Calumnies and sarcasms have reduced the character of James the First to
contempt among general readers; while the narrative of historians, who
have related facts in spite of themselves, 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 possessed 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 affections and habits of this
pacific monarch; and those 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 historians, and
often even among the few who, with better information, have re-echoed
their preconceived opinions.
Confining myself here to his domestic character, I shall not touch on
the many admirable public projects of this monarch, which have extorted
the praise, and even the admiration, of some who have not spared their
pens in his disparagement. James the First has been taxed with
pusillanimity and foolishness; this monarch cannot, however, be
reproached with having engendered them! All his children, in whose
education their father was so deeply concerned, sustained through life a
dignified character and a high spirit. The short life of Henry was
passed 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
"The History 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 Bohemia, tried as she was by such
vicissitudes of fortune, it is much to be regretted that the
interesting story remains untold; her buoyant spirits rose always above
the perpetual changes of a princely to a private state--a queen to an
exile! The father of such children derives some distinction for
capacity, in having reared such a noble offspring; and the king's marked
attention to the formation of his children's minds was such as to have
been pointed out by Ben Jonson, who, in his "Gipsies Metamorphosed,"
rightly said of James, using his native term--
You are an honest, good man, and have care of YOUR BEARNS (bairns).
Among the flouts and gibes so freely bespattering the personal character
of James the First, is one of his coldness and neglect of his queen. It
would, however, be difficult to prove by any known fact that James was
not as indulgent a husband 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 during 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 courts of judicature than in
_attending upon his destined consort_."--"Men of all sorts have taken a
pride to gird at me," might this monarch have exclaimed. But everything
has two handles, saith the ancient adage. Had an austere puritan chosen
to observe that James the First, when abroad, had lived jovially; and
had this historian then dropped silently the interesting circumstance of
the king's "spending his time in the Danish courts of judicature," the
fact would have borne him out in his reproof; and Francis Osborne,
indeed, has censured James for giving marks of his _uxoriousness_! There
was no deficient gallantry in the conduct of James the First to his
queen; the very circumstance, that when the Princess of Denmark was
driven by a storm back to Norway, the king resolved to hasten to her,
and consummate his marriage in Denmark, was itself as romantic an
expedition as afterwards was that of his son's into Spain, and betrays
no mark of that tame pusillanimity with which he stands overcharged.
The character of the queen of James the First is somewhat obscure in our
public history, for in it she makes no prominent figure; while in secret
history she is more apparent. Anne of Denmark was a spirited and
enterprising woman; and it appears from a passage in Sully, whose
authority should weigh with us, although we ought to recollect that it
is the French minister who writes, that she seems to have raised a court
faction against James, and inclined to favour the Spanish and catholic
interests; yet it may be alleged as a strong proof of James's political
wisdom, that the queen was never suffered to head a formidable party,
though she latterly might have engaged Prince Henry in that court
opposition. The _bonhommie_ of the king, on this subject, expressed with
a simplicity of style which, though it may not be royal, is something
better, appears in a letter to the queen, which has been preserved in
the appendix to Sir David Dalrymple's collections. It is without date,
but written when in Scotland, to quiet the queen's suspicions, that the
Earl of Mar, who had the care of Prince Henry, and whom she wished to
take out of his hands, had insinuated to the king that her majesty was
strongly disposed to any "popish or Spanish course." This letter
confirms 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 apprehensions, 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 daughter, ye must be all alike to me since my
wife. For the respect of your honourable birth and descent I married
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 (that 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 ingenious historical dissertation, but one perfectly theoretical,
respecting that mysterious transaction the Gowrie conspiracy, Pinkerton
has attempted 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
Denmark, but merely of coquetry."[229] To what these accusations amount
it would be difficult to say. The progeny of James the First
sufficiently bespeak their family resemblance. If 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
complained, and the queen was never accused, if we except this burthen
of an old Scottish ballad,
O 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 amusements 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
indubitable 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 himself not being a little delighted with such fluent
elegancies as made the night more glorious than the day."[230] 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 fondly 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. I give it in the words of the writer.
"_August, 1613._
"At their last being at Theobalds, about a fortnight ago, the queen,
shooting at a deer, mistook her mark, and killed _Jewel_, the king's
most principal and special hound; at which he stormed exceedingly
awhile; but after he knew who did it, he was soon pacified, and with
much kindness wished her not to be troubled with it, for he should
love her never the worse: and the next day sent her a diamond worth
two thousand pounds as _a legacy from his dead dog_. Love and
kindness increased daily between them."
Such is the history of a contemporary living at court, very opposite 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.