twelve years, were now to have a vent given them, by the call of the
parliament in _April 1640_. As the occasion, on which it met, was
in the highest degree interesting, the assembly itself was the most
august, that perhaps had ever deliberated on public councils. There
was a glow of honour, of liberty, and of virtue in all hearts, in all
faces: and yet this fire was tempered with so composed a wisdom, and
so sedate a courage, that it seemed a synod of heroes; and, as some
would then say of us, could only be matched by a senate of old Rome
in its age of highest glory. To this parliament I had the honour to
be deputed, whither I went with high-erected thoughts, and a heart
panting for glory and the true service of my country. The dissolution,
which so unhappily followed, served only to increase this ardour. So
that, on our next meeting in _November_, I went freely and warmly into
the measures of those, who were supposed to mean the best. I voted,
I spoke, I impeached[21]. In a word, I gave a free scope to those
generous thoughts and purposes which had been collecting in me for so
many years, and was in the foremost rank of those, whose pulse beat
highest for liberty, and who were most active for the interest of the
public.
DR. MORE.
This was indeed a triumph, the very memory of which warms you to this
moment. So bright a flame was not easily extinguished.
MR. WALLER.
It continued for some time in all its vigour. High as my notions were
of public liberty, they did not transport me, with that zeal which
prevailed on so many others, to act against the just prerogative of the
crown, and the ancient constitution. I owe it to the conversation and
influence of the excellent society, before-mentioned, that neither the
spirit, the sense, nor, what is more, the relationship and intimate
acquaintance of Mr. HAMPDEN[22], could ever bias me to his deeper
designs, or any irreverence to the unhappy king’s person. Many things
concurred to preserve me in this due mean. The violent tendencies of
many councils on the parliament’s side; many gracious and important
compliances on the king’s; the great examples of some who had most
authority with good men; and, lastly, my own temper, which, in its
highest fervours, always inclined to moderation; these and other
circumstances kept me from the excesses, on either hand, which so few
were able to avoid in that scene of public confusion.
DR. MORE.
This moderation carries with it all the marks of a real and confirmed
virtue.
MR. WALLER.
I rather expected you would have considered it as another _sacrifice
to Insincerity_. Such, I remember, was the language of many at that
time. The enthusiasts on both sides agreed to stigmatize this temper
with the name of _Neutrality_. Yet this treatment did not prevent me,
when the war broke out, from taking a course, which I easily foresaw,
would tend to increase such suspicions; for now, to open a fresh
scene to you, I had assumed, if not new principles, yet new notions of
the manner in which good policy required me to exert my old ones. The
general virtue, or what had the appearance of it at least, had hitherto
made plain-dealing an easy and convenient conduct. But things were now
changed. The minds of all men were on fire: deep designs were laid,
and no practice stuck at that might be proper to advance the execution
of them. In this situation of affairs, what could simple honesty do,
but defeat the purpose and endanger the safety of its master? I now,
first, began to reflect that this was a virtue for other times: at
least, that not to qualify it, in some sort, was, at such a juncture,
not honesty, but imprudence: and when I had once fallen into this train
of thinking, it is wonderful how many things occurred to me to justify
and recommend it. The humour of acting always on one principle was, I
said to myself, like that of sailing with one wind: whereas the expert
mariner wins his way by plying in all directions, as occasions serve,
and making the best of all weathers. Then I considered with myself
the bad policy, in such a conjuncture, of CATO and BRUTUS, and easily
approved in my own mind the more pliant and conciliating method of
CICERO. Those stoics, thought I, ruined themselves and their cause by a
too obstinate adherence to their system. The liberal and more enlarged
conduct of the academic, who took advantage of all winds that blew in
that time of civil dissension, had a chance at least for doing his
country better service. Observation, as well as books, furnish me with
these reflections. I perceived with what difficulty the Lord FALKLAND’S
rigid principles had suffered him to accept an office of the greatest
consequence to the public safety[23]: and I understood to what an
extreme his scruples had carried him in the discharge of it[24]. This,
concluded I, can never be the office of virtue in such a world, and in
such a period. And then that of the poet, so skilled in the knowledge
of life, occurred to me,
—aut virtus nomen inane est,
Aut decus et pretium recte petit EXPERIENS vir;
that is, as I explained it, “The man of a ready and dexterous turn in
affairs; one who knows how to take advantage of all circumstances,
and is not restrained, by his bigotry, from varying his conduct, as
occasions serve, and making, as it were, _experiments_ in business.”
