with the habit of studious men, the king had an utter carelessness of
money and a generosity of temper, which Hacket, in his Life of the
Lord-Keeper Williams, has described. "The king was wont to give like a
king, and for the most part to keep one act of liberality warm with
the covering of another." He seemed to have had no distinct notions of
total amounts; he was once so shocked at the sight of the money he had
granted away, lying in heaps on a table, that he instantly reduced it to
half the sum. It appears that Parliament never granted even the ordinary
supplies they had given to his predecessors; his chief revenue was drawn
from the customs; yet his debts, of which I find an account in the
Parliamentary History, after a reign of twenty-one years, did not amount
to 200,000_l._[A] This monarch could not have been so wasteful of his
revenues as it is presumed. James I. was always generous, and left
scarcely any debts. He must have lived amidst many self-deprivations; nor
was this difficult to practise for this king, for he was a philosopher,
indifferent to the common and imaginary wants of the vulgar of royalty.
Whenever he threw himself into the arms of his Parliament, they left him
without a feeling of his distress. In one of his speeches he says--
"In the last Parliament I laid open the true thoughts of my heart; but I
may say, with our Saviour, 'I have piped to you, and you have not danced;
I have mourned, and you have not lamented.' I have reigned eighteen years,
in which time you have had peace, and I have received far less supply than
hath been given to any king since the Conquest."
[Footnote A: "Parliamentary History," vol. v. p. 147.]
Thus James, denied the relief he claimed, was forced on wretched
expedients, selling patents for monopolies, craving benevolences, or free
gifts, and such expedients; the monopolies had been usual in Elizabeth's
reign; yet all our historians agree, that his subjects were never
grievously oppressed by such occasional levies; this was even the
confession of the contemporaries of this monarch. They were every day
becoming wealthier by those acts of peace they despised the monarch for
maintaining. "The kingdom, since his reign began, was luxuriant in gold
and silver, far above the scant of our fathers who lived before us," are
the words of a contemporary.[A] All flourished about the king, except the
king himself. James I. discovered how light and hollow was his boasted
"prerogative-royal," which, by its power of dissolving the Parliament,
could only keep silent those who had already refused their aid.
[Footnote A: Hacket's "Life of Lord-Keeper Williams."]
A wit of the day described the Parliaments of James by this ludicrous
distich:
Many faults complained of, few things amended,
A subsidy granted, the Parliament ended.
But this was rarely the fact. Sometimes they addressed James I. by what
the king called a "stinging petition;" or, when the minister, passing over
in silence the motion of the Commons, pressed for supplies, the heads of a
party replied, that to grant them were to put an end to Parliament. But
they practised expedients and contrivances, which comported as little with
the dignity of an English senate, as with the majesty of the sovereign.
At a late hour, when not a third part of the house remained, and those who
required a fuller house, amid darkness and confusion, were neither seen
nor heard, they made a protest,--of which the king approved as little of
the ambiguous matter, as the surreptitious means; and it was then, that,
with his own hand, he tore the leaf out of the journal.[A] In the sessions
of 1614 the king was still more indignant at their proceedings. He and the
Scotch had been vilified by their invectives; and they were menaced by two
lawyers, with a "Sicilian vespers, or a Parisian matins." They aimed to
reduce the king to beggary, by calling in question a third part of his
revenue, contesting his prerogative in levying his customs. On this
occasion I find that, publicly in the Banqueting-house at Whitehall, the
king tore all their bills before their faces; and, as not a single act was
passed, in the phrase of the day this was called an _addle_ Parliament.[B]
Such unhappy proceedings indicated the fatal divisions of the succeeding
reign. A meeting of a different complexion, once occurred in 1621, late in
James's reign. The monopolies were then abolished. The king and the prince
shed reciprocal tears in the house; and the prince wept when he brought an
affectionate message of thanks from the Commons. The letter-writer says,
"It is a day worthy to be kept holiday; some say it shall, but I believe
them not." It never was; for even this parliament broke up with the cries
of "some tribunitial orators," as James designated the pure and the impure
democratic spirits. Smollett remarks in his margin, that the king
endeavoured to _cajole_ the Commons. Had he known of the royal tears, he
had still heightened the phrase. Hard fate of kings! Should ever their
tears attest the warmth of honest feelings, they must be thrown out of the
pale of humanity: for Francis Osborne, that cynical republican, declares,
that "there are as few abominable princes as tolerable kings; because
princes must court the public favour before they attain supreme power, and
then change their nature!" Such is the egotism of republicanism!
[Footnote A: "Rushworth," vol. i. p. 54.]
[Footnote B: From a MS. of the times.]
* * * * *
SCANDALOUS CHRONICLES.
The character of James I. has always been taken from certain scandalous
chronicles, whose origin requires detection. It is this mud which has
darkened and disturbed the clear stream of history. The reigns of
Elizabeth and James teemed with libels in church and state from opposite
parties: the idleness of the pacific court of James I. hatched a viperous
brood of a less hardy, but perhaps of a more malignant nature, than the
Martin Mar-prelates of the preceding reign. Those boldly at once wrote
treason, and, in some respects, honestly dared the rope which could only
silence Penry and his party; but these only reached to _scandalum
magnatum_, and the puny wretches could only have crept into a pillory. In
the times of the Commonwealth, when all things were agreeable which
vilified our kings, these secret histories were dragged from their lurking
holes. The writers are meagre Suetoniuses and Procopiuses; a set of
self-elected spies in the court; gossipers, lounging in the same circle;
eaves-droppers; pryers into corners; buzzers of reports; and punctual
scribes of what the French (so skilful in the profession) technically term
_les on dit_; that is, things that might never have happened, although
they are recorded: registered for posterity in many a scandalous
chronicle, they have been mistaken for histories; and include so many
truths and falsehoods, that it becomes unsafe for the historian either to
credit or to disbelieve them.[A]
[Footnote A: Most of these works were meanly printed, and were usually
found in a state of filth and rags, and would have perished in their own
merited neglect, had they not been recently splendidly reprinted by Sir
Walter Scott. Thus the garbage has been cleanly laid on a fashionable
epergne, and found quite to the taste of certain lovers of authentic
history! Sir Anthony Weldon, clerk of the king's kitchen, in his "Court of
King James" has been reproached for gaining much of his scandalous
chronicle from the purlieus of the court. For this work and some similar
ones, especially "The None-Such Charles," in which it would appear that he
had procured materials from the State Paper Office, and for other zealous
services to the Parliament, they voted him a grant of 500_l_. "The Five
Years of King James," which passes under the name of Sir Fulk Greville,
the dignified friend of the romantic Sir Philip Sidney, and is frequently
referred to by grave writers, is certainly a Presbyterian's third day's
hash--for there are parts copied from Arthur Wilson's "History of James
I.," who was himself the pensioner of a disappointed courtier; yet this
writer never attacks the personal character of the king, though charged
with having scraped up many tales maliciously false. Osborne is a
misanthropical politician, who cuts with the most corroding pen that ever
rottened a man's name. James was very negligent in dress; graceful
appearances did not come into his studies. Weldon tells us how the king
was trussed on horseback, and fixed there like a pedlar's pack or a lump
of inanimate matter; the truth is, the king had always an infirmity in his
legs. Further, we are told that this ridiculous monarch allowed his hat to
remain just as it chanced to be placed on his head. Osborne once saw this
unlucky king "in a green hunting-dress, with a feather in his cap, and a
horn, instead of a sword, by his side; how suitable to his age, calling,
or person, I leave others to judge from his pictures:" and this he
bitterly calls "leaving him dressed for posterity!" This is the style
which passes for history with some readers. Hume observes that "hunting,"
which was James's sole recreation, necessary for his health, as a
sedentary scholar, "is the cheapest a king can indulge;" and, indeed, the
empty coffers of this monarch afforded no other.
These pseudo-histories are alluded to by Arthur Wilson as "monstrous
satires against the king's own person, that haunted both court and
country," when, in the wantonness of the times, "every little miscarriage,
exuberantly branched, so that evil report did often perch on them." Fuller
has designated these suspicious scribes as "a generation of the people
who, like _moths_, have lurked under the carpets of the council-table, and
even like _fleas_, have leaped into pillows of the prince's bed-chamber;
and, to enhance the reputation of their knowledge, thence derived that of
all things which were, or were not, ever done or thought of."--_Church
History,_ book x. p. 87.]
