic writers when
they mention proleslaiilisni by "la religion pritendue reformcc." All
party writers use the same style !

456 Secret History of Charles the First

gestions rather gave warning than struck terror." It was
evident that the event, which implied " new counsels," meant
what subsequently was y^ractised — the king governing without
a parliament ! As for " the gliosts who wore wooden shoes,"
to which the house was congratulated that they had not yet
heen reduced, they would infer tliat it was the more necessary
to provide against the possibility of such strange apparitions !
Hume truly observes, " The king reaped no further benefit
from this attempt than to exasperate the house still further."
Some words, which the duke persisted in asserting had
dropped from Digges, were explained away, Digges declaring
that they had not been used by him ; and it seems probable
that he was suffered to eat his words. Eliot was made of
"sterner stuff;" he abated not a jot of whatever he had
spoken of " that man," as he affected to call Buckingham.

The commons, whatever might be their patriotism, seem at
first to have been chiefly moved by a personal hatred of the
favourite ; * and their real charges against him amounted to
little more than pretences and aggravations. The king,
whose personal affections were always strong, considered his
friend innocent ; and there was a warm, romantic feature in
the character of the youthful monarch, which scorned to
sacrifice his faithful companion to his own interests, and to
immolate the minister to tlie clamours of the commons.
Subsequently, when the king did this in the memorable case
of the guiltless Strafford, it was the only circumstance which
weiglied on his mind at the hour of his own sacrifice! Sir
Robert Cotton told a friend, on the day on which the king
went down to the house of lords, and committed the two
patriots, that " he had of late been often sent for to the king
and duke, and that the king's affection towards him was very
admirable, and no whit lessened. " Certainly," he added,
" the king will never yield to the duke's fall, being a young
man, resolute, magnanimous, and tenderly and firmly affec-
tionate where he takes." f This authentic character of
Charles the First, by that intelligent and learned man, to
whom the nation owes the treasures of its antiquities, is

* The strength of the popular hatred may be seen in the articles on
Buckingham and Felton in vol. ii. Satires in manuscript abounded, and by
their broad-spoken pungency rendered the duke a perfect 6eie Jioir to the
people.

+ Manuscript letter.

and his First Parliaments. 457

remarkable. Sir Robert Cotton, though holding no rank at
court, and in no respect of the duke's party, was often con-
sulted bv the kiiii^, and much in his secrets. How the king
valued the judgment of this acute and able adviser, acting on
it in direct contradiction and to the mortification of the
favourite, I shall probably have occasion to show.

The commons did not decline in the subtle spirit with
which they had begun ; they covertly aimed at once to sub-
jugate the sovereign, and to e.x])el the minister ! A remon-
strance was prepared against the levying of tonnage and
poundage, whicli constituted half of the crown revenues ; and
a petition, "equivalent to a command," for removing Buck-
ingham from his majesty's person and councils.* The re-
monstrance is wrought up with a high spirit of invective
against " the unbridled ambition of the duke," whom they
class " among those vipers and pests to their king and com-
monwealth, as so expressly styled by your most royal father."
They request that '" he would be pleased to remove this person
from access to his scored presence, and that he would not
balance this one man with all these things, and with the
affairs of the Christian world."

The king hastily dissolved this second parliament ; and
when the lords petitioned for its continuance, he warmly and
angrily exclaimed, " Not a moment longer ! " It was dis-
solved in June, 1G26.

The patriots abandoned their sovereign to his fate, and
retreated home sullen, indignant, and ready to conspire
among themselves for the assumption of their disputed or
their defrauded liberties. They industriously dispersed their
remonstrance, and the king replied by a declaration ; but an
attack is always more vigorous than a defence. The declara-
tion is spiritless, and evidently composed under suppressed
feelings, which, perhaps, knew not how to shape themselves.
The " Remonstrance " was commanded everywhere to be
burnt ; and the effect which it produced on the people we
shall shortly witness.

The king was left amidst the most pressing exigencies. At
the dissolution of the first parliament he had been compelled
to practise a humiliating economy. Hume has alluded to the
numerous wants of the young monarch ; but he certainly was

* Rushvrorlli, i. 400. Hume, vi. 221, who enters widely iuto tha
views aud feeliugs ii CharleB.

458 Secret History of Charles the First

not acquainted with the king's extreme necessities. His coro-
nation seemed rather a private than a public ceremony. To
save the expenses of the procession from the Tower throuo-h
the city to Whitehall, that customary pomp was omitted;
and the reason alleged was " to save the charge for more
noble undertakings!" that is, for means to carry on the
Spanish war without supplies ! But now the most extraor-
dinary changes appeared at court. The king mortgaged his
lands in Cornwall to the aldermen and companies of London.
A rumour spread that the small pension list must be revoked ;
and the royal distress was carried so far, that all the tables at
court were laid down, and the courtiers put on board-wages !
I have seen a letter which gives an account of " the funeral
supper at Whitehall, whereat twenty-three tables were buried,
being from henceforth converted to board-wages ;" and there
I learn, that "since this dissolving of house-keeping, his
majesty is but slenderly attended." Another writer, who
describes himself to be only a looker-on, regrets, that while the
men of the law spent ten thousand pounds on a single masque,
they did not rather make the king rich; and adds, " I see a
rich commonwealth, a rich people, and the crown poor!"
This strange poverty of the court of Charles seems to have
escaped the notice of our general historians. Charles was
now to victual his fleet with the savings of the board-wages !
for this "surplusage" was taken into account!

The fatal descent on the Isle of Rhe sent home Bucking-
ham discomfited, and spread dismay through the nation. The
best blood had been shed from the wanton bravery of an
unskilful and romantic commander, who, forced to retreat,
would march, but not fly, and was the very last man to quit
the ground which he could not occupy. In the eagerness of
his hopes, Buckingham had once dropped, as I learn, that
" before Midsummer he should be more honoured and beloved
by the commons than ever was the Earl of Essex:" and thus
he rocked his own and his master's imagination in cradling
fancies. This volatile hero, who had felt the capriciousness
of popularity, thought that it was as easily regained as it was
easily lost ; and that a chivalric adventure would return to
him that favour which at this moment might have been
denied to all the wisdom, the policy, and the arts of an expe-
rienced statesman.

The king was now involved in more intricate and desperate

and his First Parliaments. 450

measures ; and tlie iKitiou was thrown into a state of agita-
tion, of which the page of popular history yields but a faint
impression.

The spirit of insurrection was stalking forth in the metro-
])olis and in the country. The scenes which I am about to
describe occurred at the close of 1G2G : an inattentive reader
miglit easily mistake them for the revolutionary scenes of
IGIO. It was an unarmed rebellion.

An army and a navy had returned unpaid, and sore with
defeat. The town was scoured by mutinous seamen and
soldiers, roving even into the palace of the sovereign. Soldiers
without pay form a society without laws. A band of captains
rushed into the duke's apartment as he sat at dinner ; and
when reminded by the duke of a late proclamation, forbidding
all soldiers coming to court in troops, on pain of hanging,
the}' replied, that " Whole companies were read\' to be hanged
with them ! that the king miglit do as he pleased with their
lives; for that their reputation was lost, and their honour for-
feited, for want of their salary to pay their debts." When a
petition was once presented, and it was inquired who was the
composer of it, a vast bod}^ tremendously shouted " All ! all !"
A multitude, composed of seamen, met at Tower-hill, and set
a lad on a scaffold, who, with an "O yes!" proclaimed that
King Charles had promised their pay, or the duke had been
on the scailnld himself! These, at least, were grievances
more apparent to the sovereign than those vague ones so
perpetually repeated by his unfaithful commons. But what
remained to be done ? It was only a choice of difficulties
between the disorder and the remedy. At the moment, the
duke got up what he called " The council of the sea;" was
punctual at its fn-st meeting, and appointed three days in
a week to sit — but broke his appointment the second day —
they found him alwavs cV.iciwisc engaged ; and " the council
of the sea" turned out to be one of those shadowy expedients
which only lasts while it acts on the imagination. It is said
that thirty thousand pounds would have quieted these disor-
ganised troops ; but the exchequer could not supply so mean
a sum. Ijuckingham in despair, and ])rofuse of life, was plan-
ning a fresh expedition for the siege of Koehelle ; a new army
was required. He swore, "if there was money in the king-
dom it should be had!"

!Now began that series of contrivances, and artifices, and

460 Secret History of Charles the First

persecutions to levy money. Forced loans, or pretended free-
gifts, kindled a resisting spirit. It was urged by the coui't
party, that the sums required were, in fact, much less in
amount than the usual grants of subsitlies ; but the cry, in
return for "a subsidy," was always "a Parliament!" Many
were heavily fined for declaring that " they knew no law,
besides that of Parliament, to compel men to give away their
own goods." The king ordered that those who would not
subscribe to the loans should not be forced ; but it seems
there were orders in council to specify those householders'
names who would not subscribe ; and it further appears that
tliose who would not pay in purse should in person. Those
who were pressed were sent to the depot ; but either the sol-
diers would not receive these good citizens, or they found easy
means to return. Every mode which the government invented
seems to have been easily frustrated, either b}' the intrepidity
of the parties themselves, or by that general understanding
which enabled the people to play into one another's hands.
When the common council had consented that an imposition
should be laid, the citizens called the Guildhall the Yield-all !
And whenever they levied a distress, in consequence of a
refusal to pay it, nothing was to be found but " Old ends,
such as nobody cared for." Or if a severer officer seized on
commodities, it was in vain to offer pennyworths where no
customer was to be had. A wealthy merchant, who had for-
merly been a cheesemonger, was summoned to appear before
the privy council, and required to lend the king two hundred
pounds, or else to go himself to the army, and serve it with
cheese. It was not supposed that a merchant, so aged and
wealthy, would submit to resume his former mean trade ; but
the old man, in the spirit of the times, jireferred the hard
alternative, and balked the new project of finance, by ship-
ping himself with his cheese. At Hicks's Hall the duke and
the Earl of Dorset sat to receive the loans ; but the duke
threatened, and the earl affected to treat witli levity, men
who came before them with all the suppressed feelings of
popular indignation. The Earl of Dorset asking a fellow who
pleaded inability to lend money, of what trade he was, and
being answered "a tailor," said: "Put down your name for
such a sum ; one snip will make amends for all !" The tailor
quoted scripture abundantly, and shook the bench with
laughter or with rage by his anathemas, till he was put fast
into a messenger's hands. This was one Ball, renowned

and his First Parliaments. 461

through tlie jiarish ol' St. Clement's ; and not only a tailor,
but a i)roij]iet. Twenty years after, tailors and prophets em-
ployed messengers themselves!*

These are instanees drawn from the inferior classes of
society ; but the same spirit actuated the country gentlemen :
one instance represents many. George Gatesby, of North-
amptonshire, being committed to prison as a loan-recusant,
alleged, among other reasons for his non-compliance, that
'• he considered that this loan might become a precedent ;
and that every precedent, he was told by the lord president,
was a llower of the prerogative." The lord president told
him that " he lied !" Gatesby shook his head, observing, " I
come not here to contend with your lordship, but to sutler!"
Lord Sutfolk then interposing, entreated the lord president
would not too far urge his kinsman, ]Mr Gatesby. This
country gentleman waived any kindness he might owe to
kindred, declaring, that " he would remain master of his own
purse." The prisons were crowded with these loan-recusants,
as well as with those who had sinned in the freedom of their
opinions. The country gentlemen insured their popularity
by their committals ; and many stout resisters of the loans
were returned in the ibllowing parliament against their own
wishes.t The friends of these knights and country gentle-

* The Radicals of that day differed from ours in the means, though not
in the end. They at least referred to their Bibles, and rather more than
was required ; but superstition is as mad as atheism ! Many of the puri-
tans confused their brains with the study of the Revelations ; believing
Prince Henry to be prefigured in the Apocalypse, some prophesied that he
should overthrow "the beast." Ball, our tailor, was this very prophet ;
and was so honest as to believe in his own prophecy. Osborn tells, that
Ball put out money on adventure ; i. e., to receive it back double or treble,
when King James should be elected pope ! So that though he had no
money for a loan, he had to spare for a prophecy.

This Ball has been confounded with a more ancient radical. Ball, a
priest, and a principal mover in Wat Tyler's insurrection. Our Ball niust
have been very notorious, for Jonson has noticed his " admi'.^ dis-
courses." Mr. Gifford, without any knowledge of my account of this
tailor-prophet, by his active sagacity has rightly indicated him. — See Jon-
son's Works, vol. V. p. 241.

t It is curious to observe that the Westminster elections, in the fourth
year of Charles's reign, were e.xactly of the same turbulent cliaracler as
those which wc witness in our days. The duke had counted by his inte-
rest to bring in Sir Robert Pye. The contest was severe, but accompanied
by some ofthose ludicrous electioneering scenes which still amuse the
mob. Whenever Sir Kobert Bye's party cried—" A Bye ! a Pye ! a Pye !"
the adverse parly would cry — " A pudding ! a pudding ! a pudding !" and
others — "A lie ! a lie ! a lie !" This Westminster election of two hun-

463 Secret History of Chai Its the First

men flocked to their prisons ; and when thej petitioned for
more liberty and air during the summer, it was policy tc
grant their request. But it was also policy that they should
not reside in their own counties : this relaxation was only
granted to those who, living in the south, consented to
sojourn in the north ; while the dwellers in the north were
to be lodged in the south !

In the country the disturbed scenes assumed even a more
alarming appearance than in London. They not only would
not provide money, but when money was oflPered by goveru-
ment, the men refused to serve ; a conscription was not then
known : and it became a question, long debated in the privy
council, whether those who would not accept press-money
should not be tried by martial law. I preserve in the note a
curious piece of secret information.* The great novelty and
s^miptomof the times wasthescattering of letters. Sealedletters,
addressed to the leading men of the country, were found
hanging on bushes; anonymous letters were dropped in shops
and streets, which gave notice that the day was fast approach-
ing when '■ Such a work was to be wrought in England as
never was the like, which will be for our good." Addresses
multiplied " To all true-hearted Englishmen !" A groom
detected in spreading such seditious papers, and brought into
the inexorable Star-chamber, was fined three thousand pounds !
The leniency of the punishment was rather regretted by two

dred years ago ended as we have seen some others ; they rejected all who
had urged the payment of the loans ; and, passing by such men as Sir
Robert Cotton, and their last representative, they fixed on a brewer and a
grocer for the two members fur ^Vestminster.

* Extract from a manuscript letter : — "On Friday last I hear, but as a
secret, that it was debated at the council-table whether our Essex men,
who refused to take press-money, should not be punished by martial-law,
and hanged up on the next tree to their dwellings, fur an example of terror
to others. My lord keeper, who had been long silent, when, in conclusion,
it came to his course to speak, told the lords, that as far as he understood
the law, noiic were liable to martial law but martial men. If these had
taken press-money, and afterwards run from their colours, they might then
be punished in that manner ; but yet they were no soldiers, and refused to
be. Secondly, he thought a subsidy, new by law, could not be pressed
against his will for a foreign service ; it being supposed, in law, the service
of his purse excused that of his person, unless his own country were in
danger ; and he appealed to my lord treasurer, and my lord president,
•whether it was not so, who both assented it was so, though some of them
faintly, as unwilling to have been urged to such an answer. So it is
thought that proposition is dashed ; and it will be tried what may be done
in the Star-chamber against these refractories."

and his First Parliaments. 403

bishops ; if it was ever carried into execution, the unhappy
man must have remained a groom who never after crossed a

horse !

There is one difficult duty of an historian, which is too
oiteu passed over by the party-writer ; it is to pause when-
ever he feels himself warmini,' with the passions of the mul-
titude, or becoming the blind apologist of arbitrary power.
An historian must transform himself into the characters
which he is representing, and throw himself back into the
times which he is opening ; possessing himself of their feelings
and tracing their actions, he may then at least hope to dis-
cover trutlis which may equally interest the honourable men
of all parties.

This reflection has occurred from the very difficulty into
which 1 am now brought. Sliall we at once condemn the
king for these arbitrary measures ? It is, however, very
possible that they were never in his contemplation ! Involved
in inextricable difficulties, according to his feelings, he was
betrayed by parliament ; and he scorned to barter their favour
by that vulgar traffic of treachery — the immolation of the
single victim who had long attached his personal affections ;
a man at least as much envied as hated! that hard lesson had
not yet been inculcated on a Britisli sovereign, that his bosom
must be a blank for all private atiection ; and had that lesson
been taught, the character of Charles was destitute of all
aptitude for it. To reign without a refractory parliament,
and to find among the people tliemselves subjects more loyal
than their representatives, was an experiment — and a fatal
one ! Under Charles, the liberty of tlie subject, when the
necessities of the state pressed on the sovereign, was matter
of discussion, disputed as often as assumed ; the divines were
proclaiming as rebellious those who refused their contributions
to aid the government ;* and the law-sages alleged precedents

* A member of the house, in James the First's time, called this race of
divines "Spaniels to the court and wolves to the people." Dr. Main-
■waring, Dr. Sibiiiorpe, and Dean Baryrave were S';eking fur ancient pre-
cedents to uiaintiiin absolute monarchy, and to inculcate passive obedience.
13argrave had this passage in his sermon : " It was the speech of a man
renowned for wisdom in our aw, that if he were commanded to put
forth to sea in a ship that had neither mast nor lacklini;, ho would do it :"
and being asked what wisdom that were, replied, " The wisdom must be
in him that hath power to command, not in him that conscience binds to
obey." Sibthorpe, after he published his sermon, immediately had hia
Louse burnt down. J>r. Mainwariug, s;iys a manuscript letter-writer.

464 Secret History of Charles the First

for raising supplies in the manner which Charles had adopted
S(-'lden, whose learned industry was as vast as the amplitude
of his mind, had to seek for the freedom of the subject in the
dust of the records of the Tower — and the omnipotence of
parliaments, if any human assembly may be invested with
such supernatural greatness, had not yet awakened the hoar
antiquity of popular liberty.

A general spirit of insurrection, rather than insurrection
itself, had suddenly raised some strange appearances through
the kingdom. "The remonstrance" of parliament had un-
questionably quickened the feelings of the people ; but yet
the lovers of peace and the reverencers of royalty were not a
few ; money and men were procured to send out the army
and the tleet. More concealed causes may be suspected to
have been at work. Many of the heads of the opposition
were pursuing some secret machinations ; about this time I
find many mysterious stories — indications of secret societies —
and other evidences of the intrigues of the popular party.

Little matters, sometimes more important than they
appear, are suitable to our minute sort of history. In
November, 1626, a rumour spread that the king was to be
visited by an ambassador from " tlie President of the Society
of the lios^'cross." He was indeed an heteroclite ambas-
sador, for he is described " as a youth with never a hair on
his face;" in fact, a child who was to conceal the mysterious

" sent the other day to a friend of mine, to help him to all the ancient
precedents he could find, to strengthen his opini(jn (for absolute monarchy),
who answered him he could help him in nothing but only to hang him, and
that if he lived till a parliament, or, &c. , he should be sure of a halter."
Mainwaring afterwards submitted to parliament ; but after the dissolution
got a free pardon. The panic of popery was a great evil. The divines,
under Laud, appeared to approach to Catholicism ; but it was probably
only a project of reconciliation between the two churches, which Eliza-
beth, James, and Charles equally wished. Mr. Cosins, a letter-writer, is
censured for " superstition" in this bitter style : " Mr. Cosins has impu-
dently made three editions of his prayer-book, and one which he gives
away in private, different from the published ones. An audacious fellow,
■whom my Lord of Durham greatly admireth. I doubt if he he a sound
protestant : he was so blind at even-song on Candlemas-day, that he could
not see to read prayers in the minster with less than three hundred and
forty candles, whereof sixty he caused to be placed about the high altar ;
besides he caused the picture of our Saviour, supported by two angels, to
be set in the choir. The committee is very hot against him, and no matter
(f they trounce him." This was Cosins, who survived the revolution, and
returning with Charles the Second, was raised to the see of Durham : thft
charitable institutions he has left are most munificent.

and his First Parliaments. 465

/*?rsonage which he was for a moment to represent. He
appointed Sunday afternoon to come to court, attended by
thirteen coaches. He was to proffer to his majesty, provided
the king accepted his advice, tliree milhons to jjut into liis
coffers ; and by his secret councils lie was to unfold matters
of moment and secrecy. A Latin letter was delivered to
"David Ramsey of the clock," to hand over to the king : a
copy of it has been preserved in a letter of the times ; but it
is so unmeaning, that it could have had no effect on the king,
who, however, declared that he would not admit him to an
audience, and that if he could tell where " the President of
the llosy cross" was to be found, unless he made good his
offer, he would hang him at the court-gates. This served the
town and country for talk till the appointifl Sunday liad
passed over, and no ambassador was visible ! Some considered
this as the plottin ■; of crazy brains, but others imagined it to
be an attempt to speak with the king in private, on matters
respecting the duke.

There was also discovered, by letters received from Rome,
"a whole parliament of Jesuits sitting" in "a fair-hanged
vault" in Clerkenwell.* Sir John Cooke would have alarmed
the parliament, that on St. Joseph's day these were to have
occupied their places ; ministers are supposed sometimes to
have conspirators for "the nonce;" Sir Dudley Digges, in
the opposition, as usual, would not believe in any such poli-
tical necromancers ; but such a part}' were discovered ; Cooke
would have insinuated that the French ambassador had pei'-
suaded Louis that the divisions between Charles and his
people had been raised by his ingenuity, and was rewarded
lor the intelligence ; this is not unlikely. After all, the par-
liament of Jesuits might have been a secret college of the
order ; for, among other things seized on, was a considerable
library.

Wlien the parliament was sitting, a sealed letter was thrown
under the door, with this superscription, Cursed he the man
that Jinds this letter, and delivers it not to the House of
Commons. The Serjeant-at-Arms delivered it to the Speaker,
who would not open it till the house had chosen a committee
of twelve members to inform them whether it was fit to be
read. Sir Edward Coke, after having read two or three lines,
stopped, and according to my authority, " dui-s't read no fur-

* llu.sLwoilL's Collections, i. oil.
YOL. HI. u u

466 Secret History of Charles the First

ther, but immediately sealing it, the committee thought fit
to send it to the king, who they say, on reading it througli.
ea^fc it into the fire, and sent the House of Commons thanks
lov their wisdom in not publishing it, and for the discretion
of the committee in so far tendering his honour, as not to
read it out, when they once perceived that it touched his
majesty."*

Others, besides the freedom of speech, introduced another
form, "A speech without doors," which was distributed to
the members of the house. It is in all respects a remarkable
one, occupying ten folio pages iu the first volume of Kush-
worth.

Some in office appear to have employed extraordinary pro-
ceedings of a similar nature. An intercepted letter written
from the archduchess to the King of Spain, was delivered by
Sir H. Martyn at the council-board on New Year's-day, who
found in it some papers relating to the navy. The duke
immediately said he would show it to the king ; and, accom-
panied by several lords, went into his majesty's closet. The
letter was written iu French ; it advised the Spanish court
to make a sudden war with England, for several reasons ; his
majesty's want of skill to govern of himself; the weakness
of his council in not daring to acquaint him with the truth ;
want of money ; disunion of the subjects' hearts from their
prince, &c. The king only observed, that the writer forgot
that the archduchess writes to the King of Spain in Spanish,
and sends her letters overland.

I have to add an important fact. I find certain evidence
that the heads of the opposition were busily active in thwart-
ing the measures of government. Dr. Samuel Turner, the
member for Shrewsbury, called on Sir John Cage, and desired
to speak to him privately ; his errand was to enti'eat him to
resist the loan, and to use his power with others to obtain
this purpose. The following information comes from Sir
John Cage himself. Dr. Turner " being desired to stay, he

* I deliver this fact as I find it in a private letter ; but it is noticed in
the Journals of the House of Commons, 23 Junii, 4°. Caroli Regis. "Sir
Edward Coke reporteth that they find that, enclosed in the letter, to be
unfit for any subject's ear to hear. Read but one line and a half of it, and
could noi ei.dare to read more of it. It was ordered to be sealed and de-
liveieij nl: lie king's hands by eight members, and to acquaint his ma-
jesty with the place and time of finding it ; particularly that upon the
reading uX one line and a half at most, they would read no more, but
sealed 3t up, "ud brought it U the House."

and his First Parliaments. 467

would not a minato, but instantly took horse, saying he had
more i)lacos to go to, and time pressed ; that there was a
company of them had divided them.selves into all parts, every
one having had a quarter assigned to him, to •perform this
service for the coinmonicealth.'" This was written in Novem-
ber, 1G2G. This unquestionably amounts to a secret confe-
deracy watching out of parliament as well as in ; and those
strange appearances of popular defection exhibited in the
country, which I have described, were in great part the con-
sequences of the machinations and active intrigues of the
popular party,*

The king was not disposed to try a third parliament. The
favourite, perhaps to regain that popular favour which his
greatness had lost him, is said in private letters to have been
twice on his knees to intercede for a new one. The elections,
however, foreboded no good ; and a letter-writer connected
with the court, in giving an account of them, prophetically
declared, " we are without question undone !"

The king's speech opens witli the spirit which he himself
felt, but which he could not communicate: —

"The times are for action : wherefore, for example's sake, I mean not
to spend much time in words ! If you, which God forbid, should not do
your duties in contributing what the state at this time needs, I must, in
discharge of my conscience, use those other means\yh\ch. God hath put into
my hands, to save that, which the follies of some particular men may
otherwise hazard to lose." lie added, with the loftiness of ideal majesty —
" Take not this as a threatening, for I scorn to threaten any but my
equals ; but as an admonition from him, that, both out of nature and
duty, hath most care of your preservations and prosperities :" and iu a
more friendly tone he requested them " To remember a thing to the end
that we may forget it. You may imagine that I come here with a doubt
of success, remembering tiie distractions of the last meeting ; but I assure
you that I shall very easily forget and forgive what is past."

A most crowded house now met, composed of the wealthiest
men ; for a lord, who probably considered that property was
the true balance of power, estimated that tliey were able to
buy the upper-house, his majesty only excepted ! The aris-
tocracy of wealth had already begun to be felt. Some ill
omens of the parliament appeared. Sir liobert Phihps moved
for a general fast : " we had one for the plague which it
pleased God to deliver us from, and we have now so many

* I have since discovered, by a manuscript letter, that this Dr. Turner
•was held in contempt by the king ; that he was ridiculed at court, which
he haunted, fur his want of veracity ; in a word, that he was a disap-
pointed courtier !

u ii2

468 Secret History of Charles the First.

plagues of the commonwealth about his majesty's person,
that we have need of such an act of humiliation." Sir
Edward Coke held it most necessary, " because there are, I
fear, some devils that will not be cast out but by fasting and
prayer."

Many of the speeches in " this great council of the king-
dom " are as admirable pieces of composition as exist in the
language. Even the court-party were moderate, extenuating
rather than pleading for the late necessities. But the evil
spirit of party, however veiled, was walking amidst them all :
a letter-writer represents the natural state of feelings : " Some
of the parliament talk desperately ; while others, of as high
a course to enforce money if they yield not!" Such is
the perpetual action and reaction of public opinion ; when
one side will give too little, the other is sure to desire too
much !

The parliament granted subsidies. — Sir John Cooke having
brought up the report to the king, Charles expressed great
satisfaction, and declared that he felt now more happ3' than
any of his predecessors. Inquiring of Sir John by how many
voices he had carried it? Cooke replied, " But by one!" —
at which his majesty seemed appalled, and asked how many
were against him ? Cooke answered, " None ! the unanimity
of the House made all but one voice /" at which his majesty
wept !* If Charles shed tears, or as Cooke himself expresses
it, in his report to the House, " was much aifected," the
emotion was profound : for on all sudden emergencies Charles
displayed an almost unparalleled command over the exterior
violence of his feelings.

The favourite himself sympathised with the tender joy of
his royal master ; and, before the king, voluntarily offered
himself as a peace-sacrifice. In his speech at the council-
table, he entreats the king that he, who had the honour to be
his majesty's favourite, might now give up that title to
them. — A warm genuine feeling probably prompted these
words : —

"To open my heart, please to pardon me a word more ; I must confess
i Lave long lived in pain, sleep liath given me no rest, favours and fortune
no conieat ; such have been my secret sorrows, to be thought the man of
stiaration, and that divided the king from his people, and them from

* This circumstance is mentioned in a manuscript letter ; what Cook©
declared to the House is in llushworlh, vol. i. p. [)2j.

and his First Parliaments. 4 GO

him ; but I hope it shall appear tliey were some mistaken minrls t!i;it
would have made me the evil spirit that walketh between a good master
and a loyal people."*

Bufkin<,'liam addctl, that for the good of his country lie
was willing to sacrifice his honours ; and since his plurality
of offices had heen so strongly exce[)ted against,t that he was
content to give up the Master of the Horse to Marquess
Hamilton, and the Warden of the Cinque Ports to the Earl
of Carlisle ; and was willing that the parliament should ap-
point another admiral for all services at sea.

It is as certain as human evidence can authenticate, that
on the king's side all was grateful affection ; and that on
Buckingham's there was a most earnest desire to win the
favours of parliament ; and what are stronger than all human
evidence, those unerring principles in human nature itself,
which are the secret springs of the heart, were working in the
hreastsof the king and his minister; for neither were tyrannical.
The king undoubtedly sighed to meet parliament with the love
which he had at first professed ; he declared that " he should
now rejoice to meet with his people often." Charles had no
innate tyranny in his constitutional character ; and Bucking-
ham at times was susceptible of misery amidst his greatness,
as I have elsewhere shown. J It could not have been
imagined that the luckless I'avourite, on the present occasion,
should have served as a pretext to set again in motion the
chaos of evil ! Can any candid mind suppose that the king
or the duke meditated the slightest insult on the patriotic
party, or would in the least have disturbed the apparent
reconciliation ! Yet it so happened ! Secretary Cooke, at the
close of his report of the king's acceptance of the subsidies,
mentioned that the duke had I'ervently beseeched the king to
grant the house all their desires ! Perhaps the mention of the
duke's name was designed to ingratiate him into their
toleration.

Sir John Eliot caught fire at the very name of the duke,
and vehemently checked the secretary for having dared to

* I refer the critical student of our history to the duke's speech at the
council-table as it appears in Rushworth, i. 525 : but whut I add respect-
ing his personal sacridces is from manuscript letters. Sloane MSS. 4177.
Letter 490, kc.

"t" On this subject, see note to the brief article on Buckingham in vol. i.

X Curiosities of Literature, First Series, vol. iii. p. 43S, ud. 1817 ; vol.
V. p. 277, ed. 1823 ; vol. iii. p. 429, ed. 1S24 ; vol. iv. p. 148 ed.
1834 ; p. 301, ed. 1840, or vol. ii. p. 357, of this edition.

470 Secret History of Charles the First

introduce it ; declaring, that " they knew of no other dis-
tinction but of king and subjects. By intermingling a sub-
ject's speech with the king's message, he seemed to derogate
from the honour and majesty of a king. Nor would it
become any subject to bear himself in such a fashion, as if no
grace ought to descend from the king to the people, nor any
loyalty ascend from the people to the king, but through him
only."

This speech was received by many with acclamations ;
some cried out, " Well spoken, Sir John Eliot !"* It marks
the heated state of the political atmosphere, where even
the lightest coruscation of a hated name made it burst into
flames !

