Part 10

The passion for LETTERS was extreme. The novelty of these studies, the artifices that had been used to keep men from them, their apparent uses, and, perhaps, some confused notion of a certain diviner virtue than really belongs to them; these causes concurred to excite a curiosity in all, and determined those, who had leisure, as well as curiosity, to make themselves acquainted with the _Greek_ and _Roman_ learning. The ecclesiastics, who, for obvious reasons, would be the first and most earnest in their application to letters, were not the only persons transported with this zeal. The gentry and nobility themselves were seized with it. A competent knowledge of the old writers was looked upon as essential to a gentleman’s education. So that _Greek_ and _Latin_ became as fashionable at court in those days, as _French_ is in ours. ELIZABETH herself, which I wonder you did not put me in mind of, was well skilled in both[88]; they say, employed her leisure in making some fine translations out of either language. It is easy to see what effect this general attention to letters must have on the minds of the liberal and well-educated. And it was a happiness peculiar to that age, that learning, though cultivated with such zeal, had not as yet degenerated into pedantry: I mean, that, in those stirring and active times, it was cultivated, not so much for show, as use; and was not followed, as it soon came to be, to the exclusion of other generous and manly applications.

Consider, too, the effects, which the alterations in RELIGION had produced. As they had been lately made, as their importance was great, and as the benefits of the change had been earned at the expence of much blood and labour: all these considerations begot a zeal for religion, which hardly ever appears under other circumstances. This zeal had an immediate and very sensible effect on the morals of the Reformed. It improved them in every instance; especially as it produced a cheerful submission to the government, which had rescued them from their former slavery, and was still their only support against the returning dangers of superstition. Thus religion, acting with all its power, and that, too, heightened by gratitude and even self-interest, bound obedience on the minds of men with the strongest ties[89]. And luckily for the queen, this obedience was further secured to her by the high uncontroverted notions of royalty, which, at that time, obtained amongst the people.

Lay all this together; and then tell me where is the wonder that a people, now emerging out of ignorance; uncorrupted by wealth, and therefore undebauched by luxury; trained to obedience, and nurtured in simplicity; but, above all, caught with the love of learning and religion, while neither of them was worn for fashion-sake, or, what is worse, perverted to the ends of vanity or ambition; where, say, is the wonder that such a people should present so bright a picture of manner’s to their admiring panegyrist?

To be fair with you; it was one of those conjunctures, in which the active virtues are called forth, and rewarded. The dangers of the time had roused the spirit, and brought out all the force and genius, of the nation. A sort of enthusiasm had fired every man with the ambition of exerting the full strength of his faculties, which way soever they pointed, whether to the field, the closet, or the cabinet. Hence such a crop of soldiers, scholars, and statesmen had sprung up, as have rarely been seen to flourish together in any country. And as all owed their duty, it was the fashion of the times for all to bring their pretensions, to the court. So that, where the multitude of candidates was so great, it had been strange indeed, if an ordinary discretion had not furnished the queen with able servants of all sorts; and the rather, as her occasions loudly called upon her to employ the ablest.

I was waiting, said Dr. ARBUTHNOT, to see to what conclusion this career of your eloquence would at length drive you. And it hath happened in this case, as in most others where a favourite point is to be carried, that a zeal for it is indulged, though at the expence of some other of more importance. Rather than admit the personal virtues of the queen, you fill her court, nay, her kingdom, with heroes and sages: and so have paid a higher compliment to her reign, than I had intended.

To her _reign_, if you will, replied Mr. ADDISON, so far as regards the qualities and dispositions of her subjects: for I will not lessen the merit of this concession with you, by insisting, as I might, that their _manners_, respectable as they were, were debased by the contrary, yet very consistent, vices of servility and insolence[90]; and their virtues of every kind deformed by, barbarism. But, for the queen’s own merit in the choice of her servants, I must take leave to declare my sentiments to you very plainly. It may be true, that she possessed a good degree of sagacity in discerning the natures and talents of men. It was the virtue by which, her admirers tell us, she was principally distinguished. Yet, that the high fame of this virtue hath been owing to the felicity of the times, abounding in all sorts of merit, rather than to her own judgment, I think clear from this circumstance, “That some of the most deserving of those days, in their several professions, had not the fortune to attract the queen’s grace, in the proportion they might have expected.” I say nothing of poor SPENSER. Who has any concern for a poet[91]? But if merit alone had determined her majesty’s choice, it will hardly at this day admit a dispute, that the immortal HOOKER and BACON[92], at least, had ranked in another class than that, in which this great discerner of spirits thought fit to leave them.