DR. MORE.
You poets, I suppose, have an exclusive right to explain one another;
or these words might seem to bear a more natural interpretation.
MR. WALLER.
You will understand from this account, which I have opened so
particularly to you, on what reasons I was induced to alter my plan,
or rather to pursue it with those arts of prudence and address, which
the turn of the times had now rendered necessary. The conclusion
was, I resolved to pursue steadily the king’s, which at the same
time was manifestly the nation’s interest, and yet to keep fair with
the parliament, and the managers on that side; for this appeared
the likeliest way of doing him real service. And yet some officious
scruples, which forced themselves upon me at first, had like to have
fixed me in other measures. In the stream of those who chose to desert
the houses rather than share in the violent counsels that prevailed in
them, the general disgust had also carried me to withdraw myself. But
this start of zeal was soon over. I presently saw, and found means to
satisfy the king, that it would be more for his service that I should
return to the parliament. I therefore resumed my seat, and took leave
(to say the truth, it was not denied me by the house, who had their
own ends to serve by this indulgence[25]) to reason and debate in all
points with great freedom. At the same time my affections to the common
interest were not suspected; for, having no connexion with the court,
nobody thought of charging me with private views; and not forgetting,
besides, to cultivate a good understanding with the persons of chief
credit in the house, the plainness I used could only be taken for what
it was, an honest and parliamentary liberty. This situation was, for a
time, very favourable to me: for the king’s friends regarded me as the
champion of their cause; whilst the prudence of my carriage towards the
leading members secured me, in a good degree, from their jealousy.
DR. MORE.
Your policy, I observe, had now taken a more refined turn. The juncture
of affairs might possibly justify this address: but the ground you
stood upon was slippery; and I own myself alarmed at what may be the
consequence of this solicitous pursuit of popularity.
MR. WALLER.
No exception, I think, can be fairly taken at the methods by which I
pursued it. However, this _popularity_ it was, as you rightly divine,
which drew upon me all the mischiefs that followed. For the application
of all men, disposed to the king’s service, was now made to me. I had
an opportunity, by this means, of knowing the characters and views
of particular persons, and of getting an insight into the true state
of the king’s affairs. And these advantages, in the end, drove me on
the project, which, on the discovery, came to be called my _Plot_: an
event, which, with all its particulars, you understand too well to need
any information from me about it.
DR. MORE.
The story, as it was noised abroad, I am no stranger to: but this being
one of those occasions, as they say, in which both your policy and
virtue were put to the sharpest trial, it would be much to the purpose
you have in view by this recital, to favour me with your own account of
it.
MR. WALLER.
To lead you through all particulars, would not suit with the
brevity you require of me. But something I will say to obviate the
misconceptions you may possibly have entertained of this business[26].
For the plot itself, the utmost of my design was only to form such a
combination among the honest and well-affected of all sorts, as might
have weight enough to incline the houses to a peace, and prevent the
miseries that were too certainly to be apprehended from a civil war. It
was never in my thoughts to surprize the parliament or city by force,
or engage the army in the support and execution of my purpose. But my
design in this affair, though the fury of my enemies, and the fatal
jealousy of the time, would not suffer it to be rightly understood, is
not that which my friends resented, and which most men were disposed
to blame in me. It was my behaviour afterwards, and the obliquity of
some means which I found expedient to my own safety, that exposed me
to so rude a storm of censure. It continues, I know, to beat upon me
even at this distance. But the injustice hath arisen from the force of
vulgar prejudices, and from the want of entering into those enlarged
principles, on which it was necessary for me to proceed in that
juncture.
DR. MORE.
Yet the ill success of this plot itself might have shewn you, what the
design of acting on these _enlarged principles_ was likely to come to.
