MARVELL the founder of "a newly-refined art of jeering
buffoonery"--his knack of nicknaming his adversaries--PARKER'S
Portrait--PARKER suddenly changes his principles--his declamatory
style--MARVELL prints his anonymous letter as a motto to "The
Rehearsal Transprosed"--describes him as an "At-all"--MARVELL'S
ludicrous description of the whole posse of answers summoned
together by PARKER--MARVELL'S cautious allusion to MILTON--his
solemn invective against PARKER--anecdote of MARVELL and
PARKER--PARKER retires after the second part of "The Rehearsal
Transprosed"--The Recreant, reduced to silence, distils his secret
vengeance in a posthumous libel.
One of the legitimate ends of satire, and one of the proud triumphs of
genius, is to unmask the false zealot; to beat back the haughty spirit
that is treading down all; and if it cannot teach modesty, and raise a
blush, at least to inflict terror and silence. It is then that the
satirist does honour to the office of the executioner.
As one whose whip of steel can with a lash
Imprint the characters of shame so deep,
Even in the brazen forehead of proud Sin,
That not eternity shall wear it out.[307]
The quarrel between PARKER and MARVELL is a striking example of the
efficient powers of genius, in first humbling, and then annihilating,
an unprincipled bravo, who had placed himself at the head of a
faction.
Marvell, the under-secretary and the bosom-friend of Milton, whose
fancy he has often caught in his verse, was one of the greatest wits
of the luxuriant age of Charles II.; he was a master in all the arts
of ridicule; and his inexhaustible spirit only required some permanent
subject to have rivalled the causticity of Swift, whose style, in
neatness and vivacity, seems to have been modelled on his.[308] But
Marvell placed the oblation of genius on a temporary altar, and the
sacrifice sunk with it; he wrote to the times, and with the times his
writings have passed away; yet something there is incorruptible in
wit, and wherever its salt has fallen, that part is still preserved.
Such are the vigour and fertility of Marvell's writings, that our old
Chronicler of Literary History, Anthony Wood, considers him as the
founder of "the then newly-refined art (though much in mode and
fashion almost ever since) of sportive and jeering buffoonery;"[309]
and the crabbed humorist describes "this pen-combat as briskly managed
on both sides; a jerking flirting way of writing entertaining the
reader, by seeing two such right cocks of the game so keenly engaging
with sharp and dangerous weapons."--Burnett calls Marvell "the
liveliest droll of the age, who writ in a burlesque strain, but with
so peculiar and entertaining a conduct, that from the king to the
tradesman, his books were read with great pleasure." Charles II. was a
more polished judge than these uncouth critics; and, to the credit of
his impartiality,--for that witty monarch and his dissolute court
were never spared by Marvell, who remained inflexible to his
seduction--he deemed Marvell the best prose satirist of the age. But
Marvell had other qualities than the freest humour and the finest wit
in this "newly-refined art," which seems to have escaped these grave
critics--a vehemence of solemn reproof, and an eloquence of invective,
that awes one with the spirit of the modern Junius,[310] and may give
some notion of that more ancient satirist, whose writings are said to
have so completely answered their design, that, after perusal, their
victim hanged himself on the first tree; and in the present case,
though the delinquent did not lay violent hands on himself, he did
what, for an author, may be considered as desperate a course,
"withdraw from the town, and cease writing for some years."[311]
The celebrated work here to be noticed is Marvell's "Rehearsal
Transprosed;" a title facetiously adopted from Bayes in "The Rehearsal
Transposed" of the Duke of Buckingham. It was written against the
works and the person of Dr. Samuel Parker, afterwards Bishop of
Oxford, whom he designates under the character of Bayes, to denote the
incoherence and ridiculousness of his character. Marvell had a
peculiar knack of calling names,--it consisted in appropriating a
ludicrous character in some popular comedy, and dubbing his
adversaries with it. In the same spirit he ridiculed Dr. Turner, of
Cambridge, a brother-genius to Parker, by nicknaming him "Mr. Smirk,
the Divine in Mode," the name of the Chaplain in Etherege's "Man of
Mode," and thus, by a stroke of the pen, conveyed an idea of "a neat,
starched, formal, and forward divine." This application of a
fictitious character to a real one, this christening a man with
ridicule, though of no difficult invention, is not a little hazardous
to inferior writers; for it requires not less wit than Marvell's to
bring out of the real character the ludicrous features which mark the
factitious prototype.