I have often suspected that Sir John Eliot, by his vehe-
ment personality, must have borne a personal antipathy to
Buckingham. I have never been enabled to ascertain the
fact ; but I find that he has left in manuscript a collection of
satires, or Verses, being chiefly invectives against the Duke
of Buckingham, to whom he bore a bitter and most inveterate
enmity. Could we sometimes discover the motives of those
who first head political revolutions, we should find how greatly
personal hatreds have actuated them in deeds which have come
down to us in the form of patriotism, and how often the
revolutionary spiiit disguises its private passions by its public
conduct.f

* I find tliis speecL, and an account of its reception, in manuscript let-
ters ; tbe fragment in Rushworth contains no part of it. I. 626. Sloaue
MSS. 4177. Letter 490, &c.

+ Modern history would afford more instances than perhaps some of us
suspect. I cannot pass over an illustration of my principle, which I shall
take from two very notorious politicians — Wat Tyler and Sir William
Walworth !

Wat, when in servitude, had been beaten by his master, Richard Lyons,
a great merchant of wines, and a sheriif of London. This chastisement,
working on an evil disposition, appears never to have been forgiven ; and
when this Radical assumed his short-lived dominion, he had his old master
beheaded, and his head carried before him on the point of a spear ! So
Grafton tells us, to tbe eternal obloquy of this arcb-jacobin, who "was a
crafty fellow, and of an excellent wit, but wanting grace." I would not
sully the patriotic blow which ended the rebellion with the rebel ; yet
there are secrets in history ! Sir William Walworth, " the ever famous
mayor of London," as Stowe designates him, has left the immortality of
his name to one of our suburbs; but having discovered in Stowe's "Survey,"
that Walworth was the landlord of the stews on the Bank-side, which he
farmed out to the Dutch vrows, and which Wat had pulled down, I am
inclined to suspect that private feeling first knocked down the saucy ribald,

and Ms First Parliaments. A7\

"But the supplies, which liad raised tears from the fervent
gratitude of Charles, thougli voted, were yet withheld. They
resolved that ^jrievances and supplies j^o hand in hand. The
commons eiitered dee])l\' into constitutional points of the
highest magnitude. The curious erudition of Selden and
Coke was comljined with the ardour of patriots who merit no
inferior celebrity, though not having consecrated their names
by their laborious literature, we only discover them in the
obscure annals of parliament. To our history, composed by
writers of different principles, I refer the reader for the argu-
ments of lawyers, and the spii-it of the commons. My secret
history is only its supplement.

The king's prerogative, and the subject's liberty, were
points hard to distinguish, and were established but by con-
test. Sometimes the king imagined that " the house pressed
not upon the abuses of power, but only upon power itself."
Sometimes the commons doubted whether they had anything of
their own to give ; while their property and their persons
seemed equally insecure. Despotism seemed to stand on one
side, and Faction on the other — Liberty trembled !

The conference of the commons before the lords, on the
freedom and person of the subject, was admirably conducted
by Selden and by Coke. When the king's attorney affected
to slight the learned arguments and precedents, pretending to
consider them as mutilated out of the records, and as proving
rather against the conuiions than for them. Sir Edward Coke
rose, affirming to the house, upon his skill in the law, that
" it lay not under Mr. Attorney's cap to answer any one of
their arguments." Selden declared that he had written out
all the records from the Tower, the E.xchequer, and the King's
Bench, with his own hand ; and " would engage his head, Mr.
Attorney should not find in all these archives a single prece-
dent omitted." Mr. Littleton said, that he had examined
every one syllabatim, and whoever said they were mutilated
spoke false ! Of so ambiguous and delicate a nature was tiieu
the liberty of the subject, that it seems they considered it t«
depend on precedents !

A startling message, on the 12th of April, was sent by the
king for despatch of business. The house, struck with
astonishment, desired to have it repeated. They remained sad

and then thrust him through and through with his dagger ; aud that there
was as much of pers uial voiigeauce as puti'iutism, which cru.shed the de-
Bjolisher of so much valuable property !

472 Secret History of Charles the First

and silent. No one cared to open the debate. A whimsical
pohtician, Sir Francis Nethersole,* suddenly started up,
entreating leave to tell his last night's dream. Some laughing
at him, he observed, that " kingdoms had been saved by
dreams!" Allowed to pi'oceed, he said, "he saw two good
pastures ; a flock of sheep was in the one, and a bell-wether
alone in the other ; a great ditch was between them, and a
narrow bridge over the ditch."

He was interrupted by the Speaker, who told him that it
stood not with the gravity of the house to listen to dreams ;
but the house was inclined to hear him out.

" The sheep would sometimes go over to the bell-wether,
or the bell-wether to the sheep. Once both met on the narrow
bridge, and the question was who should go back, since both
could not go on without danger. One sheep gave counsel that
the sheep on the bridge should lie on their bellies, and let the
bell-wether go over their backs. The application of this
dilemma he left to the house. "f It must be confessed that
the bearing of the point was more ambiguous than some of
the important ones that formed the matters of their debates.
Davus sum, non (Edipus ! It is probable that this fantastical
politician did not vote with the opposition ; for Eliot, Went-
worth, and Coke, protested against the interpretation of
dreams in the house !

When the attorne^^-general moved that the liberties of the
subject might be moderated, to reconcile the differences
between themselves and the sovereign. Sir Edward Coke
observed, that " the true mother would never consent to the
dividing of her child." On this, Buckingham swore that Coke
intimated that the king, his master, was the prostitute of the
state. Coke protested against the misinterpretation. The
dream of Nethersole, and the metaphor of Coke, were alike
dangerous in parliamentary discussion.

In a manuscript letter it is said that the House of Commons
sat four days without speaking or doing anything. On the
first of May, Secretary Cooke delivered a message, asking

* I have formed my idea of Sir Francis Nethersole from some strange
incidents in his political conduct, which I have read in some contemporary
letters. He was, however, a man of some eminence, had been Orator for
the University of Cambridge, agent for James I. with the Princes of the
Union in Germany, and also Secretary to the Queen of Bohemia. He
founded and endowed a free-school at Polesworth in Warwickshire.
+ Manuscript letter.

and his First Parliaments. 473

whether they would rely upon the ltinri''s icord F This ques-
tion was followed by a long silence. Several s])eeches are
reported in the letters of the times, which are not in Hush-
worth. Sir Nathaniel Rich observed that, " contident as he
was of the royal word, what did any indefinite word ascer-
tain ?" l\m said, "We have his majesty's coronation oath
to maintain the laws of England ; what need we then take
his word ?" He proposed to move " Whether we should
take the king's word or no." This was resisted by Secretary
Cooke ; " What would they say in foreign parts, if the people
of England would not trust their king ?" He desired the
house to call l\m to order ; on which Pym replied, " Truly,
Mr. Speaker, I ain just of the same opinion I was ; viz., that
the king's oath was as powerful as his word." Sir John
Eliot moved that it be put to the question, " because they
that would have it, do urge us to that point." Sir Edward
Coke on this occasion made a memorable speech, of which the
following passage is not given in Rushworth : —

" We sit now in parliament, and therefore must take his majesty's word
no otherwise than in a parliamentary way ; that is, of a matter agreed on
by both houses — his majesty sitting on his throne in his robes, with his
ercjwn on his head, and sceptre in his liand, and in full parliament ; ajid
his royal a.ssent being entered upon record, in perpctuam rei memoriam .
This was the royal word of a kinrj in parliament, and not a word deli-
vered in a chamber, and out of the mouth of a secretary at the second
hand ; therefore I motion, that the House of Commons, moi'e majorum,
should draw up a petition, cle droict, to his majesty ; which, being con-
firmed by both bouses, and assented unto by his majesty, will be as firm an
act as any. Not that I distrust the king, but that I cannot take his trust
but in a parliamentary way."*

In this speech of Sir Edward Coke we find the first men-
tion, in the legal style, of the ever-memorable " Petition of
Kight," which two days after was finished. The reader must
pursue its histor}' among the writers of opposite parties.

On Tuesday, June 5, a royal message announced that on
the 11th the present sessions would close. This utterly dis-
concerted the commons. Religious men considered it as a
judicial visitation for the sins of the people; others raged with
suppressed feelings ; they counted up all the disasters which
had of late occurred, all which were charged to one man :
they knew not, at a moment so urgent, when all their liberties

* These speeches are entirely drawn from those manuscript letters to
which I have frequently referred. Coke's may be substantially found in
Eushworth, but without a single expression as here given.

474 Secret History of Charles the First

seemed at stake, whether the commons should fly to the lords,
or to the king. Sir Jolin Eliot said, that as they intended to
furnish his majesty with money, it was proper that he should
give them time to supply him with counsel : he was renewing
his old attacks on the duke, when he was suddenly interrupted
by the Speaker, who, starting from the chair, declared that
he was commanded not to suffer him to proceed ; Eliot sat
down in sullen silence. On Wednesday, Sir Edward Coke
broke the ice of debate. "That man," said he of the duke,
" is the grievance of grievances ! As for going to the lords,"
he added, " that is not via regia ; our liberties are impeached
— it is our concern !"

On Thursday, the vehement cry of Coke against Bucking-
ham was followed up ; as, says a letter-writer, when one good
hound recovers the scent, the rest come in with a full cry.*
A sudden message from the king absolutely forbade them to
asperse any of his majestj^'s ministers, otherwise his majesty
would instantly dissolve them.

This fell like a thunderbolt ; it struck terror and alarm ; and
at the instant the House of Commons was changed into a scene
of tragical melancholy ! All the opposite passions of human
nature — all the national evils which were one day to burst on
the country seemed, on a sudden, concentrated in this single
spot ! Some were seen weeping, some were expostulating,
and some, in awful prophecy, were contemplating the future
ruin of the kingdom ; while others, of more ardent daring,
were reproaching the timid, quieting the terrified, and in-
fusing resolution into the despairing. Many attempted to
speak, but were so strongly affected that their very utterance
failed them. The venerable Coke, overcome by his feelings
when he rose to speak, found his learned eloquence falter on
his tongue ; he sat down, and tears were seen on his aged
cheeks. The name of the public enemy of the kingdom was
repeated, till the Speaker, with tears covering his face, de-

* The popular opinion is well expressed in the following lines preseiTed
in Sloane MS. 826 :—

When only one doth rule and guide the ship,

Who neither card nor compass knew before,
The master pilot and the rest asleep,

The stately ship is split upon the shore ;
But they awaking start up, stare, and cry,
" Who did this fault ?"— " Not I,"—" Nor I,"—" Nor I.**
So lares it with a great and wealthy state
Not govern'd by the master, but his mate,"

and his First Parliaments. 475

clared he could no loiij^'cr witness such a spectacle of woe in
the commons of England, and requested leave of absence for
half an hour. The speaker hastened to the kin^ to inform
him of the state of the house. The}- were preparing a vote
against the duke, for being an arch-traitor and arch-enemy to
king and kingdom, and were busied on their " Remonstrance,"
when the Speaker, on his return, after an absence of two
hours, delivered his majesty's message, that they should
adjourn till the next day.

This was an awful interval of time ; many trembled for the
issue of the next morning : one letter-writer calls it " that
black and dohfful Thursday !" and another, writing before the
house met, observes, " What we shall expect tliis morning,
God of heaven knows; we sliall meet timely."*

Charles probably had been greatly affected by the report of
the Speaker, on tlie extraordinary state into which the whole
house had been thrown ; for on Friday the royal message im-
ported that the king had never any intention of " barring them
from their right, but only to avoid scandal, that his ministers
should not be accused for their counsel to him ; and still he
hoped that all Christendom might notice a sweet parting
between him and his people." This message quieted the
house, but did not suspend their preparations for a " Eemon-
strance," which they had begun on the day they were
threatened with a dissolution.

On Saturday, while tln?y were still occupied on the " Re-
monstrance," unexpectedly, at four o'clock, the king came
to parliament, and the commons were called up. Charles
spontaneously came to reconcile himself to parliament. Tlie
king now gave his second answer to the " Petition of
Right." He said — " My maxim is, that the peojde's liber-
ties strengthen the king's prerogative ; and the king's pre-
rogative is to defend the people's liberties. Read your
petition, and you shall have an answer that I am sure will
please you."t They desired to have the ancient form of
their ancestors, " Soit droit fait come il est desyre," and not
as the king had before given it, with any observation on it.
Charles now granted this ; declaring that his second answer
to the petition in nowise ditiered from his first; " but you
now see how ready I have shown myself to satisfy your
demands ; I have done my part ; wherefore, if this parha-

• This last letter is printed in Rushworth, vol. i. p. 609.
+ Tlie kiug's answer is iu liushwortb, vol. i. p. fJ13.

476 Secret History of Charles the First

ment have not a happy conclusion, the shi is j'ourj:, — I am
free from it !"

Popular gratitude is at least as vociferous as it is sudden.
Both houses returned the king acclamations of joy ; everyone
seemed to exult at the happy change which a few days had
effected in the fate of the kingdom. Ever3'where the bells
rung, bonfires were kindled, an universal lioliday was kept
through the town, and spread to the country : but an omi-
nous circumstance has been registered by a letter-writer ; the
common people, who had caught the contagious happiness,
imagined that all this public joy was occasioned by the king's
consenting to commit the duke to the Tower!

Charles has been censured, even by Hume, for his " eva-
sions and delays" in granting his assent to the " Petition of
Right;" but now, either the parliament had conquered the
royal unwillingness, or the king was zealously inclined on
reconciliation. Yet the joy of the commons did not outlast
the bonfires in the streets ; they resumed their debates as if
they had never before touched on the subjects : they did not
account for the feelings of the man who-m they addressed as
the sovereign. They sent up a " Remonstrance" against the
duke,* and introduced his mother into it, as a patroness of
popery. Charles declared, that after having granted the
famous " Petition," he had not expected such a return as
this " Remonstrance." " How acceptable it is," he after-
wards said, " every man may judge ; no wise man can justify
it." After the reading of the Remonstrance, the duke fell
on his knees, desiring to answer for himself; but Charles no
way relaxed in showing his personal favour.f

The duke was often charged with actions and with ex-
pressions of which, unquestionably, he was not always guilty ;
and we can more fairly decide on some points relating to
Charles and the favourite, for we have a clearer notion of
tliem than his contemporaries. The active spirits in the
commons were resolved to hunt down the game to the death :
for they now struck at, as the king calls it, " one of the chief
maintenances of my crown," in tonnage and poundage, the
levying of which, they now declared, was a violation of the
liberties of the people. This subject again involved legal
discussions, and another " Remonstrance." They were in the
act of reading it, when the king suddenly came down to the

* This eloquent state paper is in Rushworth, vol. i. p. 619.
+ This interview is taken from manuscript letters.

and his First Parliaments. 477

house, sent for the Speaker, and prorof^nod the parliament.
" I am forced to end this session," said Charles, " some few
hours before I meant, being not willing to receive any more
Remonstrances, to which I must give a harsh answer."
There was at least as much of sorrow as of anger in this
closing speeeli.

Buckingham once more was to ofler his life for the honour
of his master — and to court popularity ! It is well known
wilh what exterior fortitude Charles received the news of the
duke's assassination ; this imperturbable majesty of his mind
— insensibility it was not— never deserted him on many
similar occasions. There was no indecision — no feebleness
in his conduct ; and that extraordinary event was not suf-
fered to delay the expedition. The king's personal industry-
astonished all the men in office. One writes that the king
had done more in six weeks than in the duke's time had been
done in six months. The death of Buckingham caused no
change ; the king left every man to his own charge, but
took the general direction into his own hands.* In private,
Charles deeply mourned the loss of Buckingham ; he gave no
encouragement to his enemies: the king called i)im "his
martyr," and declared " the world was greatly mistaken in
him ; for it was thought that the favourite had ruled his
majesty, but it was i'ar otherwise ; for that the duke had
been to him a faithful and an obedient servant." t Such
were the leelings and ideas of the unibrtunate Charles the
First, which it is necessary to become acquainted with to
judge of; few have possessed the leisure or the disposition to
perform this historical d\ity, involved as it is in the history
of our passions. If ever the man shall be viewed, as well as
the monarch, the private history of Charles the First will
form one of the most pathetic of biographies. J

All the foreign expeditions of Charles the First were alike
disastrous : the vast genius of Richelieu, at its meridian, had
paled our inetiectual star ! The dreadful surrender of Rochelle
had sent back our army and navy baffled and disgraced ; and

* Manuscript Letters : Lord Dorset to tlie Earl of Carlisle. — Sloane
MSS. 4178. Letter 519.

t Manuscript Letter.

% I have given (vol. ii. p. 336) the "Secret History of Charles the First
and his Queen," where I have traced the iirmness and independence of
his character. In another article will be found as mucli of the "Secret
Hislori' of the Duke of Buckinghaiii" as I have L^u enabled to acquire.

478 Secret History of Charles the First

Buckingham had timely perished, to save one more reproach,
one more political crime, attached to his name. Such failures
did not improve the temper of tlie times ; but the most
brilliant victory would not have changed the fate of Charles,
nor allayed the fier}' spirits in the commons, who, as Chai'les
said, " not satisfied in hearing complainers, had erected them-
selves into inquisitors after complaints."

Parliament met. The king's speech was conciliatory. He
acknowledged that the exaction of the duties of the customs
was not a right which he derived from his hereditary prero-
gative, but one which he enjoyed as the gift of his people.
These duties as yet had not indeed been formally confirmed
by parliament, but they had never been refused to the
sovereign. The king closed with a fervent ejaculation that
the session, begun with confidence, might end with a mutual
good understanding.*

The shade of Buckingham was no longer cast between
Charles the First and the commons. And yet we find that
" their dread and dear sovereign " was iiot allowed any repose
on the throne,

A new demon of national discord, Religion, in a meta-
physical garb, reared its distracted head. This evil spirit
had been raised by the conduct of the court divines, whose
political sermons, with their attempts to return to the more
solemn ceremonies of the Romish church, alarmed some
tender consciences ; it served as a masked battery for the
patriotic party to change their ground at will, without
slackening their fire. When the king urged for the duties of
his customs, he found that he was addressing a committee
sitting for religion. Sir John Eliot threw out a singular ex-
pression. Alluding to some of the bishops, whom he called
"masters of ceremonies," he confessed that some ceremonies
were commendable, such as " that we should stand up at the
repetition of the creed, to testify the resolution of our hearts
to defend the religion we profess, and in some churches they
did not only stand upright, but with their swords clrawn.^'
His speech was a spark that fell into a well-laid train ;
scarcely can we conceive the enthusiastic temper of the House
of Commons at that moment, when, after some debate, they
entered into a vow to preserve " the articles of religion estab-
lished by parliament in the thirteenth year of our late Queen

* "To conclude," said tho king; "let us not be jealous ous of the
other's actions."

and his First Parliaments. 479

jElizaheth! " and this voiv was immediately followed up by a
petition to the kiiip^ for a fast for the increasinf^ miseries of
the reformed churches abroad. Parliaments are liable to have
their passions ! Some of these enthusiasts were struck by a
panic, not perhaps warranted by the danger, of " Jesuits and
Armenians." The king answered them in good-humour;
observing, however, on the state of the reformed abroad ;
"that fighting would do them more good than fasting." He
granted them their fast, but they would now grant no
return ; for now they presented " a Declaration " to the king,
that tonnage and [joundage must give precedency to religion !
The king's answer still betrays no ill temper. He confessed
that he did not tliink that " religion was in so much danger
as they affirmed." He reminds them of tonnage and
poundage ; " I do not so mucli desire it out of greediness of
the thing, as out of a desire to put an end to those questions
that arise between me and some of my subjects."

Never had the king been more moderate in his claims, or
more tender in his style ; and never had the commons been
more fierce, and never, in truth, so utterly inexorable ! Often
kings are tyrannical, and sometimes are parliaments ! A body
corporate, with the infection of passion, may perform acts of
injustice equally with the individual who abuses the power
with which he is invested. It was insisted that Charles
should give up the receivers of the customs, who were de-
nounced as capital enemies to the king and kingdom ; while
those who submitted to the duties were declared guilty as
accessories. When Sir John Eliot was pouring forth invec-
tives against some courtiers — however tliey ma}' have merited
the blast of his eloquerice — he was sometimes interrupted and
sometimes cheered, lor the stinging personalities. Tlie timid
Speaker, refusing to put the question, suffered a severe repri-
mand from Selden : '' If you will not put it, we must sit still,
and thus we shall never be able to do anything ! " The house
adjourned in great heat ; the dark prognostic of their next
meeting, which Sir Symonds D'Ewes has remarked in his
Diary as " the most gloomy, sad, and dismal day for England
that happened for five hundred years !"

On this fatal day,* the Speaker still refusing to put the
question, and announcing the king's command for an adjourn-
ment, Sir John Eliot stood up ! The Speaker attempted to

* Monday, 2ud of ilarcli, 1629.

480 Secret History of Charles the First

leave the chair, but two members, who had placed themselves
on each side, forcibly kept him down — Eliot, who had pre-
pared "a short declaration," flung down a paper on the floor,
crying out that it might be read ! His party vociferated for
ihe reading— others that it should not. A sudden tumult
broke out ; Coriton, a fervent patriot, struck another member,
and many laid their hands on their swords.* "Shall we,"
said one, " be sent home as we were last sessions, turned off
hke scattered sheep?" The weeping, trembling Speaker,
still persisting in what he held to be his duty, was dragged
to and fro by opposite parties ; but neither he nor the clei'k
would read the paper, though the Speaker was bitterly re-
proached by his kinsman. Sir Peter Hayman, " as the disgrace
of his country, and a blot to a noble family." Eliot, finding
the house so strongly divided, undauntedly snatching up the
paper, said, " I shall then express that by my tongue which
tliis paper should have done." Denzil Holies assumed the
character of Speaker, putting the question : it was returned
by the acclamations of the party. The doors were locked
and the keys laid on the table. The king sent for the
Serjeant and mace, but the messenger could obtain no admit-
tance— the usher of the black rod met no more regard. The
king then ordered out his guard — in the meanwhile the pro-
test was completed. The door was flung open, the rush of
the members was so impetuous that the crowd carried away
among them the serjeant and the usher in the confusion and
riot. Many of the members were struck by horror amidst
this conflict, it was a sad image of the future ! Several of the
patriots were committed to the Tower. The king on dissolv-
ing this parHament, which was the last till the memoi'able
" Long Parliament," gives us, at least, his idea of it : — " It is
far from me to judge all the House alike guilty, for there are
there as dutiful subjects as any in the world ; it being but
some few vipers among them that did cast this mist of un-
dutifulness over most of their eyes." f

* It was imagined out of doors that swords had been drawn ; for a
Welsh page running in great haste, when he heard the noise, to the door,
cried out, "I pray you let hur in ! let hur in ! to give hur master his
Bword !" — Manuscript Letter.

+ At the time many undoubtedly considered that it was a mere faction
in the house. Sir Symonds D'Ewes was certainly no politician — but, un-
qiu-.slionalily, his ideas were not peculiar to himself. Of the Inst tliiid
jtailiaiiR-nt lie delivers this opinion in his Diary : " I cannot deem but the
greater part of the house were morally honest men ; but these were the

and his Fttsi Parliaments. 481

Thus have I traced, step by step, the secret histor}- of
Chiirles the First and his early Parliaments. I have entered
into their feelings, while I have supplied new facts, to make
everything as ])resent and as true as my faithful diligence
could re[)eat the tale. It was necessary that I should some-
times judge of the first race of our patriots as some of their
contemporaries did ; but it was impossible to avoid correcting
these notions by the more enlarged views of tlieir posterity.
This is the privilege of an historian and the philosophy of his
art. There is no apology for the king, nor any declamation
for the subject. Were we only to decide by the final results
of this great conflict, of which what we have here narrated is
but the faint beginning, we should confess that Sir John
Eliot and his party were the first fathers of our political
existence ; and we should not withhold from them the inex-
pressible gratitude of a nation's freedom ! But human
infirmity mortifies us in the noblest pursuits of man ; and we
must be taught this penitential and chastising wisdom. The
story of our patriots is involved ; Charles appears to have
been lowering those high notions of his prerogative, which
were not peculiar to him, and was throwing himself on the
bosom of his people. The severe and unrelenting conduct of
Sir John Eliot, his prompt eloquence and bold invective, well
fitted him for the leader of a party. He was the lodestone,
drawing together the looser particles of iron. Never sparing,
in the monarch, the errors of the man, never relinquishing
his royal prey, which he had fastened on, Eliot, with Dr.
Turner and some others, contributed to make Charles dis-
gusted with all parliaments. Without any dangerous con-
cessions, there was more than one moment when they niiglit
have reconciled the sovereign to themselves, and not have
driven him to the fatal resource of attempting to reign with-
out a parliament ! *

least guilty of the fatal breach, being only misled by tome other Machia-
vclian politics, who seemed zealous for the liberty of the commonwealth,
and by that means, in the vio rinf/ of their outward freedom, drew the
votes of tliose good men to their side."

* Since the publication of tlie present article, I have composed my
"Commentaries on the Life and Reigu of Charles the First," in five
volumes.

VOL. ITT. 1 1

4Si'

THE KUMP.

Text and commentary ! The French Eevolution abounds
\vith wonderful " explanator}' notes" on the Enghsh. It has
cleared up many obscm-e passages — and in the political his-
tory of Man, both pages must be read together.

The opprobrious and ludicrous nickname of "the Rump,"
stigmatised a faction which played the same part in tlie
Eirolish Eevolution as the "Montague" of the Jacobins did
in the French. It has been imagined that our English
Jacobins were impelled by a principle difFei'ent from that of
their modern rivals ; but the madness of avowed atheism, and
the frenzy of hypocritical sanctity, in the circle of crimes
meet at the same point. Their history forms one of those
useful parallels where, with truth as unerring as mathematical
demonstration, we discover the identity of human nature.
Similarity of situation, and certain principles, producing similar
personages and similar events, finally settle in the same results.
The Eump, as long as human nature exists, can be nothing
hut the Rump, however it ma}' be thrown uppermost.
. The origin of this political by-name has often been inquired
into ; and it is som.ewhat curious, that, though all parties
'consent to reprobate it, each assigns for it a different allusion.
'In the history of political factions there is always a mixture
'of the ludicrous with the tragic ; but, except their modern
brothers, no faction like the present ever excited such a com-
bination of extreme contempt and extreme horror.

Among the rival parties in 1G59, the loyalists and the
presbyterians acted as we may suppose the Tories and the
"Wliigs would in the same predicament ; a secret reconciliation
liad taken place, to bury in oblivion their former jealousies,
that they might unite to rid themselves from that tyranny of
tyrannies, a liydra-hcaded government ; or, as Hume observes,
that " all efibrts should be used for the overthrow of the
liump ; so they called the parliament, in allusion to that part
of the animal body." The sarcasm of the allusion seemed
obvious to our polished historian ; yet, looking more narrowly
for its origin, we shall find how indistinct were the notions of
this nickname among those who lived nearer to the times.
Evelyn sa^^s that " the Rump parliament was so called as
containing some few rotten members of the other." Roger
Coke describes it thus : " You must now be content with a

The Rump. 483

pieco of the Commons called ' the Rump.' " And Carte calls
the liuiup, '■ the earcass of a house," and seems not precisely
aware ol' the contemptuous allusion. J3ut how do " rotten
members" and "a carcass" agree with the notion of "a
Kiimp ?" Recently the editor of the Life of Colonel Hutchin-
son has conveyed a novel origin. "The number of the
members of the Long Parliament having been by seclusion,
death, &c., ver}' much reduced," — a remarkable &c. this! by
which our editor seems adroitly to throw a veil over the for-
cible transportation by the llumpers of two hundred members
at one swoop, — "the remainder was compared to the rump of
a fowl which was left, all the rest being eaten." Our editor even
considers this to be " a coarse emblem ;" yet " the rump of a
fowl" could hardly offend even a lady's delicacy! Our editor,
prol)ably, was somewhat anxious not to degrade too lowly the
anti-monarchical ]):irty, designated by this opprobrious term.
Perliaps it is panlonable in Mrs. Macaulay, an historical lady,
and a " Rumper," for she calls the " Levellers" a " brave and
virtuous party," to have passed over in her history any men-
tion of the otfensive term at all, as well as the ridiculous
catastroi>iie which they underwent in the political revolution,
whieh, however, we must beg leave not to pass by.

This party-coinage has been ascribed to Clement Walker,
their liitter antagonist; who, having saeriiiced no inconsider-
able fortune to the cause of what he considered constitutional
liberty, was one of the violent ejected members of the Long
Parliament, and perished in prison, a victim to honest, un-
bending principles. His " History of Independency" is a
i-ich legacy bequeathed to postei-ity, of all their great mis-
doings, and their petty villanies, and, above all, of their
secret history. One likes to know of what blocks the idols of
the jteople are sometimes carved out.

Clement Walker notices "the votes and acts of this y^y
end; this KU.MP of a parliament, with corrupt maggots
in it."* This hideous, but descriptive image of '' The
Rump" had, however, got forward before, for the collector of
"the Rump Songs"t tells us, "If you ask who named it
Jiiimp, know 'twas so styled in an honest sheet of prayer,
called ' The Rloody Rum)),' written hefore the trial of our
late sovereign ; but the word obtained not universal notice,

* History of Independency, Part II. p. 32.
+ First collected aud puUislied iu 1G(51, aud a'Yerwards reprinted ia two
■luall vols. ITlil.

ii2

484 The Rnmjj.

till it flew from the mouth of ]\rajor-Gv.-neral BrowTi, at a
public assembly in the days of Richard Cromwell." Thus
it hajipens that a stinging nickname has been frequently
applied to render a faction eternally odious ; and the chance
expression of a wit, when adopted on some public occasion,
circulates among a whole people. The present nickname
originated in derision on the exjnilsion of the majority of the
Long Parliament by the usurping minority. It probably
slept ; for who would have stirred it through the Protectorate ?
and finally awakened at Richard's restored, but fleeting
"Rump," to witness its own ridiculous extinction.

Our Rump passed through three stages in its political
progress. Preparatory to the trial of the sovereign, the
anti-monarchical party constituted the minority in " the
Long Parliament:" the very name by which this parliament
is recognised seemed a grievance to an impatient people,
vacillating with chimerical projects of government, and now
accustomed, from a wild indefinite notion of political equality,
to pull down all existing institutions. Such was the temper
of the times, that an act of the most violent injustice, openly
performed, served only as the jest of the day, a jest which
has passed into history. The forcible expulsion of two hun-
dred of their brother members, by those who afterwards
were saluted as " The Rump," was called "Pride's Purge,"
from the activity of a colonel of that name, a military adven-
turer, who was only the blind and brutal instrument of his
party ; for when he stood at the door of the Commons, hold-
ing a paper with the names of the members, he did not per-
sonally know one ! And his "Purge" might have operated
a quite opposite effect, administered by his own unskilful
hand, had not Lord Grey of Groby, and the door-keeper, —
worthy dispersers of the British senate ! — pointed out the ob-
noxious members, on whom our colonel laid his hand, and sent
off by his men to be detained, if a bold member, or to be deterred
from sitting in the house, if a frightened one. This colonel had
been a drayman ; and the contemptible knot of the Commons,
reduced to filty or sixty confederates, which assembled after his
*' Purge," were called "Colonel Pride's Dra^'-Horses."

It was this Rump which voted the death of the sovereign,
and abolished the regal office, and the House of Peers — as
" unnecessary, burdensome, and dangerous!" Every office ia
parliament seemed "dangerous," but that of the " Custodes

The Rump. 485

libertatis Angliae," the keepers of the liberties of England!
oi rather " the gaolers !" " The legislative half-quarter of
the House of Commons !" indignantly exclaims Clement
Walker — the " Montagne" of the French revolutionists!