It was an unlucky experiment, this, you had made in the _new_ arts
of living; and should have been a warning to you, not to proceed in
a path which, at the very entrance of it, had involved you in such
difficulties.
MR. WALLER.
No, it was not the new path, you object to me, but the good old road of
Sincerity, which misled me into those brambles. I, in the simplicity
of my heart, thought it my duty to adhere to the injured king’s
cause, and believed my continuance in parliament the fairest, as well
as the likeliest method, that could be taken to support it. Had I
temporized so far as either to desert my prince, and strike in with
the parliament, or, on the other hand, had left the house and gone with
the seceders to _Oxford_, either way I had been secure. But resolving,
as I did, to hold my principles, and follow my judgment, I fell into
those unhappy circumstances, from which all the dexterity I afterwards
assumed was little enough to deliver me.
DR. MORE.
But if your intentions were so pure, and the methods, by which you
resolved to prosecute them, so blameless, how happened it that any plot
could be worked up of so much danger to your life and person?
MR. WALLER.
This was the very thing I was going to explain to you. My intentions
towards the parliament were fair and honourable: as I retained my seat
there, I could not allow myself in the use of any but parliamentary
methods to promote the cause I had undertaken. And this, as I said,
was the whole purpose of the _combination_, which was made the
pretence to ruin me: for my unhappy project of a reconciliation was
so inextricably confounded with another of more dangerous tendency,
the _commission of array_, sent at that time from _Oxford_, that
nothing, I presently saw, could possibly disentangle so perplexed a
business, or defeat the malice of my enemies, if I attempted, in the
more direct way, to stand on my defence. Presumptions, if not proofs,
they had in abundance: the consternation of all men was great; their
rage, unrelenting; and the general enthusiasm of the time, outrageous.
Consider all this, and see what chance there was for escaping their
injustice, if I had restrained myself to the sole use of those means,
which you men of the cloister magnify so much, under I know not what
names of _Sincerity_ and _Honour_. And, indeed, this late experience,
of what was to be expected from the way of plain dealing, had
determined me, henceforth, to take a different route; and, since I had
drawn these mischiefs on myself by _Sincerity_, to try what a little
management could do towards bringing me out of them.
DR. MORE.
It was not, I perceive, without cause, that the subtlety you had begun
to have recourse to, filled me with apprehensions. Sincerity and
Honour, Mr. WALLER, are plain things, and hold no acquaintance with
this ingenious casuistry.
MR. WALLER.
What, not in such a situation? It should seem then, as if you moralists
conceived a man owed nothing to himself: that _self-preservation_ was
not what God and Nature have made it, the first and most binding of all
laws: that a man’s family, not to say his country, have no interest in
the life of an innocent and deserving citizen; and, in one word, that
_prudence_ is but an empty name, though you give it a place among your
_cardinal virtues_. All this must be concluded before you reject, as
unlawful, the means I was forced upon, at this season, for my defence:
means, I presume to say, so sagely contrived, and, as my very enemies
will own, executed so happily, that I cannot to this day reflect on my
conduct in that affair without satisfaction.
DR. MORE.
Yet it had some consequences which a man of your generosity would a
little startle at.—
MR. WALLER.
I understand you: my friends—But I shall answer that objection in its
place.
Let me at present go on with the particulars of my defence. The
occasion, as you see, was distressful to the last degree. To deny or
defend myself from the charge was a thing impossible. What remained
then but to confess it, and in so frank and ample a manner, as might
bespeak the pity or engage the protection of my accusers? I resolved
to say nothing but the _truth_; and, if ever the _whole_ truth may
be spoken, it is when so alarming an occasion calls for it. Besides,
what had others, who might be affected by the discovery, to complain
of? I disclaimed no part of the guilt myself: nor could any confession
be made, that did not first and chiefly affect me. And if I, who was
principal in the contrivance, had the best chance for escaping by such
confession, what had they, who were only accomplices, to apprehend from
it? Add to this, that the number and credit of the persons, who were
charged with having a share in the design, were, of all others, the
likeliest considerations to prevail with the houses to drop the further
prosecution of it.