Such was the race generated in this court of peace and indolence! And
Hacket, in his "Life of the Lord-Keeper Williams," without disguising the
fact, tells us that the Lord-Keeper "spared not for cost to purchase the
most certain intelligence, by his fee'd pensioners, of _every hour's
occurrences at court_; and was wont to say that no man could be a
statesman without a great deal of money."
We catch many glimpses of these times in another branch of the same
family. When news-books, as the first newspapers were called, did not yet
exist to appease the hungering curiosity of the country, a voluminous
correspondence was carried on between residents in the metropolis and
their country friends: these letters chiefly remain in their MS. state.[A]
Great men then employed a scribe who had a talent this way, and sometimes
a confidential friend, to convey to them the secret history of the times;
and, on the whole, they are composed by a better sort of writers; for, as
they had no other design than to inform their friends of the true state
of passing events, they were eager to correct, by subsequent accounts the
lies of the day they sometimes sent down. They have preserved some
fugitive events useful in historical researches, but their pens are
garrulous; and it requires some experience to discover the character of
the writers, to be enabled to adopt their opinions and their statements.
Little things were, however, great matters to these diurnalists; much time
was spent in learning of those at court, who had quarrelled, or were on
the point; who were seen to have bit their lips, and looked downcast; who
was budding, and whose full-blown flower was drooping: then we have the
sudden reconcilement and the anticipated fallings out, with a deal of the
_pourquoi_ of the _pourquoi_.[B]
[Footnote A: Mr. Lodge's "Illustrations of British History" is an eminent
and elegant work of the _minutiæ historicæ_; as are the more recent
volumes of Sir Henry Ellis's valuable collections.]
[Footnote B: Some specimens of this sort of correspondence of the idleness
of the times may amuse. The learned Mede, to his friend Sir Martin
Stuteville, chronicles a fracas:--"I am told of a great falling out
between my Lord Treasurer and my Lord Digby, insomuch that they came to
_pedlar's blood_, and _traitor's blood_. It was about some money which my
Lord Digby should have had, which my Lord Treasurer thought too much for
the charge of his employment, and said himself could go in as good a
fashion for half the sum. But my Lord Digby replies that he could not
_peddle_ so well as his lordship."
A lively genius sports with a fanciful pen in conveying the same kind of
intelligence, and so nice in the shades of curiosity, that he can describe
a quarrel before it takes place.
"You know the _primum mobile_ of our court (Buckingham), by whose motion
all the other spheres must move, or else stand still: the bright sun of
our firmament, at whose splendour or glooming all our marygolds of the
court open or shut. There are in higher spheres as great as he, but none
so glorious. But the king is in progress, and we are far from court. Now
to hear certainties. It is told me that my Lord of Pembroke and my Lord of
Rochester are so far out, as it is almost come to a quarrel; I know not
how true this is, but Sir Thomas Overbury and my Lord of Pembroke have
been long jarring, and therefore the other is likely."
Among the numerous MS. letters of this kind, I have often observed the
writer uneasy at the scandal he has seasoned his letter with, and
concluding earnestly that his letter, after perusal, should be thrown to
the flames. A wish which appears to have been rarely complied with; and
this may serve as a hint to some to restrain their tattling pens, if they
regard their own peace; for, on most occasions of this nature, the letters
are rather preserved with peculiar care.]
Such was this race of gossipers in the environs of a court, where, steeped
in a supine lethargy of peace, corrupting or corrupted, every man stood
for himself through a reckless scene of expedients and of compromises.
* * * * *
A PICTURE OF THE AGE FROM A MS. OF THE TIME.
A long reign of peace, which had produced wealth in that age, engendered
the extremes of luxury and want. Money traders practised the art of
decoying the gallant youths of the day into their nets, and transforming,
in a certain time, the estates of the country gentlemen into skins of
parchment,
The wax continuing hard, the acres melting.
MASSINGER.
Projectors and monopolists who had obtained patents for licensing all the
inns and alehouses--for being the sole vendors of manufactured articles,
such as gold lace, tobacco-pipes, starch, soap, &c., were grinding and
cheating the people to an extent which was not at first understood,
although the practice had existed in the former reign. The gentry, whose
family pride would vie with these _nouveaux riches_, exhausted themselves
in rival profusion; all crowded to "upstart London," deserting their
country mansions, which were now left to the care of "a poor alms-woman,
or a bed-rid beadsman."
In that day, this abandonment of the ancient country hospitality for the
metropolis, and this breaking-up of old family establishments, crowded
London with new and distinct races of idlers, or, as they would now be
called, unproductive members of society. From a contemporary manuscript,
one of those spirited remonstrances addressed to the king, which it was
probably thought not prudent to publish, I shall draw some extracts, as a
forcible picture of the manners of the age.[A] Masters of ancient
families, to maintain a mere exterior of magnificence in dress and
equipage in the metropolis, were really at the same time hiding themselves
in penury: they thrust themselves into lodgings, and "five or six knights,
or justices of peace," with all their retinue, became the inmates of a
shopkeeper; yet these gentlemen had once "kept the rusty chimneys of two
or three houses smoking, and had been the feeders of twenty or forty
serving-men: a single page, with a guarded coat, served their turn now."
[Footnote A: The MS. is entitled "Balaam's Ass, or a True Discoverie
touching the Murmurs and Feared Discontents of the Times, directed to King
James."--Lansdowne Collection, 209. The writer, throughout, speaks of the
king with the highest respect.]
"Every one strives to be a Diogenes in his house and an emperor in the
streets; not caring if they sleep in a tub, so they may be hurried in a
coach; giving that allowance to horses and mares that formerly maintained
houses full of men; pinching many a belly to paint a few backs, and
burying all the treasures of the kingdom into a few citizens' coffers.
"There are now," the writer adds, "twenty thousand masterless men turned
off, who know not this night where to lodge, where to eat to-morrow, and
ready to undertake any desperate course."
Yet there was still a more turbulent and dangerous race of idlers, in
"A number of younger brothers, of ancient houses, who, nursed up in
fulness, pampered in their minority, and left in charge to their elder
brothers, who were to be fathers to them, followed them in despair to
London, where these untimely-born youths are left so bare, that their
whole life's allowance was consumed in one year."
The same manuscript exhibits a full and spirited picture of manners in
this long period of peace.
"The gentry are like owls, all feathers and no flesh; all show, and no
substance; all fashion, and no feeding; and fit for no service but masks
and May-games. The citizens have dealt with them as it is said the
Indians are dealt with; they have given them counterfeit brooches and
bugle-bracelets for gold and silver;[A] pins and peacock feathers for
lands and tenements; gilded coaches and outlandish hobby-horses for goodly
castles and ancient mansions; their woods are turned into wardrobes, their
leases into laces; and their goods and chattels into guarded coats and
gaudy toys. Should your Majesty fly to them for relief, you would fare
like those birds that peek at painted fruits; all outside." The writer
then describes the affected penurious habits of the grave citizens, who
were then preying on the country gentlemen:--"When those big swoln
leeches, that have thus sucked them, wear rags, eat roots, speak like
jugglers that have reeds in their mouths; look like spittle-men,
especially when your Majesty hath occasion to use them; their fat lies in
their hearts, their substance is buried in their bowels, and he that will
have it must first take their lives. Their study is to get, and their
chiefest care to conceal; and most from yourself, gracious sir; not a
commodity comes from their hand, but you pay a noble in the pound for
_booking_, which they call _forbearing_[B] They think it lost time if they
double not their principal in two years. They have attractive powders to
draw these flies into their claws; they will entice men with honey into
their hives, and with wax entangle them;[C] they pack the cards, and their
confederates, the lords, deal, by which means no other men have ever good
game. They have in a few years laid up riches for many, and yet can never
be content to say--_Soul, take thy rest, or hand receive no more; do no
more wrong:_ but still they labour to join house to house, and land to
land. What want they of being kings, but the name? Look into the shires
and counties, where, with their purchased lordships and manors, one of
their private letters has equal power with your Majesty's privy seal.[D]
It is better to be one of their hinds, than your Majesty's gentleman
usher; one of their grooms, than your guards. What care they, if it be
called tribute or no, so long as it comes in termly: or whether their
chamber be called Exchequer, or the dens of cheaters, so that the money be
left there."
