"_Viola._ Swear as if you came but new from the knighting.
_Fust._ Nay; I'll swear after L400 a year."
_Decker's Honest W._
Written during the fever of South Sea speculation, the skit of Jonathan
Swift, known as the "Bank of Swearing," was one exceedingly felicitous
and well-timed. We are amused even now, as we read the prospectus of
this preposterous undertaking, at the extreme audacity with which the
would-be projector solemnly enumerates its advantages. Impossible and
altogether ludicrous as was the enterprise, it is not improbable that
many of the eager financiers of that speculative age fancied they saw
solid reason in the scheme. It is only to be hoped that they did not too
eagerly respond to the facilities for investment which the Swearers'
Bank was reputed to hold out.
The notion was simply that of a chartered bank established upon a novel
basis and financing upon an original principle. Such bank was in fact to
enjoy a monopoly of levying the fines which the laws of the country
imposed upon swearing. Although these penalties had been rarely
inflicted, the mere circumstance of their being warranted by the
statute-book was regarded by the projector in the light of a mine of
latent wealth. A profitable banking concern once fairly in operation,
and backed by the security of these statutory imposts, what more could
the investor require for his capital?
To convince the investing public of the merits of his scheme, he
proceeds to calculate the sums that might be realised by fully putting
the act into vigour. The neglected statute upon the basis of which the
whole of this superstructure was to be raised and the Bank of Swearing
endowed, was the act of the sixth and seventh year of William and Mary,
inflicting a penalty at the rate of not less than a shilling an
oath.[35]
"It is computed by geographers,"--so argues the promoter--"that there
are two millions in the kingdom [Ireland], of which number there may be
said to be a million of swearing souls. It is thought there may be five
thousand gentlemen. Every gentleman, taken one with another, may afford
to swear an oath every day, which will yearly produce one million eight
hundred and twenty-five thousand oaths; which number of shillings makes
the yearly sum of L91,250.
"The farmers of this kingdom, who are computed to be ten thousand, are
able to spend yearly five hundred thousand oaths, which gives L25,000;
and it is conjectured that from the bulk of the people twenty or five
and twenty thousand pounds may be yearly collected."
The swearing capacity of the army is no less minutely investigated. In
the case of the militia, however, the promoter is disposed to recommend
either a partial immunity from the tax or else a scale of fines
considerably cheapened. To put the law in full force against militiamen,
at least so opines the promoter, would only be to fill the stocks with
porters and the pawnshops with accoutrements. So essential is this point
with him, that he makes direct appeal to his Protestant countrymen,
reminding them of the satisfaction it would afford the Papists to see a
most useful body of soldiery actually swear themselves out of their
Swords and muskets.
Inclined to a politic leniency towards the military classes, it would
seem that this ingenious projector looked mainly for his revenue to the
swearing dues that might be collected at wakes and fairings. The oaths
of a single Connaught fair, he has calculated, amount to upwards of
three thousand. "It is true," he allows, "that it would be impossible to
turn all of them into money, for a shilling is so great a duty on
swearing, that if it were carefully exacted, the common people might as
well pretend to drink wine as to swear, and an oath would be as rare
among them as a clean shirt." In this way the Reverend Dean rattles on.
He is pointing his satire both at the epidemic of financial adventure
then so fatally prevalent and at that incomprehensible leaning to the
use of "bad language" of which even he was so ready to avail himself
when it either suited his purpose or strengthened his style.
The Dean can scarcely be supposed to have known that one of the many
proposals put before Lord Burghley in the very early days of political
economy, bore a close resemblance to his manner of handling oaths. A
Monsieur Rodenberg proposed to show how the revenue could be increased
to twenty millions of crowns, and part of his plan consisted in a
rigorous levy of fines on swearing. He further recommended that a
council of twelve "grave persons" should have the disposal of the fund,
which while unexpended should be put out to usury.[36]
A recommendation of this kind urged upon Queen Elizabeth's ministers was
very much in advance of English politics. It so far denotes a
turning-point in the history of swearing, that we cannot do better than
trace out what the future course of legislation was to be.