And her character; continued he, in every other respect is just as equivocal. For having touched one part of it, I now turn from these general considerations on the circumstances and genius of the time, to our more immediate subject, the PERSONAL QUALITIES of ELIZABETH. Hitherto we have stood aloof from the queen’s person. But there is no proceeding a step further in this debate, unless you allow me a little more liberty. May I then be permitted to draw the veil of ELIZABETH’S court, and, by the lights which history holds out to us, contemplate the mysteries, that were celebrated in that awful sanctuary?

After so reverend a preface, replied Dr. ARBUTHNOT, I think you may be indulged in this liberty. And the rather, as I am not apprehensive that the honour of the illustrious queen is likely to suffer by it. The secrets of her cabinet-council, it may be, are not to be scanned by the profane. But it will be no presumption to step into the drawing-room.

Yet I may be tempted, said Mr. ADDISON, to use a freedom in this survey of her majesty, that would not have been granted to her most favoured courtiers. As far as I can judge of her character, as displayed in that solemn scene of her court, she had some apparent VIRTUES, but more genuine VICES; which yet, in the public eye, had equally the fortune to reflect a lustre on her government.

Her gracious affability, her love of her people, her zeal for the national glory; were not these her more obvious and specious qualities? Yet I doubt they were not so much the proper effects of her nature, as her policy; a set of spurious virtues, begotten by the very necessity of her affairs.

For her AFFABILITY, she saw there was no way of being secure amidst the dangers of all sorts, with which she was surrounded; but by ingratiating herself with the body of the people. And, though in her nature she was as little inclined to this condescension as any of her successors, yet the expediency of this measure compelled her to save appearances. And it must be owned, she did it with grace, and even acted her part with spirit. Possibly the consideration of her being a female actor, was no disadvantage to her.

But, when she had made this sacrifice to interest, her proper temper shewed itself clearly enough in the treatment of her nobles, and of all that came within the verge of the court. Her caprice, and jealousy, and haughtiness, appeared in a thousand instances. She took offence so easily, and forgave so difficultly, that even her principal ministers could hardly keep their ground, and were often obliged to redeem her favour by the lowest submissions. When nothing else would do, they sickened, and were even at death’s door: from which peril, however, she would sometimes relieve them; but not till she had exacted from them, in the way of penance, a course of the most mortifying humiliations. Nay, the very ladies of her court had no way to maintain their credit with her, but by, submitting patiently to the last indignities.

It is allowed, from the instances you have in view, returned Dr. ARBUTHNOT, that her nature was something high and imperious. But these sallies of passion might well enough consist with her general character of affability.

Hardly, as I conceive, answered Mr. ADDISON, if you reflect that these sallies, or rather habits of passion, were the daily terror and vexation of all about her. Her very minions seemed raised for no other purpose, than the exercise of her ill-humour. They were encouraged, by her smile, to presume on the royal countenance, and then beaten down again in punishment of that presumption. But, to say the truth, the slavish temper of the time was favourable to such exertions of female caprice and tyranny. Her imperious father, all whose virtues, she inherited, had taught her a sure way to quell the spirit of her nobles. They had been long used to stand in awe of the royal frown. And the people were pleased to find their betters ruled with so high a hand, at a time when they themselves were addressed with every expression of respect, and even flattery.

She even carried this mockery so far, that, as HARRINGTON observes well, “she converted her reign, through the perpetual love-tricks that passed between her and her people, into a kind of romance.” And though that political projector, in prosecution of his favourite notion, supposes the queen to have been determined to these intrigues by observing, that the weight of property was fallen into the popular scale; yet we need look no further for an account of this proceeding, than the inherent haughtiness of her temper. She gratified the insolence of her nature, in neglecting, or rather beating down, her nobility, whose greatness might seem to challenge respect: while the court, she paid to the people, revolted her pride less, as passing only upon herself, as well as others, for a voluntary act of affability. Just as we every day see very proud men carry it with much loftiness towards their equals, or those who and raised to some nearness of degree to themselves; at the same time that they affect a sort of courtesy to such, as are confessedly beneath them.

You see, then, what her boasted affability comes to. She gave good words to her people, whom it concerned her to be well with, and whom her pride itself allowed her to _manage_: she insulted her nobles, whom she had in her power, and whose abasement flattered the idea, she doted upon, of her own superiority and importance[93].

Let the queen’s manner of treating her subjects be what it would, Dr. ARBUTHNOT said, it appears to have given no offence in those days, when the sincerity of her intentions was never questioned. Her whole life is a convincing argument; that she bore the most entire affection to her people.

