This ingenious gentleman was the son of Mr. Andrew Marvel, Minister
and Schoolmaster of Kingston upon Hull in Yorkshire, and was born in
that town in the year 1620[B]. He was admitted into Trinity College
in Cambridge December 14, 1633, where he had not been long before his
studies were interrupted by the following accident:
Some Jesuits with whom he familiarly conversed, observing in him a
genius beyond his years, used their utmost efforts to proselyte him
to their faith, which they imagined they could more easily accomplish
while he was yet young. They so far succeeded as to seduce him
from the college, and carry him to London, where, after some months
absence, his father found him in a Bookseller's shop, and prevailed
upon him to return to the college.
He afterwards pursued his studies with the most indefatigable
application, and in the year 1638, took the degree of bachelor of
arts, and the same year was admitted scholar of the house, that is,
of the foundation at Trinity College[C]. We have no farther account of
him for several years after this, only that he travelled through
the most polite parts of the world, but in what quality we are not
certain, unless in that of secretary to the embassy at Constantinople.
While our author was in France, he wrote his poem entitled Cuidam, qui
legendo Scripturam, descripsit Formam, Sapientiam, Sortemque Authoris.
Illustrissimo Viro Domino Lanceloto Josepho de Maniban Grammatomanti.
The person to whom he addresses these verses was an Abbot, famous
for entering into the qualities of those whom he had never seen, and
prognosticating their good, or bad fortune from an inspection of their
hand-writing.
During the troubles of the Republic we find him tutor to one Mr.
Dutton, a young gentleman; as appears from an original letter of his
to Oliver Cromwel. This letter sent to so extraordinary a person by
a man of Mr. Marvel's consequence, may excite the reader's curiosity,
with which, he shall be gratified. It carries in it much of that
stiffness and pedantry peculiar to the times, and is very different
from the usual stile of our author.
'May it please your LORDSHIP,
'It might perhaps seem fit for me to seek out words to give your
excellence thanks for myself. But indeed the only civility, which it
is fit for me to practise with so eminent a person, is to obey
you, and to perform honestly this work which you have set me about.
Therefore I shall use the time that your lordship is pleased to allow
me for writing, only to that purpose for which you have given me it,
that is to render you some account of Mr. Dutton. I have taken care
to examine him several times in the presence of Mr. Oxenbridge[D], as
those who weigh and tell over money, before some witnesses e'er they
take charge of it; for I thought that there might be possibly some
lightness in the coin, or error in the telling, which hereafter I
might be bound to make good. Therefore Mr. Oxenbridge is the best to
make your excellence an impartial relation thereof; I shall only say,
that I shall strive according to my best understanding to increase
whatsoever talent he may have already. Truly he is of a gentle, and
waxen disposition; and, God be praised, I cannot say that he hath
brought with him any evil impression; and I hope to set nothing upon
his spirit, but what shall be of a good sculpture. He hath in him two
things, which make youth most easily to be managed, modesty, which is
the bridle to vice, and emulation, which is the spur to virtue. And
the care which your excellency is pleased to take of him, is no small
encouragement, and shall be represented to him; but above all, I shall
labour to make him sensible of his duty to God, for then we begin to
serve faithfully, when we consider that he is our master; and in this
both he and I owe infinitely to your lordship, for having placed in so
godly a family as that of Mr. Oxenbridge, whose doctrine and
example are like a book and a map, not only instructing the ear, but
demonstrating to the eye which way we ought to travel. I shall upon
occasion henceforward inform your excellency of any particularities
in our little affairs. I have no more at present but to give thanks to
God for your lordship, and to beg grace of him, to approve myself.
* * * * *
Mr. Marvel's first appearance in public business at home, was, in
being assistant to Milton as Latin secretary to the Protector. He
himself tells us, in a piece called The Rehearsal Transposed, that
he never had any, not the remotest relation to public matters, nor
correspondence with the persons then predominant, until the year 1657,
when indeed, says he, 'I entered into an employment, for which I
was not altogether improper, and which I considered to be the most
innocent, and inoffensive towards his Majesty's affairs of any in that
usurped, and irregular government, to which all men were then exposed;
and this I accordingly discharged, without disobliging any one person,
there having been opportunities, and endeavours since his Majesty's
happy return, to have discovered, had it been otherwise.'
A little before the Restoration, he was chosen by his native
town, Kingston upon Hull, to sit in that Parliament which began at
Westminster April 25, 1660, and again after the Restoration for that
which began at the same place May 8, 1661. In this station our author
discharged his trust with the utmost fidelity, and always shewed a
peculiar regard for those he represented; for he constantly sent the
particulars of every proceeding in the House, to the heads of the town
for which he was elected; and to those accounts he always joined
his own opinion. This respectful behaviour gained so much on their
affections, that they allowed him an honourable pension to his death,
all which time he continued in Parliament. Mr. Marvel was not endowed
with the gift of eloquence, for he seldom spoke in the house; but was
however capable of forming an excellent judgment of things, and was so
acute a discerner of characters, that his opinion was greatly valued,
and he had a powerful influence over many of the Members without
doors. Prince Rupert particularly esteemed him, and whenever he voted
agreeable to the sentiments of Mr. Marvel, it was a saying of the
opposite party, he has been with his tutor. The intimacy between this
illustrious foreigner, and our author was so great, that when it was
unsafe for the latter to have it known where he lived, on account of
some mischief which was threatened him, the prince would frequently
visit him in a disguised habit. Mr. Marvel was often in such danger of
assassination, that he was obliged to have his letters directed to him
in another name, to prevent any discovery that way. He made himself
obnoxious to the government, both by his actions, and writings; and
notwithstanding his proceedings were all contrary to his private
interest, nothing could ever make his resolution, of which the
following is a notable instance, and transmits our author's name with
lustre to posterity.