Previous to the period we are now entering, a person addicted to
intemperate language might have been called to account by his church, or
at the bar of his own conscience. He could not have been called to
account by the State. The suggestion of State interference, so far as
concerns the southern division of this island, seems not to have
previously occurred, and we are consequently justified in inferring that
the necessity for it had never seriously arisen. There is, indeed,
complete cohesion and consistency in what was happening. We believe we
have shown elsewhere whence it was, and when it was, that the English
people first began to swear, and we are confirmed in our conclusions by
finding that this was the precise period at which English law-makers
began to legislate upon swearing.
Passing over barbarous and obsolete laws of a more imperfect
civilisation, we find that the first essays in State control commenced
in Scotland. A full half century before the question came before
Elizabeth's parliament, the sister kingdom had the benefit of a statute
inflicting a monetary penalty upon the use of oaths. This enactment,
passed by the Scottish parliament of 1551, calls for notice upon other
grounds besides those of morality. If a legal document can be said to
partake of a poetic character, it was certainly the case with this
ordinance of Queen Mary, which seems to have been directly inspired by
the metrical labours of William Dunbar, then lately the national poet.
The verses of Dunbar to which this result can be partially attributed
are those known as 'The Sweirers and the Devill.' It is certainly
remarkable that the framers of the Act would seem to have prepared its
clauses with Dunbar's poetry open before them. At all events, the
statute literally recites the "ugsome oaths" that are used by the old
versifier. There is a severity in the statute at which Dunbar himself
would have been surprised had he lived down to Mary's reign. In
particular, it enacts that "a prelate of kirk, earl or lord," shall for
the first offence be fined to the extent of twelve pennies, but for the
fourth the delinquent shall be banished or imprisoned for a year.
Dunbar's treatment of his subject is very similar to that of the
nameless author of the 'Moralite des Blasphemateurs' which we have
previously noticed. He supposes the devil to have assumed human shape,
an assumption which in those times would have been thought nothing out
of the way, and in that guise to be conversing with the traders in a
Lowland market. As is usual in these episodes, he invites them to join
him in the use of the most delectable oaths that he can lay before them.
The honest market-folk are so taken by his allurements that we have the
maltman, the goldsmith, the "sowter," and the "fleshor" vieing with one
another in their choice of ribaldry. In this friendly contest, needless
to say, it is the parish priest who carries off the prize. One hopes
that his excuse was as valid as that of the monk in Rabelais. "How now,"
exclaims Ponocrates, "you swear, Friar John!" "It is only," replies the
friar, "to grace and adorn my speech; it is the colour of a Ciceronian
rhetoric."
The place in literature left vacant by Dunbar was soon occupied by
Lindsay, the
"Sir David Lindsay of the Mount
Lord Lion, king at arms,"
whose name and titles are so familiar to the readers of Scott. He
likewise appears to have led up to the impending legislation, if not
indeed to have been the immediate cause of it. His 'Satyre of the Three
Estaitis,' performed at Coupar in 1535, besides containing other
objectionable matter, is a wild medley of oaths.
Apart from what was passing in and near the capital, the local
authorities from Glasgow to Aberdeen were up in arms against swearers
before any movement of the kind had taken place in the other division of
the island. To judge from the borough records of the former city,[37]
the prevalency of the habit was a source of great scandal to the
presbytery of that town. The number of Janet Andersons and William
Crawfords who were arraigned before the high bailiff for offences of
this character is something considerable. At Aberdeen[38] in 1592 the
attention of the council was specially engaged in repressing the
swearing of "horrible and execrable oaths." They proceeded to put on
foot a system of fines, and with a degree of confidence that is hardly
commendable, they authorised the heads of families to keep a box in
which to place the mulcts they were empowered to inflict in their
households. Servants' wages were liable to be taxed at the will of
their masters, and wives' pin-money at the instance of their lords. A
few years later the presbytery went further than even the magistracy had
already done. They directed the master of the house to keep a "palmer,"
or instrument for inflicting pain upon the palm of the open hand. This
we suppose to have been the last argument used against offenders whose
wages or whose pin-money had been sworn away. Altogether the attempt to
make people moral by Act of Parliament seems to have been productive of
much strife in Scotland, without securing, so far as can be perceived,
any positive gain. The Act of 1551, that under which the local and
spiritual authorities derived their powers, was further supplemented by
Acts of 1567 and 1581.