[Footnote A: Sir Giles Mompesson and Sir James Mitchell had the monopolies
of gold lace, which they sold in a counterfeit state; and not only cheated
the people, but, by a mixture of copper, the ornaments made of it are said
to have rotted the flesh. As soon as the grievance was shown to James, he
expressed his abhorrence of the practice, and even declared that no person
connected with the villanous fraud should escape punishment. The brother
of his favourite, Buckingham, was known to be one, and with Sir Giles
Overreach (as Massinger conceals the name of Mompesson), was compelled to
fly the country. The style of James, in his speech, is indeed different
from kings' speeches in parliament: he speaks as indignantly as any
individual who was personally aggrieved: "Three patents at this time have
been complained of, and thought great grievances; my purpose is to strike
them all dead, and, that time may not be lost, I will have it done
presently. Had these things been complained of to me, before the
parliament, I could have done the office of a just king, and have punished
them; peradventure more than now ye intend to do. No private person
whatsoever, were he ever so dear unto me, shall be respected by me by many
degrees as the public good; and I hope, my lords, that ye will do me that
right to publish to my people this my heart purposes. Proceed judicially;
spare none, where ye find just cause to punish: but remember that laws
have not their eyes in their necks, but in their foreheads."--Rushworth,
vol. i. p. 26.]
[Footnote B: The credit which these knavish traders gave their customers,
who could not conveniently pay their money down, was carried to an
exorbitant charge; since, even in Elizabeth's reign, it was one of the
popular grievances brought into Parliament--it is there called, "A bill
against _Double Payments_ of Book Debts." One of the country members, who
made a speech consisting entirely of proverbs, said, "Pay the reckoning
overnight, and you shall not be troubled in the morning."]
[Footnote C: In the life of a famous usurer of that day, who died worth
400,000_l_., an amazing sum at that period, we find numberless expedients
and contrivances of the money trader, practised on improvident landholders
and careless heirs, to entangle them in his nets. He generally contrived
to make the wood pay for the land, which he called "making the feathers
pay for the goose." He never pressed hard for his loans, but fondly
compared his bonds "to infants, which battle best by sleeping;" to battle,
is to be nourished--a term still retained in the battle-book of the
university. I have elsewhere preserved the character and habits of the
money-dealer in the age of James I.--See "Curiosities of Literature," 11th
Edit. p. 228.]
[Footnote D: It is observed, in the same life, that his mortgages, and
statutes, and his judgments were so numerous, that his papers would have
made a good map of England. A view of the chamber of this usurer is
preserved by Massinger, who can only be understood by the modern reader in
Mr. Gifford's edition:--
Here lay
A manor, bound fast in a skin of parchment;
Here a sure deed of gift for a market-town,
If not redeem'd this day, which is not in
The unthrift's purse; there being scarce one shire
In Wales or England, where my monies are not
Lent out at usury, the certain hook
To draw in more.
MASSINGER'S _City Madam_.]
This crushing usury seemed to them a real calamity; for although in the
present extraordinary age of calculations and artificial wealth, we can
suffer "a dunghill-breed of men," like Mompesson and his contemptible
partner of this reign, to accumulate in a rapid period more than a ducal
fortune, without any apparent injury to the public welfare, the result was
different then; the legitimate and enlarged principles of commerce were
not practised by our citizens in the first era of their prosperity; their
absorbing avarice rapidly took in all the exhausting prodigality of the
gentry, who were pushed back on the people to prey in their turn on them;
those who found their own acres disappearing, became enclosers of commons;
this is one of the grievances which Massinger notices, while the writer of
the "Five Years of King James" tells us that these discontents between the
gentry and the commonalty grew out into a petty rebellion; and it appears
by Peyton that "divers of the people were hanged up."
* * * * *
ANECDOTES OF THE MANNERS OF THE AGE.
The minute picture of the domestic manners of this age exhibits the
results of those extremes of prodigality and avarice which struck
observers in that contracted circle which then constituted society. The
king's prodigal dispensations of honours and titles seem at first to have
been political; for James was a foreigner, and designed to create a
nobility, as likewise an inferior order, who might feel a personal
attachment for the new monarch; but the facility by which titles were
acquired, was one cause which occasioned so many to crowd to the
metropolis to enjoy their airy honour by a substantial ruin; knighthood
had become so common, that some of the most infamous and criminal
characters of this age we find in that rank.[A] The young females, driven
to necessity by the fashionable ostentation of their parents, were brought
to the metropolis as to a market; "where," says a contemporary, "they
obtained pensions, or sometimes marriages, by their beauty." When
Gondomar, the Spanish ambassador, passed to his house, the ladies were at
their balconies on the watch, to make themselves known to him; and it
appears that every one of those ladies had sold their favours at a dear
rate. Among these are some, "who pretending to be _wits_, as they called
them," says Arthur Wilson,[B] "or had handsome nieces or daughters, drew a
great resort to their houses." And it appears that Gondomar, to prevent
these conversaziones from too freely touching on Spanish politics,
sweetened their silence by his presents.[C] The same grossness of manners
was among the higher females of the age; when we see that grave statesman,
Sir Dudley Carleton, narrating the adventures of a bridal night, and all
"the petty sorceries," the romping of the "great ladies, who were made
shorter by the skirts," we discover their coarse tastes; but when we find
the king going to the bed of the bride in his nightgown, to give a
reveille-matin, and remaining a good time in or upon the bed, "Choose
which you will believe;" this bride was not more decent than the ladies
who publicly, on their balconies, were soliciting the personal notice of
Gondomar.
[Footnote A: A statesman may read with advantage Sir Edward Walker on "The
inconveniences that have attended the frequent promotions to Titles, since
King James came to the crown." Sir Edward appears not to disapprove of
these promotions during the first ten years of his reign, but "when
alliance to a favourite, riches though gotten in a shop, persons of
private estates, and of families whose fathers would have thought
themselves highly honoured to have been but knights in Queen Elizabeth's
time, were advanced, then the fruits began to appear. The greater
nobility were undervalued; the ancient baronage saw inferior families
take precedency over them; nobility lost its respect, and a parity in
conversation was introduced which in English dispositions begot contempt;
the king could not employ them all; some grew envious, some factious, some
ingrateful, however obliged, by being once denied."--P. 302.]
[Footnote B: One may conjecture, by this expression, that the term of
"wits" was then introduced, in the sense we now use it.]
[Footnote C: Wilson has preserved a characteristic trait of one of the
lady wits. When Gondomar one day, in Drury-lane, was passing Lady Jacob's
house, she, exposing herself for a salutation from him, he bowed, but in
return she only opened her mouth, gaping on him. This was again repeated
the following day, when he sent a gentleman to complain of her incivility.
She replied, that he had purchased some favours of the ladies at a dear
rate, and she had a mouth to be stopped as well as others.]
This coarseness of manners, which still prevailed in the nation, as it had
in the court of Henry VIII. and Elizabeth, could not but influence the
familiar style of their humour and conversation. James I., in the Edict on
Duels, employs the expression of _our dearest bedfellow_ to designate the
queen; and there was no indelicacy attached to this singular expression.
Much of that silly and obscene correspondence of James with Buckingham,
while it adds one more mortifying instance of "the follies of the wise,"
must be attributed to this cause.[A] Are not most of the dramatic works of
that day frequently unreadable from this circumstance? As an historian, it
would be my duty to show how incredibly gross were the domestic language
and the domestic familiarities of kings, queens, lords, and ladies, which
were much like the lowest of our populace. We may felicitate ourselves on
having escaped the grossness, without, however, extending too far these
self-congratulations.