One night he was entertained by the King, who had often been delighted
with his company: his Majesty next day sent the lord treasurer Danby
to find out his lodging; Mr. Marvel, then rented a room up two pair of
stairs, in a little court in the Strand, and was writing when the lord
treasurer opened the door abruptly upon him. Surprized at the sight
of so unexpected a visitor, Mr. Marvel told his lordship, that he
believed he had mistaken his way; the lord Danby replied, not now I
have found Mr. Marvel: telling him that he came with a message from
his Majesty, which was to know what he could do to serve him? his
answer was, in his usual facetious manner, that it was not in his
Majesty's power to serve him: but coming to a serious explanation of
his meaning, he told the lord treasurer, that he well knew the nature
of courts, and that whoever is distinguished by a Prince's favour, is
certainly expected to vote in his interest. The lord Danby told him,
that his Majesty had only a just sense of his merits, in regard to
which alone, he desired to know whether there was any place at
court he could be pleased with. These offers, though, urged with
the greatest earnestness, had no effect upon him; he told the lord
treasurer, that he could not accept it with honour, for he must either
be ungrateful to the King by voting against him, or betray his country
by giving his voice against its interest, at least what he reckoned
so. The only favour therefore which he begged of his Majesty, was,
that he would esteem him as dutiful a subject as any he had, and
more in his proper interest in rejecting his offers, than if he had
embraced them. The lord Danby finding no arguments would prevail, told
him, the King had ordered a thousand pounds for him, which he hoped he
would accept, 'till he could think what farther to ask of his Majesty.
This last temptation was refused with the same stedfastness of mind as
the first.
The reader must have already taken notice that Mr. Marvel's chief
support was the pension allowed him by his constituents, that his
lodgings, were mean, and consequently his circumstances at this time
could not be affluent. His resisting these temptations therefore in
such a situation, was perhaps one of the most heroic instances of
patriotism the Annals of England can furnish. But his conduct will be
still heightened into a more amiable light, when it is related, that
as soon as the lord treasurer had taken his leave, he was obliged to
send to a friend to borrow a guinea. As the most powerful allurements
of riches, and honour, could never seduce him to relinquish the
interest of his country, so not even the most immense dangers could
deter him from pursuing it. In a private letter to a friend from
Highgate, in which he mentions the insuperable hatred of his foes to
him, and their design of murthering him, he has these words; Praeterea
magis eccidere metuo quam occidi, non quod vitam tanti aestimem, sed
ne imparatus moriar, i.e., 'Besides, I am more apprehensive of killing,
than being killed, not that I value life so much, but that I may not
die unprepared.' Mr. Marvel did not remain an unconcerned member of
the state, when he saw encroachments made upon it both by the civil,
and ecclesiastical powers. He saw that some of the bishops had formed
an idea of protestantism very different from the true one, and
were making such advances towards popery, as would soon issue in a
reconciliation. Amongst these ecclesiastics, none was so forward
as Dr. Samuel Parker, who published at London 1672 in 8vo. bishop
Bramhal's Vindication of himself, and the Episcopal Clergy, from the
Presbyterian charge of Popery, as it is managed by Mr. Baxter in his
Treatise on the Grotian Religion. Dr. Parker likewise preached up
the doctrine of Non-resistance, which slavish principle is admirably
calculated to prepare the people for receiving any yoke. Marvel, whose
talent consisted in drollery, more than in serious reasoning, took
his own method of exposing those opinions. He wrote a piece called
The Rehearsal Transposed, in which he very successfully ridiculed Dr.
Parker. This ludicrous essay met with several answers, some serious,
and others humorous; we shall not here enumerate all the Rejoinders,
Replies, and Animad-versions upon it. Wood himself confesses, who was
an avowed enemy to Marvel, 'that Dr. Parker judged it more prudent
rather to lay down the cudgels, than to enter the lists again, with an
untowardly combatant, so hugely well versed, and experienced, in
the then newly refined art of sporting, and jeering buffoonery.'