The " Red-coats" as the military were nicknamed, soon
taught their masters, "the Rumpers," silence and obedience:
the hitter having raised one colossal man for their own pur-
pose, wore annihilated by him at a single blow. Cromwell,
live years after, turned tliem out of their house, and put the
keys into his jiocket. Tlieir last jjublic aj)pearance was in
the fleeting days of Richard Cromwell, wlien the comi-tragedy
of ■' the Rum])" concluded by a catastrophe as ludicrous as
that of Tom Tlminb's tragedy !

How such a faction used their instruments to gather in
the common spoil, and how their instruments at length con-
verted the hands which held them into instruments them-
selves, appears in their history. When " the Long Parlia-
ment" opposed the designs of Cromwell and Ireton, these
chiefs cried up "the liberty of the people," and denied "the
authority of parliament :" but when they had effectuated
their famous "purge," and formed a House of Commons of
themselves, they abolished the House of Lords, crying up the
supreme authority of the House of Commons, and ei-ying
down the liberty of the people. Such is the history of poli-
tical factions, as well as of statesmen ! Cliarles the Fifth
alteriu\tely made use of the Pope's authority to subdue the
rising spuit of the Protestants of Germany, or raised an
army of Pi'otestants to imprison the Pope ! who branded his
German allies by the novel and odious name of Lutherans.
A chain of similar facts may be framed out of modern
history.

The " Rump," as they were called by every one but their
jwn party, became a whetstone for the wits to sharpen them-
.selves on ; and we have two lai'ge collections of " Rump
Songs," curious chronicles of popular feeling !* Without
this evidence we should not have been so well informed
respecting the phases of this portentous phenomenon. " The
Rump" was celebrated in verse, till at length it became "the
Rump of a Rump of a Rump 1" as Foulis traces them to their

• The first collection ever formed of these political satires was printed in
1660, with the quaint title of " Ratts rhiuicd to Dcaih ; or, the liujup-
parliament haug'd up iu tbc ShumLled."

4^6 The Rump,

dwindled and grotesque appearance. It is pourtrayed by a
wit of the times —

The Rump's an old story, if well understood,

'Tis a tiling dress'd up in a parliament's hood,

And like it — but the tail stands where the head shou'd !

'Twould make a man scratch where it dues not itch !

They say 'tis good huk when a body rises

With the rump upwards ; but he that advises

To live in that posture, is none of the wisest.

Cromwell's hunting them out of the House by military
force is alluded to —

Our politic cloctors do us teach,

That a blood sucking red-coat's as jjood as a leech

To relieve the head, if applied to the breech.

In the opening scene of the Restoration, Mrs. Hutchinson,
an honest republican, paints with dismay a scene otherwise
very ludicrous. " When the town of Nottingham, as almost
all the rest of the island, began to grow mad, and declared
themselves in their desires of the king;" or, as another of
the opposite party writes, "When the soldiery, who had
hitherto made cluhs truvips, resolved now to turn up the kin^
of hearts in their affections," the rabble in town and country
vied with each other in burning the " liump ;" and the
literal emblem was hung by chains on gallowses, with a bon-
fire underneath, while the cries of " Let us burn the Rump !
Let us roast the Rump!" were echoed everywhere. The
suddenness of this universal change, which was said to have
maddened the wise, and to have sobered the mad, must be
ascribfd to the joy at escaping from the yoke of a military
despotism ; perhaps, too, it marked the rapid transition
of hope to a restoration which might be supposed to have
imphmted gratitude even in a royal breast! The feelings of
the people expected to find an echo from the throne !

"The Rump," besides their general resemblance to the
French anarchists, had also some minuter features of ugli-
ness, which Englishmen have often exulted have not maiked
an English revolution — sanguinary proscriptions !* We had
tliought that we had no revolutionary tribunals ! no Septem-
brisers ! no noyades ! no moveable guillotines awaiting for

* In one of the popular political songs of the day, "The Eump" ia
aptly compared to

" Tlie foxes of Samson, that carried a brand

In their tails, to destroy and to burn up the land."

The Rump. 487

carts loaded with human victims! no infuriated republican
urging, in a committee of public siifety, the necessity of a
Siihitary massacre !

But if it be true tliat the same motives and the same
l^rinciples were at work in both nations, and that the like
cliaracters were performing in England tlie parts which they
did afterwards in France, by an argument d, priori we might
be sure that the same revolting crimes and chimerical pro-
jects were alike suggested at London as at Paris. Human
nature, even in transactions wliich appear unparalleled, will
be found to preserve a regularity of resemblance not always
suspected.

The first great tragic act was closely copied by the French :
and if the popular page of our history appears unstained by
their revolutionary axe, this depended only on a slight acci-
dent; for it became a question of "yea" and "nay!" and
was only carried in the negative by two voices in the council!
It was debated among " the bloody Rump," as it was hideously
designated, " whether to massacre and to put to the sword ah
the king'' s 'party /"* Cromwell himself listened to the sugges-
tion ; and it was only put down by the coolness of political
calculation — tlie dread that the massacre would be too general I
Some of the Hump not obtaining the blessedness of a mas-
saci'e, still clung to the happiness of an immolation ; and
many petitions were presented, that " two or three principal
genfJcmen oi' the royal party in each county might be sacri-
ficed to justice, whereby the land might be saved fi'om blood-
guiltiness !^' Sir Arthur Haslerigg, whose "passionate fond-
ness of liberty" has been commended, t Vv<is one of the com-
mittee of salety in 104^7 — I too would commend "a passionate
lover of liberty," whenever 1 do not discover that this lover
is nuich more intent on the dower than on the bride. Hasle-
rigg, " an absurd, bold man," as Clarendon, at a single stroke,
reveals his character, was resolved not to be troubled with
king or bishop, or with any power in the state superior to " the
Kump's." We may safely suspect the patriot wlio can cool
his vehemence in spoliation. Haslerigg would have no bishops,
but this was not from any want of reverence for church lands,
for he heaped for himself such wealth as to have been nick-

* Clement Walker's Uistory of Independency, part II. p. 130. Con-
nnned by Barwick in his Life, p. 163.

+ The Rev. J.lark Noble's Alemoirs of the Protectoral House of Crom
well, i. 405.

48^ The Rump.

nnnii.'d " the Bishop of Durham !" He is here noticed for a
political crime different from that of plunder. When, in
IGI'T, this venerable radical found the parliament resisting
liis views, he declared that "Some heads must fly off!"
adding, "the parliament cannot save England; we must
look another way ;" — threatening, what afterwards was done,
to bring in the army ! It was this " passionate lover of
liberty" who, when Dorislaus, the parliamentary agent, was
assassinated by some Scotchmen in Holland, moved in the
house, that "six royalists of the best quahty" should be im-
mediately executed! When some northern comities peti-
tioned the Commons for relief against a famine in the land,
our Maratist ob-erved, that " this ira???; of food would best
defend those counties from Scottish invasion!"* The slaughter
of Hrogheda by Cromwell, and his frightening all London by
what Walker culls " a butchery of apprentices," when he cried
out to his soldiers, " to kill man, woman, and child, and fire
the city!"t may be placed among those crimes which are
committed to open a reign of terror— but Hugh Peters's
solemn thanksgiving to Heaven that " none were spared!"
was the true expression of the true feeling of these political
demoniacs. Cromwell was cruel from politics, others from
constitution. Some were willing to be cruel without " blood-
guiltiness." One Alexander Eigby, a radical lawyer, twice
moved in the Long Parhament, that those lords and gentle-
men who were " malignants," should be sold as slaves to the
Bey of Algiers, or sent off to the new plantations in the
West Indies. He had all things prepared ; for it is added
that he had contracted with two merchants to ship them off. J
There was a most bloody-minded "maker of washing-balls,"
as one John Durant is described, appointed a lecturer by the
House of Commons, who always left out of the Lord's
Prayer, "As we forgive them that trespass against us," and
substituted, "Lord, since thou hast now drawn out thy
sword, let it not be sheathed again till it be glutted in the
blood of the malignants." I find too many enormities of
this kind. " Cursed be he that doeth the work of the Lord
negligently, and keepeth back his sword from blood!" was
the cry of the wretch, who, when a celebrated actor and

* Clemeut Walker's History of Independency, Tart II. 173.

+ lb., Part I. IGO.

X Mticurius Rubticua, xii. 115. 1.' uukk's Life, p. 42.

The tiump. 489

rojalist sued for quarter, gave no other reply than that of
*' Htting the action to the word."* Tlieir treatment of the
liisli may possihly be admired by a true JMachiavehst : "they
perniitted forty tliousand of the Iri.-li to enHst in the service of
tlie kings of Spain and France — in other \vord^;, they expelled
tliem at once, which, considering that our Kumpers attected
such an abhorrence of tyranny, may be considered as an act
of mercy ! satisfying themselves only with dividing the for-
i'eited lands of the aforesaid forty thousand among their own
party, by lot and other means. An universal confiscation,
after all, is a bloodless massacre. Tliey used the Scotch
soldiers, after the battles of Dunbar and Worcester, a little
dillerently — but equally efiRcaciously — for they sold their
Scotch prisoners for slaves to the American planters.f

The Kobespierres and the Marats were as extraordinary
beings, and in some respects the Frenchmen were working
on a more enlarged scheme. These discovered that " the
generation which had witnessed the preceding one would
always regret it ; and lor the security of the lievolution, it
was necessary that every person who was thirty years old in
1788 should perish on the scaffold!" The anarchists were
intent on reducing the French people to eight millions, and
on destroying the great cities of France. J

* This actor was a comedian named Robinson, of the Blackfriars
Theatre; the performers there beiny termed " the king's servants." In
the civil wars most of the young actors, depiived of living by their profes-
sion, all theatres being clused ly order of the Parliament, went into the
king's army. Robinson was fighting at the siege uf Basing House, in
Hampshire, October, 1645, wlien after an obstinate detence his party was
deftated, he laid down his arms, suing for quarter, but was shot through
the head by Colonel Harrison, as he repealed the words quoted above.

•|- The following account is drawn from Sir William Dugdale's inter-
leaved Pucket-boi.k for 1648. — "Aug. 17. The Scotch army, under the
cuinmaiid of Duke Hamilton, defeated at Preston in Lancashire. 24lli.
The -Moorlanders rose upon the Scots and stript some of them. The Scotch
prisoners miserably used ; exposed to eat cabbage-leaves in Ridgley (Staf-
fordshire), and carrot-tops in Coleshill (Warwickshire). The soldiers who
guarded them sold the victuals which were brought in for them from the
country."

i Desodoard's Histoire Philosophiqne de la Revolution de France, iv. 5.
When Lyons was captured in IT'J^, the revolutionary army nearly reduced
this hue city to a heap of ruins, in obedience to the decree of the TJon-
tagne, who had ordered its name to be effaced, that it should henceforth b«
termed, " Commune afl'raneliie," and upon its ruins a column erected Aid
Uiscribed, "Lyou lit la guerre a la libertO ; Lyon n'est plus.'*

490 The Rump.

Such monstrous persons and events are not credible — but
this is no proof that they have not occurred. Manj^ incre-
dible things will happen !

Another disorganising feature in the English Rumpers
was also observed in the French Sans-culottes — their hatred
of literature and the arts. Hebert was one day directing his
satellites towards the Bihliotheque Kalionale, to put an end
to all that human knowledge had collected for centuries on
centuries — in one day ! alleging, of course, some good reason.
This hero was only diverted from the enterprise by being
persuaded to postpone it for a day or two, when luckily the
guillotine intervened ; the same circumstance occurred here.
The burning of the records in the Tower was certainly pro-
posed ; a speech of Selden's, which I cannot immediately
turn to, put a stop to these incendiaries. It was debated in
the Eump parliament, when Cromwell was general, whether
they should dissolve the universities ? They concluded that
no university was necessary ; that there were no ancient
examples of such education, and that scholars in other coun-
tries did study at their oicn cost and charges, and therefore
they looked on them as unnecessary, and thought them fitting
to be taken away for the puhlic use!— How these venerable
asylums escaped from being sold with the king's pictures, as
stone and timber, and why their rich endowments were not
shared among such inveterate ignorance and remorseless
spoliation, might claim some inquiry.

The Abbe Morellet, a great political economist, imagined
that the source of all the crimes of the French Revolution
was their violation of tlie sacred rights of property. The
perpetual invectives of the Sans-culottes of France ar/ainst
propriet07's and against property proceeded from demoralised
beings who formed panegyrics on all crimes; crimes, to ex-
])lain whose revolutionary terms, a new dictionary was re-
quired. But even these anarchists, in their mad expressions
against property, and in their wildest notions of their
" egalite," have not gone beyond the daring of our own
" Rumpers !"

Of those revolutionary journals of the parliament of 1G49,
which in spirit so strongly resemble the diurnal or hebdo-
madal effusions of the redoubtable French Hebert, Marat,
and others of that stamp, one of the most remarkable is,
" The Moderate, impartially communicating Martial Affairs
to the Kinydom of England ;" the monarchical title our

The Rion/j. 491

commonwealth men had not yet had time enou2;h to ohhte-
rate from their colloquial style. This writer called himself,
in his harbarous English, Tlir Moderate I It would be hard
to conceive the meanness and illiteracy to which tiie English
language was reduced under the pens of the rabljle-writers of
tiiese (lays, had we not witnessed in the present time a
parallel to tiieir compositions. "The Modei-ate!" was a
title assumed on the princi|)le on which ]Marat denominated
himself "I'Ami du IVuple." It is curious that the most
ferocious politicians usually assert their moderation. Robes-
pierre, in his justilication, declares that Marat " m'a souvcnt
accus6 de Moderantisme." The same actors, playing the
same parts, may be always paralleled in their language and
their deeds. This " Moderate" steadily pursued one great
principle — the overthrow of all property. Assuming tliat
propertij was the original cause of sin I an exhortation to the
people ibr this purpose is the subject of the present paper:*
the illustration of his principle is as striking as the principle
itself.

It is an apology for, or rather a defence of, robbery ! Some
moss-troopers had been condenmed to be hanged lor prac-
tising their venerable custom of gratuitously su{)plying them-
selves from the flocks and herds of their weaker neighbours :
our " Moderate" ingeniously discovers that the loss of these
men's lives is to be attributed to nothing but properly.
They are necessitated to oilend the laws in order to obtain a
livelihood !

On this he descants ; and the extract is a political curio-
sity in the French style ! " Property is the original cause
of anj' sin between party and part}' as to civil transactions.
And since the tyrant is taken off, and the government altered
in nomine, so ought it really to redound to the good of the
people in specie; which, though they cannot expect it in
lew years, by reason of the muUiplicity of the gentlemen in
authority, command, &c. who drive on all designs for support
of the old government, and consequently their own interest
and the people's slavery, yet they doubt not but in time the
people will herein discern their own blindness and folly."

In September, he advanced with more depth of thought.
" Wars have ever been clothed with the most gracious pre-
tences— viz., reformation of religion, the laws of the land, the

• The Moderate, from Tuesday, July 31, to August 7, 104&.

492 The Rump.

liberty of the subject, &e. ; though the effects thereof have
prov'jd most destructive to every nation ; making the sword,
and not the people, the original of all authorities for many
hundred years together, taking away each man's birthright,
and settling upon a few a. cursed teopeiety ; the ground of
all civil offences, and the greatest cause of most sins against
the heavenly Deity. This tyranny and ojjpression running
through the veins of many of our predecessors, and being too
long maintained by the sword upon a royal foundation, at
last became so customary, as to the vulgar it seemed most
natural — the only reason why the people of this time are so
ignorant of their birthright, their only freedom," &c.

"The birthright " of citoyen Egalite to "a cursed pro-
priety settled on a few,^'' was not, even among the French
Jacobins, urged with more amazing force. Had things pro-
ceeded according to our "Moderate's" plan, "the people's
slavery " had been something worse. In a short time the
nation would have had more proprietors than property. We
have a curious list of the spoliations of those members of the
House of Commons, who, after their famous self-denying
ordinances, appropriated among themselves sums of money,
offices, and lands, for services " done or to be done."

The most innocent of this new government of " the
Majesty of the People," were those whose talents had been
limited by Nature to peddle and purloin ; puny mechanics,
who had suddenly dropped their needles, their hammers, and
their lasts, and slunk out from behind their shop-counters ;
those who had never aspired beyond the constable of the
parish, were now seated in the council of state ; where, as
Milton describes them, " they fell to huckster the common-
wealth :" there they met a more rabid race of obscure law-
yers, and discontented men of family, of blasted reputations ;
adventurers, who were to command the militia and navy of
England, — governors of the three kingdoms ! whose votes and
ordinances resounded with nothing else but new impositions,
new taxes, excises, yearly, monthly, weekly sequestrations,
compositions, and universal robbery !

Baxter vents one deep groan of indignation, and presciently
announces one future consequence of Reform! "In all this
appeared the severity of God, the mutabilit}' of worldly
things, and the fruits of eiTor, pride, and selfishness, to be
charged hereafter upon reformation and religion.''^ As a
statesman, the sagacity of this honest prophet was narrowed

Oldys and his Manuscripts. 493

by tlie hori/on of liis relii^ious views ; for he a.^pribfs the
wnolo a.> " prepaiTcl by Satan to tlie injury of the Protestant
cause, and the advantage of the Papists !" But dropping
his particuhir a])pHcation to the devil and the Pa[)ist.s,
honest Kichard Baxter is perfectly rij^ht in his general
principle concerning " liumpers," — " Saus-culottes," and
" Kadicals."

LIFE AND HABITS OF A LITERARY ANTIQUARY.— OLDYS
AND HIS MANUSCRIPTS.

Sucu a picture may be furnished by some unexpected mate-
rials which my inquiries have obtained of Oldys. This is a
sort of personage little known to the wits, who write more
than they read, and to their volatile votaries, who only read
what the wits write. It is time to vindicate the honours of
the lew whose laborious days enrich the stores of national
literature, not by the duplicates but the sup])leinents of know-
ledge. A literary antiquary is that idler whose life is passed
in a perpetual voyage aiitour de ma chamhre ; fervent in saga-
cious diligence, instinct with the enthusiasm of curious
inquiry, critical as well as erudite; he has to arbitrate
between contending opinions, to resolve the doubtful, to clear
up the obscure, and to grasp at the remote ; so busied with
other times, and so interested for other persons than those
about him, that he becomes the inhabitant of the visionary
world of books. He counts only his days by his acquisi-
tions, and may be said by his original discoveries to be
the ciiEATOR OF FACTS ; often exciting the gratitude of
the literary world, while the very name of the benefactor has
not always descended with the inestimable labours.

Such is the man whom we often find leaving, when he dies,
his favourite volumes only an incomplete project ! and few of
this class of literary men have escaped the fate reserved for
most of their brothers. Voluminous works have been usually
left unfinished by the death of the authors ; and it is with
them as with the planting of trees, of which Johnson has
forcibly observed, " There is a frightful interval between the
seed and timber." And he admirably remarks, what I cannot
forbear applying to the labours I am now to describe : " lie
tliat calculates the growth of trees has the remembrance of
the shortness of life driven hard upon him. He knows that

494) Life and Habits of a Literary Antiquary —

he is doing what will never benefit himself; and when he
rejoices to see the stem rise, is disposed to repine that another
sh;Al cut it down." The da^'s of the patriotic Count ivlazzu-
chelli were freely given to his national literature ; and six
invaluable folios attest the gigantic force of his immense eru-
dition ; yet these only carry ns through the letters A and B :
and though Mazzuchelli had finished for the press othor
volumes, the torpor of his descendants has defrauded Europe
of her claims.* The Abbe Goujet, who had designed a classi-
fied history of his national literature, in the eighteen volumes
we possess, could only conclude that of the translators, and
commence that of the poets ; two other volumes in manu-
script have perished. That great enterprise of the Bene-
dictines, the " Histoire Literaire de la France," now consists
of twelve large quartos, and the industry of its successive
writers has only been able to carry it to the twelfth century.
David Clement designed the most extensive bibliography
which had ever appeared ; but the diligent life of the writer
could only proceed as fVir as H. The alphabetical order,
which so many writers of this class have adopted, has proved
a mortifying memento of human life ! Tiraboschi was so
fortunate as to complete his great national history of Italian
literature. But, unhappily for us, Thomas Warton, after
feeling his way through the darker ages of our poetry, in
planning the map of the beautiful land, of which he had only
a PiKgah-sight, expired amidst his volumes. The most precious
portion of Warton's history is but the fragment of a fragment.

Oldys, among this brotherliood, has met perhaps with a
harder fate ; his published works, and the numerous ones to
which he contributed, are now highly appreciated by the lovers
of books ; but the larger portion of his literary labours have
met with the sad fortune of dispersed, and probably of wasted
iToanuscripts. Oldys's manuscripts, or 0. M. as they are
sometimes designated, are constantly referred to by every
distinguished writer on our literary histor}'. I believe that
not one of them could have given us any positive account
of the manuscripts themselves ! Tliey have indeed long
served as the solitary sources of information — but like the well
at the wayside, too many have drawn their waters in silence.

Oldys is chiefiy known by tlie caricature of the facetious
Grose; a great humourist, both with pencil and with pen:

* His intention waa to puLlish a general classified biography cf all the
Italian authors.

Ohlys and his ITantiscnpfs. 495

it is in a posthumous scrap-book, where Groso deposited hitj
odds and ends, and where there is perhaps not a single story
which is not satirical. Our lively antiquary, who cared more
for rusty armour than for rusty volumes, would turn over
these flams and quips to some confidential friend, to enjoy
together a secret laugh at their literary intimates. His eager
executor, who happened to be his bookseller, served up the
poignant hash to the public as "Grose's Olio ! "* The deU-
neation of Oldys is sufficiently overcharged for *' the nonce."
One prevalent infirmity ot honest Oldys, his love of comjiauion-
ship over too social a glass, sends him down to posterity in
a grotesque attitude ; and Mr. Alexander Chalmers, who has
given us the fullest account of Oldys, has inflicted on him
sumething like a sermon, on "a state of intoxication."

Alas ! Oldys was an outcast of fortune,t and the utter
simplicity of his heart was guileless as a child's — ever open
to the designing. The noble spirit of a Duke of Norfolk
once rescued the long-lost historian of llawleigh from the
confinement of the Fleet, where he had existed, probably
forgotten by the world, for six years. It was by an act uf
grace that the duke safely placed Oldj^s in the Heralds' Col>
lege as Norroy King of Arms. J But Oldys, like all shy and

* He says in his advertisement, " It will be difficult to ascertain wlie'-
ther he meant to give tliem to the public, or only to reserve them fur his
own amusement and the entertainment of his friends." Many of these
anecdotes are evidently mere loose scandal.

+ Grose narrates his early history thus : — " Ilis parents dying when he
was very young, he soon squandered away his small patrimony, when he be-
came, at first an attendant in Lord Oxford's library, and afterwards libra-
rian ; at whose death he was obliged to write for the booksellers for a
subsistence."

J Mr. John Taylor, the son of Oldys's intimate friend, has furnished
me w-ii,h this interesting anecdote. "Oldys, as my father informed me,
was many years in quiet obscurity in the Fleet prison, but at last was
spirited up to make his situation known to the Duke of Noi-folk of that
time, who received Oldys's letter while he was at dinner with some friends.
The duke immediately communicated the contents to the company, observ-
ing that he had long been anxious tu know what had become of an old,
though an humble friend, and was happy by that letter to find that he
was alive, lie then called for his f/cntlemati (a kind of humble friend
whom noblemen used to retain under that name in those days), and de-
sired liim ti> go immediately to the Fleet, to take money for the immediate
need of Oldys, to procure an account of his debts, and discharge them.
Oldya was soon after, either by the duke's gift or interest, appointed Nor-
roy King of Arms : and I remember that his official regalia came into my
fathers iianas at /ii» ueatri.''

In the "Life of Oldys," by Mr. A. Chalmers, the date of this promotioa

496 Life and Habits of a Literary Antiquary —

retired men, had contracted peculiar habits and close attach-
ments for a few ; botli these he coiild indulge at no distance.
He liked his old associates in the purlieus of the Fleet, whom
he facetiously dignified as " his Rulers," and there, as I have
heard, with the grotesque whim of a herald, established
" The Dragon Club." Companionship yields the poor man
unpurchased pleasures. Oldys, busied every morning among
the departed wits and the learned of our country, reflected
some image from them of their wit and learning to his com-
panions : a secret history as yet untold, and ancient wit,
which, cleared of the rust, seemed to him brilliant as the
moilern !

It is hard, however, for a literary antiquary to be carica-
tured, and for a herald to be ridiculed about an " unseemly
reeling with the coronet of the Princess Caroline, which
looked unsteady on the cushion, to the great scandal of his
brethren," — a circumstance which could never have occurred
at the burial of a prince or princess, as the coronet is carried
by Clarencieux, and not by Norroy. Oldys's deep potations
of ale, however, give me an opportunity of bestowing on hirai
the honour of being the author of a popular Anacreontic song.
Mr. Taylor informs me that " Oldys always asserted that he
was the author of the well-known song —

Busy, curious, thirsty fly !

and as he was a rigid lover of truth, I doubt not that he
wrote it." My own researches confirm it : I have traced this
popular song through a dozen of collections since the year
1740. the first in which I find it. In the later collections
an ori'^inal inscription has been dropped, which the accurate
llltson has restored, without, however, being able to discover
the writer. In 1740 it is said to have been " made extem-
pore by a gentleman, occasioned by a fly drinking out of his
cup of ale ;'' — the accustomed potion of poor Oldys!*

is not found. My accomplislied friend, tlie Rev. J. Dallaway, lias oblig-
ingly examined the records of the college, by which it appears that Oldys
had been Norfolk herald extraordinarij, but not belonging to the college,
was appointed ^Jcr scUtuni Norroy King of Arms by patent, May 5th, 1755.

Grose says — "The patronage of the duke occasioned a suspicion of his
being a papist, though I think really without reason ; this for a while re-
garded his appointment : it was underhand propagated by the heralds, who
■were ve.xed at having a stranger put in upon them."

* The beautiful simplicity of this Anacreontic has met the unusual fate
of entirely losing its character, by an additional and incon^mons stanza in

Oldys and his Manuscripts. 497

Grose, however, thouc^h a groat joker on the peculiarities
of Oldys, was far I'rom insensible to the extraordinary acqui-
sitions of the man. " His knowledge of English books lias
hardly been exceeded." Grose, too, was struck by the deli
caey of honour, and the unswerving veracity which so strongly
characterised Oldys, of which he gives a remarkable instance*
We are concerned in ascertaining the moral integrity of the
writer, whose main business is with history.

At a time when our literary historv, excepting in the soli-
tary labour of Anthony Wood, was a forest, with neither road
nor pathway, Oldys, fortunately placed in the library of the
Earl of Oxford, yielded up his entire days to researches con-
cerning the books and the men of the preceding age. His
labours were then valueless, their very nature not yet ascer-
tained, and when he opened the treasures of our ancient lore
in " The British Librarian," it was closed for want of public
encouragement. Our writers, then struggling to create an
age of genius of their own, forgot that they had had any
progenitors ; or while tliey were acquiring new modes of
excellence, that they were losing otliers, to which their pos-

the modem editions, by a gentleman who has put into practice the unal-
lowable liberty of altering the poetical and dramatic compositions of ac-
knowledged genius to his own notion of what he deems "morality," but
in works of genius whatever is dull ceases to be moral. "The Fly" of
Oldys may stand by "The Fly" of Gray for melancholy teuderaesa 0/
thought ; it consisted only of these two stanzas :

Busy, curious, thirsty fly !

Drink with me, and drink as I 1

Freely welcome to my cup,

Couldst thou sip and sip it up :

Make the most of life you may ;

Life is short and wears away !

Both alike are mine and thine,

Hastening quick to their decline !

Thine's a summer, mine no more,

Thouirh repeated to threescore !

Threescore summers when they're gone,

Will appear as short as one 1
* This anecdote should be given in justice to both parties, and in Qrose'a
words, who says : — " He was a man of great good-nature, honour, and in-
tegrity, particularly in his character of an historian. Nothing, I tirmly
believe, would ever have biassed him to insert any fact in his writings he
did not believe, or to suppress any he did. Of this delicacy he gave an
instance at a time when he was in great distress. After his publication
of the 'Life of Sir Walter Raleigh,' some booksellers thinking his name
would sell a piece they were publishing, offered him a considerable sum to
titlicr it, whii.h he rejected with the greatest iudignatin."
VOL. III. K K

498 Life and Habits of a Lilerary Antiquary— •

terity ov th-e national genius might return. (To know, and
to admire only, the literature and the tastes of our own age,
is a species of elegant harbarism.)* Spenser was considered
nearly as obsolete as Chaucer ; Milton was veiled by oblivion,
and Shakspeare's dramas wei'e so imperfectly known, that in
looking over the play-bills of 1711, and much later, I find
that whenever it chanced that they were acted, they were
always announced to have been " written by Shakspeare."
Massinger was unknown ; and Jonson, though called " im-
mortal" in the old play-bills, lay entombed in his two folios.
The poetical era of Elizabeth, the eloquent age of James the
First, and the age of wit of Charles the Second, were blanks
in our literary history. Bysshe, compiling an Art of Poetry
in 1718, passed by in his collection " S^^enser and the poets
of his age, because their language is now become so obsolete
that most readers of our age have no ear for them, and there-
fore 8halcspeare himself is so rarely cited in my collection."
The Ijest English poets were considered to be the modern ; a
taste which is always obstinate !

All this was nothing to Oldys ; his literary curiosity antici-
pated by half a century the fervour of the present day. This
energetic direction of all his thoughts was sustained by that
life of discovery which in literary researches is starting
novelties among old and unremembered things ; contemplat-
ing some ancient tract as precious as a manuscript, or
revelling in the volume of a poet whose passport of fame
was yet delayed in its way ; or disinterring the treasure of
some secluded manuscript, whence he drew a virgin extract ;
or raising up a sort of domestic intimacy with the eminent
in arms, in politics, and in literature in this visionary life,
life itself with Oldys was insensibly gliding away — its cares
almost unfelt !

The life of a literary antiquary partakes of the nature of
those who, having no concerns of their own, bus}'^ themselves
with those of others. Oldys lived in the back ages of Eng-
land ; he had crept among the dark passages of Time, till,
like an old gentleman usher, he seemed to be reporting the
secret history of the courts which he had lived in. He had
been charmed among t'leir masques and revels, had eyed

* We have been taught to enjoy the two ages of Genius and of Taste.
The literary public are deeply indebted to the editorial care, the taste,
and the enthusiasm of Mr. Singer, for exquisite reprints of some valuable
writers.