[Footnote A: Our wonder and surmises have been often raised at the strange
subscriptions of Buckingham to the king,--"Your dog," and James as
ingenuously calling him "dog Steenie." But this was not peculiar to
Buckingham; James also called the grave Cecil his "little beagle." The
Earl of Worcester, writing to Cecil, who had succeeded in his search after
one Bywater, the earl says, "If the _king's beagle_ can hunt by land as
well as he hath done _by water_, we will leave capping of _Jowler_, and
cap the _beagle_." The queen, writing to Buckingham to intercede with the
king for Rawleigh's life, addresses Buckingham by "My kind Dog." James
appears to have been always playing on some whimsical appellative by which
he characterised his ministers and favourites, analogous to the notions of
a huntsman. Many of our writers, among them Sir Walter Scott, have
strangely misconceived these playful appellatives, unconscious of the
origin of this familiar humour. The age was used to the coarseness. We did
not then excel all Europe, as Addison set the model, in the delicacy of
humour; indeed, even so late as Congreve's time, they were discussing its
essential distinction from wit.]
The men were dissolved in all the indolence of life and its wantonness;
they prided themselves in traducing their own innocence rather than
suffer a lady's name to pass unblemished.[B] The marriage-tie lost
its sacredness amid these disorders of social life. The luxurious
idlers of that day were polluted with infamous vices; and Drayton, in the
"Moon-calf," has elaborately drawn full-length pictures of the lady and
the gentleman of that day, which seem scarcely to have required the
darkening tints of satire to be hideous--in one line the Muse describes
"the most prodigious birth"--
He's too much woman and She's too much man.
[Footnote B. The expression of one of these gallants, as preserved by
Wilson, cannot be decently given, but is more expressive, p. 147.]
The trades of foppery, in Spanish fashions, suddenly sprung up in this
reign, and exhibited new names and new things. Now silk and gold-lace
shops first adorned Cheapside, which the continuator of Stowe calls "the
beauty of London;" the extraordinary rise in price of these fashionable
articles forms a curious contrast with those of the preceding reign.
Scarfs, in Elizabeth's time, of thirty shillings value, were now wrought
up to as many pounds; and embroidered waistcoats, which in the queen's
reign no workman knew how to make worth five pounds, were now so rich and
curious as to be cheapened at forty. Stowe has recorded a revolution in
shoe-buckles, portentously closing in shoe-roses, which were puffed knots
of silk, or of precious embroidery, worn even by men of mean rank,
at the cost of more than five pounds, who formerly had worn gilt copper
shoe-buckles.
In the new and ruinous excess of the use of tobacco, many consumed three
or four hundred pounds a year. James, who perceived the inconveniences of
this sudden luxury in the nation, tried to discountenance it, although the
purpose went to diminish his own scanty revenue. Nor was this attack on
the abuse of tobacco peculiar to his majesty, although he has been so
ridiculed for it; a contemporary publication has well described the mania
and its consequences: "The smoak of fashion hath quite blown away the
smoak of hospitalitie, and turned the chimneys of their forefathers into
the noses of their children."[A] The king also reprobated the finical
embarrassments of the new fashions, and seldom wore new clothes. When they
brought him a Spanish hat, he flung it away with scorn, swearing he never
loved them nor their fashions; and when they put roses on his shoes, he
swore too, "that they should not make him a ruffe-footed dove; a yard of
penny ribbon would serve that turn."
[Footnote A: The "Peace-Maker," 1618.]
The sudden wealth which seems to have rushed into the nation in this
reign of peace, appeared in massy plate and jewels, and in "prodigal
marriage-portions, which were grown in fashion among the nobility and
gentry, as if the skies had rained plenty." Such are the words of Hacket,
in his "Memorial of the Lord-Keeper Williams." Enormous wealth was often
accumulated. An usurer died worth 400,000_l_.; Sir Thomas Compton, a
citizen, left, it is said, 800,000_l_., and his heir was so overcome with
this sudden irruption of wealth, that he lost his senses; and Cranfield, a
citizen, became the Earl of Middlesex.
The continued peace, which produced this rage for dress, equipage, and
magnificence, appeared in all forms of riot and excess; corruption bred
corruption. The industry of the nation was not the commerce of the many,
but the arts of money-traders, confined to the suckers of the state; and
the unemployed and dissipated, who were every day increasing the
population in the capital, were a daring petulant race, described by a
contemporary as "persons of great expense, who, having run themselves into
debt, were constrained to run into faction; and defend themselves from the
danger of the law."[A] These appear to have enlisted under some show of
privilege among the nobility; and the metropolis was often shaken by
parties, calling themselves Roaring-boys, Bravadoes, Roysters, and
Bonaventures.[B] Such were some of the turbulent children of peace, whose
fiery spirits, could they have found their proper vent, had been soldiers
of fortune, as they were younger brothers, distressed often by their own
relatives; and wards ruined by their own guardians;[C] all these were
clamorous for bold piracies on the Spaniards: a visionary island, and a
secret mine, would often disturb the dreams of these unemployed youths,
with whom it was no uncommon practice to take a purse on the road. Such
felt that--
--in this plenty
And fat of peace, our young men ne'er were train'd
To martial discipline, and our ships unrigg'd
Rot in the harbour.
MASSINGER.
[Footnote A: "Five Years of King James." Harl. Misc.]
[Footnote B: A. Wilson's "Hist. of James I." p. 28.]
[Footnote C: That ancient oppressive institution of the Court of Wards
then existed; and Massinger, the great painter of our domestic manners in
this reign, has made it the subject of one of his interesting dramas.]
The idleness which rusts quiet minds effervesces in fiery spirits pent up
together; and the loiterers in the environs of a court, surfeiting with
peace, were quick at quarrel. It is remarkable, that in the pacific reign
of James I. never was so much blood shed in brawls, nor duels so
tremendously barbarous. Hume observed this circumstance, and attributes it
to "the turn that the romantic chivalry, for which the nation was formerly
so renowned, had lately taken." An inference probably drawn from the
extraordinary duel between Sir Edward Sackville, afterwards Lord Dorset,
and the Lord Bruce.[A] These two gallant youths had lived as brothers, yet
could resolve not to part without destroying each other; the narrative so
wonderfully composed by Sackville, still makes us shudder at each blow
received and given. Books were published to instruct them by a system of
quarrelling, "to teach young gentlemen when they are beforehand and when
behindhand;" thus they incensed and incited those youths of hope and
promise, whom Lord Bacon, in his charge on duelling, calls, in the
language of the poet, _Auroræ filii,_ the sons of the morning,--who often
were drowned in their own blood! But, on a nearer inspection, when we
discover the personal malignity of these hasty quarrels, the coarseness of
their manners, and the choice of weapons and places in their mode of
butchering each other, we must confess that they rarely partake of the
spirit of chivalry. One gentleman biting the ear of a Templar, or
switching a poltroon lord; another sending a challenge to fight in a
saw-pit; or to strip to their shirts, to mangle each other, were
sanguinary duels, which could only have fermented in the disorders of the
times, amid that wanton pampered indolence which made them so petulant and
pugnacious. Against this evil his Majesty published a voluminous edict,
which exhibits many proofs that it was the labour of his own hand, for the
same dignity, the same eloquence, the same felicity of illustration,
embellish the state-papers;[B] and to remedy it, James, who rarely
consented to shed blood, condemned an irascible lord to suffer the
ignominy of the gallows.
[Footnote A: It may be found in the popular pages of the "Guardian;" there
first printed from a MS. in the library of the Harleys.]
[Footnote B: "A publication of his Majestie's edict and seuere censure
against private combats and combatants, &c." 1613. It is a volume of about
150 pages. As a specimen of the royal style, I transcribe two passages:--
"The pride of humours, the libertie of times, the conniuencie of
magistrates, together with a kind of prescription of impunity, hath bred
ouer all this kingdome, not only an opinion among the weakest, but a
constant beleefe among many that desire to be reputed among the wisest, of
a certain freedome left to all men vpon earth by nature, as their
_birth-right_ to defend their reputations with their swords, and to take
reuenge of any wrong either offered or apprehended, in that measure which
their owne inward passion or affection doth suggest, without any further
proofe; so as the challenge be sent in a civil manner, though without
leave demanded of the _sovereign_," &c.