We now arrive at the point at which legislation upon the subject was to
cross the border and take a prominent place in the counsels of King
James' reign.
We have seen that it was Queen Elizabeth's godson Sir John Harington,
who first recorded the positive introduction of the damnatory oath. A
long time, however, must have elapsed before the bantling took heart of
grace and found strength to run alone. An examination of Elizabethan
writings does not conduce to the idea of the term having had a
widespread acceptation. The reference we have given to the comedy of
Nat Field, 'Amends for Ladies,' tends to show that the British
shibboleth was still regarded as of exotic growth. The truth would seem
to be that the literature of the country, gross and abusive as it often
was, was singularly free from terms of this particular description,
while the conversation of the humbler orders was not so unexceptionable.
Already it had become a source of uneasiness to the Legislature. In 1601
a measure was introduced into the Commons "against usual and common
swearing," but, having been carried up to the Lords, it dropped after
the first reading. This would appear to have been the first attempt at
legislation on the subject.[39] On the accession of James I. the topic
was again brought to the notice of the House, but the early Parliaments
of this reign were too much occupied with the work thrown upon them in
consequence of the Gunpowder Treason to formulate any code for the
regulation of this abuse. Although no less than five separate bills,
having the prevention of swearing for their object, were presented
during the course of this reign, it was not until 1623 that an enactment
was finally carried defining and controlling the offence. The statute of
that year[40] provided that every offender should forfeit the sum of
twelve pence. In default of payment the culprit was to be placed in the
stocks for three hours, or if under the age of twelve years was to be
severely whipped.
The attack made by the Puritans upon performances of a dramatic nature
had resulted in a kindred piece of legislation especially affecting the
stage. By an Act[41] passed in 1606 it was provided that a penalty of
10_l._ should be borne by every person who jestingly or profanely used
the name "of God, or of Christ Jesus, or the Holy Ghost, or of the
Trinity," in any interlude, pageant or stage-play. It was in consequence
of the rigour of this enactment that Ben Jonson narrowly escaped a
prosecution for blasphemy. On the production of the 'Magnetic Lady,' the
language employed upon the stage gave great offence in legal quarters,
and the author was sent for from a sick-bed and severely questioned by
the Master of the Revels. An examination of the play will show the
charge, as against Jonson, to have been unfounded; even the author was
at a loss to understand the occasion for the accusation being preferred.
The actors in the piece were accordingly called together, and when
confronted with the dramatist, were forced to admit that the
objectionable expletives were those of their own supplying.
When some months later the play of 'The Wits' was presented to the
licenser, previous to its production on the stage of the Blackfriars,
that dignitary was particularly careful to expunge all such passages as
struck him as unparliamentary. Sir William D'Avenant, the author of the
comedy, complained to the king of this exercise of the censorship, and
His Majesty, after reading the play for himself, negatived the decision
of the licenser. He ruled that the words "s'death," "s'light," and such
kindred terms, were asseverations merely, and not oaths. The court
functionary does not appear to have been any the more satisfied, and has
left an entry in his diary, submitting indeed to his master's judgment,
but maintaining his own opinion. The play was returned to D'Avenant,
having the full sanction of the king, who on its first production took
boat to the Blackfriars playhouse to witness the performance.[42]
The stage has continued to enjoy a species of traditional immunity from
all the reprobation which swearing is presumed to incur. So long as the
action passing on the boards is in ever so remote a degree in affinity
with its supposed natural counterpart, and is suited with dialogue that
is fairly appropriate, the use of expletives is not omitted in deference
to the susceptibilities of an audience. The theatre may in some sense be
called a school of swearing, and in that capacity has frequently brought
upon itself the castigations of its appointed supervisors. Of all the
censors who from time to time have made a stand against this traditional
licence, George Colman is to be remembered as the most violent and the
most inconsistent.
