solace of a good old age, if God vouchsafe it me, the honest
liberty of free speech from my youth, where I shall think it
available in so dear a concernment as the church's good. For
if I be, either by disposition or what other cause, too
inquisitive, or suspicious of myself and mine own doings, who
can help it? But this I foresee, that should the church be
brought under heavy oppression, and God have given me ability
the while to reason against that man that should be the author
of so foul a deed; or should she, by blessing from above on
the industry and courage of faithful men, change this her
distracted estate into better days, without the least
furtherance or contribution of those few talents, which God at
that present had lent me; I foresee what stories I should hear
within myself, all my life after, of discourage and reproach.
Timorous and ungrateful, the church of God is now again at the
foot of her insulting enemies, and thou bewailest. What
matters it for thee, or thy bewailing? When time was, thou
couldst not find a syllable of all that thou hast read, or
studied, to utter in her behalf. Yet ease and leisure was
given thee for thy retired thoughts, out of the sweat of other
men. Thou hast the diligence, the parts, the language of a
man, if a vain subject were to be adorned or beautified; but
when the cause of God and his church was to be pleaded, for
which purpose that tongue was given thee which thou hast, God
listened if he could hear thy voice among his zealous
servants, but thou wert dumb as a beast; from henceforward be
that which thine own brutish silence hath made thee. Or else I
should have heard on the other ear: Slothful, and ever to be
set light by, the church hath now overcome her late distresses
after the unwearied labours of many her true servants that
stood up in her defence; thou also wouldst take upon thee to
share amongst them of their joy: but wherefore thou? Where
canst thou shew any word or deed of thine which might have
hastened her peace? Whatever thou dost now talk, or write, or
look, is the alms of other men's active prudence and zeal.
Dare not now to say or do anything better than thy former
sloth and infancy; or if thou darest, thou dost impudently to
make a thrifty purchase of boldness to thyself, out of the
painful merits of other men; what before was thy sin is now
thy duty, to be abject and worthless. These, and such-like
lessons as these, I know would have been my matins duly, and
my even-song. But now by this little diligence, mark what a
privilege I have gained with good men and saints, to claim my
right of lamenting the tribulations of the church, if she
should suffer, when others, that have ventured nothing for her
sake, have not the honour to be admitted mourners. But if she
lift up her drooping head and prosper, among those that have
something more than wished her welfare, I have my charter and
freehold of rejoicing to me and my heirs. Concerning therefore
this wayward subject against prelaty, the touching whereof is
so distasteful and disquietous to a number of men, as by what
hath been said I may deserve of charitable readers to be
credited, that neither envy nor gall hath entered me upon this
controversy, but the enforcement of conscience only, and a
preventive fear lest the omitting of this duty should be
against me, when I would store up to myself the good provision
of peaceful hours: so, lest it should be still imputed to me,
as I have found it hath been, that some self-pleasing humour
of vain-glory hath incited me to contest with men of high
estimation, now while green years are upon my head; from this
needless surmisal I shall hope to dissuade the intelligent and
equal auditor, if I can but say successfully that which in
this exigent behoves me; although I would be heard only, if it
might be, by the elegant and learned reader, to whom
principally for a while I shall beg leave I may address
myself. To him it will be no new thing, though I tell him that
if I hunted after praise, by the ostentation of wit and
learning, I should not write thus out of mine own season when
I have neither yet completed to my mind the full circle of my
private studies, although I complain not of any insufficiency
to the matter in hand; or were I ready to my wishes, it were a
folly to commit anything elaborately composed to the careless
and interrupted listening of these tumultuous times. Next, if
I were wise only to my own ends, I would certainly take such a
subject as of itself might catch applause, whereas this hath
all the disadvantages on the contrary, and such a subject as
the publishing whereof might be delayed at pleasure, and time
enough to pencil it over with all the curious touches of art,
even to the perfection of a faultless picture; whenas in this
argument the not deferring is of great moment to the good
speeding, that if solidity have leisure to do her office, art
cannot have much. Lastly, I should not choose this manner of
writing, wherein knowing myself inferior to myself, led by the
genial power of nature to another task, I have the use, as I
may account, but of my left hand. And though I shall be
foolish in saying more to this purpose, yet, since it will be
such a folly, as wisest men go about to commit, having only
confessed and so committed, I may trust with more reason,