Oldys and his Manuscripts. 499

with astonishment their cumbrous magnificence, when knights
and Indies carried on their mantles and their cloth of gold
ten thousand pounds' worth of ropes of pearls, and buttons
of diamonds ; or, descending to the gay court of tlie second
Charles, he tattled merry tales, as in that of the first he had
painfully watched, like a patriot or a loyalist, a distempered
era. He had lived so constantly with tiiese people of another
age, and had so deeply interested himselt in their affairs, and
so loved the wit and tlie U-arning which are often bright
under the rust of antiquity, that his own uncourtly style is
embrowned with the tint of a century old. But it was this
taste and curiosity which alone could have produced the
extraordinary volume of Sir Walter llawleigh's life — a work
richly inlaid with the most curious facts and the juxta-
position of the most remote knowledge; to judge by its ful-
ness of narrative, it would seem rather to have been the work
of a contemporar3^*

It was an advantage in this primaeval era of literary curio-
sity, that those volumes which are now not even to be
found in our national library, where certainly they are per-
petually wanted, and which ax-e now so excessively appre-
ciated, were exposed on stalls, through the reigns of Anne
and the two Georges. t Oldys encountered no competitor,
cased in the invulnerable mail of his purse, to dispute his
possession of the rarest volume. On the other hand, our
early collector did not possess our advantages ; he could not
fly for instant aid to a " Biographia Britanniea," he had no
history of our poetry, nor even of our drama. Oldys could
tread in no man's path, for every soil about him was unbroken
ground. He had to create everything for his own purposes.
We gather fruit from trees which others have planted, and
too often we but " pluck and eat."

Nulla dies sine liuea, was his sole hope while he was aceu-

* Gibbon once meditated a life of Rawleigh, and for that purpose began
some researches in that "memorable era of our English annals." After
reading Oldys' s, he relinquished Iiis desi;,'n, from a conviction that "ho
could add nothing new to the subject, except the uncertain merit of style
and sentiment."

t The British Museum is extremely deficient in our National Literature.
The gift of George the Third's library has, however, probably supplied
many deficiencies. [The recent bequest of the Grcnville collection, and t1ie
Constant search made of late years for these relics of early literature by the
officers of our great national libr.ary. Las greatly altered the sUte of the
collection since the above was writteni — Ed.\

K K 2

500 hife and Habits of a Literary Antiquary —

mulating masses of notes ; and as Old^^s never used liis pen
from the weak passion of scribbling, but from the urgency of
]ireserving some substantial knowledge, or planning some
future inquiry, he amassed nothing but what he wished to
remember. Even the minuter pleasures of settling a date, or
classifying a title-page, were enjoyments to his incessant pen.
Everything was acquisition. This never-ending business of
research appears to have absorbed his powers, and sometimes
to have dulled his conceptions. No one more aptly exercised
the tact of discovery ; he knew where to feel in the dark : but
he was not of the race — that race indeed had not yet ap-
peared among us — who could melt into their Corinthian
l)i-ass the mingled treasures of Research, Imagination, and
Pliilosophy !

We may be curious to inquire where our literary antiquary
deposited the discoveries and curiosities which he was so in-
cessantly acquiring. They were dispersed, on many a fly-leaf,
in occasional memorandum-books ; in ample marginal notes
on his authors — they were sometimes thrown into what he
calls his " parchment budgets," or " Bags of Biography — of
Botany — of Obituary " — of " Books relative to London," and
other titles and bags, which he was every day tilling.*
Sometimes his collections seem to have been intended for a
series of volumes, for he refers to " My first Volume of Tables
of the eminent Persons celebrated by English Poets " — to
another of " Poetical Characteristics." Among those manu-
scripts which I have seen, I find one mentioned, apparently
of a wide circuit, under the reference of " My Biographical
Institutions. Part third ; containing a Catalogue of all the
English Lives, with Historical and Critical Observations on
them." But will our cm'ious or our whimsical collectors of
the present day endure without impatience the loss of a
quarto manuscript, which bears this rich condiment for it«
title — " Of London Libraries ; with Anecdotes of Collectors
of Books ; Remarks on Booksellers ; and on the first Pub-
lishers of Catalogues ? " Oldys left ample annotations on
" Puller's Worthies," and " Winstanley's Lives of the Poets,"
and on " Langbaine's Dramatic Poets." The late Mr.

* Grose says — " His mode of composing was somewhat singular : he had
a number of small parchment bags, inscribed with the names of the per-
sons whose lives he intended to write ; into these bags he put every cir-
cumstance and anecdote he could collect, and from thence drew up his
history."

Oldys and his Manuscripts. 501

Boswell showed me a Fuller in tlio Malone collection, with
vSteevens's transcriptions of OJ(fi/s's notes, which ?.Ialone pur-
chased for 4;3/. at Steevcns's sale ; hut where is the oi-iginal
copy of Oldys ? The " Winstanley," 1 think, also reposes in
the same collection. The " Langhainc " is far-ianicd, and i.-;
preserved in the Britisli Museum, the i^ift of JJr. Birch; it has
been considered so precious, that several of our eniinent writers
have cheerfully passed through the labour of a minute tran-
sci'iption of its numberless notes. In the history of the fatii
and fortune of books, that of Oldys's Lanjhaine is too curious
to omit. 01d3^s may tell his own story, which I find in the
Museum copy, p. 33G, and which copy appears to be a second
attempt ; for of the Jlrst Langbaine we have this account : —

AVhen I left London in 1724, to reside in YorJcshirc, I left in the care of
the Kev. Mr. Burridge's family, with whom I had .several years lodged,
among many other books, goods, &c., a copy of this "Langbaine," in
whii-h I had wrote several notes and references to further knowledge of
tliLse poets. When I returned to London, 1730, I undtistood my books
had been dispersed ; and afterwards becoming acquainted with Air. T.
Coxeter, I found that he had bought my " Langbaine" of a bookseller who
was a great collector of plays and poetical books : this must have been of
service to him, and he has kept it so carefully from my sight, that I never
could have the opjiortuuity of transcribing into this I am now writing in
the notes I had collected iu that.*

* At the Bodleian Library, I learnt by a letter with which I am favoured
by the Rev. Dr. Bliss, that there is an interleaved " Gildon's Lives and
Characters of the Dramatic Poets," with corrections, which once belonged
to Coxeter, who appears to have intended a new editioti. Whether Cox-
eter transcribed into his Gildon the notes of Oldys's Jirst " Langbaine,"
iu worth inquiry. Coxeter's conduct, though he had purchased Oldys's
first " Langbaine," was that of an ungenerous miser, who will quarrel with a
brother rather than share in any acquisition he can get into his own hands.
To Coxeter we also owe much ; he suggested Dodsley's Collection of Old
Plays, and the first tolerable edition of Massinger.

Oldys could not have been emploj'ed in Lord Oxford's library, as Mr.
Clialniers conjectures, aboutl726 ; for here he mentions that he was in York-
shire from 1724 to 1730. This period is a remarkable blank in 0i<ly.s'3
life. Jly learned friend, the Rev. Joseph Hunter, has supplied ino with a
note in the copy of Fuller in the Alalone collection preserved at the Bod-
leian. Those years were passed apparently in the household of the first
Earl of Malton, who built Wentworth House. There all the collections of
the antiquary Gascoigne, with "seven great chests of manuscripts," some
as ancient as the time of the Conquest, were condemned in one solemn
sacrifice to Vulcan ; the ruthless earl being im]ienetrable to tlie prayers
and remonstrances of our vot;iry to English History. Ohlys left the earl
with little satisfaction, as appears by some severe strictures from his
gentle pen.

502 Life and Huh'its of a Literary Anticfaary —

This first Langbaine, with additions by Coxeter, was
bought, at the sale of his books, by Theophilus Gibber : on tlie
strength of these notes he prefixed his name to the first col-
lection of the " Lives of our Poets," which appeared in weekly
numbers, and now form five volumes, written chiefly by Shiels,
an amanuensis of Dr. Johnson. Shiels has been recently
castigated by Mr. Gilford.

These literary jobbers nowhere distinguished Coxeter's and
Oldj's's curious matter from their own. Such was the fate of
the first copy of Langbaine, with Oldys's notes ; but the
second is more important. At an auction of some of Oldys's
books and manuscripts, of which I have seen a printed cata-
logue, Dr. Birch purchased this invaluable copy for three
shillings and sixpence.* Such was the value attached to
these original researches concerning our poets, and of which,
to obtain only a transcript, very large sums have since been
cheerfully given. The Museum copy of Langbaine is in
Oldys's handwriting, not interleaved, but overflowing with
notes, written in a very small hand about the margins, and
inserted between the lines ; nor may the transcriber pass negli-
gently even its corners, otherwise he is here assured that he
will lose some useful date, or the hint of some curious refer-
ence. The enthusiasm and diligence of Oldys, in undertaking
a repetition of his first lost labour, proved to be infinitely
greater than the sense of his unrequited labours. Such is the
history of the escapes, the changes, and the fate of a volume
which forms the groundwork of the most curious information
concerning our elder poets, and to which we must still fre-
quently refer.

In this variety xji literary arrangements, which we must
consider as single works in a progressive state, or as portions
of one great work on our modern literary history, it may,
perhaps, be justly suspected that Oldys, in the delight of
perpetual acquisition, impeded the happier labour of unity of
design and completeness of purpose. He was not a Tira-

* This copy was lent by Dr. Birch to the late Bishop of Dromore, who
with his own hand carefully transcribed the notes into an interleaved copy
of "Langbaine," divided into fourvolumes, which, as I am informed, nar-
rowly escaped the flames, and was injured by the water, at a fire at Northum-
berland House. His lordship, wheu he went to Ireland, left this copy with
Mr. Nichols, for the use of the projected editions of the Tatler, the Spectator,
and ihc Guardian, with notes and illustrations; ofwliich I think the
Taller only has appeared, and to which his lordship contributed some
valuable communications.

Oldya and his Manuscripts, r)03

bof^chi — nor even a Nieeron ! He was sometimes chilled by
neglect, and by " vanity and vexation of spirit," else we should
not now have to count over a barren list of manuscript
works ; masses of literary history, of which the existence is
even doubtful.

In Kippis's Biographia Britannica we find frequent refer-
ences to 0. M., Oldys's Manuscripts. Mr. John Taylor, the
son of the friend and executor of Oldj^s, has greatly obliged
me with all his recollections of this man of letters ; vyrhose
pursuits, however, were in no manner analogous to his, and
whom he could only have known in youth. By him I learn,
that on the death of Oldys, Dr. Kippis, editor of the Biogra-
phia Britannica, looked over these nianuscripts at Mr. Taylor's
house. He bad been directed to this discovery by the late
Bishop of Dromore, whose active zeal was very remarkable iu
every enterprise to enlai-ge om- literary history. Kippis was
one who, in some degree, might have estimated their literary
value; but, employed by commercial men, and negotiating
with persons who neither conipreliended their nature, nor
affixed any value to them, the editor of the Biographia found
Oldys's manuscripts an easy purchase for his employer, the
late Mr. Cadell ; and the twenty guineas, perhaps, served to
bur_y their writer! Mr. Taylor says — '"The manuscripts of
Oldys were not so many as might be expected Irom so inde-
fatigable a writer. They consisted chiefly of short extracts
from books, and minutes of dates, and were thought worth pur-
chasitiff by the doctor. 1 remember the manuscripts well ;
though Oldys was not the author, but rather recorder." Such
is the statement and the opinion of a writer whose effusions
are of a gayer sort. But the researches of Oldys must not
be estimated by this standard ; with him a single line was
the result of many a day of research, and a leaf of scattered
hints would supply more original knowledge than some
octavos iashioned out by the hasty gilders and varnishers of
modern literature. These discoverien occupy small s[)ace to
the eye ; but large works are composed out of them. This
verj' lot of Oldys's manuscripts was, indeed, so considerable
in the judgment of Kippis, that ht! has described them as " a
large and usrful hodg of biographical materials, left by Mr.
Oldgs." Were these the " Biographical Institutes" Oldys
refers to among his man<iscrij)ts ? "The late Mr. Malone."
continues Mr. Tajdor, " told me that he had seen all Oldg-is
manuscripts ; so I presume they ai'e iu the hands of Cadell

504 Life and Habits of a Literary Antiquary —

and Davies." Have tlicy met with the fate of sucked
oranges ? — and how much of Malone may we owe to Oldj's ?

Tliis information enabled me to trace the manuscripts of
Oldys to Dr. Kippis ; but it cast me among the booksellers,
who do not value manuscripts which no one can print. I
discovered, by the late jNIr. Davies, that the direction of that
liapless work in our literary history, with its whole treasure
of manuscripts, had been consigned by Mr. Cadell to tlie
late Geroge Robinson, and tliat the successor of Dr. Kippis
had been the late Dr. George Gregory. Again I repeat, the
history of voluminous works is a melanchol}' office ; every
one concerned with them no longer can be found ! The
esteemed relict of Dr. Gregory, with a friendly promptitude,
gratified my anxious inquiries, and informed me, that " she
perfectly recollects a mass of papers, such as I described, being
returned, on the death of Dr. Gregory, to the house of Wilkie
and Robinson, in the early part of the year 1809." I applied
to this house, who, after some time, referred me to Mr. John
Robinson, the representative of his late father, and with
whom all the papers of the former partnership were deposited.
But Mr. John Robinson has terminated my inquiries, by his
civility in promising to comply with them, and his perti-
nacity in not doing so. He may have injured his own interest
in not trading with my curiosity.* It was fortunate for the
nation that George Vei tue's mass of manuscripts escaped the
fate of Oldys's ; had the possessor proved as indolent, Horace
Walpole would not have been the writer of his most valuable
work, and we should have lost the " Anecdotes of Painting,"
of which Vertue had collected the materials.

Of a life consumed in such literary activity we should have
known m.ore had the Diaries of Oldys escaped destruction.
" One habit of my father's old friend, William Oldys," says
Mr. Taylor, " was that of keeping a diary, and recording in
it every day all the events that occurred, and all his engage-
ments, and the employment of his time. I have seen
piles of these books, bu t know not what became of them."

* I know that not only this lot of Olchjs's manuscripts, but a great
quantity of original contributions of whole lives, intended for the " Biogra-
jjhia Britannica," must lie together, unless they have been destroyed as
waste paper. These biographical and literary curiosities were often sup-
plied by the families or friends of eminent persons. Some may, perhaps,
have been reclaimed by their owners. I am informed there was among
them an interesting collection of the correspondence of Locke ; and I could
mention several lives which were prepared.

Oldys and his Manuscripls. 505

Tlie existence of such diaries is confirnieil by a sale cataloguo
of Thomas Davies, the Hterary bookseller, who sold many of
the books and some manuscripts of Oldys, which appear to
have been dispersed in various libraries. I find Lot " 8027,
Mr. Oldys's Diary, containing several observations relating
to books, characters, &c. ;" a single volume, which appears to
have separated from the " piles" which IMr. Taylor once wit-
nessed. The literary diary of Okie's could have exhibited
the mode of his piu'suits, and the results of his discoveries.
One of these volumcjs I have fortunately discovered, and a
singularity in this writer's feelings throws a new interest ovei
such diurnal records. Oldys was apt to give utterance with
his pen to his most secret emotions. Querulous or indignant,
his honest simplicity confided to the paper before him such
extemporaneous soliloquies, and I have found him hiding in
the very corners of his manuscripts his " secret sorrows."

A few of tlu se slight memorials of his feelings will exhibit
a sort of Silhouette likeness traced by his own hand, when at
times the pensive man seems to have contemplated his own
shadow. Oldys would throw down in verses, whose humility
or quaintness indicates their origin, or by some pithy adage,
or apt quotation, or i-ecording anecdote, his self-advice, or liis
self-regrets !

Oppressed by a sense of tasks so unprofitable to himself,
while his days were often passed in trouble and in prison, he
breathes a self-reproach in one of these profound reflections
of melancholy which so often startle the man of study, who
truly discovers that life is too limited to acquire real know-
ledge, with the ambition of dispensing it to the world : —

I say, who too long in these cobwebs lurks,
Is always whetting tools, but never works.

In one of the corners of his note-books 1 find this curious
but sad reflection : —

Alas ! this is but the apron of a fig-leaf — but the curtain of a cobweb.

Sometimes he seems to have anticipated the fate of that
obscure diligence which was pursuing discoveries reserved
for others to use : —

He heapeth up riches, and knoweth not who shall gather tliem.

Fond treasurer of these stores, behold thy fate
In Psalm the thirty-ninth, 6, 7, and 8.

506 Life mul Habit fs of a Literary Antiquartj —

Sometimes he checks the eager ardour of his pen, and reuunds
himself" of its repose, in Latin, Itahan, and English.

Non vi, sed ssepe cadendo.

Assai presto si fa quel che si fa bene.
Some respite best recovers what we need,
Discreetly baiting gives the journey speed.

There was a thoughtless kindness in honest Oldys ; and
his simplicity of character, as I have observed, was practised
on by the artful or the ungenerous. We regret to find
the following entry concerning the famous collector, James
West :—

I gave above threescore letters of Dr. Davenant to his son, who was
envoy at Frankfort in 1703 to 1708, to llr. James West,* with one hun-
dred and fifty more, about Christmas, 1746 : but the same fate they found
as grain that Ls sown in barren gi-ound.

Such is the plaintive record by which Oldys relieved him-
self of a groan ! We may smile at the simplicity of tlie fol-
lowing narrative, where poor Oldys received manuscripts in
lieu of money : —

Old Counsellor Fane, of Colchester, who, in formd pauperis, deceived
me of a good sum of money which he owed me, and not long after set up
his chariot, gave me a parcel of manuscripts, and promised me others,
•which he never gave me, nor anything else, besiiles a barrel of oysters, and
a manuscript copy of Randolph's poems, an original, as he said, with many
additions, being devolved to him as the author's relation.

There was no end to his aids and contributions to every
author or bookseller who applied to him ; yet he had reason
to complain of both while they were using his invaluable
but not valued knowledge. Here is one of these diurnal
entries : —

I lent the tragical lives and deaths of the famous pirates. Ward and
Dansiker, 4to, London, 1612, by llobt. Daborn, alias Dabourne, to Mr.
T. Lediard, when he was writing his Naval History, and he never returned
it. See Howell's Letters of them.

In another, when his friend T. Hayward was collecting,
for his "British Muse," the most exquisite commonplaces of
our old English dramatists, a compilation which must not be
confounded with ordinary ones, Oldys not only assisted in the

* This collection, and probably the other letters, have come down to tis,
no doubt, with the manuscripts of this collector, purchased for the British
Museum. The correspondence of Dr. Davenant, the political writer, v.-itb
his son, the envoy, turns on one perpetual topic, his son's and his own ad«
vanceraent in the state.

Ohhjs and /its Manuscripts. 507

labour, but drew up a curious introduction with a knowledge
and love oi' the subject which none but himself possessed.
But so little were these researches then understood, that we
find Okie's, in a moment of vexatious recollection, and in a
corner of one of the margins of his Langbaine, accidentally
preserving an extraordinary circumstance attending this
curious dissertation. Oldys having completed this elaborate
introduction, "the penurious publislier insisted on leaving out
one third part, which happened to be the best matter in it,
because he would liave it contracted into one sheet .'" Poor
Oldys never could ibrget the fate of this elaborate Disser-
tation on all the collections of English poetry ; 1 am con-
fident that I have seen some volume which was formerly
Oldys's, and afterwards Thomas Warton's, in the possession
of my intelligent friend Mr. Douce, in the fly-leaf of which
Oldys has expressed himself in these words : — " In my his-
torical and critical review of all the collections of this kind,
it would have made a sheet and a half or two sheets ; but
they for sordid gain, and to save a little expense in print and
paper, got Mr. John Campbell to cross it mid cramp it, and
play the devil with it, till they squeezed it into less compass
than a sheets This is a loss which we may never recover.
The curious book-knowledge of this singular man of letters,
those stores of which he was the fond treasui-er, as he says
with such tenderness for his pursuits, were always ready to
be cast into the forms of a dissertation or an introduction ;
and when Morgan published his Collection of Eare Tracts,
the friendly hand of Oldys furnished " A Dissertation upon
Pamphlets, in a Letter to a Nobleman ;" probably the Earl
of Oxford, a great literary curiosity ; and in the Harleian
Collection he has given a Cataloyue raisonne of six hundred.
When Mrs. Cooper attempted "The Muse's Library," the
first essay which influenced the national taste to return to
our deserted poets in oiu* most poetical age, it was Oldys who
only c )uld have enabled this lady to perform that task so
well.* When Curll, the publisher, to help out one of his
hasty compilations, a " History of the Stage," repaired, like
all the world, to Oldys, whose kindness could not resist the

* It is a stout octavo voluiue of 400 pages, containing a good selection of
specimens from tlie earliest era, concluding witli Sam. Daniel, iu the reign
of James I. Jhs. Elizabeth Cooper was the wife of au auctioneer, who
had Leea a chum of Oldys's in the Fleet Prison, where he died a
debtor ; and it was to aid his widow that Oldys edited this book.

508 Life and Habits of a Literary Antiquary —

importunit}' of this busy publisher, he g'avc him a life of
Nell Gwynn ; while at the same moment Oldys could not
avoid noticing, in one of his usual entries, an intended work
on the stage, which we seem never to have had, " Dick
Leveridge's History of the Stage and Actors iii Ms own
Time, for these forty or fifty years past, as he told me he had
composed, is likely to prove, whenever it shall appear, a more
perfect work." I might proceed with many similar gra-
tuitous contributions with which he assisted his contem-
poraries. Oldys sliould have been constituted the reader for
the nation. His Comptes Bendus of books and manuscripts
are still held precious ; but his useful and curious talent had
sought the public patronage in vain ! From one of his
" Diaries," which has escaped destruction, I transcribe some
interesting passages ad verhitm.

The reader is here presented with a minute picture of
those invisible occupations which pass in the study of a man
of letters. There are those who may be surprised, as well as
amused, in discovering how all the business, even to the very
disappointments and pleasures of active life, can be transferred
to the silent chamber of a recluse student ; but there are
others who will not read without emotion the secret
thoughts of him who, loving literature with its purest pas-
sion, scarcely repines at being defrauded of his just fame, and
leaves his stores for the after-age of his more gifted heirs.
Thus we open one of Oldys's literary days : —

I was informed that day by Mr. Tho. Odell's daughter, that her father,
who was Deputy-Inspector and Licenser of the Plays, died 24 May, 1749, at
his house in Cbappel-street, Westminster, aged 58 years. He was writing
a history of the characters he had observed, and conferences he had had
with many eminent persons he knew in his time. He was a great ob-
servator of everything curious in the conversations of his acquaintance, and
his own conversation was a living chronicle of the remarkable intrigues,
adventures, sayings, stories, writings, &c., of many of the quality, poets,
and other authors, players, booksellers, &c., who flourished especially in
the present century. He had been a popular man at elections, and some-
time master of the playhouse in Goodman's Fields, but latterly was forced
to live reserved and retired by reason of his debts. He published two or
three dramatic pieces, one was the Patron, on the story of Lord llomney.

Q. of his da. to restore me Eustace Budgell's papers, and to get a sight
of her father's.

Have got the one, and seen the other.

July 31. — Was at Mrs. Odell's ; she returned me Mr. Budgell's papers.
Saw some of her husband's papers, mostly poems in favour of the ministry,
and against Mr. Pope. One of them, printed by the late Sir Ilobert Wal-
pole's encouragement, who gave him tea guineas for writing and as much

Oldys and his Manuscripts. 509

for the expense of printing it ; bnt through his advice it was never pub-
lished, because it might hurt his interest witli Lord Chestertield, and smne
other noblemen wiio favoured Mr. l'oi>e for his fine genius. Tiie tract I
lilced best of his writings was the history of his playhouse in Goodman's
Fields. (Kememlier that which was published against that playhouse,
which I liave entered in my London Catalogue. Letter to Sir Kic. Jjrocas,
Lord Mayor, &c., 8vo, 17!30.)

Saw nothing of the history of his conversations with ingenious men; his
characters, tales, jests, and intrigues of them, of which no man was better
furnished with them. She thinks she has some papers of these, and pro-
mises to look them out, and also to inquire after Mr. Griffin, of the Lord
Chamberlain's ofiice, that I may get a search made about Spenser.

So intent \va.s Oldys on these literary researches that we
see, by the last words of this entry, how in hunting aftc-r
one sort of jjame, his undivided zeal kept his eye on another.
One of his favourite subjects was the realising of original dis-
coveries respecting Spenser and Shakspeare ; of wliom, per-
haps, to our shame, as it is to our vexation, it may be said
that two of our master-poets are those of whom we know
the least ! Oldys once flattered himself that he should be
able to have given the world a Life of Sliakspeare. Mr. John
Taylor informs me, that " Oldys had contracted to su])ply
ten yeai's of the life of Shakspeai'e unknown to the hiorjraphers,
witli one Walker, a liookseller in the Strand ; and as Oldys
did not live to I'ultil the engagement, my father was obliged
to return to Walker twenty guineas which he had advanced
on the work." That interesting narrative is now hajx-ltss
for us. Yet, by the solemn contract into which Oldys had
entered, and from his strict integrity, it might induce one to
suspect that he had made positive discoveries which are now
irrecoverable.

We may observe the manner of his anxious inquiries about
Spenser : —

Ask Sir Peter Thompson if it were improper to try if Lord Effingham
Howard would procure the pedigrees in the Herald's office, to be seen for
Edmund Spenser's parentage or family ? or how he was related to Sir John
Spenser of Allhorpe, in Northamptonshire ? to three of whose daughters,
who all married nobilitj', S])enser dedicates three of his poems.

Of Mr. Vcrtue, to examino Stowe's memorandum-book. Look more
carefully for the year when Spenser's monument was raised, or between
which years the entry stands — 1623 and 1(526.

Sir Clement Cottrell's book about Spenser.

Captain Power, to know if he has heard from Capt. Spenser about my
letter of inquiries relating to Edward Spenser.

Of Whistou, to examine if my remarks on Spenser are compkte as to
the press — Yes.

iiemember, when I see Mr. W Thompson, to inquire whether he Laa

510 Lije and Habits of a Literary Antiquary —

printed in any of liis works any other character of our old poets than
those of Spenser and Shakspeare ;* and to get the liberty of a visit at
Kentish Town, to see his Collection of Robert Grr.eae's Works, in about
four large volumes quarto. He commonly published a pamphlet every
term, as his acquaintance Tom Nash informs us.

Two or three other memorials may excite a smile at his
peculiar habits of study, and unceasing vigilance to draw
from original soiarces of information.

DrydmHi Dream, at Lord Exeter's, at Burleigh, while he was trans-
lating Virgil, as Signior Verrio, then painting there, related it to the
Yorkshire painter, of whom I had it, lies in the parchment book in
quarto, designed for his life.

At a subsequent period Oldj's inserts, " Now entered
therein." Malone quotes this very memorandum, which he
discovered in Oldys's Langhaine, to show Dryden had some
confidence in Oneirocriticisra, and supposed that future events
were sometimes prognosticated by dreams. Malone adds,
" Where either the loose prophetic leaf or the j)arcliment
iook now is, I know not." f

Unquestionably we have incurred a great loss in Oldys's
collections for Dryden's Life, which are very extensive ; such a
mass of literary history cannot have perished unless by acci-
dent ; and I suspect that many of Oldys's manuscripts are
in the possession of individuals who are not acquainted with
his hand-writing, which may be easily verified.

To search the old papers in one of my large deal boxes for Dryden's
letter of thanks to my father, for some communication relating to Plu-
tarch, while they and others were publishing a translation of Plutarch's
Lives, in five volumes 8vo. 1683. It is copied in the yellow book for
DryderCs Life, in which there are about 150 transcriptions, in prose and
verse, relating to the life, character, and writings of Dryden. — Is Eng-
land's Remembrancer extracted out of my obit, (obituary) into my remarks
on him in th& poetical bay ?

i\Iy extracts in the parchment budget about Denham's seat and family
in Surrey.

My white vellum pocket-book, bordered with gold, for the extract from
*' Groans of Great Britain" about Butler.

See my account of the great yews in Tankersley's park, while Sir R.
Faushaw was prisoner in the lodge there ; especially Talbot's yew, which
a man on horseback might turn about in, in my botanical budget.

* William Thompson, the poet of " Sickness," and other poems ; a warm
lover of our elder bards, and no vulgar imitator of Spenser. He was the
revivor of Bishop Hall's Satires, in 1753, by an edition which had been
more fortunate if conducted by his friend Oldys, fur the text is unfaithful,
tliough the edition fullowed was one borrowed from Lord Oxlord'.s library,
probably by the aid of Oldys.

+ Malone's Life of Diyden, p. 420.

Oldijs and his Manuscripts. 511

This Dunald Lupton I have nientioned in my catalogue of all the
books and pamphlets relative to London in folio, bc;5iin anno 1740, and in
xhieh I have now, 1740, entered between 300 and 400 articles, besides
remarks, &c. Now, in June, 1748, between 400 and 500 articles. Now,
in October, 1750, six hundred and thirty-six.*

There remains to be told an anecdote which shows that
Pope greatly regarded our literar}^ antiquary. " Oldys,"
says my friend, " was one of the librarians of the Earl of
Oxford, and he used to tell a story of the credit which he ob-
tained as a scholar, by setting Pope right in a Latin quota-
tion which he made at the earl's table. He did not, how-
ever, as I remember, boast of having been admitted as a
guest at the table, but as happening to be in the room."
Wliy might not OKlys, however, have been seated, at least
below the salt ? It would do no honour to either party to
suppose that Oldys stood among the menials. The truth is,
there appears to have existed a confidential intercourse
between Pope and Oldys ; of this I shall give a remarkable
proof. In those fragments of 01d\'s, pi'eserved as " addi-
tional anecdotes of Shakspeare," in Steevens's and Ma-
lone's editions, Oldys mentions a story of Davenant,
which, he adds, " Mr. Pope told me at the Earl of
Oxford's table 1" And further relates a conversation which
passed between them. Nor is this all ; for in Oldys's
Langbaine he put down this memorandum in the article of
Shakspeare — " Remember what I observed to my Lord
Oxford for Mr. Pope's use out of Cowley's preface." Malone
appears to have discovered this observation of Cowley's,
which is curious enough, and very ungrateful to that
commentator's ideas : it is " to prune and lop away the
old withered branches" in the new editions of Shakspeare
and other ancient poets! "Pope adopted," says Malone,

* This is one of Oldyis Manuscripts ; a thick folio of titles, which has
been made to do its duty, with small thnnks from those who did not care
to praise the service which they derived from it. It passed from Dr.
Berkeidiout to George Steevens, who lent it to GuUL,'h. It was sold for
live guineas. The useful work of ten ye.'irs of attention given to it ! The
antirjuary Gongh alludes to it with his usual disceiiiment. " Among these
titles of books and pamphlets about London are many purel;/ lihtoriral,
and many of too low a kind to rank under the head of topDgrapliy and
history." Thus the design of Oldys, in forming this elaborate collection,
is condemned by trying it by the limited object of the topographer's view.
This catalogue remains a desideratum, were it printed entire as collected
by Oldys, not merely for the topo,,'raphy of the uiotropolis, but for its lo-
lati'u to its manuers, domestic anuals, events, and persons connected with
its history.

5 1 2 Life and Habits of a Literary Antiquary —

" this very unwarrantable idea ; Oldys was the person who
sui^gested to Pope the singular course he pursued in his
edition of Shakspeare." Without touching on tlie felicity or
the danger of this new sj'stem of republishing Sliakspeare,
one may say that if many passages were struck out, Sliak-
speare would not be injured, for many of them were never
composed by that great bard ! There not only existed a
literary intimacy between Oldys and Pope, but our poet
adopting his suggestions on so important an occasion, evinces
low highly he esteemed his judgment ; and unquestionably
Pope had often been delighted by Oldys with the history of
his predecessors, and the curiosities of English poetry.