As a writer he had scandalised a whole generation of playgoers. The
'Heir-at-Law' and the 'Poor Gentleman,' comedies with which he has
permanently benefited stage literature, do not certainly halt at any
extreme. His very appointment as censor was due to the bottle-acquaintance
that had sprung up with the regent Prince of Wales. Yet so squeamish did
he become when once the official mantle had descended upon his shoulders,
that even the exclamations "lud!" and "la!" were ruthlessly expunged from
productions submitted to his censorship. The words "Oh, Providence!" were
also rigidly excised, and the very names of heaven and hell were flatly
condemned as savouring of irreverence.
Says Mr. Dutton Cook, in treating of this feature of the Georgian
drama:--"Men swore in those days not meaning much harm or particularly
conscious of what they were doing, but as a matter of bad habit, in
pursuance of a custom certainly odious enough, but which they had not
originated and could hardly be expected immediately to overcome. In this
way malediction formed part of the manners of the time. How could these
be depicted upon the stage in the face of Mr. Colman's new ordinance?
There was great consternation among actors and authors. Critics amused
themselves by searching through Colman's own dramatic writings and
cataloguing the bad language they contained. The list was very
formidable. There were comminations and anathemas in almost every scene.
The matter was pointed out to him, but he treated it with indifference.
He was a writer of plays then, but now he was Examiner of Plays."
The persecution under which Jonson suffered was due to the steady growth
of Puritan principles. Measures of austerity were speedily generated by
this ascetic philosophy; and among others we find that a scheme for
bringing oaths, in a liquidated shape, to the aid of the national
resources, was put into operation. Letters patent were granted in the
month of July 1635, for establishing a public department for enforcing
the laws against swearing. One Robert Lesley was appointed to the office
of chief inquisitor, and was authorised to take all necessary steps for
carrying out the act in every parish of the kingdom. Whatever moneys
might be realised were to be paid over to the bishops for the benefit of
the deserving poor. Lesley appointed deputies in the parishes, who, we
notice, were at liberty to deduct 2_s._ 6_d._ in the L for their pains.
A copy of one of these appointments to a London parish appears among the
State papers, but no balance-sheet from which we might learn something
of the "turn-over" of the office appears to be forthcoming.[43]
With what feelings the army of the Parliament regarded this offence may
be gathered from two sentences passed upon offenders convicted under
military law. In March 1649, a quartermaster named Boutholmey was tried
by council of war for uttering impious expressions. The man was found
guilty and condemned to have his tongue bored with a red-hot iron, his
sword broken over his head, and himself ignominiously dismissed the
service. In the following year a dragoon was similarly sentenced by
court-martial to be branded on the tongue.[44] Even in districts removed
from martial severity the monetary tax on oath-taking was frequently
demanded. We perceive from a recent writer,[45] who has collected the
ancient records of quarter sessions, that swearing was severely visited
upon the lieges of Somerset and Devon. John Huishe, of Cheriton, was
convicted for swearing twenty-two oaths. Humfrey Trevitt, for swearing
ten oaths, was adjudged to pay 33_s._ 4_d._ for the use of the poor.
William Harding, of Chittlehampton, was held to be within the act of
swearing for saying "Upon my life," and Thomas Buttand was fined for
exclaiming "On my troth!"