because with more folly, to have courteous pardon. For
although a poet, soaring in the high reason of his fancies,
with his garland and singing robes about him, might, without
apology, speak more of himself than I mean to do; yet for me
sitting here below in the cool element of prose, a mortal
thing among many readers of no empyreal conceit, to venture
and divulge unusual things of myself, I shall petition to the
gentler sort, it may not be envy to me. I must say, therefore,
that after I had for my first years, by the ceaseless
diligence and care of my father, (whom God recompense!) been
exercised to the tongues, and some sciences, as my age would
suffer, by sundry masters and teachers, both at home and at
the schools, it was found that whether aught was imposed me by
them that had the overlooking, or betaken to of mine own
choice in English, or other tongue, prosing or versing, but
chiefly by this latter, the style, by certain vital signs it
had, was likely to live. But much latelier in the private
academies of Italy, whither I was favoured to resort,
perceiving that some trifles which I had in memory, composed
at under twenty or thereabout, (for the manner is, that every
one must give some proof of his wit and reading there,) met
with acceptance above what was looked for; and other things,
which I had shifted in scarcity of books and conveniences to
patch up amongst them, were received with written encomiums,
which the Italian is not forward to bestow on men of this side
the Alps; I began thus far to assent both to them and divers
of my friends here at home, and not less to an inward
prompting which now grew daily upon me, that by labour and
intense study, (which I take to be my portion in this life,)
joined with the strong propensity of nature, I might perhaps
leave something so written to aftertimes, as they should not
willingly let it die. These thoughts at once possessed me, and
these other; that if I were certain to write as men buy
leases, for three lives and downward, there ought no regard be
sooner had than to God's glory, by the honour and instruction
of my country. For which cause, and not only for that I knew
it would be hard to arrive at the second rank among the
Latins, I applied myself to that resolution, which Ariosto
followed against the persuasions of Bembo, to fix all the
industry and art I could unite to the adorning of my native
tongue; not to make verbal curiosities the end, (that were a
toilsome vanity,) but to be an interpreter and relater of the
best and sagest things among mine own citizens throughout this
island in the mother dialect. That what the greatest and
choicest wits of Athens, Rome, or modern Italy, and those
Hebrews of old did for their country, I, in my proportion,
with this over and above, of being a Christian, might do for
mine; not caring to be once named abroad, though perhaps I
could attain to that, but content with these British islands
as my world; whose fortune hath hitherto been, that if the
Athenians, as some say, made their small deeds great and
renowned by their eloquent writers, England hath had her
noble achievements made small by the unskilful handling of
monks and mechanics.
Time serves not now, and perhaps I might seem too profuse to
give any certain account of what the mind at home, in the
spacious circuits of her musing, hath liberty to propose to
herself, though of highest hope and hardest attempting;
whether that epic form whereof the two poems of Homer, and
those other two of Virgil and Tasso, are a diffuse, and the
book of Job a brief model: or whether the rules of Aristotle
herein are strictly to be kept, or nature to be followed,
which in them that know art, and use judgment, is no
transgression, but an enriching of art: and lastly, what king
or knight, before the conquest, might be chosen in whom to lay
the pattern of a Christian hero. And as Tasso gave to a prince
of Italy his choice whether he would command him to write of
Godfrey's expedition against the Infidels, or Belisarius
against the Goths, or Charlemagne against the Lombards; if to
the instinct of nature and the emboldening of art aught may be
trusted, and that there be nothing adverse in our climate, or
the fate of this age, it haply would be no rashness, from an
equal diligence and inclination, to present the like offer in
our own ancient stories; or whether those dramatic
constitutions, wherein Sophocles and Euripides reign, shall be
found more doctrinal and exemplary to a nation. The Scripture
also affords us a divine pastoral drama in the Song of
Solomon, consisting of two persons, and a double chorus, as
Origen rightly judges. And the Apocalypse of St. John is the
majestic image of a high and stately tragedy, shutting up and
intermingling her solemn scenes and acts with a sevenfold
chorus of hallelujahs and harping symphonies: and this my
opinion the grave authority of Pareus, commenting that book,
is sufficient to confirm. Or if occasion shall lead, to
imitate those magnific odes and hymns, wherein Pindarus and
Callimachus are in most things worthy, some others in their
frame judicious, in their matter most an end faulty. But those
frequent songs throughout the law and prophets beyond all
these, not in their divine argument alone, but in the very