I have now introduced the reader to Oldj's sitting amidst
his " poetical bags," his " parchment biographical budgets,"
his " catalogues," and his " diaries," often venting a solitary
groan, or active in some fresh inquiry. Such is the Sil-
houette of this prodigy of literary curiosity !

The very existence of Oldys's manuscripts continues to be
of an ambiguous nature ; referred to, quoted, and transcribed,
we can but seldom turn to the originals. These masses of
curious knowledge, dispersed or lost, have enriched an after-
race, who have often picked up the spoil and claimed the
victory, but it was Oldys who had fought the battle !

Oldys affords one more example how life is often closed
amidst discoveries and acquisitions. The literary antiquary,
when he has attempted to embody his multiplied inquiries,
and to finish his scattered designs, has found that the labor
ABSQUE LABOiiE, " the labour void of labour," as the inscrip-
tion on the library of Florence finely describes the researches
of literature, has dissolved his days in the voluptuousness of
his curiosity ; and that too often, like the hunter in the heat
of the chase, while he disdained the prey which lay before him,
he was still stretching onwards to catch the fugitive !
Transvolat in medio posita, et fugientia capiat.

At the close of every century, in this growing world of
books, may an Oldys be the reader for the nation ! Should
he be endowed with a philosophical spirit, and combine
the genius of his own times with that of the preceding, he
will hold in his hand the chain of human thoughts, and,
like another Bayle, become the historian of the human miud •

INDEX.

AnF.i.ARD, ranks among the heretic?,
i. MO; book condemned as his
written by another, ib.; absolution
granted to, 14C; wrote and suvg
finely, 147; raises the school of the
Paraclete, ib.

Abram-men, ii. 312, and note, ib.

AuniDGERS, objections to, and re-
commendations of, i. 397 ; liayle's
advice to, 398; now slightly re-
garded, 399; instructions to, quoted
from the Book of JIaccabees, ib.

Absence of mind, anecdotes of, i.
206.

Absolute monarchy, search for pre-
cedents to maintain, iii. .510, note.

Abstraction of mind, instances of,
amongst great nun, ii. 59 — (JO ;
sonnet on, by Metaslasio, 61.

Academy, the I'"rcnch,.some account
of, i. 413— 417 ; visit of Christina
Queen of Sweden to, 414 ; of Lite-
rature, designed in the reign of
Queen Anne, ii. 407; abortive
attempts to establish various, ib. ;
disadvantages of, ib. ; arguments of
the advocates for, ib.; should be
designed by individuals, 408;
French origin of, 408 — !10 ; origin
of the Koyal Hociety, 410—412;
ridiculous titles of Italian, 479 ;
some account of the Arcadian, and
its service to literature, 482 ; deri-
vation of its title, ib. ; of the Co-
lombaria, 483; indications of, in
England, 484 ; early rise of among
the Italians, 485 ; establishnunt of
the " Academy," 480 ; suppressed,
and its members persecuted, ib. ;
of the " Oziosi," 488; suppression
of many, at Florence and Sienna,
ib.; considerations of the reason of
tlic Italian fantastical titles of, &c.,
489.

Acajou and Zirphile, a whimsical
laii-y tale, ii. 308—311.

Accademia of Uologna originated
with Lodovico Caracci: ii. 393.
\0L. ni.

Accident, instances of the pur-
suits of great men directed bv, i.
85.

AcEPiiAi,!, iii. 193, and note. ib.

Aches, formerly a dissyllable ; e.vam-
ples from Swift, Ihulibras, and
Shakespeare ; John Kemble's use
of tlie word, i. 81, note.

Acrostics, i. 295 — 290.

Actors, tragic, i. 248; who liave
died martyrs to their tragic cha-
racters, 249 ; should be nursed in
the laps of queens, 20O ; anec-
dotes of, 250 — 251.

Addison, silent among strangers, i.
lot.

Adriani, his continuation of Guic-
ciardini'8 History, iii. ISO.

Advice, good, of a literary sinner,

i. 350.

Acates, presenting representations
of natural forms, i. 24 J.

Aeon ARD, Archbishop of Lyons, i. 2 1 ,
and note.

Agreda, Maria, wrote the Life of the
Airgin Mary, i. 307.

Ai.BERiCO, vision of, ii. 422.

Albeutus Magnus, his opinion con-
cerning books of magic, iii. 281 ;
his brazen man, 282 ; his enter-
tainment of the Earl of UoUand,
290.

Alciiy.mists, results of their opera-
tions, iii. 284 ; their cautious
secrcsy, 285 ; discoveries by, ib.

ALcnY:MV, anecdotes of jirofcssors of,
i. 283 — 284 ; Henry VI. endea-
voured to recruit liis colTers by,
284 ; professors of, calk'd multi-
pliers, 285 ; books of, pious frauds,
ib. ; Klias -•Vshmole ratlicr the histo-
rian of, than an adept in,28C ; opi-
nions of modern chemists on,
287.

Alexandria, library of, i. 1 ; Deme-
trius Phalereus, its industrious and
skilful librarian, ib. ; original
manuacripta of .ICschyluii, Sdi l.o-
L L

;a4

Index.

cles, and Euripides procured for,
ib. : dcstniction of, 47 — 57.

Ambassadoi!S, anecdotes of frivo-
lous points of etiquette insisted on
by, ii. 195 — 20().

Amicable ceremonies in various na-
tions, ii. 12.

AiMiLCAR, the author of the Second
Punic AVar, iii. 14.1.

Amtiiigoiries, i. 298.

Amusement, periodical, durinjc study,
a standing rule among the Jesuits,
i. 31 ; various, practised by dif-
ferent celebrated men, 38 — 41.

Anagrams, 1. 298, ii. 229 ; are
classed among the Hebrews with
the cabalistic sciences, 230 ; I'la-
tonic notions of, ib. ; specimens of
Greek, ib. ; several examples of
curious, 231 — 233; amusing anec-
dotes concerning, 234.

Ancillon and his library, i. 10, and
note.

Andreini, an actor and author of
irregular Italian comedies, ii. 141 ;
a drama of his gave the tirst idea
to Milton of liis " Paradise Lost," ib.

Anecdotes of European Planners,
ii. 30 — 39 ; of Abstraction of
Mind, 59 — G2 ; literary, their im-
portance, 300; Dr. Johnson's de-
fence of, 301; the absurdity of
many transmitted by biographers,
ib. ; general remarks on, 303

Anglesea, Earl of, his MS.S. si-.p-
pressed, ii. 447.

Animals, influence of music on, i.
272—4.

Annil'S of Viterbo i^ublished seven-
teen books of pretended antiquities,
iii. 305; and afterwards a com-
mentary, ib. ; caused a literary
war, 30G.

Antediluvian researches, i. 301 —
303.

Anti, a favourite prefix to books of
controversy, i. 318.

Antiqc auies. Society of, inquiry into
its origin and progress, ii. 410 — I
415.

Antony, Marc, anecdote of, ii. 10.

Api-ahel, excess in, proclamation
against, by Elizabelh, iii. 375.

A.PPLES grafted on mulberry stocks,
ii. 157, note.

Akciiestratus, a celebrated culinary
philosopher, ii. 24(;.

Ari'iments, invented by a machine,
ii. 419.

Ariosto, his merits disputed in
Italy, i. 380; public preference
given to, by the Accademia della
Crusca, 387; his verses sung by
the gondoliers, "SS.

Ai?istock.\t, a nick-name, iii. 83.

Aristotle, account of criticisms on,
i. 25 ; fate of his library, 63 ;
Arabic commentaries on, 61 ; rage
for, ib. ; his opinions on sneezing,
127; letter of riiihp of 'Ms.Qr.Cri.
to, 142 ; description of the per.son
and manners of, ib. ; will of, 1-13 ;
studied under I'lato, ib. ; parallel
between him and Plato, by Kapin,
ib. ; anecdote concerning him and
Plato, 144; raises a school, ib. ;
attacked by Xenocrates, ib. ; hii
mode of pointing out a successor,
145 ; writers against and for, 314;
bon-mot on his precepts, 407.

Armstrong, Arcliibald, jester to
Cliarles I., ii. 23C, note.

Arn,\uld, one of the most illu.s-
trious members of the Port Royal
Society, i. 94; anecdotes of, 90;
was still the great Arnauld at the
age of eighty-two, 97.

AsnJiOLE, Elias, his Theafrum Che-
micum Eiilannicum, i. 280 ; his
Diary, ii. 209 ; Ids superstition, ib.,
note.

AsTR.iiA, D'Urfe's romance of the, i.
451 ; sketch of, 402—454.

Astrologers, faith in, by celebrated
characters, i. 278 ; Lilly consulted
by Charles I., ib. ; Nostrodamus, by
Catherine de Jledici, 27 9 ; several
have suffered death to verify their
skill, ib. ; shifts and impostures of.
279—280.

Astrology, greatly flourished in t'ne
time of the Civil Wars, i. 2 SO;
attacks on and defences of. 2.S\ —
282.

Atei.lan-'e Eabuicc, Attllari farces,
ii. 131, and note, 132.

Atticus, emjiloyed to collect for
Cicero, ii. 397 ; traded in hooka
and gladiators, 398.

Aubrey, John, extract from liis cor-
respondence, iii. 294 ; his search
after gold, ib. ; his idea of uni-
versal education, 290.

AuDLEY, a lawyer and usurer, i'.
158 ; his commencement of life,
and means of rising in, 159; anec-
dote of him and a draper, Ifll;
his maxims of political economy,

Index.

ol5

10? ; his reply to a borrowing
lord, ib. ; liis manners and o[)inion'5,
108 — 170; Iii.s death and general
character, 170.

AuTotiHAPHS, indications of charac-
ter, iii. 1C3; of Englisli sovereigns,
1G5— ICG.

Bahin<;ton's conspiracy, some ac-
count of its progress, and of tlic
noble youths concerned in it, ii.
171 ; trial and defences of tlie con-
spirators, 173 ; their execution,
175—176.

Baccius, ancient descriptions of, and
modern translations of them, ii. 2'J'J.

P.ACON, Lord, sl<etch of his life as a
philosoplicr, iii. 320 — oiG ; more
valued abroad than at home, 327.

Bakeu, Sir Itichard, autlior of tlie
" Chronicle," died in tlic Fleet, ii.
452 ; his papers burnt, ib.

Bales, Peter, a celebrated cali-
graplier, i. 275 ; iii. 173—177.

Bam.aud, the Jesuit, concerned in
Babington's conspiracy, ii. 172 ;
expression of his on Iiis trial, 173.

Bapttsta Porta, founded tlie Acea-
demie of the Oziosi and Segreti,
iii. 290 ; considered himself a
prognosticator, ib. ; his magical
devices, ib.

Baubieu, Louis, anecdote relating to,
ii. 1 1 ; his superstitious observances,
ib., note.

Baunaud, Dr., his " Life of Iley-
lin," iii. 217 — 221.

Bartiiius, Caspar, a voluminous au-
thor, ii. 530 ; an infant prodigy,
ib. ; published a long list of un-
printed works, 537 ; its fate, ib.

.Basnage, his Dictionary, iii. 233.

Bayle, publishes his A'ouvclles de la
Jiepubliquc lies Lcttrcs, i. II; ac-
count of his deatli, 301 ; his con-
duct to his friend, 392 ; read much
by his fingers, ib. ; amusements of,
ib. ; anecdotes relating to, 393;
his "Critical Dictionary," remarks
on its character, ii. 3S2 — 38S ; Gib-
bon's remarks on, 385 ; publication
of, ib. ; his originality, how obtain-
ed, 3SC ; his errors, 388 ; his per-
gonal traits, 389 ; his characteris-
tics, 3SS — 39G ; changes his religion
twice, 390 ; extract from his diary,
ib. ; bis metlio;ls of study, 391;
appointed to a professorship, ib. ;
deprived of it, ib. ; laments liis
want of books, 392 ; anecdotes of

the elTecfs of his worVs. ?94 : a
model of a literary character. 305.

Beam in the eye of the I'liari.i'^ft,
literally represented in early art,
i. 007, and note.

Beards, various fashions in, i. 220

Be.vussol, M. I'eyraud dc, his preface
to his condemned tragedy, ii. 301 —
307.

Ben Jonson, ma.sqnos by, iii. 12 ;
assisted liawleigh in his l.islory of
the world, 131, and note.

Benevolences, iii. 218, 219.

Bentlev, notice of his criticisms on
Milton, i. 370—373.

Bethlehem Hospital, its original
foundation, ii. 311, and note.

Betteuton, anecdote of, i. 250.

Beza, Theodore, an imitator of Calvin
in abuse, i. 310 ; eflcct of his work
against toleration, iii 215.

Bhjle, the prohibition of, ii. 19 ; va-
rious versions of, 20 — 23 ; a. family
one, 22 ; tlie Olivetan, iii. 155; cor-
rupt state of tlie English, formerly,
427 ; printing of, an article of ojicn
trade, 428 ; shameful i)rnctices in
the printing of, 428 — 431, and note;
privilege of printing granted to one
Bentley, 430; Field's Pearl Bible
contained 6000 faults, 431; divi-
sion of, into chapter and verse, 432.

BiHLiOMANE,iii. 343.

Bibliomania, i. 9.

BlELlOGNOSTE, iii. 343.

BinLloCK.vrilE, iii. 313.

BinLiooK APii Y, remarks on its impor-
tance, iii. 341.

BllJLlopiilLE, iii. 343.

BiisLiOTAPliE, iii. 343.

BioGUAPiiiCAL parallels, iii. 425 ; a
book of, proposed by llurd, ib. ; be-
tween Budxus and Erasmus, 4 2G ;
instances of several, 427.

Biography, painted, a, iii. 137 — 141 :
remarks on, 414; sentimental, dis-
tinguished from chronological, ib. ;
of Dante, by Boccacio and Arctino,
415—419; domestic, 420 — 423;
customary among the IJomans, 421;
comparative, a series of, projected
by Elizabeth Hamilton, ib.

Birch, Dr., his great services to his-
tory, iii. 383.

Birkenhead, Sir John, a newspaper
writer and pamphleteer during the
great rebellion, i. 159.

Black Cloaks, a political nickname
for a party in Naples, iii. S2.
L L 2

.16

Index.

Li.ESiH.iM.s-ccri-t liistory of flic build-
iii,4 oi', iii. 102 — 111; drawn from
MSS., 103, note.

BONAVEXTURE DE Perriers, Speci-
men of liis stories, i. 128.

Book of Sports, efTect of, ii. H8.

Books, collections of, see LiurwVRiES;
collectors of, see Collectors ; re-
views of, and criticisms on, see Li-
terary Journals and Sketches
OF Criticism; destruction of, see
Title -, lost, i. 47 — 57 ; prices of, in
early times, 7G ; treatise on the art
of reading printed, 78; curious ad-
vertisements of, 157 ; titles of, 2SS;
various opinions as to the size of,
347 ; difficulties encountered in pub-
lishing many books of merit, 375 ;
works of another description better
remunerated, 377 ; leaves of, origin
of their name, ii. 23, note; table-
books, 2G; derivation of the name
" book," 28 ; description of the form
and condition of ancient, ib.; cen-
sors and licensers of, 210; catalogue
of, condemned at the Council of
Trent, ib. ; inquisitors of, ib. ; see
Index; burning of, anecdote of its
good effect in promoting tlieir sale,
219; mutilations caused by the
censors in Camden's works, Lord
Herbert's History of Henry VIII.,
and the I'oems of Lord Brooke,
220 ; anecdotes of purloiners of, iii.
31C — 019 ; predilection of cele-
brated men to particular, iii. 310
— 343 ; calculations as to their pre-
sent number, 342 ; different terms
for amateurs of, 340 ; whicli have
been designed but not completed,
403, 494.

Booksellers, two ruined by one au-
thor, ii. 533.

Borrowers, destructive to collections
of books, i. 12.

Botanic Garden, Darwin's remarks
on, i. 341.

Bourdaloue, i. 257.

Bourgeois, Pere, one of the Chinese
missionaries, account of his attempt
at preaching in Chinese, 1. 2C8.

Bouts Ki.mes, i. 290.

Brandt, Ship of Fools, i. 7.

Bridgewater, late Duke of, destroy-
ed many family 3ISS., ii. 4.^1.

Buckingham, Duke of, his fami-
lial ity and coarseness witli .Tames
I.,i. 4G3,note; his conduct inSpain,
ii. 4 ; equally a favourite with

James T. and Cliarlcs T., 5 ; ITume'a
cliaracter of, ib. and 355 ; anec-
dote of him and the Queen of
France, 6 ; his audacity and " En-
glish familiarity," ib. ; anecdote of
him and Prince Cliarles, 7 ; his
rise, 10 ; his magnificent entertain-
ment of Charles I. and the French
ambassador, 32 7 ; his character,
356 — 358, and notes; his fears of
being supplanted, 357, note ; con-
trast between him and Richelieu,
358 ; secret history of his expedition
to Spain with Prince Charles, 359 ;
prognostics of his death, 3G4 ; por-
trait of, 3CG, note; determined to
succour Rochelle, 3G7; his death,
371 ; satires on, 369, 370 ; possess-
ed the esteem of Charles I., ib.; his
extravagance in dress, iii. 407 ; in-
trigued with tlie Puritans, 443;
his intercourse with Dr. Preston, a
Puritan, 414; discovers Preston's
insincerity, and abandons the Pu-
ritans, 445; his impeachment, 452;
his failure at the Isle of Khc, 458 ;
offers to resign his offices, 469; hatred
of, by the parliament, 470 — 174.

BurroN, Vieq d'Azyr's description of
his study, iii. 208.

Buildings in the metropolis, opposi-
tion to, from the days of I-^llizabeth
to those of Charles II., iii. 363 ;
statutes against, 364 ; proclama-
tions against, 365.

Burnet, his book against Yarilla=,
i. 132, and note.

Burying grounds, iii. 231.

Butler, the author of " Iludibras,"
vindicated, ii. 491 — 195.

Cadiz, e.xpedition to, in the time of
Charles I., ii. 366 ; satirical lines
on, 367.

Calamy, his "History of the Ejected
Ministers," iii. 240.

Calumny, political advantages of.iii.
81.

Calvin, less tolerant than Luther in
controversy, i 309.

Camus, his " Medecine de I'Esprit,"
ii. 4G9.

Caracci, family of the, ii. 399 ; Lo-
dovico, character of, ib. ; tlie school
of the, 401, note; Agostino and
Annibale, their opposite chiiractcr.s,
402 ; tlie three opened a school in
their own liouse, 403 ; Agostino's
eminence tliere, ib. ; his sonr.ot,
comprising the huvs of paia'.i'Jg,

Index.

il7

<04 ; Uomcnichino, Albaiio, Guido,
Oiificino, tlifir pujiils, 405; dis-
putes between Aimibiile and Agos-
tino, ib. ; their separation, lOtl.

Caudinal Kiciif.liku, anecdotes of,
and cunsiderations on liis character,
i. 13!)— 1-12.

Cauleton, Sir Dudley, Vice-Cham-
berlain of Charles 1., his speech to
the Commons on the inipri.-onnicnt
of two of their members for their
impeachment of liuckingham, iii.
455.

Caktoons of Raphael, now at Hamp-
ton Court, ollered for sale, and
bought by Cromwell, ii. ."SS ; nearly
sold to l-'rance by Charles II., ib.,
note ; the gallery for their reception
built by William III., ib.

Catiieiune de' Medici, her belief in
astrology, iii. 347 ; employs Moiit-
luc to intrigue to secure the election
of the Duke of Aujou to the crown
of l"oland,o49.

Catiiauixot, a voluminous writer,
ii. 515 ; his singular mode of pub-
lishing his un.^aleable works, 54G.

Cause and I'rete.xt, distinction be-
tween,to be observed by historians,
iii. 141 ; anecdotal illustrations,
142—144.

Caxton, the printer, his earliest
works, i. 75, note.

Cayet, Dr., his " Chronologic Novc-
n-aire," ii. 7.

Censeks used to sweeten houses in
the reign of Elizabeth, ii. 3S, note.

Cessous of books, designed to coun-
teract the press, ii. 21C ; originated
with the Inquisition, ib.; appointed
with the title of Inquisitors of
liooks, ib. ; disagreement among
these Inr,uisitors, 217; in Spain,
21S; their treatment of commen-
tators on the " Lusiad," ib. ; in-
stances of the injury done to En-
glisli literature by the appointment
of, 220; never recognised by English
law, 221; regularly cstablislied
under Charles I., 223; office of,
maintained by the Puritans, ib. ;
treatment of 5Iiltou by, ib. ; the
office lay doriuant under Cromwell,
221.; revived and continued
under Charles II. and James II.,
ib. ; anecdotes relative to, 22G — 22S.

Centos, i. 299.

Ci.itt:.MONiES, different, among various
aations, ii. 12—10.

Cervantes, rcmaiV of i 89 ; taken
lirisonor at the battle of Eepanlo,
ib.

CiiA.MiLLART, Minister of Erancc, Ida
rise, ii, 11.

Chau.vdes, i. 297.

CiiAitLES JIahtel, his combat with,
and defeat of, the Mahometans, ii.
430.

CiiARLES the Hald of France, his
remarkable vision, ii. 423.

CiiAKLES the First,accountof his ex-
pedition into Spain, ii. 1 — 1; anec-
dote of \\m\ and ISuckingham, C ;
history of his diamond seal, 32G;
his love of the fine arts, 327; the
magnificence and taste of his court
entertainments, 328 ; anecdote of,
329; catalogue of his effects, 331
— 334 ; an artist and a poet, 334,
335, and note ; infiucnce of his wife
on, doubted, 33(; ; his dismisnul of
his wife's French establisliment,
345 ; reply to the French ambas-
sador's remonstrances, 317; his
conduct on the death of Uucking-
ham, 371; secret history of him and
his first Parliaments, iii. 418; the
latter a sullen bride, ib. ; his ad-
dress to his first Farlianunt, and
their ungracious conduct, 443 ; they
abandoned ti.e king, 4.')0; raises
money on I'rivy Seals, ib. ; on the
failure of the expedition to Cadiz
he called his second Parliament,
451 ; communications between him
and his Parliament, ib. ; his .ad-
dress to tliem, noticing the impeach-
ment of Kuckingham, 452 ; his con-
duct on that occa.-^iou the beginning
of his troubles, 453 ; on the Com-
mons' further remonstrance against
Buckingliam, he dissolves his se-
cond Parliament, 457 ; his distress

: for money, ib. ; his fresh distresses
on the failure of the expedition to
the Isle of lihe, and his expedients
to raise money, 45S, 469; their ill
success, 400, 401 ; reflections on his
situation, 463 ; rejects the proffered
advice of the President of the Kosy-
Cross, 404; anonymous letter sent
to tlic Commons, an<l by them for-
warded to the king without perus-
ing, 405 ; secret measures used by
the opposition, 40G ; speech of the
king to I'arliameut, 407 ; his emo-
tion on being informed that the
Parliament had granted subsidies

518

Index.

4CS; debates on tli3 king's mes-
!^age, 4(.9, Elect's speech tlicrcon.
■17U, Coke's memorable spoecli,
473 ; the king grants l)is assent to
tlie Petition of Kiglit, •JTS ; iiO]nilar
rejoicings, 47G; presentation ol'tlie
Remonstrance, ib.; tlie king's con-
duct after the assassination of
Buckingliani, 47 7 ; vow of the Par-
liament to maintain the Articles of
Religion of the 13th Eliz., 47S ; tu-
mult in the House, and dissolution
of the Parliament, 4 SO.

Charles the Fifth, his edicts against
the lieformed religion, iii. 'J 4 2 ; his
conduct influenced by political, not
religious motives, 243.

Charles the Ninth, account of the
death of, ii. 7 — 9 ; his apology for
tlie massacre of St. Bartholomew,
iii. 2.55 — 259 ; his character, 2C0.

Cherries, introduction of, into Great
Jiritain, ii. 15G ; loss and rcin-
t reduction of, in the reign of Henry
VIII.,ib.

Chess, clergymen prohibited from
playing, ii. 32 ; Kempelen's Me-
chanical Chess-player, iii. 284,
note.

Chinese language,!. 2G7; difhcultics
of, experienced by P. Bourgeois,
2C8.

Chocolate, brought from Mexico by
the Spaniards, ii. 325; treatise
against the use of, ib. ; chocolate-
houses in London, ib.

Christmas Prince at the Universities,
ii. 2GS; account of one at Oxford,
1G07, ib., note.

CiiRiSTODixs, iii. 81.

Chronograms, i. 295.

Churchill abhorred the correction
ofhisMSS., ii. 85.

Cicero a punster, i. C9 ; a manufiic-
turer of prefaces, 71 ; a collector,
ii. 390 ; his projected library, ib. ;
employs Atticus to procure books
and statues, 397 ; discovered the
tomb of Arcliimedes, iii 409.

Cities, Free, shook off the yoke of
feudal tyranny, i. 184.

Clairon, Mademoiselle, anecdote of,
i. 251.

Clarendon House, history of its
erection, iii. 189 — 191 ; pojmlarly
called Dunkirk House, or Tangier
Hall, 189; satire on the building
of, 190; cxii'ting remains of, ISl,
note,

Classical learning, ii. t^'M.

Clovis, his reasons for adopting
Christianity, ii. 433, 434, and note.

Coaches, introduction of, into Eng-
land, ii. 36 ; use of, in France, ib.

CocKERAM, H., his English Dictionary
and its new words, iii. 24.

CocK-ncHTiNG in Ceylon, i. 188.

CoFEEE, introduction of, into Europe,
ii. 320 ; made fashionable at Paris
by the Turkish ambassador, 321;
invectives and poetical satires
against, 322 — 324 ; advantages of
its use, 325.

Coffee-houses, the first opened at
Paris, ii. 321 ; improvements in,
ib. ; the first in England. 322 ;
shut up by proclamation, ib. ; and
iii. 379, note.

Coke, or Cook, Sir Edward, his most
pleasing book, his Manual, or Vade
Mecit/n, ii. 519 ; his MSS. seized on
his death, ib. ; yet to be recovered,
ib., note ; his character, 520 ; his
matrimonial alliances, ib. ; his dis-
grace, 521 ; disputes between him
and his wife. Lady Hatton, con-
cerning the marriage of his daugh-
ter, 523 ; curious letter of advice to
Lady Hatton, for her defence be-
fore the Council, 524 ; his daughter
married to Lord Villiers, and Coke
reinstated, 529 ; his daughter'sbad
conduct, ib. ; his death, 530 ; his
vituperative style, ib. ; his conduct
to Uawleigh, 531 ; his abjectness in
disgrace, 532 ; pricked as sherilf, to
exclude him from Parliament, iii.
44G ; eludes the appointment by
excepting to the oath, 448.

Coke, Mr. Clement, a violent opposi-
tion leader in the second Parlia-
ment of Charles I., iii. 498, 499.

Coleridge, method pursued by him
in his remarkable political predic-
tions, iii. 2G8.

Collections of books, see Libra-
ries ; of engravings, see Engrav-
ings.

Collector of books, i. 1 — 8 ; defence
of himself, as one of the body, by
Ancillon, 10 ; Aristotle first saluted
as a, 53.

Collectors, their propensity to
plunder, iii. 31 C — 319.

Collins, Anthony, a great lover of
books, iii IC ; a free-thinker, ib. ;
the friend of Locke, 18; fate cf
feisMSS.. 19—23.

Index.

m9

Comedies, exlompornl, ii. 130 ; opi-
nion of northoru critics on, 131 ;
the iiiniisenicnt of Italy, ib. ; prac-
tised by tlic Huiiiiins, ib. ; Salvator
Itosa's prologue to one, 133; opi-
nions unci descriptions of, by Kicco-
boni and (jihtrardi, 131,130 ; anec-
dote of tlie excfllonceof, 137 ; when
first introduced in Kngland, 138.

Com FITS universally used under Henry
III of France, i. 221.

CoMiNES, notice of, i. 2i;3.

Co.Mi'osiTiox, various modes of lite-
rary, ii. 85 ; correction in, ncces-
s;iry, ib. ; but by some authors im-
possible, ib. ; illustrative anecdotes,
80; use of models in, 8S ; various
modes of, used by celebrated au-
tliors, 90 — 92 ; passion for, exhi-
bited by some authors, 533 — 540.

CoNDE, great I'rince of, expert in
phy.-siosnomy, i. 150.

CoNiUKRES de la Passion, i. 353.

Confusion of words by writers, ill.
<;5 ; by the Nominalists and Iteal-
ists, GG ; in modern pliilosophy, ib. ;
between the Antinoniians and their
opposers, and tlie .Tansenists and
Jesuits, G8 ; between Abelard and
St. Bernard, ib ; other instances,
09 ; in jurisprudence and politics,
70; liistorieal instances, 71 — 73;
arising from a change of meaning
in tlic course of time, 71 ; serious
consequences of, 77 ; among jioli-
tical economists, 78 ; illustrative
anecdote of Caraniuel, a Spanish
bisliop, 79.

CoNST.\NTiNE, motivcs of his acknow-
ledgment of Christianity, ii. 433.

CoNTitovERSiAL Writings, acrimony
infused into by schohirs, i. 153,
and 317.

CoNTHOVEUSV, literary, that of the
Nominalists and Uealists, i. 312;
between Benedetto Aletino and
Constantino Grinialdi, 314; abuse
lavished on each otlier by learned
men in, 308 — 320 ; challenges sent
on occasion of, 317.

CooKEiiY and cooks of the ancients,
ii. 215 ; Epic composed in praise of,
2IG; iUustrative translations from
Athen;t;us,247 — 252 ; tlio dexterity
of the cooks, 253 ; writers on, 254 ;
anecdotes, 255.

CoRNEii.i.E, I'eter, died in poverty,
i. 32 ; delic'ieut in conversation,
104 ; sketch of liis life, 428—432.

ConNEiLi.E, Thomas, imprompt'.nvrit-
ten under his portrait, i. 4;r2.

CoKXELiLS AcuirrA, accu^ei of
magic, i. 27 ; his dog supposed to
be u demon, 28 ; his belief in de-
mons, iii. 282.

Cou.MiERT, Theodore, a great advo-
cate for toleration, iii. 253, and note.

Corti'L'S CiiltiSTi phiys at Chester, i.
353; at Kendal, iii. 442, and
note.

Cosmetics, use of, by the ladies of
the Elizabethan age, i. 227.

Cotton, Sir Kobert, his manuscript
collections, iii. 31G; his character
of Charles I., 45G, 157.

CofXTKV gentlemen, their former
habits commended, ii. 214; Lord
Clarendon's mention of his grand-
father's conduct as one ot the body,
ib. ; their conduct created a national
character, ib.

Country residence, opinion of Justico
Best upon, iii. 303 ; James I. re-
commendation of, 304; proclama-
tions to compel a, ib. ; and pro-
ceedings in the Star Chamber
against the disobedient, 305 — 308 ;
Ode upon, by Sir Kichard Fan-
shaw, 009.

Court of Wards and Liveries, ii. 158,
note.

Ckan.mer, Jansenist character of, i,
373.

Creation of the AYorld, precise date
of, i. 303.

Crebillon, his creditors attached
the proceeds of his tragedy of Cati-
line, i. 405; decree of Louis XV.
thereupon, 406.

Critics may ]iossoss the art of judg-
ing without the power of execution,
i. 407 ; Abbe d'Aubignac and Cha-
I)elaine quoted as instances, ib.

Criticism, Periodical, see Literauv
JouRN.\LS. i. 12 — 17; sketches of
amongst the ancients, 24 — 27;
ell'ect of, upon authors, 409.