The king employs a bold and poetical metaphor to describe duelling--to
turn this hawk into a singing-bird, clip its wings, and cage it. "By
comparing forraine mischiefes with home-bred accidents, it will not be
hard to judge into what region this bolde bird of audacious presumption,
in dealing blowes so confidently, will mount, if it bee once let flie,
from the breast wherein it lurkes. And therefore it behoveth justice both
to keep her still in her own close cage, with care that she learn neuer
any other dittie then _Est bene_; but withall, that for preuention of the
worst that may fall out, wee clippe her wings, that they grow not too
fast. For according to that of the proverb, _It is labour lost to lay nets
before the eyes of winged fowles,"_ &c. p. 13.]
But, while extortion and monopoly prevailed among the monied men, and a
hollow magnificence among the gentry, bribery had tainted even the lords.
All were hurrying on in a stream of venality, dissipation, and want;
and the nation, amid the prosperity of the kingdom in a long reign of
peace, was nourishing in its breast the secret seeds of discontent and
turbulence.
From the days of Elizabeth to those of the Charleses, Cabinet transmitted
to Cabinet the caution to preserve the kingdom from the evils of an
overgrown metropolis. A political hypochondriacism: they imagined
the head was becoming too large for the body, drawing to itself all the
moisture of life from the middle and the extremities. A statute against
the erection of new buildings was passed by Elizabeth; and from James to
his successors proclamations were continually issued to forbid any growth
of the city. This singular prohibition may have originated in their
dread of infection from the plague, but it certainly became the policy
of a weak and timid government, who dreaded, in the enlargement of
the metropolis, the consequent concourse of those they designated as
"masterless men,"--sedition was as contagious as the plague among the
many. But proclamations were not listened to nor read; houses were
continually built, for they were in demand,--and the esquires, with their
wives and daughters, hastened to gay or busy London, for a knighthood, a
marriage, or a monopoly. The government at length were driven to the
desperate "Order in Council" to pull down all new houses within ten miles
of the metropolis--and further, to direct the Attorney-General to indict
all those sojourners in town who had country houses, and mulct them in
ruinous fines. The rural gentry were "to abide in their own counties, and
by their housekeeping in those parts were to guide and relieve the meaner
people _according to the ancient usage of the English nation_." The
Attorney-General, like all great lawyers, looking through the spectacles
of his books, was short-sighted to reach to the new causes and the new
effects which were passing around. The wisest laws are but foolish when
Time, though not the lawyers, has annulled them. The popular sympathy was,
however, with the Attorney-General, for it was imagined that the country
was utterly ruined and depopulated by the town.
And so in the view it appeared, and so all the satirists chorused! for in
the country the ancient hospitality was not kept up; the crowd of
retainers had vanished, the rusty chimneys of the mansion-house hardly
smoked through a Christmas week, while in London all was exorbitantly
prosperous; masses of treasure were melted down into every object of
magnificence. "And is not this wealth drawn from our acres?" was the
outcry of the rural censor. Yet it was clear that the country in no way
was impoverished, for the land rose in price; and if manors sometimes
changed their lords, they suffered no depreciation. A sudden wealth was
diffused in the nation; the arts of commerce were first advancing; the
first great ship launched for an Indian voyage, was then named the
"Trade's Increase." The town, with its multiplied demands, opened a
perpetual market for the country. The money-traders were breeding their
hoards as the graziers their flocks; and while the goldsmiths' shops
blazed in Cheap, the agriculturists beheld double harvests cover the soil.
The innumerable books on agriculture published during these twenty years
of peace is an evidence of the improvement of the country--sustained by
the growing capitals of the men in trade. In this progress of domestic
conveniency to metropolitan luxury, there was a transition of manners; new
objects and new interests, and new modes of life, yet in their incipient
state.
The evils of these luxuriant times were of quick growth; and, as fast as
they sprung, the Father of his people encountered them by his
proclamations, which, during long intervals of parliamentary recess, were
to be enforced as laws: but they passed away as morning dreams over a
happy, but a thoughtless and wanton people.
* * * * *
JAMES THE FIRST DISCOVERS THE DISORDERS AND DISCONTENTS OF A PEACE OF MORE
THAN TWENTY YEARS.
The king was himself amazed at the disorders and discontents he at length
discovered; and, in one of his later speeches, has expressed a mournful
disappointment:
"And now, I confess, that when I looked before upon the face of the
government, _I thought, as every man would have done_, that the people
were never so happy as in my time; but even, as at divers times I have
looked upon many of my coppices, riding about them, and they appeared, on
the outside, very thick and well-grown unto me, but, when I turned into
the midst of them, I found them all bitten within, and full of plains and
bare spots; like the apple or pear, fair and smooth without, but when you
cleave it asunder, you find it rotten at heart. Even so this kingdom, the
_external_ government being as good as ever it was, and I am sure as
learned judges as ever it had, and I hope as honest administering justice
within it; and for peace, both at home and abroad, more settled, and
longer lasting, than ever any before; together with as great plenty as
ever: so as it may be thought, every man might sit in safety under his own
vine and fig-tree," &c. &c.[A]
But while we see this king of peace surrounded by national grievances, and
that "this fair coppice was very thick and well-grown," yet loud in
murmurs, to what cause are we to attribute them? Shall we exclaim with
Catharine Macaulay against "the despotism of James," and "the intoxication
of his power?"--a monarch who did not even enforce the proclamations or
edicts his wisdom dictated;[B] and, as Hume has observed, while vaunting
his prerogative, had not a single regiment of guards to maintain it. Must
we agree with Hume, and reproach the king with his indolence and lore of
amusement--"particularly of hunting?"[C]
[Footnote A: Rushworth, vol. i. p. 29; sub anno 1621.]
[Footnote B: James I. said, "I will never offer to bring a new custom upon
my people without the people's consent; like a good physician, tell them
what is amiss, if they will not concur to amend it, yet I have discharged
my part." Among the difficulties of this king was that of being a
foreigner, and amidst the contending factions of that day the "British
Solomon" seems to have been unjustly reproached for his Scottish
partialities.]
[Footnote C: La Boderie, the French Ambassador, complains of the king's
frequent absences; but James did not wish too close an intercourse with
one who was making a French party about Prince Henry, and whose sole
object was to provoke a Spanish war: the king foiled the French intriguer;
but has incurred his contempt for being "timid and irresolute." James's
cautious neutrality was no merit in the Frenchman's eye.
La Boderie resided at our court from 1606 to 1611, and his "Ambassades,"
in 5 vols., are interesting in English history. The most satirical
accounts of the domestic life of James, especially in his unguarded hours
of boisterous merriment, are found in the correspondence of the French
ambassadors. They studied to flavour their dish, made of spy and gossip,
to the taste of their master. Henry IV. never forgave James for his
adherence to Spain and peace, instead of France and warlike designs.]
* * * * *
THE KING'S PRIVATE LIFE IN HIS OCCASIONAL RETIREMENTS.
The king's occasional retirements to Royston and Newmarket have even been
surmised to have borne some analogy to the horrid Capræa of Tiberius; but
a witness has accidentally detailed the king's uniform life in these
occasional seclusions. James I. withdrew at times from public life, but
not from public affairs; and hunting, to which he then gave alternate
days, was the cheap amusement and requisite exercise of his sedentary
habits: but the chase only occupied a few hours. A part of the day was
spent by the king in his private studies; another at his dinners, where he
had a reader, and was perpetually sending to Cambridge for books of
reference: state affairs were transacted at night; for it was observed, at
the time, that his secretaries sat up later at night, in those occasional
retirements, than when they were at London.[A] I have noticed, that the
state papers were composed by himself; that he wrote letters on important
occasions without consulting any one; and that he derived little aid from
his secretaries. James was probably never indolent; but the uniform life
and sedentary habits of literary men usually incur this reproach from
those real idlers who bustle in a life of nothingness. While no one loved
more the still-life of peace than this studious monarch, whose habits
formed an agreeable combination of the contemplative and the active life,
study and business--no king more zealously tried to keep down the growing
abuses of his government, by personally concerning himself in the
protection of the subject.[B]
[Footnote A: Hacket's Scrinia Reserata, Part I. p. 27.]