critical art of composition, may be easily made appear over
all the kinds of lyric poesy to be incomparable. These
abilities, wheresoever they be found, are the inspired gift of
God, rarely bestowed, but yet to some (though most abuse) in
every nation; and are of power, beside the office of a pulpit,
to imbreed and cherish in a great people the seeds of virtue
and public civility, to allay the perturbations of the mind,
and set the affections in right tune; to celebrate in glorious
and lofty hymns the throne and equipage of God's almightiness,
and what he works, and what he suffers to be wrought with high
providence in his church; to sing victorious agonies of
martyrs and saints, the deeds and triumphs of just and pious
nations, doing valiantly through faith against the enemies of
Christ; to deplore the general relapses of kingdoms and states
from justice and God's true worship. Lastly, whatsoever in
religion is holy and sublime, in virtue amiable or grave,
whatsoever hath passion or admiration in all the changes of
that which is called fortune from without, or the wily
subtleties and refluxes of man's thoughts from within; all
these things with a solid and treatable smoothness to paint
out and describe. Teaching over the whole book of sanctity and
virtue, through all the instances of example, with such
delight to those especially of soft and delicious temper, who
will not so much as look upon truth herself, unless they see
her elegantly dressed; that whereas the paths of honesty and
good life appear now rugged and difficult, though they be
indeed easy and pleasant, they will then appear to all men
both easy and pleasant, though they were rugged and difficult
indeed. And what a benefit this would be to our youth and
gentry, may be soon guessed by what we know of the corruption
and bane which they suck in daily from the writings and
interludes of libidinous and ignorant poetasters, who having
scarce ever heard of that which is the main consistence of a
true poem, the choice of such persons as they ought to
introduce, and what is moral and decent to each one; do for
the most part lay up vicious principles in sweet pills to be
swallowed down, and make the taste of virtuous documents harsh
and sour. But because the spirit of man cannot demean itself
lively in this body, without some recreating intermission of
labour and serious things, it were happy for the commonwealth,
if our magistrates, as in those famous governments of old,
would take into their care, not only the deciding of our
contentious law-cases and brawls, but the managing of our
public sports and festival pastimes; that they might be, not
such as were authorized a while since, the provocations of
drunkenness and lust, but such as may inure and harden our
bodies by martial exercises to all warlike skill and
performance; and may civilize, adorn, and make discreet our
minds by the learned and affable meeting of frequent
academies, and the procurement of wise and artful recitations,
sweetened with eloquent and graceful enticements to the love
and practice of justice, temperance, and fortitude,
instructing and bettering the nation at all opportunities,
that the call of wisdom and virtue may be heard everywhere, as
Solomon saith: 'She crieth without, she uttereth her voice in
the streets, in the top of high places, in the chief
concourse, and in the openings of the gates.' Whether this may
not be, not only in pulpits, but after another persuasive
method, at set and solemn paneguries, in theatres, porches, or
what other place or way may win most upon the people to
receive at once both recreation and instruction, let them in
authority consult. The thing which I had to say and those
intentions which have lived within me ever since I could
conceive myself anything worth to my country, I return to
crave excuse that urgent reason hath plucked from me, by an
abortive and foredated discovery. And the accomplishment of
them lies not but in a power above man's to promise; but that
none hath by more studious ways endeavoured, and with more
unwearied spirit that none shall, that I dare almost aver of
myself, as far as life and free leisure will extend; and that
the land had once enfranchised herself from this impertinent
yoke of prelaty, under whose inquisitorious and tyrannical
duncery, no free and splendid wit can flourish. Neither do I
think it shame to covenant with any knowing reader, that for
some years yet I may go on trust with him toward the payment
of what I am now indebted, as being a work not to be raised
from the heat of youth, or the vapours of wine; like that
which flows at waste from the pen of some vulgar amourist, or
the trencher fury of a rhyming parasite; nor to be obtained by
the invocation of dame Memory and her Siren daughters, but by
devout prayer to that eternal Spirit, who can enrich with all
utterance and knowledge, and sends out his seraphim, with the
hallowed fire of his altar, to touch and purify the lips of
whom he pleases: to this must be added industrious and select
reading, steady observation, insight into all seemly and
generous arts and affairs; till which in some measure be
compassed, at mine own peril and cost, I refuse not to sustain
this expectation from as many as are not loth to hazard so
much credulity upon the best pledges that I can give them.