Cro-mwell, his great political error,
ii. 435; prediction of his future
eminence, iii. 209; reasons for hia
delay in naming a successor, 328,

329.

Cruiksii.vnk, George, curious error

concerning, i. 321, note.
CvitE, the Abbe, an envoy of the Ein-

jieror's in I'oland, iii. 350; seized

and imprisoned, 300.
P'AouESSEAU, the Chancellcr, his

Index.

jidv;oe lo his son on tlie study of
history, iii. 179.
Dance of Deatli, iii, 211—215.
Dante, origin of Ids Inferno, dis-
putes on, ii. 421 ; the entire work
Gothic, ib. ; Yi.sion of Alborico
sui)posed to be borrowed, 422 ; and
pro'oably read by Dante, ib. ; his
originality vindicated, 423; tiie
true origin of the Inferno, 427, and
note.
Day-fatalitt, i. 2 79; lucky and

unlucky days, ib., note.
Death, anecdotes relating to the
death of many distinguished per-
sons, i. 417 — 421 ; book containing
the accounts of the deaths of re-
markable persons, compiled by
Montaigne, iii. 200; reflections on
death, ib. ; anecdotes of tlie death
of some celebrated persons, 201,
202 ; effect of the continual con-
sideration of, ;;03; Lady Gethin's
ideas on, 204; conversations of
Johnson and Boswell on, ib. ; sin-
gular preparations for, by Moncrilf,
205; opinions of the ancients on,
207; personifications of, among the
ancients, 208, and note; Gotlnc re-
presentations of, 209.

Dedications, curious anecdotes con-
cerning, i. 337 — 341 ; price for the
dedication of a play, 338; one to
himself, composed by a patron, ib. ;
practice of Elkanah Settle with re-
gard to, 339 ; of the Polyglot
Bible to Cromwell, ib. ; altered at
the llestoration, ib. ; to Cardinal
Iliclielieu, 340 ; Drydcn's, ib. ; in-
genious one by Sir Simon Degge,
341.

De I'OE, his lionour questioned as to
the pubhcation of Kobinson Crusoe,
ii. 274 ; probably struck by Steele's
observations on Selkirk's narration,
27C ; wrote Kobinson Crusoe in
comparative solitude, ib. ; vindica-
tion of his character, ib.

De la Ciiambke, secret correspon-
dence of, with Louis XIV. on phy-
siognomy, i. 148.

Delinquents, a convenient revolu-
tioiKiry phrase, iii. SO.

Descartes, persecuted for his opi-
nions, i. 29; silent in mixed com-
pany, 104 ; his description of his
life in Amsterdam, 113.

DESCiiirTioNS, local, when prolonged
tedious, iii. 1 ; JJoilcau's criticisms

on, 1,2; inefficiency of, instanced
by a passage from riiny, 2 ; ex-
ample of elegant, in a sonnet by
Fiaucesca de Castello, 3.
Descriptive I'oems, general remarks
on, i. 341 ; race of, confined to one
object, ib. ; titles of, and notices on
several of these, 342, 343.
Des Maizeavx, a French refugee,
iii. 13 ; his Life of Bayle, 14 ; notices
of his literary life, 15 — 18; Anthony
Collins bequeaths his MSS. to,
19 ; relinquishes them to Collins's
widow, 20 ; correspondence con-
cerning, 19 — 22.
Desmarets, his comedy of the

" Visionnaires," ii. 48.
De Seuhes, introduced the cultiva-
tion of the mulberry tree and silk-
worm into France, ii. 152; opposi-
tion to his schemes, ib. ; supported
by Henry IV., ib. ; medal struck in
honour of his memory, 153.
Destruction of books and MSS. by
the monks, i. 18, 50 ; account of, at
Constantinople, by the Christians,
suppressed, 47 ; burning of 'I'al-
muds, 48 ; of Irish and Mexican,
ib. ; anecdotes regarding, 49 ; of
Korans, ib. ; of the classics, 50 ;
of Bohemian, ib. ; in England under
Henry VIII., 51 ; at Stationers'
Hall in 1599, 53 ; of many of Lady
Mary Wortley Montague's letters,
54 ; of Anglo-Saxon MSS., 55 ;
anecdotes concerning the, ib., note ;
by fire and shipwreck, 56, 57.
D'EwES, Sir Syinonds, a sober anti-
quary, but a visionary, iii. 433 ;
extracts from his Diary, 434, 435.
Diary, of a Jlaster of the Ceremo-
nies, ii. 194 — 20G ; Shaftesbury's
definition of a, ib. ; Colonel Har-
wood's, 20G ; kept by Titus, ib. ;
Alfred's, 207 ; I'rince Henry's, ib. ;
Edward VI. 's, ib. ; kept by James
II., 208 ; usually kept by heads of
families, 209 ; kept by Swift and
Horace Walpole, ib. ; recommended
by Sir Thomas Bodley to Sir
Francis Bacon, ib. ; Coke's, ib. ;
Camden's, 210; of Sir Symonds
D'Ewes, ib. ; Baxter's, 211; the
thoughtful disposition giving rise
to the keeping of a diaiy, partaken
even by women, ib. ; AVhitelocke's,
212; Laud's, 213; Lord Claren-
don's, 214; practice of keeping onte
recommended, 215.

Index.

r«21

PlARiF.s, Reli},'ioiis, iii. 435.

Djctioxauy of Trcvoux, account of
its origin and prof^resa, iii. '110 ; of
Basiiiige, i'30 ; of Dr. Johnson, '-'33.

DiCGES, Sir Dudley, a violent oppo-
sition leader in Charles l.'s second
parliunient, iii. 4',i ; opened the
impeachnient of 15iiclvingliani, 453 ;
coniniilted to the tower, 4.') 4.

DiLAriDATioNSof Jisy. — SecSlANU-

SCRIPTS.

DiNNEK hour, variations of, in
diflerent times, ii. 34,35.

DiN.NKK iiarties, Koman limitation of
the number of guests at, ii. •i4(J.

DiscovKKiES in literature and science,
aptitude in, obtained hy studious
men, iii. 40S ; illustrative anec
dotes. 409—413.

Divinity, scholastic, i. GO, 61; curi-
ous accounts and specimens of,
C! — G5.

Dodd's Church History of England,
iii. 239.

Dhagons, origin of the old stories of,
ii. 311.

DiivUMA, anecdotes of the early, ii.
40 — 43 ; Mexican, ib. ; account of
a curious drama, entitled Techno-
tamia, or the Marriage of tlie Arts,
43 — 4G ; account of one written by
a madman, 48.

Dr.vmatic works made the vehicle
of political feeling, ii. 277 ; by the
Catholics at the Reformation, ib. ;
such conduct caused a proclama-
tion by Kdward VI. against Eng-
lish interludes, &c., ib. ; those on
the side of the Reformation allowed,
and specimens of one, 2TJ — JSl;
proceedings against in the Star
Chamber, ib.

Dkam.vtic Annals. — See Dram.vtic
AVouKS. Sup])ression of tlie drama
during the civil wars of Charles I.,
ii. 281 ; opposite conduct of actors
at that time, and at the period of
the French revolution, 282 ; writers
against the stage, 283 ; custom of
boys personating females, 284 ; in-
troduction of actresses, 285 ; Ilis-
triomastix, ib. ; all theatres sup-
pressed in 1G42, ib. ; ordinance
against theatre.-^, 2SG ; plays enacted
secretly during tlieir suppression,
ib. ; Co.x's " drolleries," 287 ; peti-
tions against the drama, 2 89 ; the
player's petition in favour of, ib. ;
secretly Acted at llolhvud House,

291 ; the suppression of the dr.-xma
caused the publication Oi many
^I.S. plays, ib.

Dim:ss, costliness of, in the reigr.s of
Elizabeth, James I., and Charles I.,
iii. 405—408.

DitiNKiNG, hard, a borrowed custom
among the English, ii. 2 93 ; learnt
by them in the Netln rlands, ib. ;
statutes against, ib., note ; terms of,
29 4, note, 295 — 298 ; anecdotes of,

3U0.

DitL'NKAnDS, their different charac-
teristics, ii. 299 ; "A Delicate Diet
■ for," ib., note ; toasts of, 300, and
note.

Du Clos, origin of his fairy tale of
Aciijou and Zirphile, and account
of his satirical preface to it, ii.

30S — 310.

Dutch literature, remarks and stric-
tures on, i. 403 — 400 ; satirical
medals, iii. 15C — ICO.

Echo verses, specimen of, ii. 23C.

Eclectic Scliool of Art founded by
the Caracci, ii. 401, note.

Edwaud the Fourth, to what he
owed his crown, i. 261.

Eglisiiaw, Dr., his political libels, ii.
3 J7, note ; is murdered in llolland,
ib.

Elizabeth, queen, i. 2G4 ; her
amours, 2G5 ; wished to be tliought
beautiful by all the world, ib. ; her
habits studious, but not of the
gentlest kind, 2CC ; her writing,
2C7 ; her education severely classi-
cal, ib ; various anecdotes concern-
ing, 2G4 — 2C7 ; her able manage-
ment of her parliaments, ii. 179 —
186 ; her conduct regarding the
succession, iii. 328 ; her treatment
of James I., 332 ; her proclamation
against excess in apparel, 37 5.

Eliot, Sir John, a violent opposition
leader in Charles l.'s second I'ar-
liament, iii. 4 52 ; his speech on the
impeachment of IJuckingham, 453;
committed to the 'lower, 451 ;
violent against liuokingham in
Parliament, 4G9 — 471 ; his collec-
tion of satires against him, ib. ; a
leader in the last I'ai'liaincut of
Charles!., 474—479.

Eloisa, solieiteii and obtained Abe-
lard's absolution, i. 14G ; buried
with Abelard, ib. ; a line lady, 147 ;
I'ope's reprehensible lines I'uuud in
original letters of, 148.

Index.

V"vcu.\\ti:rs, origin of the old stories

of, ii. 31.
F.NGLisii Poetry, scarcely known in
France in 1610, iii. 233 ; ignorance
of, displayed by Quadrio in his
History of Poetry published in
1750, 236

Engraving, early origin among the
Egyptians, i. 43, note.

FiNC.R.vviNCS, first collection of,
under Louis XIV., by Colbert, i. 7 ;
collecting of engraved portraits
originated the work of Granger, 4.5.

Epitaph on Cardinal Richelieu, by
his protege, Benserade, 1. 84 ; by
celebrated persons on themselves,
417 ; on Philip I., 471 ; on Butler,
the author of lludibras, ii. 548.

Errata, remarkable anecdotes con-
cerning, i. 78 — 82.

Eruoneous proper names, given in
foreign authors, i. 327, and note.

Etiquette, Court, reflections on its
rise and progress, ii. 194 ; forms of,
observed between the English am-
bassadors and Cardinal Kichelieu,
19-3; creation of a master of tlie
ceremonies, 196 ; absurd punctilios
of, illustrated from the Diary of
Sir John Finett, 196—204.

Evelyn, his mode of composition,
ii. 88 ; praise due to him for his
Sylva, 152 ; his design for arms
of Koyal Society, 411, and nore.

Events which have not happened,
ii. 428 — 438.

Excommunication, by the Popes,
dreadful consequences of, ii. 84.

Fairfax Papers, curious discovery
of, i. 24, note.

Fairfax, Sir Thomas, anecdotes of
him and his family, ii. 461 — 474.

Fame, contemned, 66.

Fa.miliar spirits, intercourse with,
believed, i. 27, 28, 280.

Fansiiaw, Sir Richard, his Ode on
the king's commanding the gentry
to reside on their estates, iii. 369 —
371.

Farces, ancient, reprehensible, but
their pleasantry and humour not
contemptible, i. 358 ; customary
among the Romans after a serious
piece, ii. 131.

Fashions -SeeLiTERARv Fashions.
Anecdotes of their origin, changes
and extravagances, i. 216 — 230;
introduction of French, 227, 228 ;
chronicled by Stowe, 225; Frencli,

prevailed in the reign of CJinrles
II., 228; notice of modern, 229;
lines condemning tlie acts of, 230 ;
expensive in the reigns of Henry
VII and VIII., ii. 36.
Feast of Fools, ii. 31 .
Feast of Asses, ii. .".1.
Felton, John, the assassin of the
Duke of Buckingham, his motives
for the act, ii. 371 ; his passage to
Loudon in triumpli, 372 ; anagram
on his name, 373 ; his remorse, ib.;
his character, 374 ; his family, ib.,
and note ; propositions found in his
trunk, 375; history of the remark-
able written paper found in his hat,
ib., note; answer to a threat of
torture, 376 ; poem addressed to,
378.

Fem.vle beauty and ornaments, opi-
nions and practices of various
nations concerning, i. 211.

Fenelon, Jansenist character of, i.
373 ; his admiration of Homer, iii.
339.

Feudal customs and rights, the bar-
barous, the first attempts at or-
ganizing society, i. 183; servitude
of the land, 184; maiden rights,
ib. ; wardship, 185; German lords
privileged to rob on the highway,
ib. ; anecdote of Geoifrey, Lord of
Coventry, ib. ; anecdotes of tlio
abuse of feudal rights and power,
186, 187.

Filbert, origin of the name, ii. 157,
and note.

FlLCllERS, literary, iii. 316 — 319.

FiLiCAJA, a sonnet of, iii. 197,
translated, ib.

Finett, Sir John, master of the
ceremonies to Charles I. — See
Etiquette.

Fire, in prima;val ages, a signal of
respect, ii. 16 ; worshipped as a
divinity, ib. ; a symbol of majesty,
ib. ; ancient observances regard-
ing, ib.

Fire-works, not known to antiquity,
ii. 15 ; their epoch, 17 ; originated
with the Florentines and Sieune e,
ib. ; their use passes to Rome, ib. ;
exhibition of at Paris, 18.

Fl.\p-dragons, ii. 298.

Fle.\, collection of poems on, i. 30t.

Floral gifts, withheld by the Caj)!-
touls of Toulouse from Maynard, a
Frencli poet, i. 437.

Flogging, a discussion on, occa-

Index.

533

gfoned Roger Ascliam to write his
ScIioolmastcT, i. 87.
Floweus and Fruits, praise of the
introducers of exotic, ii. 151 ;
Peircsc and Kvelyn, ib. ; Ilartlib,
153 ; enthusiasm evinced by tlie
trangjjlanters of, ib. ; notice of
many introduced by particular
persons, 154 ; origin of, distin-
guislied by their names, 155 ;
worlliy pride of introducers of,
150, 157.
FoncKKiF.s and fictions, political and
religious, iii. 141 ; historical in-
stances, 145 — 150 ; literary, iii.
304—319.
Formosa, Fsalmanazar's pretended

Iiistory of, i. 13C, note.
FoscoLO, Ugo, his ojjinion on the
titles of Italian Academies, ii. 400.
youKMONT, the Oriental scholar,

anecilote of, iii. 30C.
Fox's Acts and Slonuments, iii. 239.
FiiiENDSiiiPS of literary men, inte-
resting anecdotes of, ii. 55 — 59.
Franklin, Dr., experiments with

lightning, ii. 413.
French Kevolltion a commentary

on the English, iii. 4 89.
FuoNDEUKS, organized by Cardinal

de lictz, iii. S3.
FuGGEUS, a wealthy family of mcr-

cliants, i. G, and note.
FUNER.VL lionours paid to their kings

by the tioths and Huns, i. lOU.
Galileo, condemned to disavow his
own opinions, i. 28 ; Lis annota-
tions on Tasso, ii. 444.
Gamesters, memoirs of celebrated,

i. 190.
Gaming, a universal passion, i. 187 ;
treatises on, ib.; among the nations
of the East, 188,189; the ancients,
ib. ; picture of a gambling-house iu
1731, ib.
Ga.IDF.ns, mediaeval, ii. 154, note;
gradual introduction of fruits and
llowers, 151 — 157.
Gas, origin of the word, iii. 282.
Gayton, Edmund, his pleas.ant notes
upon Don Quixote and otlier works,
i. 139, note.
Gem.vua. — See Talmud.
Genius, inequalities of, i. 88; men of,
deficient in conversation, 103 ; mo-
dern persecution of, 197.
Gerbier, Sir lialtliazar, a confiden-
tial agent of the Duke of Ruck-
ingham, ii. 358 ; notices of his Me-

moirs, 359 — 3C9; his account of the
preparations for the tiege of Uo-
clielle, 308.

Gestuues significant, used by tlie
ancients and by modern Neapoli-
tans, ii. 119, note.

Getiiin, Lady Grace, her statue in
■Westminster Abbey, ii. 270; her
jjapers collected and published,
under tlie title of Ueliquia; Getlii-
nianx, 271 ; character of the book,
ib. ; Congreve's laudatory lines on,
ib. ; its autlicnticity doubted, 272 ;
her considerations on the choice of
a husband, 273.

Ghosts, theory of, iii. 287, 288.

Giannone, his History of Naples, iii.

184 ; threatened by tlie Inquisition.

185 i died in the citadel of Turin,
ib.

Gibbon, his mode of study useful to

students, ii. 89.
Gill, Alexander, committed by the
Star Chamber, ii. 373.

Gloves, supposed to be mentioned in
the 108th Psalm, i. 235; account
of, by Xenophon, ib. ; mentioned
by several ancient writers, ib. ; use
of, universal in the Uth century,
23C; regulations concerning, ib. ;
employed on great and solemn oc-
casions, such as investitures, ib. ;
Abbots forbidden to use, ib. ; bles-
sing of, 237 ; deprivation of, a mark
of degradation, ib. ; challenging
by, ib. ; used for secret cor-
respondence, ib., note ; use of, in
carrying the hawk, 23S; formerly
forbidden to judges, ib. ; singular
anecdote concerning, ib. ; ancient,
in the Denny family, 239.

Glove-money, i. 238.

Goi'F, Thomas, a tragic poet, speci-
mens of his works, ii. 42.

Gondoliers of Venice, description of
tlieir chanting the verses of Tasso
and Ariosto, i. 388.

GouGii, the antiquary, anecdote of,
iii. 319.

Gray, loss of his MSS., ii. 451.

GitoTius, account of his life and
studies, i. 129, 130.

Grub-street Journal, extract from,
ii. 492; its authors, ib., note.

GuELi'iis and Ghibellines, iii. 89.

GuEux.iii. 81.

GuiuEiiT, foretold the French Hevo-
lutiun, iii. 300.

GuicciARDiNi, his history postha-

)24

Index.

moiis, iii. 180; first editions of liis
works castrated, ib. ; continuation
ol' liis history by Aclriani, ib.

Gl'ilt, trials and modes of proof of,
in superstitious ages, i. 161 — 1C6.

Gulliver's Travels, account of the
lirst edition, i. Sl'O, note.

Kaik, early taste in the colour of, ii.
33, and note.

Halifax, Marquis of, his MS. me-
moirs suppressed, ii. 44 7.

Hall, Bishop, his belief in witches,
iii. 21)3, and note.

Ualley, anecdote of his perseverance
and sagacity, iii. 411.

Hamilton, Elizabeth, her projected
series of comparative biography,
iii. 424.

Hans Carvel, origin of Prior's story
of,i. 111.

II audi, a French tragic author, ii. 41.

Ha1!LEQlin, his Italian origin, ii.
117; turned into a magician by the
English, ib. ; tlie character essen-
tially Italian, US; treatises written
on it, 121; a Koman mime, ib.
and note ; his classical origin, 123,
note; liis degeneration, 12.0; liis
renovation under the hand of Gol-
doni, ib. ; improved into a wit in
France, ib.

IIaktlibb, Samuel, a collector and
publisher of manuscripts on horti-
culture and agriculture, ii. 153.

Harvey, his discovery of the circu-
lation of the blood, iii. 412.

H,\ZLERK;r., Sir Arthur, " an absurd
bolil man," a violent leader of the
Itump I'arliament, iii. 487.

Heart of a lover, story of, i. 233, 234.

Heavv hours of literary men, i. 392.

Hell, Purgatory, and Heaven, topo-
graphical descriptions of, i. 202 ;
treatises on, 204, 205.

Hemon de la Fosse, a modern Poly-
theist, executed in 1503, i. 21C.

Henrietta, queen of Charles I., her
character, ii. 337 ; anecdote illus-
trative of, ib. ; after the liestoration,
33S ; various descriptions of her
person, ib. ; her contract with the
Pope, 339 ; account of her journey
to England on her marriage, 340;
her Frencli establishment, 341 ;
anecdote of her confessor's conduct,
342; tlie dismissal other French
attendants, 345 ; the amount of her
wipjiosed influence over her hus-
band, 348.

IIexrt the Seventh, anecdote of, ii.

10.

liK.vuT the Eightli, anecdote of, ii. 10;
liis proclamation against reading
tlie liible in English, iii. 373, note.

Henky, prince, son of James I., anec-
dote of, iii. ISG — 194.

Henry, the Engli.sh historian, loose
and general in hisreferences,ii.418.

Ili.RKTics, a classitication of, i. 350.

Uermippus Redivivus, a curious
ji'U-d'-csprit, i. 320.

Heylin, a popular writer, died in
\(,02, iii. 215 ; his rival biographers,
21C— 221 ; his History of the Puri-
tans and Presbyterians, 239.

High Sheriff's Oath, exceptions
taken to, by Sir Edward Coke, iii.
446.

History, of events which have not
happened, a good title for a curious
book, ii. 428; speculative history
of the battle of Worcester, had it
terminated dilferently, 429 ; a his-
tory of this kind in Livy, ib. ; sub-
jects for, 430—438.

History of New Words. — See Neo-
logy. Of suppressed opinion, iii.
150 — 163; of writing masters, 167
—177.

Historians, remarks on the infideli-
ties of, i. 191 ; Italian, commended,
iii. 177; notices of the most cele-
brated, ISO — 186 ; wrote for poste-
rity, 1S2, 1S3; fate of Giannoiie,
who published in his life-time, 185;
observations on, 186.

HoLYDAY, Barton, author of tlie
comedy " The Marriage of the
Arts," ii. 4 3.

Home, the author of the tragedy of
" Douglas," persecuted for compo-
sing it, i. 197.

HOMKR, notice of his detractors, i.
24 ; profound knowledge of liistory,
geography, arts, sciences, and sur-
gery ascribed to, 303.

HuDiBRAS, attacks upon Butler, the
author of, ii. 491; various ac-
counts of the original of the cha-
racter, 192 ; indecency avoided in,
493 ; epitaph on the author of, ib. ;
attacks on Butler's character, 494;
and vindication of, 495.

Hugh of Lincoln, legend of, iii. 145,
note.

Hlguenot, origin of the term, iii. 82.

Hlme, liis carelessness in research,
iii. S6S.

Index.

525

IIUMPnnr.v.Diikc, origin of the phrase
" (liiiiiifr witli," ii. ICn, note.

IIURi), Hishop, his proposed book of
parallels, iii. ■125.

Hymns set to popular tunes, ii. HO,
note.

Idleness punished among the an-
cient?, i. lO'J, I'OO.

Ikon IJASiUKr, ; its probable effects
liad it appeared a week sooner, ii.
435.

Iliad, in a nut-shell, i. 275.

Imaoe-breakeks, iiroclamation by
Elizabeth against, iii. 375, .37G.

IsilTATOns, masterly, i. 258, 2C1.

Imitations, of Cicero, i. G7 ; Le
]5ruu's religious Virgil and Ovid,
ib. ; Sannazarius's poem de Parlu
Virginia, G8 ; Arruntius an ancient
imitator of Sallust, ib. ; modern,
ib.; Arabian anecdote, 69.

I.MiT.\TioNS and Similarities, Poetical,
various and curious inftanccs of, ii.
92—110.

Independents, their intolerance, iii.
85.

Index, of prohibited books, ii. 21G ;
Expurgatory, ib. ; Congregation of
the, ib. ; reprinted by the heretics
with annotations, 217; effect of, in
raising the sale of books, 219.

Indexes, Fuller's observations on, i.
72.

Influence of a name, ii. Co — 75.

Ingiiiua.mi, and forged Etruscan
antiques, iii. .307.

Inigo Jones, his excellent machinery
for exhibiting masques, iii. 12, 1.3.

Ink, inferiority of modern, ii. 29 ;
various kinds anciently used, 30.

Inqlisition, establishment of, at
Toulouse, i. 1(J6; in Si)ain, 1G7; first
proceeding of, ib.; taciturnityof the
Spaniards attributed to, ib. ; anec-
dotes concerning, IGS — 170; history
of, by Orobio, 1G7.

Intemper.vnce in study, i. 8.

Introddceus of exotic flowers, fruits,
&c., ii. 151, 157.

Ireland, W. II., his Shakesperian
forgeries, i. 1.37, note.

ISABELLA-coLOUii, Origin of term, i.
217.

Italians, their national genius dra-
matic, ii. 1 IS.

It.vli.xn Historians, iii. 177 — 13G.

Italic letter, introduction of, i. 77;
formerly called the Aldine, 73.

Jacquerie, ill. 83.

James the First gave credit to phy-
siognomy, i.l 49 ; injustice done to
his character for wit, 156; distin-
guished as Queen .Tamos, 4C2; liis
ambassador's speech, 4':3; cAvoi/i.
nrv.v of his court, ib. ; his effemi-
nacy, ib. ; his general character, ib. ;
liis imbecility in his amusements,
4C1 ; his pedantry, 4C5; account
of his death, 4C(; ; results of the
author's further inquiry into the
character of, 4G7; his conduct re-
garding his son's expedition into
Spain, ii. 2; his objections to Laud's
promotion, iii. 297; his character
vililicd, 33-3; his attention to the
education of his children, ib. ; his
conduct towards his wife, 33 1 — 337.

Ja.mes the Second, kept a diary, ii.
211.

Jajiet l'AIne, proposes to edit a new
edition of the Dictionary of Trc-
voux, iii. 232.

jANSENiSTS,the McthodistRof France,
i. 373; cause a biographical Dic-
tionary to be compiled, devoted to
their cause, in opposition to that of
L'Avocat, ib. ; specimens of this
dictionary, 373, 374; their curses
never " lapsed legacies," 375.

JeruS/VJLE.m, Arabic chronicle of, only
valuable from the timecf ^laliomet,
i. 191 ; several portions translated
by Longuerue, ib.

Jesuits, a senate of, sent by Sigis-
mund. King of Sweden, to repre-
sent him at Stockholm, destroyed
by stratagem, i. 2.31 — 233.

Jesuit's snuff poisoned, ii. 442, note.

Jews of York, history of their self-
destruction, ii. 75 — 79.

Jocular Fre.vchers, i. 251 — 253.

Jodelle, Kticn\ie, tlic first author of
French tragedy, ii. 40.

Johnson, Dr., hi.5 original Jlcnioran-
dum of Hints for the Life of I'ope,
ii. 3Sn — 382.

JoNSON, lien. Fuller's character of, i.
380; his arrogance, 381 ; his Ode
on the ill reception of his play of
" The New Inn" quoted, 082 ; Owen
Feltham's Ode in reply, 383; Kan-
dolph's Consolatory Ode to, 385 ;
his poem on translation, ii. 601 ;
employed on court masques, iii. 6 —
8, 12.

JosEi'ii Vella, pretended to have re-
covered seventeen of the lost booka
of Livy, i. 135 ; patronized by tha

"^ J

Index?.

king of Naples, ib. ; discovered and
imprisoned, 13G.

Journals. — See Literary Jour-
nals.

Journalist, Public, indispensable
acquirements of a, i. IG.

Judicial Combats, anecdotes of, i.
1C2, 163.

Kings, remark of St. Chrysostom on,
i. 173 ; willing to be aided, but not
surpassed, 174; anecdotes of, ib. :
observations of tlie Dulcc of Alva
and of IJr. Jolinson on, 17G ; divine
honours bestowed on, 179; de-
tlironed, 181; anecdotes of, and
their families, in misfortune, ISl,
182 ; descendants of, found among
the dregs of the populace in con-
quered countries, 183 ; funeral
honours paid to, by tlie Gotlis and
Iluns, 19G.

Kirk, Colonel, original of tlie horrid
tale of, related by Hume, iii. 148.

Kissing hands, customary among tlie
ancients as an act of adoration, ii.
81 ; used by the primeval bisliops,
ib. ; declined witli Paganism, ib. ;
prevailed at Come, 82 ; an essential
duty under the emperors, ib. ; prac-
tised in every known country, ib.

Knox, John, his Machiavelian poli-
tics, iii. 2 42 ; his opinions on tole-
ration, 251 ; his predictions, 277,
278.

Lambe, Dr., a magician, murdered in
tlie streets of London, ii. 3C1 ; line
and as.sessraent on City comijanies
in consequence, ib., note.

La ]\Iotiie Le Va ver, a great quoter,
ii. 417.

La.mps, Perpetual, i. 243 ; possibility
of, ib. ; Rosicrucians, ib.

La Kue, i. 257.

Latimer, Bishop, curious sermons by,
i. 25C, and note; his youthful his-
tory, ii. 30, note.

Latour du Ciiatel, a neglected con-
tributor to the Dictionary of Tre-
voux, procures tlie mediation of tlie
French government, iii. 231.

Lauder, William, pretended dis-
covery of plagiarisms of Milton,
i. 137, and note.

Laure.vts, sketch of the history of,
i. 4,54; ancient, ib. ; Petrarch the
first modern, ib. ; degrees granted
to, ib. ; formula employed in grant-
ing the degree of, 455 ; their honours
disgraced in Italy, ib. ; Querno

crowned in a joke, ib. ; Iionours
lavished on, by Maximilian I.,
45G ; honours still conferred on, in
Germany, ib. ; unknown among the
French, ib.; appointment of, in
Spain, ib. ; in England never so-
lemnly crowned, 457 ; salary of, in
Flngland, ib.

Lazzaroni, iii. 82.

Lazzi, dramatic side-play, ii. 128.

League, the, its pretext and its
cause, iii. 142, 143.

Learned men, persecution of, i. 27;
poverty of, 29 ; imprisonment of,
35 ; amusements of, 38.

Le Clerc, antagonist of Bayle, and
author of three Bibliotlieques, the
Universelle et Historique, Choisie,
and Ancienne et Moderne, i. 15.

Le Fevre, Nicholas, edition of his
works by Lenglet du Fresnoy, iii.
24 9, and note.

Legends, origin of, i. 89 ; Golden,
90 ; of the Seven Sleepers, 91 ;
account of several, 92, 93 ; Golden,
abounds in religious indecencies,
3GG ; of St. Mary the Egyptian, ib.

Leibnitz, his admiration of IJarclay's
Argenis, iii. 339 ; anecdote of, iii.
455.

Lenglet du Fresnoy, his " Methode
pour etudier I'Histoire," iii. 221 ;
his peculiar character, ib. ; history
of his Methode, 222, 224, and note,
ib. ; his literary history, 224 ; a be-
liever in alchymy, 225; his politi-
cal adventures, 227.

Le Kain, anecdote of, i. 251.

Leo the Tenth, motive of his pro-
jected alliance against the Turks,
iii. 142.

L'Estrange, Sir Eoger, a strong
party writer for Charles II., i. 159 ;
his Jlisop's Fables, 160.

Lettres de Cacuet, invented by
Father Joseph, confessor to Riche-
lieu, iii. 19G.

Libel, singular means used to dis-
cover the author of a, ii. 314.

Libels on the Duke of Buckingham,
ii. 36.5—370.

