THE WORKS OF JOHN DRYDEN.
THE
WORKS
OF
JOHN DRYDEN,
NOW FIRST COLLECTED
_IN EIGHTEEN VOLUMES_.
ILLUSTRATED
WITH NOTES,
HISTORICAL, CRITICAL, AND EXPLANATORY,
AND
A LIFE OF THE AUTHOR,
BY
WALTER SCOTT, ESQ.
VOL. XVII.
LONDON:
PRINTED FOR WILLIAM MILLER, ALBEMARLE STREET,
BY JAMES BALLANTYNE AND CO. EDINBURGH.
1808.
CONTENTS OF VOLUME SEVENTEENTH.
PAGE.
The Life of Plutarch, 1
Dedication to the Duke of Ormond, &c. 5
Specimen of the Translation of the History of the League, 77
Dedication to the King, 81
The Author’s Advertisement to the Reader, 93
The History of the League, Book III. 101
Postscript to the History of the League, 150
Controversy between Dryden and Stillingfleet concerning the
Duchess of York’s Paper, 185
Copy of a Paper written by the late Duchess of York, &c. 189
An Answer to the Duchess’s Paper by the Rev. Edward
Stillingfleet, 194
A Defence of the Paper written by the Duchess of York,
against the Answer made to it, 208
An Answer to the Defence of the Third Paper, 252
The Art of Painting, by C. A. Du Fresnoy, with Remarks,
translated into English; with an original Preface,
containing a Parallel between Painting and Poetry, 279
A Parallel of Poetry and Painting, 286
The Preface of M. de Piles, the French Translator, 333
THE LIFE OF PLUTARCH.
THE LIFE OF PLUTARCH.
In 1683, appeared the first volume of a translation of Plutarch’s Lives,
executed by several hands. Among the persons engaged in this undertaking,
Mr Malone enumerates “Richard Duke, and Knightly Chetwood, Fellows of
Trinity College, in Cambridge; Paul Rycaut, Esq.; Thomas Creech, of
Wadham College, Oxford, the translator of Horace, &c.; Edward Brown,
M.D. author of Travels in Germany, &c.; Dr Adam Littleton, author of
the Latin Dictionary; John Caryl, Esq. I believe the friend of Pope; Mr
Joseph Arrowsmith; Thomas Rymer, Esq.; Dr William Oldys; John Evelyn,
Esq.; and Mr Somers, afterwards Lord Somers, who translated the Life of
Alcibiades, though his name is not prefixed to it. Beside the persons
here enumerated, twenty-nine others were engaged in this work: so that
the total number of the translators was forty-one. Dryden translated none
of the Lives.”
Dryden was induced to honour this work, so creditable to those who had
undertaken it, with a Dedication, and Life of Plutarch. The Dedication
is addressed to the great Duke of Ormond, whom Dryden had celebrated,
in “Absalom and Achitophel,” under the name of Barzillai. The reader
will find some account of that nobleman, in the note upon that passage,
Vol. IX. p. 294. It is doing no injustice to the other great qualities
of Ormond, to say, that his generous and unwearied protection of Dryden
will not be the soonest forgotten. The poet’s feelings towards this noble
family were expressed in the preface to the “Fables,” his last great work.
The publication and translation of “Plutarch’s Lives” was not completed
until 1686, when the last volume appeared. The following remarkable
advertisement was prefixed to the work; which, from internal evidence, Mr
Malone ascribes to our author, although bearing the name, and written in
the character, of Jacob Tonson, the publisher of the work.
“You have here the first volume of “Plutarch’s Lives” turned from the
Greek into English; and give me leave to say, the first attempt of doing
it from the originals. You may expect the remainder in four more, one
after another, as fast as they may conveniently be dispatched from the
press. It is not my business, or pretence, to judge of a work of this
quality; neither do I take upon me to recommend it to the world, any
farther than under the office of a fair and careful publisher, and in
discharge of a trust deposited in my hands for the service of my country,
and for a common good. I am not yet so insensible of the authority and
reputation of so great a name, as not to consult the honour of the
author, together with the benefit and satisfaction of the bookseller, as
well as of the reader, in this undertaking. In order to which ends, I
have, with all possible respect and industry, besought, solicited, and
obtained, the assistance of persons equal to the enterprize, and not only
critics in the tongue, but men of known fame and abilities for style
and ornament; but I shall rather refer you to the learned and ingenious
translators of this first part, (whose names you will find in the next
page,) as a specimen of what you may promise yourself from the rest.
“After this right done to the Greek author, I shall not need to say what
profit and delight will accrue to the English reader from this version,
when he shall see this illustrious piece in his own mother tongue, and
the very spirit of the original transfused into the traduction; and in
one word, “Plutarch’s Worthies” made yet more famous, by a translation
that gives a farther lustre even to Plutarch himself.