[Footnote B: As evidences of this zeal for reform, I throw into this note
some extracts from the MS. letters of contemporaries.--Of the king's
interference between the judges of two courts about prohibitions, Sir
Dudley Carleton gives this account:--"The king played the best part in
collecting arguments on both sides, and concluded that he saw much
endeavour to draw water to their several mills; and advised them to take
moderate courses, whereby the good of the subject might be more respected
than their particular jurisdictions. The king sat also at the Admiralty,
to look himself into certain disorders of government there; he told the
lawyers 'he would leave hunting of hares, and hunt them in their quirks
and subtilities, with which the subject had been too long abused.'"--MS.
Letter of Sir Dudley Carleton.
In "Winwood's Memorials of State" there is a letter from Lord Northampton,
who was present at one of these strict examinations of the king; and his
language is warm with admiration: the letter being a private one, can
hardly be suspected of court flattery. "His Majesty hath in person, with
the greatest dexterity of wit and strength of argument that mine ears ever
heard, compounded between the parties of the civil and ecclesiastical
courts, who begin to comply, by the king's sweet temper, on points that
were held to be incompatible."--Winwood's Mem. iii. p. 54.
In his progresses through the country, if any complained of having
received injury from any of the court, the king punished, or had
satisfaction made to the wronged, immediately.]
* * * * *
DISCREPANCIES OF OPINION AMONG THE DECRIERS OF JAMES THE FIRST.
Let us detect, among the modern decriers of the character of James I.,
those contradictory opinions, which start out in the same page; for the
conviction of truth flashed on the eyes of those who systematically
vilified him, and must often have pained them; while it embarrassed and
confused those, who, being of no party, yet had adopted the popular
notions. Even Hume is at variance with himself; for he censures James for
his indolence, "which prevented him making any progress in the practice of
foreign politics, and diminished that regard which all the neighbouring
nations had paid to England during the reign of his predecessor," p. 29.
Yet this philosopher observes afterwards, on the military character of
Prince Henry, at p. 63, that "had he lived, he had probably promoted _the
glory; perhaps not the felicity, of his people_. The unhappy prepossession
of men in favour of ambition, &c., engages them into such pursuits _as
destroy their own peace, and that of the rest of mankind_." This is true
philosophy, however politicians may comment, and however the military may
command the state. Had Hume, with all the sweetness of his temper, been a
philosopher on the throne, himself had probably incurred the censure he
passed on James I. Another important contradiction in Hume deserves
detection. The king, it seems, "boasted of his management of Ireland as
his masterpiece." According to the accounts of Sir John Davies, whose
political works are still read, and whom Hume quotes, James I. "in the
space of nine years made greater advances towards the reformation of that
kingdom than had been effected in more than four centuries;" on this
Hume adds that the king's "_vanity_ in this particular was not without
foundation." Thus in describing that wisest act of a sovereign, the
art of humanising his ruder subjects by colonisation, so unfortunate is
James, that even his most skilful apologist, influenced by popular
prepossessions, employs a degrading epithet--and yet he, who had indulged
a sarcasm on the _vanity_ of James, in closing his general view of his
wise administration in Ireland, is carried away by his nobler feelings.
--"Such were the arts," exclaims the historian, "by which James introduced
humanity and justice among a people who had ever been buried in the most
profound barbarism. Noble cares! much superior to the vain and criminal
glory of conquests." Let us add, that had the genius of James the First
been warlike, had he commanded a battle to be fought and a victory to be
celebrated, popular historians, the panders of ambition, had adorned their
pages with bloody trophies; but the peace the monarch cultivated; the
wisdom which dictated the plan of civilisation; and the persevering arts
which put it into practice--these are the still virtues which give no
motion to the _spectacle_ of the historian, and are even forgotten in his
pages.
What were the painful feelings of Catharine Macaulay, in summing up the
character of James the First. The king has even extorted from her a
confession, that "his conduct in Scotland was unexceptionable," but
"despicable in his Britannic government." To account for this seeming
change in a man who, from his first to his last day, was always the same,
required a more sober historian. She tells us also, he affected "a
sententious wit;" but she adds, that it consisted "only of quaint and
stale conceits." We need not take the word of Mrs. Macaulay, since we have
so much of this "sententious wit" recorded, of which probably she knew
little. Forced to confess that James's education had been "a more learned
one than is usually bestowed on princes," we find how useless it is to
educate princes at all; for this "more learned education" made this prince
"more than commonly deficient in all the points he pretended to have any
knowledge of." This incredible result gives no encouragement for a prince;
having a Buchanan for his tutor. Smollett, having compiled the popular
accusations of the "vanity, the prejudices, the littleness of soul," of
this abused monarch, surprises one in the same page by discovering enough
good qualities to make something more than a tolerable king. "His reign,
though ignoble to himself, was happy to his people, who were enriched by
commerce, felt no severe impositions, while they made considerable
progress in their liberties." So that, on the whole, the nation appears
not to have had all the reason they have so fully exercised in deriding
and vilifying a sovereign, who had made them prosperous at the price of
making himself contemptible! I shall notice another writer, of an amiable
character, as an evidence of the influence of popular prejudice, and the
effect of truth.
When James went to Denmark to fetch his queen, he passed part of his time
among the learned; but such was his habitual attention in studying the
duties of the sovereign, that he closely attended the Danish courts of
justice; and Daines Barrington, in his curious "Observations on the
Statutes," mentions, that the king borrowed from the Danish code three
statutes for the punishment of criminals. But so provocative of sarcasm is
the ill-used name of this monarch, that our author could not but shrewdly
observe, that James "spent more time in those courts than in attending
upon his destined consort." Yet this is not true: the king was jovial
there, and was as indulgent a husband as he was a father. Osborne even
censures James for once giving marks of his uxoriousness![A] But while
Daines Barrington degrades, by unmerited ridicule, the honourable
employment of the "British Solomon," he becomes himself perplexed at the
truth that flashes on his eyes. He expresses the most perfect admiration
of James the First, whose statutes he declares "deserve much to be
enforced; nor do I find any one which hath the least tendency to extend
the prerogative, or abridge the liberties and rights of his subjects." He
who came to scoff remained to pray. Thus a lawyer, in examining the laws
of James the First, concludes by approaching nearer to the truth: the step
was a bold one! He says, "_It is at present a sort of fashion_ to suppose
that this king, because he was a pedant, had no real understanding, or
merit." Had Daines Barrington been asked for proofs of the pedantry of
James the First, he had been still more perplexed; but what can be more
convincing than a lawyer, on a review of the character of James the First,
being struck, as he tells us, by "his desire of being instructed in the
English law, and holding frequent conferences for this purpose with the
most eminent lawyers,--as Sir Edward Coke, and others!" Such was the
monarch whose character was perpetually reproached for indolent habits,
and for exercising arbitrary power! Even Mr. Brodie, the vehement
adversary of the Stuarts, quotes and admires James's prescient decision on
the character of Laud in that remarkable conversation with Buckingham and
Prince Charles recorded by Hacket.[B]
[Footnote A: See "Curiosities of Literature," vol. iii. p. 334.]
[Footnote B: Brodie's "History of British Empire," vol. ii. p. 244, 411.]
But let us leave these moderns perpetuating traditional prejudices, and
often to the fiftieth echo, still sounding with no voice of its own, to
learn what the unprejudiced contemporaries of James I. thought of the
cause of the disorders of their age. They were alike struck by the wisdom
and the zeal of the monarch, and the prevalent discontents of this long
reign of peace. At first, says the continuator of Stowe, all ranks but
those "who were settled in piracy," as he designates the cormorants of
war, and curiously enumerates their classes, "were right joyful of the
peace; but, in a few years afterwards, all the benefits were generally
forgotten, and the happiness of the general peace of the most part
contemned." The honest annalist accounts for this unexpected result by the
natural reflection--"Such is the world's corruption, and man's vile
ingratitude."[A] My philosophy enables me to advance but little beyond. A
learned contemporary, Sir Symond D'Ewes, in his manuscript diary, notices
the death of the monarch, whom he calls "our learned and peaceable
sovereign."--"It did not a little amaze me to see all men generally slight
and disregard the loss of so mild and gentle a prince, which made me even
to feel, that the ensuing times might yet render his loss more sensible,
and his memory more dear unto posterity." Sir Symond censures the king for
not engaging in the German war to support the Palsgrave, and maintain "the
true church of God;" but deeper politicians have applauded the king for
avoiding a war, in which he could not essentially have served the
interests of the rash prince who had assumed the title of King of
Bohemia.[B] "Yet," adds Sir Symond, "if we consider his virtues and his
learning, his augmenting the liberties of the English, rather than his
oppressing them by any unlimited or illegal taxes and corrosions, his
death deserved more sorrow and condolement from his subjects than it
found."[C]
[Footnote A: Stowe's Annals, p. 845.]