HER LOVE OF HER PEOPLE, returned Mr. ADDISON hastily, is with me a very questionable virtue. For what account shall we give of the multitude of penal statutes, passed in her reign? Or, because you will say, there was some colour for these; what excuse shall we make for her frequent grants of monopolies, so ruinous to the public wealth and happiness, and so perpetually complained of by her parliaments? You will say, she recalled them. She did so. But not till the general indignation had, in a manner, forced her to recall them. If by her _people_, be meant those of the poorer and baser sort only, it may be allowed, she seemed on all occasions willing to spare them. But for those of better rank and fortune, she had no such consideration. On the other hand, she contrived in many ways to pillage and distress them. It was the tameness of that time, to submit to every imposition of the sovereign. She had only to command her gentry on any service she thought fit, and they durst not decline it. How many of her wealthiest and best subjects did she impoverish by these means (though under colour, you may be sure, of her high favour); and sometimes by her very visits! I will not be certain, added he, that her visit to this pompous castle of her own LEICESTER, had any other intention.

But what, above all, are we to think of her vow of celibacy, and her obstinate refusal to settle the succession, though at the constant hazard of the public peace and safety?

You are hard put to it, I perceive, interrupted. Dr. ARBUTHNOT, to impeach the character of the queen in this instance, when a few penal laws, necessary to the support of her crown in that time of danger; one wrong measure of her government, and that corrected; the ordinary use of her prerogative; and even her virginity; are made crimes of. But I am curious to hear what you have to object to her ZEAL FOR THE ENGLISH GLORY, carried so high in her reign; and the single point, as it seems to me, to which all her measures and all her counsels were directed.

The _English_ glory, Mr. ADDISON said, may, perhaps, mean the state and independency of the crown. And then, indeed, I have little to object. But, in any other sense of the word, I have sometimes presumed to question with myself, if it had not been better consulted, by more effectual assistance of the Reformed on the Continent; by a more vigorous prosecution of the war against _Spain_[94]; as I hinted before, by a more complete reduction of _Ireland_. But say, we are no judges of those high matters. What glory accrued to the _English_ name, by the insidious dealing with the queen of _Scots_; by the vindictive proceedings against the duke of _Norfolk_; by the merciless persecutions of the unhappy earl of _Essex_? The same spirit, you see, continued from the beginning of this reign to the end of it. And the observation is the better worth attending to, because some have excused the queen’s treatment of ESSEX by saying, “That her nature, in that decline of life, was somewhat clouded by apprehensions; as the horizon, they observe, in the evening of the brightest day, is apt to be obscured by vapours[95].” As if this fanciful simile, which illustrates perhaps, could excuse, the perverseness of the queen’s temper; or, as if that could deserve to pass for an incident of age, which operated through life; and so declares itself to have been the proper result of her nature.

You promised, interposed Dr. ARBUTHNOT, not to pry too closely into the secrets of the cabinet. And such I must needs esteem the points to be, which you have mentioned. But enough of these beaten topics. I would rather attend you in the survey you promised to take of her court, and of the princely qualities that adorned it. It is from what passes in the inside of his palace, rather than from some questionable public acts, that the real character of a prince is best determined. And there, methinks, you have a scene opened to you, that deserves your applause. Nothing appears but what is truly royal. Nobody knew better, than ELIZABETH, how to support the decorum of her rank. She presided in that high orb with the dignity of a great queen. In all emergencies of danger, she shewed a firmness, and, on all occasions of ceremony, a magnificence, that commanded respect and admiration. Her very diversions were tempered with a severity becoming her sex and place, and which made her court, even in its lightest and gayest humours, a school of virtue.

These are the points, concluded he, I could wish you to speak to. The rest may be left to the judgment of the historian, or rather to the curiosity of the nice and critical politician.

You shall be obeyed, Mr. ADDISON said. I thought it not amiss to take off the glare of those applauded qualities, which have dazzled the public at a distance, by shewing that they were either feigned or over-rated. But I come now to unmask the real character of this renowned princess. I shall paint her freely indeed, but truly as she appears to me. And, to speak my mind at once; I think it is not so much to her virtues, which at best were equivocal, as to her very VICES, that we are to impute the popular admiration of her character and government.

I before took notice of the high, indecent PASSION, she discovered towards her courtiers. This fierceness of temper in the softer sex was taken for heroism; and, falling in with the slavish principles of the age, begot a degree of reverence in her subjects, which a more equal, that is a more becoming, deportment would not have produced. Hence, she was better served than most of our princes, only because she was more feared; in other words, because she less deserved to be so. But high as she would often carry herself in this unprincely, I had almost said, unwomanly, treatment of her servants; awing the men by her oaths, and her women by blows; it is still to be remembered, that she had a great deal of natural TIMIDITY in her constitution.

What! interrupted Dr. ARBUTHNOT hastily, the magnanimous ELIZABETH a coward? I should as soon have expected that charge against CÆSAR himself, or your own MARLBOROUGH.