To glance at Scotland at this time, we find the governing body enacting
laws of a more searching and stringent character than any that had
preceded them. The Parliament of 1645 ordered that whoever should curse
or blaspheme should upon a second conviction be "censurable" in the
manner prescribed, that is, a nobleman should pay twenty pounds Scots, a
baron twenty marks, a gentleman ten marks. The Act anticipates the case
of a minister of religion coming under its provisions. The punishment in
that case was the forfeit of the first part of his year's stipend. In
1649 a further enactment was passed, the previous one being admittedly
too lenient, and in the same session the offence of cursing a parent was
made punishable by sentence of death. It is certainly curious to witness
the extremes to which the Scottish nation were prepared to go in
legislating against the commission of this offence. In 1650, when the
country was rushing to arms to resist the invasion of Cromwell, an Act
of Parliament was prepared which disqualified for command all officers
who were addicted to swearing.
The code which, in this country, had proved sufficient for the Puritans
remained in force until the manners of the Restoration had rendered
further legislation imperative. This took the shape of the statute of
William and Mary, by which, as we have seen, the Dean of St. Patrick's
was so greatly exhilarated. After an interval of some fifty years the
interference of Parliament was again felt to be necessary, and an Act of
George II. was passed which still regulates the law upon the subject of
swearing.[46]
The preamble admits that the existing laws were not sufficiently
powerful to meet the circumstances for which they were designed. A more
onerous scale of penalties was to be prescribed, commencing with a fine
of one shilling in the case of a labourer, and rising to five shillings
in the case of a swearer of gentleman's degree. That this measure should
not want for publicity, it was ordered to be read quarterly in every
church and chapel throughout the kingdom.
A curious instance of punishment for neglect of this saving provision,
is noticed in the 'Gentleman's Magazine' for 1772. In July of that year
a rich vicar and a poor curate were condemned to pay into the hands of
the proper officer a sum of 15_l._ for neglecting to read in church the
Act against swearing. This clause was only repealed by an enactment of
the present century.
We have some means of knowing whether the fines recoverable under this
statute were in point of fact actually inflicted, and from the
importance attached by the public prints to the decisions of
magistrates on this head, we are justified in thinking that the statute
was very rarely put into requisition. In the 'Gentleman's Magazine' for
July 1751 we read that a woman convicted of uttering a profane oath and
unable to defray the shilling penalty, was sentenced to ten days' hard
labour in Bridewell. In December of the same year a tradesman was
committed for a matter of three hundred and ninety oaths, the fines
amounting to upwards of 20_l._, which he was unable to pay. Convictions
under the statute were at this time seriously attracting public
attention. That the calculations of Dean Swift should not be altogether
lost to the world, one rigid economist practically entertained the
notion of adding to the national resources by preaching a crusade
against the opulent classes of swearers. There was a Mr. Matthew
Towgood, who in 1746 prepared a treatise 'Upon the Prophane and Absurd
use of the Monosyllable Damn.' It is enough to say that neither
imagination nor research seem to have been the especial gift of Mr.
Towgood. It is a whining piece of work, in which the author gravely
informs us that he had taken up his residence at a seaport town in order
the more closely to observe the impious language of the sailors. We
should, however, do the author the justice to refer to the one
distinctive experience he seems to have gathered in his marine retreat.
He had discovered,--so at least he solemnly assures us,--that the
monosyllable in question was a "hortatory expression" by which the
chaplains in His Majesty's navy were accustomed to summon British seamen
to their prayers.
But much as it enters into the penal administration of the seventeenth
century, there is little to indicate that the vice was countenanced in
high places, or that it was seriously regarded as a pardonable incident
pertaining to the enjoyments of men of rank. That crowning distinction
seems to have been reserved for the age of Anne and the first sovereigns
of the house of Brunswick. Then it was that the insular propensity grew
impudent and headstrong, and soon became a power in the land. It is only
probable that the moral relapse that followed the Restoration may have
given the first impetus to the ascendancy of this invigorating habit.