Liberty of the Press, restrictions on,
ii. 216 — 227; its freedom did not
commence till 1694, 227; reflec-
tions on, 228 — See Censors.

Libraries, i. 1 ; celebrated Egyptian
and Roman, 1 — 3 ; public, in Italy
and England, 3, 4 ; in France and
Germany, 6, 7 ; use of lights in, Ts

Index.

f/^/

tliat of tlie Palatine Apollo de-
stroyed by I'ope GrcRory VIII.,
60 ; in ISohemia, destroyed by tlic
Jesuits, ib. ; destruction of, under
ITcnry VIII. ib. ; (i.>itronomical, in
the ark of Noah, 303 ; Irisii, before
tlie Flood, ib. ; Adams'.s, ib. ; mo-
dern oxiinion on tlieir utility, iii.
345.

LicnNSERS of the Press. — See Cex-
sons.

Lights, in public libraries, ordered
in France by Charles V., i. C ; ob-
jection to, 7.

Lilly, the astrologer, notices of, i.
280— 2S3 ; his great work, 28-J ; an
exquisite rogue, ib.

LiPOGUAMMATic works, i. 203.

Lirsius, Justus, his opinions on tole-
ration, iii. 253.

LiTER.vUY Blunders, a pair of lexi-
cographical, i. 305 ; instances of
curious, 320 — 327.

LiTERAUY Composition, ii. S5-:-92.

Literary Controversy, specimens of
Lutlier's mode of managing, i. 308 ;
Calvin's conduct of, 309 ; Beza imi-
tates Calvin's style in, 310 ; opinion
of ISi.'^hop 15cdell on, ib. ; conduct of
the fatliers in, ib. ; grossncss used
in, 3H ; of the Nomiualislj and
Realists, 312.

LiTEU.\RY Fashions, ii. 113; applause
given to a work supposed to be
written by a celebrated man, ib. ;
notices of various, ib. ; love all
the fashion, 114; Spenscr"s Faerie
Queen became one, ib. ; the trans-
lation of Greek tragedies, a, ib. ; of
tlie seventeenth century, 115 ; of tlie
time of Charles I., ib. ; of Charles
IF, and of more moilcrn times, ib.

Literary Follies, instances of va-
rious in the fantastical composition
of verses, i. 203 — 307; strange re-
searches made in antediluvian
times to be classed with, 301 — •')0 ! ;
anecdote of a malicious one, ib. ;
various anecdotes concerning, 301
—307.

Literary Forgeries, by Dr. IJerken-
hout, a letter from Peelc to Mar-
low, i. 380 ; by George Steevens,
Jii. 297; history of one, 299, 300;
by Horace Walpole, 302; anecdote
of Steevens and Gough, 303, 304,
uad notes; by l)e Grassis, ib. ;
by Annius of Viterbo, 305, and
mischievous consequences of, ib. ;

Sanclioniathon, SOS; of Etrus-
can antiquities, ib. ; the false I'e-
cretals of Isidore, 308 ; in the
prayer-book of Columbus, ib. ; in
the Virgil of Peirarcli, ib. ; by tlie
Duke de la Vallii re, 309 ; by Lau-
der, 310 ; by I'.-alinanazar, 311.

LirruARY Friend>hips, ii. 55 — 58.

Literary Impositions, curious anec-
dotes of, i. 260, 2G1.

Literary Impostures, i. 132; by
Varilhis, the French historian,
ib. ; supposed by Gemelli Carrcri,
but afterwards discovered to be
fact, ib. ; Du Ilalde's account of
China compiled, 133; Daniberger's
Travels, ib. ; titles of works an-
nounced by tlie historiographer
I'aselial, his works at his death
amounting to six pages, ib. ; by
Gregorio Leti, ib. ; forgeries of Tes-
taments Politiqiies, ib. ; pretended
translations, 13 t ; Travels of Kabbi
IJenjamin, ib. ; by Annius Viterbo,
ib. ; by Josepli Vella, who pre-
tended to have recovered seventeen
of tlic lo.-^t books of Livy, 135 ; by
Jledina Conde, 13G ; by George
Psalmanazar, ib. ; Lauder's, 137;
Ireland's, ib. ; by a learned Hindu,
ib. ; anecdotes concerning, 138.

Literary Journals, i. 12; originated
witli tlic Journal de Soavans, by
Denis de Sallo, counsellor in tlie
Parliament of Paris, 13 ; Nouvelles
de la Kepublique des Lettres, pub-
lished by IJayle in IfiSI — continued
by Bernard, and afterwards by Bas-
nage in his llistoire des Ouvrages
de Syavans, 15; Le Clerc's Bibli-
otheques Universclle et Ilistorique,
Choisie, and Aneienne et Moderne,
ib. ; Apostolo Zeno's Giornale de
Litterati d'ltalia, ib.; Bibliotheque
Germanique, IC; Bibliotheque Bri-
tannique, ib. ; Journal Britanni<nie
by Dr. Maty, ib.; Kevicw conducted
by Maty, jun., 1 6 ; 5Ienioire des I're-
voux, ib. ; Journal Litteraire, ib ;
Memoirs of Literature and Present
State of the Kepublic of Letters, the
best early English, ib. ; monthly, ib.

Lollards, oath against them en-
forced upon sherills until reigii of
Charles I., iii. 447; repealed by the
political feeling of Coke, ib.

LosGOLiis, or Longueil, composed a
biographical parallel between Hi;-
da^us and Erasmus, iii. 426.

k28

Index

LoEENzo Dr,' SrEDici, cfTcct of his
death, ii. 43'i.

Louis the Eiglith, singular anecdote
of tlio cause of his deatli, ii. 32.

Loi'is tlie Eleventh, anecdote of, ii.
10, 11.

Louis the Twelfth, cause of his death,
ii. 31.

Louis the Fourteenth, chose his cour-
tiers by the rules of physiognomy,
i. 1-18; some remarks on his real
character, ii. 449 ; passages sup-
pressed in his instruction to the
Dauphin, 450.

Louis L'Are, the Aspasia of Lyons,
i. 362 ; wrote the morality of" Love
and Folly," ib.

LouPS-GAROUX, iii. 293.

LucuLLUS, description of the library
of, i. 3.

Luke, Sir Samuel, the true prototype
of Iludibras, ii. 491, and note.

LuNSFORD, Colonel, imputed a can-
nibal, iii. 14 9, note.

Luther, Slartin, remarks on, and ex-
tracts from, his controversial writ-
ings, i. 308, 309 ; caricatures on,
309, note ; Jansenist character of,
374 ; anecdote of, from Guicciar-
dini, ii. 479, 480 ; his political con-
duct, iii. 144.

LuYNES, Due de, his origin, ii. 11.

Luxury, in dress, an old dramatist's
opinion on, iii. 400; doctrines of
political economy concerning, 401 ;
excessive amongst our ancestors,
ib. ; the Pas de Sandricourt, 402
— 40.5 ; ruinous in the reigns of
Elizabeth, James I., and Claarles
I., 40.5.

BlAniJE, James, translator of " Guz-
man" and " Celestinn," Spanish
plays, ii. .501 ; I'.en Jonson's verses
in praise of, ib.

BlAciiiAVEL discovered the secret of
comparative liistory, iii. IT.'J.

BIackenzie, Sir George, notice of
liis Treatise on Solitude, ii. 50.

M.\D-soNG, specimen of an ancient,
ii. 315.

Magic, instances of many learned
men accused of, i. 27 — 29 ; Solomon
accounted an adept in, 122.

Magius, Charles, a noble Venetian,
iii. 13G ; his travels and adventures
contained in a volume of pain*;-
ings, ib. ; detailed description of,
137—141

BIagmaeeciii, Anthony, celebrated

for his great knowledge of books,
i. 391 ; description of him and iiia
mode of life, 39 4 — 397.

Maii, the discoverer of Cicero's trea-
tise de liepiiblira, i. 18, and note.

Maillard, Oliver, a famous corde-
lier and preacher, i. 252.

Maine, Due de, instituted the Jour-
nal de Trevoux, iii. 230; and the
Dictionary of Trevoux, ib.

Maintenon, Jladame de, marries
Searrou, i. 424 ; corrects his style,
ib.

Maliierbe, his love of Horace, iii.
340.

Malignants, iii. SG.

Man of one book, iii. 337 — 340.

Mandrake, i. 24G.

Manners, anecdotes of European, ii.
30 — 39 ; domestic, among tlie
Engli.«h, 42—4 4.

M.\NuscRiPTS, more valued by the
Komnns than vases of gold, i. 2 ;
two thousand collected by Trithc-
mius, abbot of Spanlieim, who died
151G, 7; recovery of, 17 — 24 ; of the
classics, disregarded and mutilated
by tlie monks, 1 8 ; researches for,
at the restoration of letters, 19;
great numbers imported from Asia,
20 ; of Quintilian discovered by
Poggio under a heap of rubbish,
ib. ; of Tacitus found in a West-
plialian monastery, ib. ; of Justi-
nian's code found in a city of Ca-
labria, ib. ; loss of, ib. ; unfair use
made of by learned men, 22 ;
anecdotes concerning, 22 — 25 ; of
Galileo, partly destroyed by his
wife's confessor, 28 ; ancient, fre-
quently adorned with portraits of
the authors, 4 2 ; destruction of, at
the lleformation, 51; of Lord
]\Ians)ield destroyed in the riots of
1780, and of Dr. Priestley by the
mob at Birmingham, 53 ; loss of
many of I^ndy Mary Wortley
Montagu's letters, 54; loss of let-
ters addressed to Peiresc, ib. ; of
Leonardo da Vinci, ib. ; anecdotes
of manuscriptsof several celebrated
works, 375 — 377 ; description of the
ancient adornments of, ii. 28; of
Pope's versions of the Iliad and
Odyssey, 110; of Sir Matthew
Hale, bequeathed to Lincoln's Lin,
to avoid their mutilation by the
licensers of tlie press, 220; slares
employed to copy, 398; of Vhe

Index,

529

Vision of Alberico, preserved in
the king's library at Paris, 4'.'2 ; of
Galileo's annotations on Tasso,
444 ; destruction of Iluglt
Broughton's, by Speed, 445; de-
struction of Leland's, by I'olydore
Vergil, ib. ; dilapidation of tlie
llarleian, 44G ; suppression of one
relating to Sixtus IV. by Fabroni,
ib. ; of the Marquis of Ilalifa.K
suppressed, 417; Earl of I'ulte-
ney's and Earl of Anglesea's
JIS. Blenioirs suppressed, ib. ;
anecdotes of the suppression of
various, 448 — 452; mutilators of,
448; of Oldys's, iii. 4^3.

Makana, Jolin Paul, autlior of tlic
Turkish Spy, i. 377 — 379.

Marbles, presenting representations
of natural forms, i. 244 — 247.

Mare Clausum, written by Seldcn
in answer to the Marc Liberum of
Grotius, ii. SO ; copies preserved in
the chest of the E.vcliequer and in
the Court of Admiralty, ib.

Marionettes, improved by the
English, iii. 238.

Mahlborouoii, the great Duke of
(See P.leniieim), account of liis
wealth, iii. 108.

Makolles, Abbe de, a most egre-
gious scribbler, i. 350 ; wrote his
own memoirs, 351 ; good advice in
the postscript to the epistle dedi-
catory of that work, ib. ; his me-
moirs, ii. 538 ; anecdote of him
and De L'lCtang, a critic, 5S9 ;
notices of his voluminous works,
ib. ; his magnificent coUeclioa of
prints, 541.

Marot, Clement, his character, ii.
474 ; his translation of the
Psalins, ib. ; sung to the airs of
popular ballads, 470 ; his Psalms
the fashion, 477 ; edition publislied
by Theodore Ueza, set to music,
ib. ; his Psahns declared Lutheran,
and himself forced to lly to Ge-
neva, ib.

Mar-Pkelate, the book suppressed,
ii. 453.

M.\SKS, worn by Italian actors, ii. 124.

Massinger a student of the Italian
drama, ii. 138.

M.\SQUES, notices of magnificent, in
the time of Charles I., ii. 327 ; the
farewell masque of tlie Duke of
lluckinglKun, 3(19 ; mistaken no-
tions of commentators regarding,
VOL. III.

iii. 5 ; their real nature, 7, 8, 9 ;
description of the masque of Night
and tlie Hours, 10; their ultimate
ruin, by their splendour, at the
court of Louis XIV., 13, note.

Massillon, i. 250.

Master of the Ceremonies, created
by .James the First, ii. 191;.

M.\STERI,V I.MITATOKS, i. 258 — 201,

M.\TRiMo.\Y, its suitableness to
learned men considered, i. 332 —
331 ; opinions of Sir Thomas
Urowne upon, 335 ; not borne out
by his practice, ib.

Maxijiilian the First, founds a po-
etical college at Vienna, i. 450.

Me.vls, hours of, ii. 315.

Med.vl, struck by the Catholics to
commemorate the massacre of the
Huguenots, iii. 249.

Medals, satiric, used as money in
the Saturnalia, iii. 151 ; modem
applications of, 158 — ICO.

Medicine and Morals, considerations
on their connection, ii. 4C4 — 409 ;
connection of the mind with tlie
body, 470.

Medina Conde, forges deeds and
inscriptions to benclit the Cluirch,
i. 130 ; sold a bracelet to the Mo-
rocco ambassador, as part of tlie
treasure of the last Jloorisli king,
yet in fact fabricated by himself,
ib.

Me.moirs, remarks on their interest
as compared with history, i. 462.

Mendelssohn, anecdote of, i. 392.

Mendicity, punished among the
Jews and nations of antiquity, i.
199, 200 ; first made a trade of by
liberated Christian slaves, 201;
punishment of in China, 202.

Mexot, Michael, a celebrated
preacher, specimen of his sermons,
i. 25G.

Ment.vl Disorders, singular mode
of cure of, ii. iHd; remarkable
anecdotes of, 4GS — 170.

Mete.mpsvcuosis, doctrines of, ad-
vocated in the present age, i. 192 ;
notion long e.xtant in Greece before
the time of Pytliagoras, ib. ;
taught by the Egyptians, ib. ; en-
tertained by many Eastern nations
and by the Druids, ib. ; Welsh
system of, explained by Sharon
Turner, 193; believed in Me.xico,
194; Plutarch's description of, ib.

MicuA£L Angelo, auecdotcof.i. 258.
M M

530

Index.

MiGNAUD, a celebrated painter, curi-
ous anecdote concerning, i. 258, '.'09.
Milton, liis controversy with Sal-
masius and Morus conducted with
mutual revilings, i. 152, 153 ; ab-
surdly criticised by Bentley,370 —
373 ; indebted to Andreini for the
first idea of Paradise Lost, ii. 141 ;
his worlcs suffered at the liands of
both Koyalist and Republican li-
censers, 223 ; his Areopagitica,
225 ; a passage in liis History of
England suppressed, but preserved
in a pamphlet, 448 ; his Comus
escaped the destruction of tlie
Bridgewater papers, 451 ; the story
of him and the Italian lady, pro-
bably an invention of George
Steevens, iii. 299 ; copied from a
French story purporting to be of
the loth century, SOO.
Milliners' bills, ancient and mo-
dern, ii. 39.
Mimes, Arcli-mirae followed the body
of Vespasian at his funeral, iii.
120.
MiMi, an impudent race of butToons,
ii. 120 ; liarlequin.a Eoman mime,
121, and note.
Ministers, origin of tlie term as
applied to the pastors of Christinn
churches, i. 128 ; palaces built by,
notices of several, iii. 18G — 192;
Sir Robert "Walpole's remarks on
the imprudence of their erecting
such, 193; yet builds one himself,
ib.
Minstrels, ancient and modern,

pickpockets, ii. 14 0, note.
MisiiNA, see Talmud.
Missals, gross adornments of, i. 3CC.
Modern stories and plots, many de-
rived from tlie East, i. Ill, 112.
HloDESofsalutation in various nations,

ii. 12.
AIONK, General, anecdote of him and
his wife, i. 468; his conduct to-
wards Charles II. at his landing,
iii. 389.
Montagu, Lady JIary AVortley,

suppression of lier MSS., ii. 4 50.
MoNTFLEURY, a French actor, death

of, i. 248.
MoNTLLC, Bishop of Valence, his
negotiations for the election of the
Duke of Anjou as King of Poland,
iii. 349— :]G2.
Moralities, see BIvsteries and
Moralities

Mou.\litv of " Every Man," referred
by Percy to the class of tragedy,
ii. 278.
More, Doctor, his extravagant Pla-
tonic opinions, i. 21G.
Morus, controversy of Salmasius
with Milton, continued by, with
mutual abuse, i. 153.
Music, use of, in discovering indis-
positions by the voice, i. 151 ; in<
fluence of, in tho cure of diseases,
2C9 — 271 ; efl'ect of, on animals,
272 — 274.
Mutilations commonly practised in

the middle ages, ii. 311.
Mysteries, An ciENT,bibliograpliical
note of such as are printed, i. 352,
note ; one still performed in Bava-
ria, i. 360, note.
Mysteries and Moralities introduced
by ijilgrims, i. 352 ; subsequently
distinguished characters actors in,
353 ; performed in open plains, ib. ;
indulgence granted to frequenters
of, ib. ; at Chester, ib. ; singular
anecdotes concerning a mystery,
3 54 ; specimens from French mys-
teries, 355 ; observations of Bayle
and Warton on, 357 ; distinguished
from each other, ib.; specimen of a
morality, 358 ; moralities allego-
rical dramas, ib. ; passion of Ren^
d'Anjoufor, SCO ; triple stage used
for representation of, 361; anec-
dote relating to an English mys-
tery, ib. ; morality of " Love and
Folly," 362 ; at Kendal, York-
shire, iii. 442; usually performed
in tlie festival of Corpus Christi,
ib , note.
Names, anecdotes relating to, and to
their eHect on mankind, ii. G5 —
75 ; orthography of proper, ii. 237
— 239 ; names of our streets, 239
—2 43.
Names, significance of Roman, ii. 75,

note.
Nardi, his history of Florence, iii.

181.
Natural Productions resembling
artificial compo;~itions, i. 244 — 2 4 6.
Neal, his account of the Noncon-
formists, iii. 240.
Needham, Marchmont, tlie great
patriarch of newspaper writers, i.
158; short account of, ib.
Neology, or the novelty of new
words and phrases, remarks on,
iii. 23 ; Neological Dictionary pro-

Index.

5.31

posed by Loril Che?torfiplrl, 2fi ;
not always to be coiuleiiiiicd, 27;
examples of the inlroiluction of
various new words in Froncli and
En;;lisli, '.'S — :;■_>; the fLTin "fa-
therland" introduced by the author,
31 ; picturesque words, 32.

Nei!i-i, I'hilip, his " Commcutarj dc
Fatti Civili," iii. 1S2.

Newcastle, Margaret, Duchess of,
celebrated ainonj,' literary wives, i.
327 — 337 ; her account of Iier hus-
band's mode of life, ii. 3s, 39.

NEwsr.vi'EUS, forged, and used un-
su>i)ectiugly by historiaus, i. liC,
note.

Newspapers, originated in Italy, i.
I.'i5 ; called Ciazettas, ib. ; first a
Venetian, published monthly, ib. ;
circulated in manuscript, ib. ; pro-
hibited by Gregory XIII., ib. ; lirst
English, l-jl; much used by the
English during the Civil Wars of
Cromwell, and notices of these, 157
— 1.5!); origin of, in France, ICO ;
first daily one after the Restoration,
ib. ; only one daily, in the reign
of Queen Anne, ib. ; union between
them and literary periodicals, opi-
nions expressed on, ib.

Newton, remarks on, iii. 413.

NiccoLi, Nicholas, founded the first
public library in Italy, i. 4.

NiCKN.VMEs, use of, practised by poli-
tical parties, iii. SO ; instances of
many, 81 — SO ; serve to heat the
minds of the people, 83 ; of various
Parliaments, 85 ; effect of, on mi-
nisters, 89.

NoiuLiTV, conduct of kings towards,
ii. 11, 12.

NonLE.MEN turned critics, pair of
anecdotes concerning, i. 131.

No.MiN.vi.TSTS and Kealists, i. 312.

NosTRODAMUS, Consulted by Cathe-
rine de' Medici, i. 27t).

Novels, the successors of romances,
i. 450 ; Adam Smith's favourable
opinion of, ib.

Numerical Figures, of Indian origin,
i. 27G ; introduction of Arabic, 277 ;
Roman, ib. ; origin of Uoraau, ib. ;
falsification of Arabic, 27S.

Obscuuitv, in style, taught by a pro-
fessor, i. 401 ; Lycophron possessed
this taste, 4 02 ; defence of, by
Thomas Anglus, ib. ; Gravina's ob-
servations on, ib.

Ou> Age, progress of, in new studies,

i. OS ; remark of Adam Smith, on
re.-!uini)tion of former studies in, ib.

Oldvs, a literary anti<iuary, iii. 4^3;
caricature of, by Grose, i'jr, ; re-
leased from the fleet by the iJuko
of Norfolk, and made Norroy King
at Arms, ib., and note ; author of
the anacreontic, "Busy, cuiious,
thirsty lly," 4'JG ; placed in the
library of the Earl of Oxford, 497 ;
his integrity, ib., and note; his
literary labours, 497 — 499 ; his life
of Kawleigh,4 99 ; history of his two
annotated copiesofLanghaine, 502 ;
fate of his MS.S., 503; his diaries,
50 4; his readiness to aid others
with his knowledge, 50G ; liis Dis-
sertation on English I'oetry cur-
tailed by the bookseller, 507 ; ex-
tracts from his diaries, 508 — 511;
his intended Life of Shakspeare,
509 ; anecdoteofhim and Pope, 511.

Olivetan Hible, iii. 155.

Opinions, suppressed, modes of ex-
pressing them in ancient and mo-
dern times, iii. 150 ; in the .Satur-
nalia, ib. ; by carvings and illumi-
nations, 152 ; preceding tlie llefor-
mation, 153; instance of the Oli-
vetan Bible, 155 ; by medals and
prints, 15G.

Orchis, l!ee and Fly, i. 245.

Oude.vls, i. IGl — ICG.

Ordinaries, the "Hells" of the
17th century, ii. 1G5; description
of the arts practised at, 1C5 — 1C7.

Orobio, his description of his im-
pri-Jonment in the Inquisition, i.
1(57.

Orthography of proper names, ii.
2G1 ; of the name of .'Shakespeare,
ii. 238, note ; of Sir Walter Italeigh,
iii. 111.

Os.man, Sultan, promotes his gardener,
ii. 10.

Oxford, Edward Vere, Earl of, his
secret history, ii. 21.1—245.

Palaces built by ministers, iii. 18C —

192.

Palingenesis. — See Kegenera-

TION.

Pal.mei!, the actor, his death, i. 249.

P.v.MPiiLETS, sketch cf ^lyles Davis's
history of, i. 343 ; origin and rise
of, 344; one pretended to have
been composed by Jesus Christ, ib. ;
Alexander Pope denounced as a
plotter in a, 345 ; etymologies of
the word, 345— -347.
M il 2

)33

Index.

Pantomime, Frcncli verses in praise
of, and translation of, ii. IIG ; Cer-
vantes and Bayle's delight in, 116,
117; harlequin, 119 ; of the lower
Italians in their ge=tincs, ib. ; trea-
tises on, 121 ; trausuiitted from tlie
Eoiiians, 123; imiirovement of, by
Kuzzan'.e, 124 ; the history of a
people traced in, 125 ; description
Of the various characters in Italian,
12C.

pANTOMiMi, tragic actors usually
mute, ii. 120; Seneca's taste for,
ib. ; their influence over the lloman
people, 121.

Pantomimicai. Characters. See
Pantomime ; Massinger and Mo-
liere indebted to, ii. 138 ; remarks
on Shakspcare's " Pantaloon," 139.

Paper, among the ancients, ii. 2 7,
28 ; introduction into England, 29 ;
various sorts of modern, ib.

Paracelsus, his receipt for making
a fairy, iii. 2SG, 2S7.

Paradise Lost, prose and verse ver-
sions of, i. 305.

Parisian Massacre, apology for, iii.
253— 2C0, 352.

Park, Mungo, liis book interpolated
and altered by his editor, Bryan
Edwards, ii. 453.

Parker, Bishop of Oxford, iii. 279,
note.

Parodies, anecdote relating to, ii.
453; resembles mimicry, 454; not
made in deri.sion, ib. ; practised by
tlie ancients, 4 55 ; ancient, of Ho-
mer, ib. ; modern, 45G; dramatic,
anecdotes of modern, 45S — 4G0 ;
legitimate use of, ib.

Parpaillots, or ParpiroUes, iii. 82.

Particul.-vr Providence, various opi-
nions on, ii. 428 — 431 ; the grant-
ing a free-conduct to Luther, by
Charles V., possibly one, 432.

Pasquin and Marforio, account of, i.
208.

Pasquinades, origin of, and instances
of several, i. 208.

Patrons, their treatment of authors,
i. 82 ; anecdotes regarding, S3, 84 ;
opinion of Dr. Johnson upon, S3.

Paulus Jovius, description of the
country-house and collections of
etatues, books, and portraits be-
longing to, i. 45 ; description of
tlie villa built by, iii. 39 7.

pAzzi,Cavaliero,founderofthe Acca-
dcmia Colombaria, ii. 4S3.

Peg-tankakds, ii. 296, and note.

Peiresc, a man of incessant literary
cccupations, and an enthusiast in
the imiiortatiou of exotic plants,
ii. 151 ; anecdotes of, iii. 409.

Pembroke, Anne, Countess of, de-
signed a history of her family, iii,
421.

Perfumery and costly washes, in-
troduced into England by the Earl
of Oxford, i. 223.

Petitions, to Parliament against tho
Drama, ii. 289 ; mock, ib.

Petitioners and Abhorrers, iii. 87.

Petr.\rcii, formula used at his coro-
nation with the Laure! Crown, i.
455 ; his passion for literary com-
position, ii. 592 ; bis Laura, iii.
309.

Pictorial Biography. — See Magius.

Pisistr.\tus, the first projector
amongst the Greeks of a collec-
tion of the works of the learned,
i. 2.

Philip the First of Spain, i. 4C9 ;
his marriage with Mary of Eng-
land, ib. ; sought Queen Elizabeth
in marriage, 470 ; offered himself
to three diilereut sisters-in-law, ib. ;
his advice to his son, ib. ; his
death-bed, ib. ; his epitaph, 471.

Philosophy, dreams at the dawn of,
iii. 280 — 290 ; mechanical fancies,
291, 292; inquiries after prodi-
gies, 293 ; further anecdotes of,
294 — 29C.

PiiYSioGNO.MY, credited by Louis
XIV. and James I., i. 148, 149.

PiCART, his impostures innocentes, i.
259.

Pictures belonging to Charles I., ii.
332, 333.

Pinamonti, his book on the eternal
punishments, i. 204, note.

PiNELLi, his great library, and its
partial destruction, i. 57, and note.

Plagiarism, in printed sermons, i.
400 ; a professor of, ib.

Plants, presenting representations
of natural forms, i. 245.

Plantyn the printer, and his office
at Antwerp, i. 7 7, note.

Platina, his account of his persecu-
tion and tortures, for having been
a member of the " Academy" at
Rome, ii. 4SG.

Plato, Aristotle studied under, i.
143; parallel between him and
Aristotle, ib. ; contest between him

Index.

)33

and Aristotle, 144; the model of
the moderns who profess to be anti-
poetical, 433; a true poet himself,
ib.

PiiATOMSM, modern, originated
amoiii; tlic Italians, i. 213 ; system
of, by Geniistlius I'letlio, ib. ; pro-
fessed by a Mr. Thomas Taylor,
215; by a scliolar in tlie reign of
Louis XII., 216 ; by Dr. More,
ib.

Pjuetho, or Gemisthus, a remarkable
modern professor of I'latonisra, i.
213.

Platts or Plot.'!, theatrical discovery
of curious ones at JJulwicIi College,
and remarl<s upon, ii. 13S — 140;
see ScENAnio.

Plott, Dr., his project of a tour, iii.
292.

Plunder, etymology of, iii. 87, and
note.

Poets, Plato's description of the feel-
ing.s of, in the I'lixdon, i. 433 ;
opinions of various learned men on
the works of, 433 ; remarks on the
habits of, 434, 435; behaviour
of Frederic King of Prussia
(fatlier of the Great Frederic) to,
4;JG ; dillcrent conduct of other
kings towards, 437 ; honours paid
to, in the early stage of poetry, ib. ;
anecdote of JIargarct of Scotland
and Alain the poet, 43S; opinions
of the pious on the works of, ib. ;
too frequently merely poets, 439 ;
hints to young, 440 ; to veteran, ib.;
mistresses of, 441; change their
oinnions of tlieir productions, ib. ;
antiquity of tlie custom of crown-
ing, 454 ; abolished in the reign of
Theodosius. ib. ; regal, 457; con-
demned, ii. 303 — 303; laurcat,
see L.vuREATS.

Poetical Oakland, i. 247.

Poetical imitations and similarities,
ii. 92—113.

Point-uevice, etymology of, iii. 188,
and note.

Poland, history of the election of
the Duke of Anjou as King of, iii.
346— 3(;3.

POLICIIINELLO. — See PCXCII.

PoLiTiAN, Angelo, a polislied Italian
writer of the 15th century, i. 457 ;
his dedicatory epistle, prefixed to
his epistles, 4.">S.

PonTic.\L Nicknames, iii. 80 — 90.

Political Keporu, false maxim on

the efTieacy of, il. 43S; nncient In-
stances, ib. ; of the buttle of Lut-
zen, 439 ; on the battle of the
IJoyne, ib. ; other a^ecdote.s, mo-
dern and ancient, of the effect of,
440—443.

Political Religionism, illustrations
of its cflects, iii. 238 — 244.

Politic.vl Prognostics. — See Piie-
DiCTioNS. Dugdnlc ha.-tencd his
labours in anticipation of llie dis-
orders of the Ucbellion, iii. 2C1.

Political Parallels, iii. 267.

Polydore Vergil, a destroyer of
MS.S., ii. 445.

Po.MroNiis L.t.tus, in the 15th cen-
tury raised altars to Itomulus, ii.
4S5 ; chief of the "Academy" &t
Kome, 486.

Pope, his manuscripts, ii. 110 ; pas-
sage from, with the various altera-
tions, 111, 112; Dr. Johnson's
memorandum of hints for the life
of, 381 ; anecdote of, iii. 397.

PoFE, project of tlie, for placing a
cardinal on the throne of England,
ii. 605 ; favoured by Henry IV.,
ib.

Popes, their early humility and sub-
sequent arrogance, ii. 83 ; Celestiuc
kicks off tlie crown of the Em-
peror Henry the Sixth, ib. ; their
infallibility first asserted, ib. ;
protest of the University of Vienna
against, 84 ; their excommunica-
tions, ib.

Porta, John Dapfiste and John
Vincent, found the academy
" Dcgli Oziosi," ii. 483; Baptiste's
mechanical genius, iii. 290.

Portraits, of authors, of ccle'crated
men, i. 42 — 4 7 : of the Fuggcr
family, 6 ; commonly prefixed to
ancient manuscripts, 42 ; collec-
tions of, amongst the ancients, 4 3 ;
query upon the mode of their
transmission and their correctness,
ib. ; use of, ib. ; anecdotes relative
to the efitct of, 45 ; objections of
ingenious men to sit for, repro-
bated, 46 ; Granger's illustrations
of, 45; Perrault's " Eloges" con-
fined to French, ib. ; collection by
Paulus Jovius, ib. ; doubts as to
authenticity of several, ib. ; lite-
rary, of himself, by St. Evre-
mond, 102; in minute writing,
275.