Parker himself must have his portrait, and if the likeness be justly
hit off, some may be reminded of a resemblance. Mason applies the
epithet of "Mitred Dullness" to him: but although he was at length
reduced to railing and to menaces, and finally mortified into silence,
this epithet does not suit so hardy and so active an adventurer.
The secret history of Parker may be collected in Marvell,[312] and his
more public one in our honest chronicler, Anthony Wood. Parker was
originally educated in strict sectarian principles; a starch Puritan,
"fasting and praying with the Presbyterian students weekly, and who,
for their refection feeding only on thin broth made of oatmeal and
water, were commonly called _Gruellers_." Among these, says Marvell,
"it was observed that he was wont to put more graves than all the rest
into his porridge, and was deemed one of the _preciousest_[313] young
men in the University." It seems that these mortified saints, both the
brotherhood and the sisterhood, held their chief meetings at the house
of "Bess Hampton, an old and crooked maid that drove the trade of
laundry, who, being from her youth very much given to the godly party,
as they call themselves, had frequent meetings, especially for those
that were her customers." Such is the dry humour of honest Anthony,
who paints like the Ostade of literary history.
But the age of sectarism and thin gruel was losing all its coldness in
the sunshine of the Restoration; and this "preciousest young man,"
from praying and caballing against episcopacy, suddenly acquainted
the world, in one of his dedications, that Dr. Ralph Bathurst had
"rescued him from the chains and fetters of an unhappy education,"
and, without any intermediate apology, from a sullen sectarian turned
a flaming highflyer for the "supreme dominion" of the Church.[314]
It is the after-conduct of Parker that throws light on this rapid
change. On speculative points any man may be suddenly converted; for
these may depend on facts or arguments which might never have occurred
to him before. But when we watch the weathercock chopping with the
wind, so pliant to move, and so stiff when fixed--when we observe this
"preciousest grueller" clothed in purple, and equally hardy in the
most opposite measures--become a favourite with James II., and a
furious advocate for arbitrary power; when we see him railing at and
menacing those, among whom he had committed as many extravagances as
any of them;[315] can we hesitate to decide that this bold, haughty,
and ambitious man was one of those who, having neither religion nor
morality for a casting weight, can easily fly off to opposite
extremes? and whether a puritan or a bishop, we must place his zeal to
the same side of his religious ledger--that of the profits of barter!
The quarrel between Parker and Marvell originated in a preface,[316]
written by Parker, in which he had poured down his contempt and abuse
on his old companions, the Nonconformists. It was then Marvell clipped
his wings with his "Rehearsal Transprosed;" his wit and humour were
finely contrasted with Parker's extravagances, set off in his
declamatory style; of which Marvell wittily describes "the volume and
circumference of the periods, which, though he takes always to be his
chiefest strength, yet, indeed, like too great a line, weakens the
defence, and requires too many men to make it good." The tilt was now
opened, and certain masqued knights appeared in the course; they
attempted to grasp the sharp and polished weapon of Marvell, to turn
it on himself.[317] But Marvell, with malicious ingenuity, sees Parker
in them all--they so much resembled their master! "There were no
less," says the wit, "than six scaramouches together on the stage, all
of them of the same gravity and behaviour, the same tone, the same
habit, that it was impossible to discern which was the true author of
the 'Ecclesiastical Polity.' I believe he imitated the wisdom of some
other princes, who have sometimes been persuaded by their servants to
disguise several others in the regal garb, that the enemy might not
know in the battle whom to single." Parker, in fact, replied to
Marvell anonymously, by "A Reproof to the Rehearsal Transprosed," with
a mild exhortation to the magistrate to crush with the secular arm the
pestilent wit, the servant of Cromwell, and the friend of Milton. But
this was not all; something else, anonymous too, was despatched to
Marvell: it was an extraordinary letter, short enough to have been an
epigram, could Parker have written one; but short as it was, it was
more in character, for it was only a threat of assassination! It
concluded with these words: "If thou darest to print any lie or libel
against Dr. Parker, by the Eternal God I will cut thy throat." Marvell
replied to "the Reproof," which he calls a printed letter, by the
second part of "the Rehearsal Transprosed;" and to the unprinted
letter, by publishing it on his own title-page.