[Footnote B: See Sir Edward Walker's "Hist. Discourses," p. 321; and
Barrington's "Observ. on the Statutes," who says, "For this he deserves
the highest praise and commendation from a nation of islanders."]
[Footnote C: Harl. MSS. 646.]
Another contemporary author, Wilson, has not ill-traced the generations
of this continued peace--"peace begot plenty, plenty begot ease and
wantonness, and ease and wantonness begot poetry, and poetry swelled out
into that bulk in this king's time which begot monstrous satyrs." Such
were the laseivious times, which dissolving the ranks of society in a
general corruption, created on one part the imaginary and unlimited wants
of prosperity; and on the other produced the riotous children of
indolence, and the turbulent adventurers of want. The rank luxuriance of
this reign was a steaming hot-bed of peace, which proved to be the
seed-plot of that revolution which was reserved for the unfortunate son.
In the subsequent reign a poet seems to have taken a retrospective view of
the age of peace of James I. contemplating on its results in his own
disastrous times--
--States that never know
A change but in their growth, which a long peace
Hath brought unto perfection, are like steel,
Which being neglected will consume itself
With its own rust; so doth Security
Eat through the hearts of states, while they are sleeping
And lulled into false quiet.
NABB'S _Hannibal and Scipio_.
* * * * *
SUMMARY OF HIS CHARACTER.
Thus the continued peace of James I. had calamities of its own! Are we to
attribute them to the king? It has been usual with us, in the solemn
expiations of our history, to convert the sovereign into the scape-goat
for the people; the historian, like the priest of the Hebrews, laying his
hands on Azazel,[A] the curses of the multitude are heaped on that devoted
head. And thus the historian conveniently solves all ambiguous events.
[Footnote A: The Hebrew name, which Calmet translates _Bouc Emissaire_,
and we _Scape Goat_, or rather _Escape Goat_.]
The character of James I. is a moral phenomenon, a singularity of a
complex nature. We see that we cannot trust to those modern writers who
have passed their censures upon him, however just may be those very
censures; for when we look narrowly into their representations, as surely
we find, perhaps without an exception, that an invective never closes
without some unexpected mitigating circumstance, or qualifying abatement.
At the moment of inflicting the censure, some recollection in opposition
to what is asserted passes in the mind, and to approximate to Truth, they
offer a discrepancy, a self-contradiction. James must always be condemned
on a system, while his apology is only allowed the benefit of a
parenthesis.
How it has happened that our luckless crowned philosopher has been the
common mark at which so many quivers have been emptied, should be quite
obvious when so many causes were operating against him. The shifting
positions into which he was cast, and the ambiguity of his character, will
unriddle the enigma of his life. Contrarieties cease to be contradictions
when operated on by external causes.
James was two persons in one, frequently opposed to each other. He was an
antithesis in human nature--or even a solecism. We possess ample evidence
of his shrewdness and of his simplicity; we find the lofty regal style
mingled with his familiar bonhommie. Warm, hasty, and volatile, yet with
the most patient zeal to disentangle involved deception; such gravity in
sense, such levity in humour; such wariness and such indiscretion; such
mystery and such openness--all these must have often thrown his Majesty
into some awkward dilemmas. He was a man of abstract speculation in the
theory of human affairs; too witty or too aphoristic, he never seemed at a
loss to decide, but too careless, perhaps too infirm, ever to come to a
decision, he leaned on others. He shrunk from the council-table; he had
that distaste for the routine of business which studious sedentary men are
too apt to indulge; and imagined that his health, which he said was the
health of the kingdom, depended on the alternate days which he devoted to
the chase; Royston and Theobalds were more delectable than a deputation
from the Commons, or the Court at Whitehall.
It has not always been arbitrary power which has forced the people into
the dread circle of their fate, seditions, rebellions, and civil wars; nor
always oppressive taxation which has given rise to public grievances. Such
were not the crimes of James the First. Amid the full blessings of peace,
we find how the people are prone to corrupt themselves, and how a
philosopher on the throne, the father of his people, may live without
exciting gratitude, and die without inspiring regret--unregarded,
unremembered!
INDEX.
ABERNETHY'S opinion of enthusiasm, 145.
ABSTRACTION of mind in great men, 133-136.
ACTORS, traits of character in great, 137.
ADRIAN VI., Pope, persecutes literary men, 18.
ÆSTHETIC Critics, 282.
AKENSIDE on the nature of genius, 30.
ALFIERI, childhood of, 32;
loneliness of his character, 96;
excited by Plutarch's works, 141.
ANGELO, Michael, illustrates Dante, 21;
his ideas of intellectual labour, 85;
his reason for a solitary life, 111;
his picture of battle of Pisa destroyed by Bandinelli, 158;
his elevated character, 252;
his letter to Vasari describing the death of his servant, 373.
ANTIPATHIES of men of genius, 160-163.
ANXIETY of genius, 74;
of authors and artists over their labours, 80-88.
ARISTOPHANES, popularised by a false preface, 287.
ART FRIENDSHIPS, 209-210.
ARTISTS, "Studies," or first thoughts, 131;
their mutual jealousies, 156-158.
AUTOBIOGRAPHY, its interest, 295.
BARRY the painter, his love of ancient literature, 23;
his general enthusiasm, 60;
his rude eloquence, 107.
BAILLET and his catalogue, 352.
BEATTIE describes the powerful effect on himself of metaphysical study,
147.
BIRCH, Dr., and Robertson the Historian, 342-350.
BOCCACCIO'S friendship for Petrarch, 212-214.
BOOK COLLECTORS, 227-231.
BOOKSELLERS, the test of public opinion, 194.
BOSIUS, his researches in the Roman catacombs, 144.
BOYLE on the disposition of childhood, 31;
his advertisement against visitors, _n_, 113;
his idea of a literary retreat, 188.
BRUCE the traveller disbelieved, 78.
BUFFON gives a reason for his fame, 92.
BUONAPARTE revives old military tactics, 266.
BURNS'S diary of the heart, 71.
BURTON, his constitutional melancholy, 220.
BUNYAN a self-taught genius, 60.
BYRON'S loneliness of feeling, _n._, 96.
CALUMNY frequently attacks genius, 185.
CANTENAC and his autobiography, 296.
CARACCI, the, their unfortunate jealousies, 157.
CASTAGNO murders a rival artist, 157.
CHARLES V., friendship for Titian, 253;
Robertson's life of, 343.
CHATELET, Madame de, a female philosopher and friend of Voltaire, 95.
CHATHAM, Earl of, his constancy of study, 96.
CHENIER a literary fratricide, 173.
CICERO on youthful influence, 32.
CLARENDON, his love of retirement, 111.
COACHES, their first invention, 359.
COAL, its first use as fuel, 362.
COMA VIGIL, a disease produced by study, 147.
COMPOSITION, its toils, 80-81.
CONTEMPORARY criticism, frequently unjust, 75.
CONVERSATIONS of men of genius, 99-109;
those who converse well seldom write well, 104.
COTIN, Abbé, troubled by wealth, 188.
CRACHERODE, Rev. C.M., his collections of art and literature, _n._, 13.
CRITICISM not always just, 65-75.
CURRIE, his idea of the power of genius, 26.
CUVIER'S discoveries in natural history, 145.
DANTE, his great abstraction of mind, 134.
DEATHS of literary men, 243.
DEPRECIATION, theory of, 160.
DIARIES, their value, 122.
DISEASE induced by severe study, 147.
DOMENICHINO poisoned by rivals, 158.
DOMESTIC Novelties at first condemned, 355-364.
DOMESTIC life of literary men, 173-186.
DREAMS of eminent men, 127-128.
DROUAIS an enthusiastic painter, 153.
ENGLAND and its tastes, 264.