Port Koval Societv, the, i. 94;

)31

Index.

tlieir Logic, or TIio Art of Tliink-
iiig, ail ;uliiiir:iblc work, ib. ; ac-
count of its rise and progress, 95 ;
many families of rank erected
lioiises tlicrc, ib. ; persecuted and
destroyed by the Jesuits, 'JG ; their
writings fixed tlie French lan-
guage, ib.
TosiESon rings, iii. 09, note.
rovF-KTV, abridgment of history of,
by Morin, i. 19S ; regulations re-
garding, among the Jews, ib. ;
among the Greeks, Eomans, and
Egyptians, 199 ; uncommon among
the ancients, 201 ; introduction of
hosi)itals for the relief of, ib.
riiAYf:R-ii00KS, gross illustrations of,

i. 3C6.
ruEACHEUS, jocular, i. 251 — 258.
Prediction, political and moral, de-
termined by certain prognostics,
iii. 2C0 ; of tlie Reformation by
Cardinal Julian, Sir Thomas Jlore,
and Erasmus, 2G2; by Sir Walter
Kawleigh, 2C3 ; of Tacitus, ib. ; of
Solon, 2G1; of Charlemagne, ib. ;
Cicero's art of, ib. ; faculty of, pos-
sessed by Du Vair, 26.5 ; principles
of, revealed by Aristotle, 2CG ; by
Jlr. Coleridge, 2G8 ; of the French
llevolution, 2Cn, 270 ; frequently
false, 272; anecdotes, 273; of the
end of the world, ib., note; of the
destruction of London in 1750, ib.,
note ; of American independence,
274 ; sometimes condemned as
false when really verified, 275;
caution to be observed in, 27G;
instances of, by Knox, 2 77 ; of
the death of Henry IV., ib. ; re-
flections on, 278, 279.
FuEFACES, frequently superior to the
work, i. 71; a volume of, always
kf'pt ready by Cicero, ib. ; ought to
be dated, 72 ; anecdote of Du Clos'
to a fairy tale, ii. 340.
rREFERMENT, anecdotcs of, ii. 12.
Tresbyterians, their conduct under
Charles II., iii. 240; their intole-
rance, 254.
Tress-money, proposition that those
who refused it should be tried by
martial law, iii. 4G2,and note.
Price, Robert, a Welsh lawyer, inci-
dents in his life, iii. 422.
Pki.mero, a game at cards described,

ii. IGG, note.
Prince Henry', son of James I.,
resembled Henry V. in his features,

ii.l8G ; Dr. Birch's life of, i87 ; anec-
dotes concerning, 1S7 — 194 ; hia
diary, 207.
Printing, art of, possessed by the
Romans without being aware of it,
i. 43, and note ; probably origi-
nated in China, ib., and note ; gene-
ral account of early, 73 — 78.
Printers, mention of early, i. 75.
Prints, satiric, iii. ICO.
Proclamations, against long swords
and deep ruffs, i. 222 ; royal,
against buildings in London, iii.
3G5 ; to enforce a country residence,
oG7 ; never possessed the force of
laws, 3CG; of Henry VIII., 372;
of Mary, 373; of Edward VI.,
S74 ; of Elizabeth, 375 ; of James
I., 37G ; of Charles L, 377 ; of
Charles II. against vicious, dc-
bniiclied, and profane persons, ib. ;
otlurs by Charles II., 379.
Profession, the choice of one and its
influence on the mind, with some
illustrative anecdotes, ii. 4G1 —
463.
Proper names, orthography of, the
uncertainty of, ii. 237; anecdotes
and instances of, 237 — 243.
Protestantism, once existed in

Spain, ii. 434.
Proverbs, use of, derided by Lord
Chesterfield, iii. 33; records of the
populace, 34 ; existed before books,
ib. ; abound in the most ancient
writers, ib. ; " the dark sayings of
the wise," 35 ; introduced into the
Greek drama, 36 ; definition of,
33 ; influence of, over a whole peo-
ple, ib. ; collection of, by Frank-
lin, ib. ; inscribed on furniture, ib. ;
English, collected by Hey wood, SO;
a speech of, 40 ; an era of, amongst
the English, 41 ; long favourites in
France, ib.; comedy of, ib. ; family,
42 ; ancient examples of the use
of, 43 ; some, connected with the
characters of eminent men, 4 4 ; use
of, by poets, ib. ; Eastern origin of
many, 45 ; collection of, by Poly-
dore Vergil and Erasmus, of
Spanish by Fernandez Nunes, of
Italian and French, English and
Scotch, 46, 47; study of, 48; illus-
trative of national character, 48 —
5G ; anecdotes of the origin of cer-
tain, 56 — 61 ; historical, Gl ; re-
marks on the arrangement of col-
lections of, 63.

Index.

535

Prtuke, his motliod of composition,
ii. 534 ; liis extraordinary porsc-
vcrance, ib. ; title of tlie cataloftue
of liis writings, 5ii5; copy of liis
worlds bequeatlicd to Sion College,
ib. ; the pretended retractation of
his Ilistriomastix, iii. 315, note.

rsALM-siNGiNG, remarks on, ii. 472 ;
first introduction of, ib.j T. War-
ton's criticism of, -173; history of,
473— J78 ; practised at lord
mayor's feasts, 479.

PsALsiAN.vzAR, his extraordinary
literary forgery, i. 1.37, note; iii.
311 ; some account of, 312 — 314.

Puck, the Commentator. — See Stee-

VENS.

TuLTENEV, Earl of Bath, SIS. Me-
moirs of, suppressed, ii. 4 47.

PtJNCii, his ancient origin, ii. 122, and
note ; origin of his name, ib., note.

Punchinello. — Sec Punch.

Punning, in a dictionary, i. 305.

Puns, Cicero's, i. C9.

Puppet-shows in England, iii. 238.

Purgatory, Cardinal Bellarmin's
treatise on, i. 204.

Puritans, turn bacchanalian songs
into spiritual ones, ii. 148.

PuiiiTANS and I'recisians, party
nicknames at the Keformation, iii.
84, 85.

Pyrotechnics. — See Fireworks.

QuADRio, his Universal History of
Poetry, iii. 233; his ignorance of
English poetry, 234 — 230 ; his opi-
nion of English comedy, 236;
praises our puppet-shows, 238.

Queen .Mary the First, her marriage
with Philip of Spain, i. 4G9 ; her
letter of instructions, ib.

QoEEN Elizabeth, letter of, to her
brother, Edward VI., i. 4G1 ; l;cr
exhibition of youtlifulness to the
ambassador of tlie Scottish king,
4G3 ; i-emarkable period in her
annals, ii. 170; her maiden state,
ib. ; real cause of her repugnance
to change it, ib., and note ; her ar-
tiliccs to conceal her resolution,
ISO; debates of the Commons on
tlie succession to, ISl ; address to,
by the Duke of Norfolk, and her
answer, ib. ; despatch of the
French ambassador on this occa-
sion, ISl — ISO; her judicious con-
duct, ib. ; her conduct towards
printers and autliiirs, 221, ■JJ2 ;
Ler dislike to the aiipointnieut of a

successor, ill. 831 ; account of her
death-bed, 331, 332.

QuF.KN Anne Uullen, anecdote rela-
tive to her cxccutiun, i. 4C2.

Qlerno, made laurcat for the joke's
sake, i. 455.

QuEVEOo, his love for Don Quixote,
iii. 339.

Quince, origin of, ii. 157, note.

QuoDLiBETS, or Scholastic Disquisi-
tions, i. GO.

Quotation, remarks on the useof.ii.
41C ; Selden's precept for, violated
by himself, 417; Bayle's remarka
on the use of, 4 1 8 ; when used by an
eminent author often approi)nated
by an inferior, 419; value of the
1 :oijer application of, 420.

liAiiiiiMCAL Stories, specimens of, i.
IJO — 12G; scripture quoted to sup-
port, 12G. •

llAWLEiGH, Sir Walter, composed his
History of the World in prison, i.
3G ; assisted in tliat work by seve-
ral eminent persons, ib. ; variations
in ortliography of his name, iii.
Ill, note; author's account of his
character, 112 ; Gibbon's and
Hume's observations on, 113 ; cun-
ning practised by, ib. ; anecdotes
of, 114 ; account of his return from
Guiana, 115, 116; his attempt to
escape, 118 ; betrayed by Sir Le^vis
Stucley, 119; narrative of his last
hours, 124 — 129 ; his History of
the World, the labour of several
persons, 131; note on Sir. Tytler's
remarks on the author's account of,
135, note; his extravagance in
dress, 407 ; notice of Oldys's life
of, 499.

Rantzau, founder of Ihegreat library
at Copenhagen, stanzas by, i. 5.

IIanz des Vaches, effect of, i. 274.

K.WN.viD, Theophilus, his works fill
twenty folios, and ruined his book-
seller, 542 ; notice of, 543 ; his
curious treatises, ib.

Realists, a sect of Scholars, 1.
312.

Reformation, origin of, iii. 142.

IIEIITATION, a Catluilic's, i. 349.

Regeneration of material bodies,
iii. 286, 287.

Relics of Saints, bought, sold, nnd
stolen, i. 2;;9 ; treatise on, by Gil-
bert de Nogent, ib. ; of St. Lewin,
ib. ; of St. Indalece, 240; of St.
Majoan.ib. ; of St. Augustin',sarm,

536

Index,

ib.; flo.SKin?; )f, ib. ; miracles pcr-
fonncil by, ib. ; miraculously mul-
tijilied, L'41 ; anecdote of a box of,
presLiitcd by tlie I'ope lo I'rincc
Eadzivil, ib. ; Frederick the Wise, a
great collector of, 242; phial of
the blood of Christ sent to Henry
III., ib. ; fall in price of, ib. ; de-
ceptive, 2 43.

Religion, state of, during the Civil
"\Var.s, iii. 433 : illustrative anec-
dotes of, 434 — 43G ; contest between
Owen and Baxter on, 437 ; confu-
sion of, ib. ; a colt baptised in St.
Paul's Cathedral, 43!), and note ;
anecdotes, 430 — 141 ; noticed by
George Wither the Poet, 442; ordi-
nance of the Parliament to rectify
the disorders in, 443.

Eeligionis.m distinguished from reli
gion, iii. 23D.

Eeligiol's Nouvellcttes, a class of
very singular works, i. 363 ; ac-
count of one, 304 ; notice of one
discussing three thousand questions
concerning the Virgin Mary, 3G.5 ;
Life of the Virgin, 3G7; Jesuits
usual authors of, 36 8 ; one describ-
ing what passes in Paradise, ib. ;
the Spiritual Kalendar, ib.

Representation, right of, not fixed
in the 10th century, i. 162.

Eesidences of literary men, notices
of several, iii. 394 — 399.

Eeviews. — See LiTER.'UiY Journals.

Eevolutions, maxim on, iii. 278.

EiiYMES inscribed on knives, and
alluded to by Shakespeare, iii. 38,
note ; on fruit trenchers, ib. ; on
riivjs, 39, note.

EiccoBONi, a celebrated actor, his
remarks on the Italian extempore
comedy, ii. 134 ; anecdote of, 137 ;
his inscription on the curtain of his
theatre, ib.

EiciT, a celebrated harlequin, ii. 130,
and note.

EiciiARDSON, the author of Sir
Charles Grandison, remarks on him
and his works, ii. C2 — 65.

EicuELiEU, Cardinal de, his general
character, ii. 349 ; his death-bed,
ib. ; anecdotes of the sinister means
practised by, Z'lO ; his confessor,
Father .Joseph, Sol — 353; X'rojecta
of assassination of, 354, and note;
drives Father Caussin, the king's
confessor, into exile, 355.

EiVE, Abbe de, librarian of the Duke

de la Vallierc, iii. 341 ; liis style of
criticism, 312 ; his collections for
works never begun, ib. ; his obser-
vations on the cause of the errors
of literary history, 344.

EoBiNSON Crusoe, remarks on, ii.
274; history of, traced, 275; written
by Defoe, after illness, and in com-
parative solitude, 276 ; not pub-
lished till seven years after Selkirk's
adventures, 277.

Roc, the, of Arabian tales, a creature
of Rabbinical fancy, i. 124.

EocHEFOLCAULT De la, remarks on
him and his maxims, i. 110.

RocHELLE, expedition to, ii. 367 ;
preparations for, ib. ; frustrated by
the death of Buckingham, 369.

Romances, tlie offspring of fiction
and love, i. 442 ; early, ib. ; that of
IFeliodorus denounced in the synod,
413: forbidden in the Koran, ib. ;
of the Troidjadours, 444 ; modern
poets indebted to, ib. ; Le Roman
de Perceforest, 445; of chivalry,
examples of, 446; Italian, 44S;
use made of by poets, 44 9 ; French,
ib. ; went out of fashion with
square cocked hats, 450 ; modern
novels, ib. ; histories of, 461 ;
D'L'rfe's Astrrea, ib.

RoMNEY the painter, his belief in
alchymy, i. 282, and note.

Ronsard, the French bard, and bis
Bacchaualia, ii. 41.

Rosy-Cross, the President of, proffers
his advice to Charles I., iii. 464.

Eousseau, his prediction of the
French Revolution, iii. 271, 272,
and note; his favourite authors, iii.
340.

RoYAi. Autographs, iii. 165.

Royal Promotions, ii. 10.

Royal Society, origin of, ii. 410 —
413.

Royal Society of Literature, ii. 406,
note.

Rubens, his house at Antwerp, iii.
398; his love for collections of art,
399, and note.

Ruffs, extravagances in,i. 222 — 227.

Rump, the origin of the term, iii. 482,
4 83 ; three stages in its political
progress, 484; songs upon, 485;
debate of the, whether to massacre
all the king's party, 487 ; parallel
between their coarse of conduct
and that of the leaders in tlie
French Revolution, 4S9 — 493.

Index.

537

Sainte Ampoule, ii. 434, note.

Sai.masus, Ills coii(rovcr.-y with nnd
abuse of Jlilloii, i. l.i:' — 154.

Salvatou Uosa, fund of nctiiig in
cxtcnipural comedy, ii. 133.

Sanduicol'ut, the Sicur de, ruined
himself by one fete, iii. 402 — 405.

Sans Cilottes, iii. k3.

St. A.MI5R0SE, writes n treatise on
Virftins, i. 412 ; nnd anotlieron tlie
Perpetual Virginity of the Slother
of (iod, ib. ; his chastiseiuent of an
erring nun, ib.

St. Baktiiolomew, apology for the
massacre of, iii. i.'iS — 200.

St. EvitEMU.ND, literary portrait of,
by himself, i. 102.

St. UitsiLA and the Eleven Thou-
eand Virgins all created out of a
blunder, i. 324.

St. Viar, created by an error, i, 323.

Satiric.vl medals, iii. 15G — IGO.

Satirists may dread the cane of the
satirised, i. 442.

Satl'k.nali.\, institution of among
tlie Itomans, derived by Macrobius
from tlie Grecians, ii. 250; dedi-
cated to Saturn, ib. ; latterly pro-
longed for a week, 257 ; descrip-
tion of, ib. ; crept into tlie Christian
Church, 25S, and note ; practised in
the middle ages, 259 ; Feast of
Asses, ib. ; " December liberties,"
2C0; the boy-bi.-hop, 201: Lord of
Misrule, ib. ; Abbot of Unreason,
262 ; description of a grand Clirist-
rnashcldat the Inns of Courts, 203 —
205, and note ; tlie last memorable,
of the Lords of Misrule of the Inns
of Court, 2GC ; anecdote of a Lord
of Misrule, 207 ; the Mayor of
Ganatt, 209; regiment do la Ca-
lotte, ib., and note, 270; Kepublic
of Baboonery, ib. ; medals used for
money in, iii. 150, 151.

Saunteri.vg, i. 175.

Savages, various usages of at meals,
i. 171—173.

SCALIGER, JuliuB, his singular manner
of composition, ii. SO.

SCARA.MOLCIIES. — See PANTOMniE.

Punch and Zany, prints of, ii. 125;
character of, invented by Tiberio
Fiurilli, 12C; power of a cele-
brated, ib.

ScARON, account of his life and
works, i. 4 2 I — 4 2S.

Scenery of the old English stage,
iii. 4, and note.

ScENARiE, the plots of cxtcmporal
comedies, ii. l.iO; description of,
note ; some discovered at DuUvicli
College, 139, 140, and note.

ScKiiir.ERAiD, the, a poetical ivtt on
pseudo-science, by M. O. Cambridge,
i. 295, and note.

SciiiPTLRE story treated likemediac', al
romance, i. 103, and note.

ScuDEUV, Mademoiselle, composed
ninety romances, i. 100; pane-
gyrics 0)1, ib. ; her "Great Cyras
and Map of Tenderness," 107.

ScuDEUv, George, famous for com-
posing romances, i. 107; a votary
of vanity, ib. ; author of fi.xteen
jilays, 103.

Secret lIiSTORV,of authorswho have
ruined their booksellers, ii. 532 —
540; of an elective monarchy, iii.
340 — 303; the supplement of his-
tory itself, iii. 3S0 ; reply to an at-
tack on the writers of, 3S2 ; two
species of, positive and relative, ib.;
the true sources of to be found in MS.
collections, 3S3 ; neglect of by his-
torians, 384; its utility, 3S5 ; of
the llcstoration, 380 ; of Mary, the
Queen of William III., 389 —
393.

Sedan chairs, introduced into Eng-
land by the Duke of Buckingham,
ii. 30.

Segni, Bernardo, his History of
Florence, iii. 182.

Senti-mental biography, iii. 414 —
424.

Ser.vssi, writes the life of Tasso, ii.
4 44; finds Galileo's 5LS. annota-
tion.-', copies them, and suppre.-ics
the original, ib.

Sermons, printed, Baylc's saying on,
i. 315.

SEy.MOLH, William, his family and
character, ii. 508 ; enters into a
treaty of marriage witli the l.ady
Arabella Stuart, ib. ; summoned
before the I'rivy Council, ib. ; his
marriage, 509; imprisoned in the
Tower, ib. ; his wife's letter to liiia.
510; his escape, 515; is jiermitted
to return, 519.

Sii-VKKSPEARE, Fuller's character of,
i. 3.^0 ; orthography of his name,
ii. 2o8, and note ; introduces a
masque in his " Tempe.-it," ami
burkstjues the characters in eomt
masques, iii. 5. and note ; bequc&t
to his wife, 302.

538

Index.

Shenstone, the object of his poem of
the Schoohiiistress misunduistood,
ii.49G; his ludicrous index to, 499;
his character, his life, and his
works, iii. 90 — 102.
Shoeing-iiorns, ii. 297, note.
Silhouette, a term not to be found
in any dictionary, iii. 84; origi-
nated in a political nickname, ib.
Silk stockings, pair of, proscuted to

Queen Elizabetli, i. '22G.
SiLLi, ancient parodies, ii. 455.
Skelton, his satire on Wolsey, iii.

187.
Sneezing, the custom of saluting
after, i. 126 ; attributed to St. Gre-
gory, ib. ; Kabbinical account of,
ib.; anecdotes concerning, 127.
Sncff-boxes, therage.iu the reign of
Queen Anne, i. 229 ; the Jesuits',
reported to be poisoned, ii. 442.
Solitude, treatise on, by Sir George
Slackenzie, ii. 50 ; necessary for the
pursuits of genius, 52; discomforts
of 53, 54.
Solomon, accounted an adept in ne-
cromancy, i. 122 ; story of him and
the Queen of Sheba, 202.
Songs among the Grecians, ii. 142 ;
sayings of Fletcher of Saltouu, and
Dr. Clerk on, ib. ; Greek songs of
the trades, 143 ; of the weavers
among the English, ib. ; harvest
and oar-songs in the Highlands,
ib.; of the gondoliers, ib. ; Dibdin's,
144; old English, lt5 ; Swiss, 14G ;
Italian, composed at Florence, under
the Jledici, ib.; French " Chansons
de' Vendange," 147; parodied, by
Puritans, 148 ; slang or Hash,
known to the Greeks, and speci-
mens from Athenaius, 149; ancient
practices in, connected with old
Engli.sh customs, 150 ; political, iii.
179, ISO.
SONNAii, tlie, i. 113.
SoTADES travestied the Iliad, ii.

455.
SoTTiES, more farcical than farce, i.

358 ; specimen of one, 359 — 3G0.
SovEKKiONTY of the seas, ii. 79 — SI.
Spanish Etiquette, instances of its

absurdity, i. 194.
Spanish I'oetry, i. 100 ; remarks on
and illustrative quotations of, 101;
translation of a madrigal found in
a newspaper, 102.
Speed, the historian, suspicions of his
originality, ii. 445,

Spenser, Fuller's character of, i. 379.
Spiders, influence of music on, i. 2 72;

admired as food, ii. 355, note.
Stanzas to Laura, i. 230.
Starching, origin of, i. 227.
Steevens, George, the Puck of com-
mentators, iii. 29C ; account of his
literary forgeries, 297, 298; the
story of Jlilton and the Italian
lady attributed to, 299 ; his motives
for omitting the Poems from his
edition of Shakespeare, 301; his
trick on the antiquary Gough, 303,
304.
Stephens, Robert, the printer, his
family and their works, i. 7G, note :
divided the Bible into chapter and
verse, iii. 433.
Sternhold and Hopkins, their ver-
sion of the Psalms, ii. 472.
Stones, presenting representations of

natural forms, i. 244, 245.
Stoscii, Baron, his dishonest collect-
ing, iii. 318.
Streets of London, origin of many

of tlieir names, ii. 239 — 243.
Stuart, Arabella, mistakes of his-
torians regarding, ii. 502 ; lier
history, 503—519.
Stukeley, Dr., his Imaginary His-
tory of the Empress Oriuna, i. 324,
note.
Stucley, Sir Lewis, Vicc-Admiral of
Devon, accepted a surveillance over
his kinsman, Sir Walter Kawleigh,
iii. 116; his base treachery, 119;
universally shunned in consequence,
120; convicted of clipping gold, ib.;
his miserable death, 121.
Student in the metropolis, tlie, de-
scription of, by Gibbon, Kogers,
and Descartes, i. 112.
Study, plans of historical, ii. 90 — 93.
Style, remarks on, in the composi-
tion of works of science, i. 89 ;
strictures on the, of theological
writers, ii. 21, 22 ; on that of
Lancelot Addison, 23.
Sugar- Loaf-Court, origin of the

name, ii. 10.
Suppression of MSS.— See MANr-

SCRIPTS.

Svdenhasi, F., his melancholy death
occasions the foundation of the
Literary Fund, i. 34, and note.

Tablets, and Table-books, ii. 26.

Talmud, many copies of, burnt, i.
48; a collection of Jewish tradi-
tions orally preserved, 114 j com*

Indtx.

;39

prises Mishna, wliicli is llie text of
the Gcinara, its comincntury, ib. ;
gL'iKTiil account of, ib. ; believed
apocryplial, even by a few among
tlie Jews, ib. ; time of the lirst
njjpcarance of its traditions uncer-
tain, ib. ; compiled by Jewish doc-
tors to opjiose the Christians, ib. ;
analysis of, by ^V^ Wotton, 11. 'i;
two Talinuds, ib. ; committed to
writinjr, and arranged by I{. .luda,
prince of the Uabbins, forming the
Jlishna, ib. ; disputes and opinions
of the Uabbins on the form of the
Mi.shna, ib. ; God's study of, ib. ;
curious, from its antiquity, IIG;
specimens of, from the Jliihnic
titles, UG— 118; and froru the
Geniara, 119.

Tasso, various opinions on the re-
spective merits of him and Ariosto,
i. 3SC ; Uoileau's criticism on, 388;
his errors national, ib. ; his verses
sung by the gondoliers, ib.

Taxation, remarks on the popular
feeling on, in ancient and modern
times, iii. 193; a.'-sociated with the
idea of tyranny, ib. ; illustrative
anecdotes, 194 ; clhcacy of using a
mitigated term for, 195; gifts, tri-
bute, benevolences, and loans, 195
— 198 ; Burleigh's advice on, 199.

Taylok, Thomas, a modern professor
of Platonism, i. 215.

Tea, opposition to the introduction
of, Ji. 317 ; present of, declined
by the Russian ambassador, 318;
Dutch bargain for, 319; introduc-
tion into Europe, ib. ; shop-bill of
the tirst vendor of, o-JO.

Tenlues, curious ancient, i. 187, note.

Tiio.MAS Aquinas, some accouut of
the works of, i. 03 — r,5.

TiMON of riiilius, his parodies of
Homer, ii. 455.

TiCiiBOCRNE, Chidiock, concerned in
Babington's conspiracy, ii. 171 ; liis
address to the populace at his exe-
cution, 17G; his letter to his wife,
177; verses composed by him the
night before his execution, 178.

Titles, origins of, and anecdotes
concerning, i. 155; book of, pub-
lished in Spain, ib. ; Selden's Titles
of Honour, ib. ; of books, 288 — 292.

Toi.ekation, practised by the IJo-
nans, and inculcated by Mahomet,
iii. 245 ; caution used in publisliing
works on, ib. ; early English advo-

cates of, 24C,and note ; in Holland,
ib.; facta illustrative ol the history
of, 247, 248; condemned by all
parties, 249 — 253 ; opinions of an
English clergyman on, 252.

To.M o' Uedla.ms, account of, ii. 311
— 314, and notes; songs of, 315 —
317.

ToiiTL'UE, Felton threatened with, ii.
37G ; its frequent use in England,
ib.

Touquemada, first Spanish inquisitor,
in fourteen years persecuted 80,000
individuals, i. IGU.

Townlev, Zouch, his poem on Feltop,
ii. 378; collection of antique mar-
bles formed by his descendant
Charles Townley, purchased for the
British JIuseum, ib., note.

Tkaitoks, barbarous mode of execu-
tion of, in Queen Elizabeth's time,
ii. 175, and note.

TiiE.\SL'i(ES in hills, iii. 295, note.

Trevou.x. — .See Diction ah v.

TuoLB.vuoLus, their poems and their
loves, i. 44 4.

Tkusler, Doctor, first vendor of
printed sermons imitating manu-
scri])t, i. 400.

TuKNEK, Doctor, a violent opposition
leader in the second Parliament of
Charles I., iii. 451 ; an agent of the
opposition in I'arliament against
the measures of Charles I., 4GG; a
disappointed courtier, 4U7, note.

Turkish Spy, the, i. 377 ; John Paul
Marana, the author of, 378.

Urb.vn the Eighth, instances of liia
poetic sensibility, i. 45C.

Usurers of the 17th century, notice
of the practices of, ii. 158 — 170.

Usury, contrary opinions on, ii. 174,
175.

Utopia, Sir Thomas >rore's, missiona-
ries proposed to be sent to, i. 320.

Vaccination, strange dread of, ii.
317.

VAi.r.ANCEY's Collectanea, curiotu
error in, i. 32C, note.

Vanbrugii, thearchitectof Rlenheim,
got a |)Ower from I..ord Uodolphin
to contract in the Duke of JlarlLo-
rougli's name, iii. 10 1; produces
the power, lOG ; his dejwsitions.ib. ;
attempt of the Duchess of Marlbo-
rough to charge the debts of IJIen-
hciin on, 108; conduct of tlio
Duchess towards, 109; discovery
of his orii;in, 110, HI.

540

Index:

VArom, Benedetto, his " Storie Fio-

jvntine," iii. 183; remarks of Mr.

Jlerivale on, ib., note.
Varillas, his fictitious work on the

llL-formation, i. 133, note.
Vasari's History of Artists, not en-
tirely written by himself, iii. 131.
Vatican, library of, i. 4.
Val'canson, his mechanical figures,

iii. 281, note.
Vaudevilles, origin of the name, ii.

lis.
Verses, follies in the fantastical

forms of, i. 295 — 300 ; reciprocal,

ib.
Vicvu OF Bray, story of the, i. 19C;

Dr. Kitchen, Bishop of Llandafl',

acted the same jjart, 197 ; type of,

ii. 37.
ViDA, Jerome, from the humblest ob-
scurity attained to the episcopacy,

i. 105.
Vision of Alberico, ii. 422 ; of Charles

the Bald, 423.
Virgin Mary, images of, frequently

portraits of mistresses and queens,

i. 3GG ; miraculous letter of, 3G7 ;

Louis II. conveys Boulogne to, ib. ;

Life of, by Maria Agreda, ib. ;

worship paid to, in Spain, 3C8;

system of, in seven folio vols., 3C9.
Virginity, St. Ambrose's treatise on,

i. 412.
Walker, his account of the clergy

of the Church of England who

were sequestered, &c., iii. 243.
Walpole, Sir Robert, his magnificent

building at Houghton, iii. 191.
Walsingiiam, Sir Francis, dicl in

debt, iii. 192.
WALWORTti, Sir William, his private

motive for killing Wat Tyler, iii.

470, note.
Warri T.TON, .T., by neglect causes

the destruction of old manuscript

plays, i. 54, note.
Wat Tylek, anecdote of, iii. 4 70,

note.
Westminster elections always turbu-
lent from the days of Charles the

First, iii. 4C1, note.
Whig and Tory, origin of the terms,

iii. 88.
WriisTLECRAFT's Pocm on King

Arthur, ii. 490, note; imitated by

Byron in his Bcppo, ib.

Whitelocke, liis Memorials, ii. 212 ;
his remembrances, a work addressed
to his family, lost or concealed, ib.;
preface to the Kemembrances pre-
served, ib.; omissions in first edi-
tion of liis Memorials, ii. 448.

Wife, Literary, i. 327 ; of Budaeus,
328; of Evelyn, who designed the
frontispiece to his translation of
Lucretius, ib. ; of Baron Haller, ib.;
Calphurnia, wife of I'liny, ib. ;
Mafgaret, Duchess of Newcastle,
329 ; extract from lier epistle to
her husband, ib. ; notices of the
wives of various celebrated men,
332—337.

Wigs, custom of using, i. 217 — 220 ;
Steele's, 229.

WiLKiNS, Bishop, Ilis museum, iii.
291.

WiNKELMANN, the plan on which he
composed his works, ii. 89.

Wolsev, Cardinal, his magnificent
houses, iii. 187.

Women, actors, first introduced on
the Italian stage, ii. 140 ; on the
English, 284 ; Kynaston a favourite
actor of female characters, 285,
note.

Woodcuts, ancient, in the British
Museum, i. 74, note.

Words, introduction of new. — See
Neology.

AVooD, Anthony, when dying, caused
his papers to be destroyed, ii. 243 ;
some, however, preserved, ib. ; se-
cret history of the Earl of Oxford
drawn from, ib. ; compelled to dis-
avow the translation of his book,
453 ; Gibbon's opinion of Ilis dul-
ness opposed, 538, note.

Writing, minute, i. 275; ancient
modes of, ii. 20 — 2G ; materials used
for, 27— ."0.

Writing-Masters, iii. 167; Massey's
lives of, 169 ; anecdote of Tomkins,
171 ; Peter Bales, a celebrated,
173; account of his contest with
David Johnson, 173—177.

Xenocrates, pupil of riato, attacked
Aristotle, i. 142.

Yvery, notice of the History of the
House of, iii. 420, and note.

Zany, etymology of the word, ii. 123 ;
and notes.

THE END.

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