And bishop Burnet tells us in the History of his own Time, 'That
Dr. Parker, after he had for some years entertained the nation with
several virulent books, was attacked by the liveliest droll of
the age, who wrote in a burlesque stile, but with so peculiar, and
entertaining a conduct, that from the King down to the tradesman, his
book was read with great pleasure. This not only humbled Parker, but
the whole party, for the author of The Rehearsal Transposed, had all
the men of wit on his side.' Dr. Swift likewise in his Apology for
the Tale of a Tub, speaking of the usual fate of common answerers to
books, and how short-lived their labours are, observes, 'That there is
indeed an exception, when any great genius thinks it worth his while
to expose a foolish piece; so we still read Marvel's answer to Parker
with pleasure, though the book it answers be sunk long ago.'
The next controversy in which we find Mr. Marvel engaged, was with
an antagonist of the pious Dr. Croft, bishop of Hereford, who wrote a
discourse entitled The Naked Truth, or A True State of the Primitive
Church: By an humble Moderator. Dr. Turner, fellow of St. John's
College, wrote Animadversions upon this book; Mr. Marvel's answer to
these Animadversions, was entitled Mr. Smirk, or The Divine in Mode;
being certain Annotations upon the Animadversions on The Naked Truth,
together with a Short Historical Essay concerning General Councils,
Creeds, and Impositions in Matters of Religion, printed 1676.
Our author's next work was An Account of the Growth of Popery, and
Arbitrary Government in England; more particularly from the long
prorogation of November 1675, ending February 15, 1676, 'till the
meeting of Parliament July 15, 1677, printed in folio 1678. Our author
in a letter dated June 10, 1678, wrote thus; 'There came out about
Christmas last here, a large book concerning the Growth of Popery,
and Arbitrary Government. There have been great rewards offered in
private, and considerable, in the Gazette, to any, who would inform of
the author, and Printer, but not yet discovered. Three or four printed
books since have described (as near as was proper to go, the man being
a member of Parliament) Mr. Marvel to be the author, but if he had, he
surely could not have escaped being questioned in Parliament, or 'Some
other place.' This book was so offensive to the court at that time,
that an order was published in these words,
'Whereas there have been lately printed, and published several
seditious, and scandalous libels against the proceedings of both
Houses of Parliament, and other his Majesty's Courts of Justice,
to the dishonour of his Majesty's government, and the hazard of the
public peace, these are to give notice, that what person soever shall
discover unto one of the secretaries of state, the printer, publisher,
author, or hander to the press of any of the said libels, so that
full evidence may be made thereof to a Jury, without mentioning the
informer, especially one libel, entitled An Account of the Growth
of Popery; and another called A Reasonable Argument to all the Grand
Juries, &c. the discoverer shall be rewarded as follows; he shall
have fifty pounds for such discovery as aforesaid, of the printer or
publisher of it from the press, and for the hander of it to the press,
one hundred pounds.'
Mr. Marvel begins this book with a panegyric on the constitution of
the English government, shewing how happy the people are under such
wholesome laws, which if faithfully observed, must make a people
happy, and a monarch great. He observes, that the king and the subject
are equally under the laws; and that the former is no longer king than
he continues to obey them. 'So that, says he, the kings of England,
are in nothing inferior to other princes, save in being more abridg'd
from injuring their own subjects, but have as large a field as any of
external felicity, wherein to exercise their own virtue, and to reward
and encourage it in others. In short there is nothing that comes
nearer the divine perfection, than when the monarch, as with us,
enjoys a capacity of doing all the good imaginable to mankind, under a
disability of all that is evil.'
After slightly tracing popery from earlier times, he begins with the
Dutch war in 1665; but dwells most upon the proceedings at Rome, from
November 1675, to July 1677. He relates the occasion of the Dutch war,
shews that the papists, and the French in particular, were the true
springs of all our councils; and draws the following picture of
popery.
'It is such a thing, as cannot but for want of a word to express it,
be called a religion; nor is it to be mentioned with that civility,
which is otherwise decent to be used in speaking of the differences of
human opinions about divine matters; were it either open Juadism,
or plain Turkery, or, there is yet a certain Bona Fides in the most
extravagant belief, and the sincerity of an erroneous profession may
render it more pardonable: But this is a compound of all the three,
an extract of whatever is most ridiculous or impious in them,
incorporated with more peculiar absurdities of its own, in which those
were deficient; and all this deliberately contrived, and knowingly
carried on, by the solid imposture of priests, under the name of
Christianity.'
This great man died, not without strong suspicions of being poisoned,
August 16, 1678, in the 58th year of his age, and was interred in the
church of St. Giles's in the Fields; and in the year 1688 the town of
Kingston upon Hull contributed a sum of money to erect a monument over
him, in St. Giles's church, for which an epitaph was composed by an
able hand; but the minister of that church, piously forbad both the
inscription and monument to be placed there.
Mr. Wood tells us, that in his conversation, he was very modest, and
of few words; and Mr. Cooke observes, 'that he was very reserved among
people he did not very well know; but a most delightful, and improving
companion amongst his friends.'
In the year 1680, his miscellaneous poems were published, to which
is prefixed this advertisement. 'These are to certify every ingenious
reader, that all these poems, as also the other things in this book
contained, are printed according to the exact copies of my late dear
husband, under his own hand writing, both found since his death, among
his other papers.
Witness my hand,