Charles II. is said to have taught his ladies to swear like parrots, but
oaths were still only the plaything and not part of the serious business
of the Court. The Foppingtons and Clumsys were scrupulously nice in
their methods of affirmation, but it was publicly recognised that their
swearing was a mere theatrical device, and that they either swore like
cavaliers or swore like chambermaids. The acme had not even then been
reached. That point was only attained in the age when Duchess
Marlborough found disguise impossible by reason of her oaths. In the
matter of swearing the courtiers of the Stuarts may have demeaned
themselves like Mantalinis, but the giants of a later day swore home. An
obscure American clergyman, having undertaken a voyage across the
Atlantic to solicit alms for a pious foundation in Virginia, and urging
that the people of that state had souls to be saved as well as their
brethren in England, was met with the rejoinder from King William's
attorney-general, "Souls! damn your souls! make tobacco!"
In the year 1700 there was founded the Society for the Reformation of
Manners. It had for one of its prime objects the entire suppression of
oath-taking. The society seems to have enrolled members distinguished
alike for a laxity of their own morals and a tender solicitude for the
welfare of other people's. The King Consort, "Est-il-possible," was
persuaded to become a fellow, and was induced to put forth a howling
manifesto upon the iniquities of the age. This exordium was publicly
read at Bow Church. What with openly declaiming against the hideousness
of vice and proceeding criminally against its professors, the society
convinced the diarist Evelyn that they were working a complete
reformation in the habits of the community.
The building of Saint Paul's Cathedral was proceeding at this time, and
the work necessarily employed a large body of labourers and workmen,
who, as things were and are, were not scrupulously delicate in the
choice of words. Nevertheless, it was the particular care of the
builders that not one offensive word should be used during the progress
of the work.[47] Sir Christopher Wren framed rules which made a
delinquency in this respect liable to be so summarily visited that it
has been the boast of many earnest and slightly credulous people that
the mighty fabric was piled up without an oath being spoken. The society
certainly did good work if they had any hand in this result.
In spite of the society, the question of swearing and its prevalent
grossness seems to have attracted the attention of the civil courts of
law at this time. In a number of Applebee's Journal for 1723, some
account is given of a certain Abel Boyer, an infamous scribbler and
notorious swearer of the day. It seems he had threatened some of his
fellow journalists with the pains of libel because they had done him
simple justice in referring to the comminations he was accustomed to use
in speech. Before commencing his suit, Abel prudently sought the advice
of counsel, contending that his trifling derelictions did not partake of
the colour of blasphemy. The lawyers accordingly gave it against Mr.
Boyer, advising that his "goddams" and kindred expletives came entirely
within the prohibited pale. In March 1718, there is another instance of
swearing being food for Westminster Hall, as appears from the _Flying
Post_, the prominent Whig journal of the day. Mr. Richard Burridge, a
scurrilous newsman attached to the _British Gazetteer_, had been tried
at Hicks's Hall for addiction to blasphemous expressions, too shocking,
says the _Post_, to be named. Burridge was very properly convicted,
although a strong presentation was made in his favour, that when sober a
better conducted man did not exist. To account for this person's
unfortunate relapse, it was urged that he was "excessively drunk," a
consideration that so weighed with the tribunal, that they passed upon
him what was admitted on all hands to be a most moderate sentence.
Burridge was ordered to take up a position at the New Church in the
Strand and to be from there publicly whipped to Charing Cross. Further,
he was to pay a fine of twenty shillings and be imprisoned for a month.
Thenceforward a paper war was waged between the two political divisions
of journalism. The Tories professed to see the Whig journalists
stigmatised by the disgrace of one of their number, and the great Daniel
Defoe cast censure upon them and upon Burridge from _Mist's Journal_,
the Tory paper he conducted.
* * * * *
And so, pursued by judgments of court and branded with letters of
infamy, it would seem to have been a very desperate time for these
unfortunate swearers. The profession of the pen was likely enough to
rankle under this load of aspersion, were it not that a more genial
influence had arisen that was bent upon remedying rather than provoking
offences. For while the leaders of opinion were playing their intensest
game of political intrigue, while poets were occupied with the trade of
admiration, and divines with the trade of subserviency, there arose in
England a gentler and more captivating literature of reproval, that laid
its generous laws upon men the most intolerant and the most prurient. We
allude to that more benevolent code of morality inaugurated by Joseph
Addison.