Of two volumes of wit and broad humour, and of the most galling
invective, one part flows so much into another, that the volatile
spirit would be injured by an analytical process. But Marvell is now
only read by the curious lovers of our literature, who find the
strong, luxuriant, though not the delicate, wit of the wittiest age,
never obsolete: the reader shall not, however, part from Marvell
without some slight transplantations from a soil whose rich vegetation
breaks out in every part.
Of the pleasantry and sarcasm, these may be considered as specimens.
Parker was both author and licenser of his own work on "Ecclesiastical
Polity;"[318] and it appears he got the licence for printing Marvell's
first _Rehearsal_ recalled. The Church appeared in danger when the
doctor discovered he was so furiously attacked. Marvell sarcastically
rallies him on his dual capacity:--
"He is such an _At-all_, of so many capacities, that he would
excommunicate any man who should have presumed to intermeddle with any
one of his provinces. Has he been an author? he is too the licenser.
Has he been a father? he will stand too for godfather. Had he acted
_Pyramus_, he would have been _Moonshine_ too, and the _Hole in the
Wall_. That first author of 'Ecclesiastical Polity,' (such as his)
Nero, was of the same temper. He could not be contented with the Roman
empire, unless he were too his own precentor; and lamented only the
detriment that mankind must sustain at his death, in losing so
considerable a fiddler."
The satirist describes Parker's arrogance for those whom Parker calls
the vulgar, and whom he defies as "a rout of wolves and tigers, apes
and buffoons;" yet his personal fears are oddly contrasted with his
self-importance: "If he chance but to sneeze, he prays that the
_foundations of the earth_ be not shaken.--Ever since he crept up to
be but the _weathercock of a steeple_, he trembles and cracks at every
puff of wind that blows about him, as if the _Church of England_ were
falling." Parker boasted, in certain philosophical "Tentamina," or
essays of his, that he had confuted the atheists: Marvell declares,
"If he had reduced any atheist by his book, he can only pretend to
have converted them (as in the old Florentine wars) by mere tiring
them out, and perfect weariness." A pleasant allusion to those mock
fights of the Italian mercenaries, who, after parading all day, rarely
unhorsed a single cavalier.
Marvell blends with a ludicrous description of his answerers great
fancy:--
"The whole _Posse Archidiaconatus_ was raised to repress me; and great
rising there was, and sending post every way to pick out the ablest
ecclesiastical droles to prepare an answer. Never was such a hubbub
made about a sorry book. One flattered himself with being at least a
surrogate; another was so modest as to set up with being but a
paritor; while the most generous hoped only to be graciously smiled
upon at a good dinner; but the more hungry starvelings generally
looked upon it as an immediate call to a benefice; and he that could
but write an answer, whatsoever it were, took it for the most
dexterous, cheap, and legal way of simony. As is usual on these
occasions, there arose no small competition and mutiny among the
pretenders."