I distinguish, Mr. ADDISON said, betwixt a parade of courage, put on to serve a turn, and keep her people in spirits, and that true greatness of mind, which, in one word, we call _magnanimity_. For this last, I repeat it, she either had it not, or not in the degree in which it has been ascribed to her. On the contrary, I see a littleness, a pusillanimity, in her conduct on a thousand occasions. Hence it was, that both to her people and such of the neighbouring states as she stood in awe of, she used an excessive hypocrisy, which, in the language of the court, you may be sure, was called policy. To the _Hollanders_, indeed, she could talk big; and it was not her humour to manage those over whom she had gained an ascendant. This has procured her, with many, the commendation of a princely magnanimity. But, on the other hand, when discontents were apprehended from her subjects, or when _France_ was to be diverted from any designs against her, no art was forgotten that might cajole their spirits with all the professions of cordiality and affection. Then she was _wedded_, that was the tender word, to her people: and then the interest of religion itself was sacrificed by this Protestant queen to her newly-perverted brother on the Continent.

Her foible, in this respect, was no secret to her ministers. But, above all, it was practised upon most successfully by the Lord BURGHLEY; “for whom, as I have seem it observed, it was as necessary that there should be treasons, as for the state that they should be prevented[96].” Hence it was, that he was perpetually raising her fears, by the discovery of some plot, or, when that was wanting, by the proposal of some law for her greater security. In short, he was for ever finding, or making, or suggesting, dangers. The queen, though she would look big (for indeed she was an excellent actress), startled at the shadows of those dangers, the slightest rumours. And to this convenient timidity of his mistress, so constantly alarmed, and relieved in turn by this wily minister, was owing, in a good degree, that long and unrivalled interest, he held in her favour.

Still, further, to this constitutional _fear_ (which might be forgiven to her sex, if it had not been so strangely mixed with a more than masculine ferocity in other instances) must be ascribed those favourite maxims of policy, which ran through her whole government. Never was prince more attached to the Machiavelian doctrine, DIVIDE ET IMPERA, than our ELIZABETH[97]. It made the soul of her policies, domestic and foreign. She countenanced the two prevailing factions of the time. The Churchmen and Puritans divided her favour so equally, that her favourites were sure to be the chiefs of the contending parties. Nay, her court was a constant scene of cabals and personal animosities. She gave a secret, and sometimes an open, countenance to these jealousies. The same principle directed all her foreign[98] negociations.

And are you not aware, interrupted Dr. ARBUTHNOT, that this objected policy is the very topic that I, and every other admirer of the queen, would employ in commendation of her great ability in the art of government? It has been the fate of too many of our princes (and perhaps some late examples might be given) to be governed, and even insulted, by a prevailing party of their own subjects. ELIZABETH was superior to such attempts. She had no bye-ends to pursue. She frankly threw herself on her people. And, secure in their affection, could defeat at pleasure, or even divert herself with, the intrigues of this or that aspiring faction.

We understand you, Mr. ADDISON replied; but when two parties are contending within a state, and one of them only in its true interest, the policy is a little extraordinary that should incline the sovereign to discourage _this_, from the poor ambition of controuling _that_, or, as you put it still worse, from the dangerous humour of playing with _both_ parties. I say nothing of later times. I only ask; if it was indifferent, whether the counsels of the CECILS or of LEICESTER were predominant in that reign? But I mentioned these things before, and I touch them again now, only to shew you, that this conduct, however it may be varnished over by the name of wisdom, had too much the air of fearful womanish intrigue, to consist with that heroical firmness and intrepidity so commonly ascribed to queen ELIZABETH[99].

And what if, after all, I should admit, replied Dr. ARBUTHNOT, that, in the composition of a woman’s courage, at least, there might be some scruples of discretion? Is there any advantage, worth contending for, you could draw from such a concession? Or, because you would be thought serious, I will put the matter more gravely. The arts of prudence, you arraign so severely, could not be taken for pusillanimity. They certainly were not, in her own time; for she was not the less esteemed or revered by all the nations of _Europe_ on account of them. The most you can fairly conclude is, that she knew how to unite address with bravery, and that, on occasion, she could _dissemble_ her high spirit. The difficulties of her situation obliged her to this management.

Rather say at once, returned Mr. ADDISON, that the constant dissimulation, for which she was so famous, was assumed to supply the want of a better thing, which had rendered all those arts as unnecessary as they were ignoble.

But _haughtiness_ and _timidity_, pursued he, were not the only vices that turned to good account in the queen’s hands. She was frugal beyond all bounds of decorum in a prince, or rather AVARICIOUS beyond all reasonable excuse from the public wants and the state of her revenue. Nothing is more certain than this fact, from the allowance both of friends and enemies. It seems as if, in this respect, her father’s example had not been sufficient; and that, to complete her character, she had incorporated with many of his, the leading vice of her grandfather.