Well, the discovery had great effects. But there was no stopping here.
Penitence, as well as confession, is expected from a sinner. I had to
do with hypocrites of the worst sort. What fairer weapons, then, than
hypocrisy and dissimulation? I counterfeited the strongest remorse, and
with a life and spirit that disposed all men to believe, and most to
pity me. My trial was put off in very compassion to my disorder; which,
in appearance, was so great, that some suspected my understanding had
been affected by it. In this contrivance I had two views; to gain time
for my defence, and to keep it off till the fury of my prosecutors was
abated. In this interval, indeed, some of my accomplices suffered. But
how was it possible for me to apprehend that, when, if any, I myself
might expect to have fallen the first victim of their resentment?
DR. MORE.
If this apology satisfy yourself, I need not interrupt your story with
any exceptions.
MR. WALLER.
It was, in truth, the only thing which afflicted me in the course of
this whole business. But time and reflection have reconciled me to
what was, in some sense, occasioned, but certainly not intended, by me.
And it would be a strange morality that should charge a man with the
undesigned consequences of his own actions.
DR. MORE.
And were all the symptoms of a disturbed mind, you made a shew of, then
entirely counterfeit?
MR. WALLER.
As certainly as those of the Roman BRUTUS, who, to tell you the truth,
was my example on that occasion. It was the business of both of us to
elude the malice of our enemies, and reserve ourselves for the future
service of our respective countries.
But all I have told you was only a prelude to a further, and still
more necessary, act of dissimulation. Had the house been left to
itself, it might possibly have absolved me, on the merits of so large
a confession, and so lively a repentance. But I had to do with another
class of men, with holy inquisitors of sordid minds, and sour spirits;
priestly reformers, whose sense was noise, and religion fanaticism,
and that too fermented with the leven of earthly avarice and ambition.
These had great influence both within doors and without, and would
regard what had hitherto passed as nothing, if I went not much further.
To these, having begun in so good a train, I was now to address myself.
I had studied their humours, and understood to a tittle the arts that
were most proper to gain them.
The first step to the countenance and good liking of these restorers of
primitive parity was, I well knew, the most implicit subjection both
of will and understanding. I magnified their gifts, I revered their
sanctity. I debased myself with all imaginable humility: I extolled
them with the grossest flattery.
Having thus succeeded to my wish in drawing the principal of these
saints around me, I advanced further: I sought their instruction,
solicited their advice, and importuned their ghostly consolation.
This brought me into high favour; they regarded me as one, who wished
and deserved to be enlightened: they strove which should impart most
of their lights and revelations to me. I besought them to expound,
and pray, and preach before me: nay, I even preached, and prayed,
and expounded before them. I out-canted the best-gifted of them; and
out-railed the bitterest of all their decriers of an anti-christian
prelacy. In short, it would have moved your laughter or your
indignation to observe, how submissively I demeaned myself to these
spiritual fathers; how I hung on their words, echoed their coarse
sayings, and mimicked their beggarly tones and grimaces.
To complete the farce, I intreated their acceptance of such returns
for their godly instructions, as fortune had enabled me to make
them. I prevailed with them to give leave that so unworthy a person
might be the instrument of conveying earthly accommodations to these
dispensers of heavenly treasures; and it surpasses all belief, with
what an avidity they devoured them! It is true, this last was a serious
consideration: in all other respects, the whole was a perfect comedy;
and of so ridiculous a cast, that, though my situation gave me power of
face to carry it off gravely then, I have never reflected on it since
without laughter.
DR. MORE.
Truly, as you describe it, it was no serious scene. But what I admire
most, is the dexterity of your genius, and the prodigious progress you
had now made in your favourite arts of _accommodation_.
MR. WALLER.