FAMILY affection an incentive to genius, 179-182.
FENELON'S early enthusiasm for Greece, 151.
FIRST STUDIES of great men, 55-59;
first thoughts for great works, 129-133.
FORKS, when first used, 356.
FRANKLIN, Dr., notes the calming of the sea, 133;
his influence on American manners, 272.
FUSELI'S imaginative power, 151.
GALILEO invents the pendulum, 132.
GALVANISM first discovered, 133.
GESNER recommends a study of literature to artists, 22;
on enthusiasm, 154;
his wife a model for those of literary men, 206-208.
GLEIM and his portrait gallery, 211.
GOLDSMITH contrasted with Johnson, 294.
GOLDONI overworks his mind, 147.
GOVERNMENT of the thoughts, 117.
GRAY'S excitement in composing verse, 141;
GUIBERT, his great work on military tactics, 265.
HABITUAL PURSUITS, their power over the mind, 302-304.
HALLUCINATIONS of genius, 148;
realities with some minds, 150.
HAYDN, his regulation of his time, 92.
HELMONT'S (Van) love of study, 152.
HERBERT of Cherbury, Lord, questions the Deity as to the publication of
his book, 148.
HOBBES, theory to explain his terror, 150.
HOGARTH, attacks on, _n._ 87.
HOLLIS, his miserable celibacy, 201.
HONOURS awarded literary men, 249-258.
HORNE (Bishop), his love of literary labour, 135.
HUME the historian, his irritability, 86;
unfitted for gay life, 99;
gives his reason for literary labour, _n._ 177;
endeavours to correct Robertson, 342.
HUNTER, Dr., fraternal jealousy, 156.
HYPOCHONDRIA, its cause and effect, 150.
IDEALITY defined, 137;
its power, 138-154.
INCOMPLETED books, 350-355.
INDUSTRY of great writers, 125.
INFLUENCE of authors, 267-270; 273-277.
INTELLECTUAL nobility, 250.
IMITATION in literature, 305-307.
IRRITABILITY of genius, 70, 86-88.
ISOCRATES' belief in native character, 32.
JAMES I., a critical disquisition on the character of, 385-455.
JULIAN, Emperor, anecdotes of, 97.
JEALOUSY in art and literature, 154-159;
of honours paid to literary men, 251.
JOHNSON, Dr., defines the literary character, 12;
his moral dignity, 192;
his metaphysical loves, 200;
anecdotes of him and Goldsmith, 294.
JUVENILE WORKS, their value, 67.
LABOUR endured by great authors, 75;
a pleasure to some minds, 176-177.
LETTERS in the vernacular idiom, 375-379.
LINNÆUS sensitive to ridicule, 75;
honours awarded to, 191.
LITERARY FRIENDSHIP, 209-217.
LITERATURE an avenue to glory, 248.
LOCKE'S simile of the human mind, 25.
MANNERISTS in literature, 293.
MARCO Polo ridiculed unjustly, _n._ 79.
MATRIMONIAL STATE in literature and art, 198-208.
MAZZUCHELLI a great literary historian, 352.
MEDITATION, value of, 129.
MEMORY, as an art, 120, 122.
MENDELSSOHN, Moses, his remarkable history, 61-64.
MEN of LETTERS, their definition, 226-238.
METASTASIO a bad sportsman, 38;
his susceptibility, 140.
MILTON, his high idea of the literary character, 12;
his theory of genius, 25;
his love of study, 135;
sacrifices sight to poetry, 152.
MISCELLANISTS and their works, 282-286.
MODES OF STUDY used by great men, 125.
MOLIERE, his dramatic career, 310-325.
MONTAIGNE, his personal traits, 223.
MORE, Dr., on enthusiasm of genius, 149.
MORERI devotes a life to literature, 152.
MORTIMER the artist, his athletic exercises, 39.
MURATORI, his literary industry, 351.
NATIONAL tastes in literature, 260.
NECESSITY, its influence on literature, 193-194.
OBSCURE BIRTHS of great men, 248-249.
OLD AGE of literary men, 238-244.
PECULIAR habits of authors, 119-120.
PEIRESC, his early bias toward literature, 234;
his studious career, 235.
PERSONAL CHARACTER differs from the literary one, 217-226.
PETRARCH'S remarkable conversation on his melancholy, 68;
his mode of life, 114.
POPE, his anxiety over his Homer, 81;
severity of his early studies, 147.
POUSSIN fears trading in art, 193.
POVERTY of literary men, 186;
sometimes a choice, 188-190.
PRACTICAL KNOWLEDGE of life wanting in studious men, 183-185.
PRAYERS of great men, 146.
PRECIEUSES, 315-318.
PREDISPOSITION of the mind, 118.
PREFACES, their interest, 286;
their occasional falsehood, 287;
vanity of authors in, 288;
idle apologies in, 289;
Dryden's interesting, 290.
PREJUDICES, literary, 160-163.
PUBLIC TASTE formed by public writers, 268.
RACINE, sensibility of, 83; 325-332.
RAMBOUILLET, Hotel de, 315-317.
READING analyzed, 298-302.
RECLUSE manners in great authors, 98-99.
RELICS of men of genius, 255-258.
REMUNERATION of literature, 194-195.
RESIDENCES of literary men, 255-257.
REYNOLDS, Sir J., his "automatic system," 26;
discovers its inconsistencies, 27.
RIDICULE the terror of genius, 94
ROBERTSON the historian, 341-350.
ROLAND, Madame, anecdote of the power of poetry on, 141.
ROMNEY, his anxiety over his picture of the Tempest, 81-82.
ROUSSEAU'S expedient to endure society, 73;
his domestic infelicity, 175.
ROYAL SOCIETY, attacks on, _n._ 14.
RUBENS' transcripts of the poets, 21.
SANDWICH, Lord, his first idea of a stratagem at sea, 132.
SCUDERY, Mademoiselle, 316.
SENSITIVENESS of genius, 72, 78, 78; 139-140.
SELF-IMMOLATION of genius to labour, 152.
SELF-PRAISE of genius, 162-170.
SERVANTS, a dissertation on, 364-374.
SHEE, Sir M.A., relations of poetry and painting, _n._, 21.
SHENSTONE, his early love, 199.
SIDDONS, Mrs., anecdote of, 137.
SINGLENESS of genius, 245-247.
SOCIETY, artificial, an injury to genius, 90.
SOLITUDE loved by men of genius, 35-40; 109-115.
STEAM first discovered, 133.
STUDIES of advanced life, 241-243.
STERNE, anecdotes of, 332-340.
STYLE and its peculiarities, 291-294.
SUSCEPTIBILITY of men of genius, 170-172.
SUGGESTIONS of one mind perfected by another, 275-276.
TASSO uneasy in his labours, 84.
TAYLOR, Dr. Brooke, his torpid melancholy, 175.
TEMPLE, Sir W., his love of gardens, 283.
THEORETICAL history, 342.
THOMSON, his sensitiveness to grand poetry, 142;
irritability over false criticisms, 65.
TOBACCO, its introduction to England, 362.
TOOTHPICKS, origin of, 358.
TOWNLEY Gallery of Sculpture, _n._, 13.
TROUBADOURS, their influence, 285.
UMBRELLAS, their history, 358.
UTILITARIANISM and its narrow view of literature, 15.
UNIVERSALITY Of genius, 244.
VAN PRAUN refuses to part with his collection to an emperor, 229.
VERNET sketches in a storm, 144.
VERS DE SOCIETE, 308-310.
VINDICTIVENESS of genius, 170-173.
VISIONARIES of genius, 148.
VISITORS disliked by literary men, 112-113.
VOLTAIRE, anecdote of his visit to a country house, 95;
his universal genius, 245.
WALPOLE's, Horace, opinion of Gray, 91;
of Burke, _ib._
WATSON neglects research in his professorship, 17.
WERNER'S discoveries in science, 145.
WILKES desirous of literary glory, 17.
WIT sometimes mechanical, 126.
WIVES of literary men, 202-208.
WORKS intended, but not executed, 123.
WOOD, Anthony, sacrifices all to study, 152.
YOUNG the poet, his want of sympathy, 185.
YOUTH of great men, 34-54.
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