It seems all the body had not impudence enough, and had too nice
consciences, and could not afford an extraordinary expense in wit for
the occasion. It was then
"The author of the 'Ecclesiastical Polity' altered his lodgings to a
calumny-office, and kept open chamber for all comers, that he might be
supplied himself, or supply others, as there was occasion. But the
information came in so slenderly, that he was glad to make use of
anything rather than sit out; and there was at last nothing so slight,
but it grew material; nothing so false, but he resolved it should go
for truth; and what wanted in matter, he would make out with invention
and artifice. So that he and his remaining comrades seemed to have set
up a glass-house, the model of which he had observed from the height
of his window in the neighbourhood, and the art he had been initiated
into ever since from the manufacture (he will criticise because not
orifacture) of _soap-bubbles_, he improved by degrees to the mystery
of making _glass-drops_, and thence, in running leaps, mounted by
these virtues to be Fellow of the Royal Society, Doctor of Divinity,
Parson, Prebend, and Archdeacon. The furnace was so hot of itself,
that there needed no coals, much less any one to blow them. One burnt
the weed, another calcined the flint, a third melted down that
mixture; but he himself fashioned all with his breath, and polished
with his style, till, out of a mere jelly of sand and ashes, he had
furnished a whole cupboard of things, so brittle and incoherent, that
the least touch would break them again in pieces, and so transparent,
that every man might see through them."
Parker had accused Marvell with having served Cromwell, and being the
friend of Milton, then living, at a moment when such an accusation not
only rendered a man odious, but put his life in danger.[319] Marvell,
who now perceived that Milton, whom he never looked on but with the
eyes of reverential awe, was likely to be drawn into his quarrel,
touches on this subject with infinite delicacy and tenderness, but not
with diminished energy against his malignant adversary, whom he shows
to have been an impertinent intruder in Milton's house, where indeed
he had first known him. He cautiously alludes to our English Homer by
his initials: at that moment the very name of Milton would have
tainted the page!
"J. M. was, and is, a man of great learning and sharpness of wit, as
any man. It was his misfortune, living in a tumultuous time, to be
tossed on the wrong side; and he writ, _flagrante bello_, certain
dangerous treatises. But some of his books, upon which you take him at
advantage, were of no other nature than that one writ by your own
father; only with this difference, that your father's, which I have by
me, was written with the same design, but with much less wit or
judgment, for which there was no remedy, unless you will supply his
judgment with his high Court of Justice. At his Majesty's happy
return, J. M. did partake, even as you yourself did, for all your
huffing, of his royal clemency, and has ever since expiated himself in
a retired silence. Whether it were my foresight, or my good fortune, I
never contracted any friendship or confidence with you; but then it
was you frequented J. M. incessantly, and haunted his house day by
day. What discourses you there used, he is too generous to remember.
But for you to insult over his old age, to traduce him by your
scaramouches, and in your own person, as a schoolmaster, who was born
and hath lived more ingenuously and liberally than yourself!"
Marvell, when he lays by his playful humour and fertile fancy for more
solemn remonstrances, assumes a loftier tone, and a severity of
invective, from which, indeed, Parker never recovered.
Accused by Parker of aiming to degrade the clerical character, Marvell
declares his veneration for that holy vocation, and that he reflected
even on the failings of the men, from whom so much is expected, with
indulgent reverence:--
"Their virtues are to be celebrated with all encouragement; and if
their vices be not notoriously palpable, let the eye, as it defends
its organ, so conceal the object by connivance." But there are cases
when even to write satirically against a clergyman may be not only
excusable, but necessary:--"The man who gets into the church by the
belfry or the window, ought never to be borne in the pulpit; and so
the man who illustrates his own corrupt doctrines with as ill a
conversation, and adorns the lasciviousness of his life with an equal
petulancy of style and language."--In such a concurrence of
misdemeanors, what is to be done? The example and the consequence so
pernicious! which could not be, "if our great pastors but exercise the
wisdom of common shepherds, by parting with one to stop the infection
of the whole flock, when his rottenness grows notorious. Or if our
clergy would but use the instinct of other creatures, and chastise the
blown deer out of their herd, such mischiefs might easily be
remedied. In this case it is that I think a clergyman is laid open to
the pen of any one that knows how to manage it; and that every person
who has either wit, learning, or sobriety, is licensed, if debauched,
to curb him; if erroneous, to catechise him; and if foul-mouthed and
biting, to muzzle him. Such an one would never have come into the
church, but to take sanctuary; rather wheresoever men shall find the
footing of so wanton a satyr out of his own bounds, the neighbourhood
ought, notwithstanding all his pretended capering divinity, to hunt
him through the woods, with hounds and horse, home to his harbour."