Necessity is the best master. Besides, can you blame me for taking more
than common pains to outdo these miscreants in their own way; I might
say, to excel in an art which surpasses, or at least comprises in it
the essence of all true wisdom? The precept of your admired ANTONINUS,
as you reminded me to-day, is SIMPLIFY YOURSELF[27]. That, I think,
was the quaint expression. It had shewn his reach and mastery in the
trade he professed, much more, if instead of it, he had preached up,
ACCOMMODATE YOURSELF; the grand secret, as long experience has taught
me, _bene beateque vivendi_.
All matters thus prepared, there was now no hazard in playing my
last game. I requested and obtained leave to make my defence before
the parliament. I had acquired a knack in speaking; and had drawn
on myself more credit, than fine words deserve, by a scenical and
specious eloquence. If ever I acquitted myself to my wish, it was on
this occasion. I soothed, I flattered, I alarmed: every topic of art
which my youth had learned, every subject of address which experience
had suggested, every trick and artifice of popular adulation, was
exhausted. All men were prepared by the practices of my saintly
emissaries to hear me with favour; and, which is the first and last
advantage of a speaker, to believe me seriously and conscientiously
affected.
In the end I triumphed; and for a moderate fine obtained leave to
shelter myself from the following storm, which almost desolated this
unhappy country, by retiring into an exile, at that time more desirable
than any employment of those I left behind me.
DR. MORE.
You retired, I think, to _France_, whither, no doubt, you carried with
you all those generous thoughts and consolatory reflexions, which
refresh the spirit of a good man under a consciousness of suffering
virtue.
MR. WALLER.
Why not, if _prudence_ be a virtue? for what, but certain prudential
regards (which in common language and common sense are quite another
thing from vicious compliances) have hitherto, as you have seen,
appeared in my conduct? But be they what they will, they had a very
natural effect, and one which will always attend on so reasonable a
way of proceeding. For, since you press me so much, I shall take leave
to suggest an observation to you, more obvious as well as more candid
than any you seem inclined to make on the circumstances of this long
relation. It is, “that the _pretended_ penitence for my past life, and
the readiness I shewed to acquiesce in the _false_ accounts which the
parliament gave of my plot, saved my life, and procured my liberty;
whilst the _real and true_ discoveries I made to gain credit to _both_,
hurt my reputation.” But such a reflexion might have shocked your
system too much. For it shews that all the benefit, I drew to myself
in this affair, arose from those _prudential maxims_ you condemn; and
that all the injury, I suffered, was owing to the _sincerity_ I still
mixed with them.
DR. MORE.
Seriously, Sir——
MR. WALLER.
I can guess what you would say: but you promised to hear me out,
without interruption.
What remains I shall dispatch in few words, having so fully vindicated
the most obnoxious part of my life, and opened the general principles,
I acted upon, so clearly.
I went, as you said, to _France_; where, instead of the churlish humour
of a malcontent, or the unmanly dejection of a disgraced exile, I
appeared with an ease and gaiety of mind, which made me welcome to the
greatest men of that country. The ruling principle of my philosophy
was, to make the best of every situation. And, as my fortune enabled me
to do it, I lived with hospitality, and even splendour; and indulged
myself in all the delights of an enlarged and elegant conversation.
Such were my amusements for some years; during which time, however, I
preserved the notions of loyalty, which had occasioned my disgrace,
and waited some happier turn of affairs, that might restore me with
honour to my country. But when all hopes of this sort were at an end,
and the government, after the various revolutions which are well
known, seemed fixed and established in the person of one man, it
was not allegiance, but obstinacy, to hold out any longer. I easily
succeeded in my application to be recalled, and was even admitted to
a share in the confidence of the PROTECTOR. This great man was not
without a sensibility of true glory; and, for that reason, was even
ambitious of the honour, which wit and genius are ever ready to confer
on illustrious greatness. Every muse of that time distinguished, and
was distinguished by, him. Mine had improved her voice and accent in a
foreign country: and what nobler occasion to try her happiest strain
than this, of immortalizing a Hero?
“Illustrious acts high raptures do infuse,
And ev’ry conqueror creates a muse;”
as I then said in a panegyric, which my gratitude prompted me to
present to him[28].
DR. MORE.
This panegyric, presented in verse, could hardly, I suppose, be
suspected of flattery!
MR. WALLER.