Although it nothing content me to have disclosed thus much
beforehand, but that I trust hereby to make it manifest with
what small willingness I endure to interrupt the pursuit of no
less hopes than these, and leave a calm and pleasing
solitariness, fed with cheerful and confident thoughts, to
embark in a troubled sea of noises and hoarse disputes, put
from beholding the bright countenance of truth in the quiet
and still air of delightful studies, to come into the dim
reflection of hollow antiquities sold by the seeming bulk, and
there be fain to club quotations with men whose learning and
belief lies in marginal stuffings, who, when they have, like
good sumpters, laid ye down their horse-loads of citations and
fathers at your door, with a rhapsody of who and who were
bishops here or there, ye may take off their packsaddles,
their day's work is done, and episcopacy, as they think,
stoutly vindicated. Let any gentle apprehension, that can
distinguish learned pains from unlearned drudgery imagine what
pleasure or profoundness can be in this, or what honour to
deal against such adversaries. But were it the meanest
under-service, if God by his secretary conscience enjoin it,
it were sad for me if I should draw back; for me especially,
now when all men offer their aid to help, ease, and lighten
the difficult labours of the church, to whose service, by the
intentions of my parents and friends, I was destined of a
child, and in mine own resolutions: till coming to some
maturity of years, and perceiving what tyranny had invaded the
church, that he who would take orders must subscribe slave,
and take an oath withal, which, unless he took with a
conscience that would retch, he must either straight perjure,
or split his faith; I thought it better to prefer a blameless
silence before the sacred office of speaking, bought and begun
with servitude and forswearing. Howsoever, thus church-outed
by the prelates, hence may appear the right I have to meddle
in these matters, as before the necessity and constraint
appeared.
_From 'Apology for Smectymnuus'_
If, readers, to that same great difficulty of well-doing what
we certainly know, were not added in most men as great a
carelessness of knowing what they and others ought to do, we
had been long ere this, no doubt but all of us, much further
on our way to some degree of peace and happiness in this
kingdom. But since our sinful neglect of practising that which
we know to be undoubtedly true and good, hath brought forth
among us, through God's just anger, so great a difficulty now
to know that which otherwise might be soon learnt, and hath
divided us by a controversy of great importance indeed, but of
no hard solution, which is the more our punishment; I resolved
(of what small moment soever I might be thought) to stand on
that side where I saw both the plain authority of scripture
leading, and the reason of justice and equity persuading; with
this opinion, which esteems it more unlike a Christian to be a
cold neuter in the cause of the church, than the law of Solon
made it punishable after a sedition in the state.
