There is nothing more memorable in history than the actions, fortunes,
and character of this great man; whether we consider the grandeur of the
plans he formed, the courage and wisdom with which they were executed,
or the splendour of that success, which, adorning his youth, continued
without the smallest reserve to support his age even to the last moments
of his life. He lived above seventy years, and reigned within ten years
as long as he lived: sixty over his dukedom, above twenty over England;
both of which he acquired or kept by his own magnanimity, with hardly
any other title than he derived from his arms; so that he might be
reputed, in all respects, as happy as the highest ambition, the most
fully gratified, can make a man. The silent inward satisfactions of
domestic happiness he neither had nor sought. He had a body suited to
the character of his mind, erect, firm, large, and active; whilst to
be active was a praise; a countenance stern, and which became command.
Magnificent in his living, reserved in his conversation, grave in his
common deportment, but relaxing with a wise facetiousness, he knew how
to relieve his mind and preserve his dignity; for he never forfeited
by a personal acquaintance that esteem he had acquired by his great
actions. Unlearned in books, he formed his understanding by the rigid
discipline of a large and complicated experience. He knew men much, and
therefore generally trusted them but little; but when he knew any man
to be good, he reposed in him an entire confidence, which prevented his
prudence from degenerating into a vice. He had vices in his composition,
and great ones; but they were the vices of a great mind: ambition, the
malady of every extensive genius; and avarice, the madness of the wise:
one chiefly actuated his youth; the other governed his age. The vices
of young and light minds, the joys of wine, and the pleasures of love,
never reached his aspiring nature. The general run of men he looked on
with contempt, and treated with cruelty when they opposed him. Nor
was the rigour of his mind to be softened but with the appearance of
extraordinary fortitude in his enemies, which, by a sympathy congenial
to his own virtues, always excited his admiration, and insured his
mercy. So that there were often seen in this one man, at the same time,
the extremes of a savage cruelty, and a generosity, that does honour
to human nature. Religion, too, seemed to have a great influence on his
mind from policy, or from better motives; but his religion was displayed
in the regularity with which he performed his duties, not in the
submission he showed to its ministers, which was never more than what
good government required. Yet his choice of a counsellor and favourite
was not, according to the mode of the time, out of that order, and a
choice that does honour to his memory. This was Lanfranc, a man of great
learning for the times, and extraordinary piety. He owed his elevation
to William; but, though always inviolably faithful, he never was the
tool or flatterer of the power which raised him; and the greater freedom
he showed, the higher he rose in the confidence of his master. By mixing
with the concerns of state he did not lose his religion and conscience,
or make them the covers or instruments of ambition; but tempering the
fierce policy of a new power by the mild lights of religion, he became
a blessing to the country in which he was promoted. The English owed to
the virtue of this stranger, and the influence he had on the king, the
little remains of liberty they continued to enjoy; and at last such a
degree of his confidence, as in some sort counterbalanced the severities
of the former part of his reign.