And he frames an ingenious apology for the freedom of his humour, in
this attack on the morals and person of his adversary:--
"To write against him (says Marvell) is the odiousest task that ever I
undertook, and has looked to me all the while like the cruelty of a
living dissection; which, however it may tend to public instruction,
and though I have picked out the noxious creature to be anatomised,
yet doth scarce excuse the offensiveness of the scent and fouling of
my fingers: therefore, I will here break off abruptly, leaving many a
vein not laid open, and many a passage not searched into. But if I
have undergone the drudgery of the most loathsome part already (which
is his personal character), I will not defraud myself of what is more
truly pleasant, the conflict with, if it may be so called, his
reason."
It was not only in these "pen-combats" that this Literary Quarrel
proceeded; it seems also to have broken out in the streets; for a tale
has been preserved of a rencontre, which shows at once the brutal
manners of Parker, and the exquisite wit of Marvell. Parker meeting
Marvell in the streets, the bully attempted to shove him from the
wall: but, even there, Marvell's agility contrived to lay him
sprawling in the kennel; and looking on him pleasantly, told him to
"lie there for a son of a whore!" Parker complained to the Bishop of
Rochester, who immediately sent for Marvell, to reprimand him; but he
maintained that the doctor had so called himself, in one of his recent
publications; and pointing to the preface, where Parker declares "he
is 'a true son of his mother, the Church of England:' and if you read
further on, my lord, you find he says: 'The Church of England has
spawned two bastards, the Presbyterians and the Congregationists;'
ergo, my lord, he expressly declares that he is the _son of a
whore_!"
Although Parker retreated from any further attack, after the second
part of "The Rehearsal Transprosed," he in truth only suppressed
passions to which he was giving vent in secrecy and silence. That,
indeed, was not discovered till a posthumous work of his appeared, in
which one of the most striking parts is a most disgusting caricature
of his old antagonist. Marvell was, indeed, a republican, the pupil of
Milton, and adored his master: but his morals and his manners were
Roman--he lived on the turnip of Curtius, and he would have bled at
Philippi. We do not sympathise with the fierce republican spirit of
those unhappy times that scalped the head feebly protected by a mitre
or a crown. But the private virtues and the rich genius of such a man
are pure from the taint of party. We are now to see how far private
hatred can distort, in its hideous vengeance, the resemblance it
affects to give after nature. Who could imagine that Parker is
describing Marvell in these words?--
"Among these insolent revilers of great fame for ribaldry was one
Marvell. From his youth he lived in all manner of wickedness; and
thus, with a singular petulancy from nature, he performed the office
of a satirist for the faction, not so much from the quickness of his
wit, as from the sourness of his temper. A vagabond, ragged, hungry
poetaster, beaten at every tavern, where he daily received the rewards
of his impudence in kicks and blows.[320] By the interest of Milton,
to whom he was somewhat agreeable for his malignant wit, he became the
under-secretary to Cromwell's secretary."
And elsewhere he calls him "a drunken buffoon," and asserts that "he
made his conscience more cheap than he had formerly made his
reputation;" but the familiar anecdote of Marvell's political honesty,
when, wanting a dinner, he declined the gold sent to him by the king,
sufficiently replies to the calumniator. Parker, then in his retreat,
seems not to have been taught anything like modesty by his silence, as
Burnet conjectured; who says, "That a face of brass must grow red when
it is burnt as his was." It was even then that the recreant, in
silence, was composing the libel, which his cowardice dared not
publish, but which his invincible malice has sent down to posterity.