And because I observe that fear and dull disposition,
lukewarmness and sloth, are not seldomer wont to cloak
themselves under the affected name of moderation, than true
and lively zeal is customably disparaged with the term of
indiscretion, bitterness, and choler; I could not to my
thinking honour a good cause more from the heart, than by
defending it earnestly, as oft as I could judge it to behove
me, notwithstanding any false name that could be invented to
wrong or undervalue an honest meaning. Wherein although I have
not doubted to single forth more than once such of them as
were thought the chief and most nominated opposers on the
other side, whom no man else undertook; if I have done well
either to be confident of the truth, whose force is best seen
against the ablest resistance, or to be jealous and tender of
the hurt that might be done among the weaker by the entrapping
authority of great names titled to false opinions; or that it
be lawful to attribute somewhat to gifts of God's imparting,
which I boast not, but thankfully acknowledge, and fear also
lest at my certain account they be reckoned to me rather many
than few; or if lastly it be but justice not to defraud of due
esteem the wearisome labours and studious watchings, wherein I
have spent and tired out almost a whole youth, I shall not
distrust to be acquitted of presumption: knowing, that if
heretofore all ages have received with favour and good
acceptance the early industry of him that hath been hopeful,
it were but hard measure now if the freedom of any timely
spirit should be oppressed merely by the big and blunted fame
of his elder adversary; and that his sufficiency must be now
sentenced, not by pondering the reason he shews, but by
calculating the years he brings.
However, as my purpose is not, nor hath been formerly, to look
on my adversary abroad, through the deceiving glass of other
men's great opinion of him, but at home, where I may find him
in the proper light of his own worth, so now against the
rancour of an evil tongue, from which I never thought so
absurdly, as that I of all men should be exempt, I must be
forced to proceed from the unfeigned and diligent inquiry of
my own conscience at home, (for better way I know not,
readers,) to give a more true account of myself abroad than
this modest confuter, as he calls himself, hath given of me.
Albeit, that in doing this I shall be sensible of two things
which to me will be nothing pleasant; the one is, that not
unlikely I shall be thought too much a party in mine own
cause, and therein to see least: the other, that I shall be
put unwillingly to molest the public view with the vindication
of a private name; as if it were worth the while that the
people should care whether such a one were thus, or thus. Yet
those I entreat who have found the leisure to read that name,
however of small repute, unworthily defamed, would be so good
and so patient as to hear the same person not unneedfully
defended.
I will not deny but that the best apology against false
accusers is silence and sufferance, and honest deeds set
against dishonest words. And that I could at this time most
easily and securely, with the least loss of reputation, use no
other defence, I need not despair to win belief; whether I
consider both the foolish contriving and ridiculous aiming of
these his slanderous bolts, shot so wide of any suspicion to
be fastened on me, that I have oft with inward contentment
perceived my friends congratulating themselves in my
innocence, and my enemies ashamed of their partner's folly: or
whether I look at these present times, wherein most men, now
scarce permitted the liberty to think over their own
concernments, have removed the seat of their thoughts more
outward to the expectation of public events: or whether the
examples of men, either noble or religious, who have sat down
lately with a meek silence and sufferance under many libellous
endorsements, may be a rule to others, I might well appease
myself to put up any reproaches in such an honourable society
of fellow-sufferers, using no other defence.
And were it that slander would be content to make an end where
it first fixes, and not seek to cast out the like infamy upon
each thing that hath but any relation to the person traduced,
I should have pleaded against this confuter by no other
advocates than those which I first commended, silence and
sufferance, and speaking deeds against faltering words. But
when I discerned his intent was not so much to smite at me, as
through me to render odious the truth which I had written, and
to stain with ignominy that evangelic doctrine which opposes
the tradition of prelacy, I conceived myself to be now not as
mine own person, but as a member incorporate into that truth
whereof I was persuaded, and whereof I had declared openly to
be a partaker. Whereupon I thought it my duty, if not to
myself, yet to the religious cause I had in hand, not to leave
on my garment the least spot or blemish in good name, so long
as God should give me to say that which might wipe it off;
lest those disgraces which I ought to suffer, if it so befall
me, for my religion, through my default religion be made
liable to suffer for me. And, whether it might not something
reflect upon those reverent men, whose friend I may be thought
in writing the Animadversions, was not my last care to
consider: if I should rest under these reproaches, having the
same common adversary with them, it might be counted small
credit for their cause to have found such an assistant, as
this babbler hath devised me. What other thing in his book
there is of dispute or question, in answering thereto I doubt
not to be justified; except there be who will condemn me to
have wasted time in throwing down that which could not keep
itself up. As for others, who notwithstanding what I can
allege have yet decreed to misinterpret the intents of my
reply, I suppose they would have found as many causes to have
misconceived the reasons of my silence.
* * * * *