“Now as to the bookseller’s part, I must justify myself, that I have
done all that to me belonged; that is to say, I have been punctually
faithful to all my commissions toward the correctness and decency of the
work; and I have said to myself, that which I now say to the public,—It
is impossible but a book that comes into the world with so many
circumstances of dignity, usefulness, and esteem, must turn to account.”
TO HIS GRACE THE DUKE OF ORMOND, &c.
MY LORD,
Lucretius, endeavouring to prove from the principles of his philosophy,
that the world had a casual beginning from the concourse of atoms, and
that men, as well as the rest of animals, were produced from the vital
heat and moisture of their mother earth, from the same principles is
bound to answer this objection,—why men are not daily formed after
the same manner; which he tells us, is, because the kindly warmth and
procreative faculty of the ground is now worn out; the sun is a disabled
lover; and the earth is past her teeming time.
Though religion has informed us better of our origin, yet it appears
plainly, that not only the bodies, but the souls of men, have decreased
from the vigour of the first ages; that we are not more short of the
stature and strength of those gigantic heroes, than we are of their
understanding and their wit. To let pass those happy patriarchs who were
striplings at fourscore, and had afterwards seven or eight hundred years
before them to beget sons and daughters, and to consider man in reference
only to his mind, and that no higher than the age of Socrates, how vast a
difference is there betwixt the productions of those souls, and these of
ours? How much better Plato, Aristotle, and the rest of the philosophers
understood nature; Thucydides and Herodotus adorned history; Sophocles,
Euripides, and Menander advanced poetry, than those dwarfs of wit and
learning who succeeded them in after times? That age was most famous
amongst the Greeks which ended with the death of Alexander; amongst the
Romans, learning seemed again to revive and flourish in the century which
produced Cicero, Varro, Sallust, Livy, Lucretius, and Virgil: and after
a short interval of years, wherein nature seemed to take a breathing
time for a second birth, there sprung up under the Vespasians, and those
excellent princes who succeeded them, a race of memorable wits, such
as were the two Plinies, Tacitus, and Suetonius; and, as if Greece was
emulous of the Roman learning, under the same favourable constellation
was born the famous philosopher and historian, Plutarch; than whom
antiquity has never produced a man more generally knowing, or more
virtuous; and no succeeding age has equalled him.
His Lives, both in his own esteem and that of others, accounted the
noblest of his works, have been long since rendered into English; but
as that translation was only from the French,[1] so it suffered this
double disadvantage; first, that it was but a copy of a copy, and that
too but lamely taken from the Greek original; secondly, that the English
language was then unpolished, and far from the perfection which it has
since attained; so that the first version is not only ungrammatical and
ungraceful, but in many places almost unintelligible. For which reasons,
and lest so useful a piece of history should lie oppressed under the
rubbish of antiquated words, some ingenious and learned gentlemen have
undertaken this task; and what would have been the labour of one man’s
life, will, by the several endeavours of many, be accomplished in the
compass of a year. How far they have succeeded in this laudable attempt,
to me it belongs not to determine, who am too much a party to be a
judge. But I have the honour to be commissioned from the translators of
this volume to inscribe their labours and my own, with all humility, to
your Grace’s name and patronage; and never was any man more ambitious
of an employment of which he was so little worthy. Fortune has at last
gratified that earnest desire I have always had to shew my devotion
to your Grace, though I despair of paying you my acknowledgments. And
of all other opportunities, I have happened on the most favourable to
myself, who, having never been able to produce any thing of my own,
which could be worthy of your view, am supplied by the assistance of
my friends, and honoured with the presentation of their labours. The
author they have translated, has been long familiar to you, who have
been conversant in all sorts of history both ancient and modern, and
have formed the idea of your most noble life from the instructions and
examples contained in them, both in the management of public affairs,
and in the private offices of virtue; in the enjoyment of your better
fortune, and sustaining of your worse; in habituating yourself to an easy
greatness; in repelling your enemies, in succouring your friends; and
in all traverses of fortune, in every colour of your life, maintaining
an inviolable fidelity to your Sovereign. It is long since that I have
learned to forget the art of praising, but here the heart dictates to the
pen; and I appeal to your enemies, (if so much generosity and good nature
can have left you any,) whether they are not conscious to themselves that
I have not flattered.
It is an age, indeed, which is only fit for satire, and the sharpest I
have shall never be wanting to lance its villainies, and its ingratitude
to the government. There are few men in it, who are capable of supporting
the weight of a just and deserved commendation; but amongst those few
there must always stand excepted the illustrious names of Ormond and
of Ossory; a father and a son only worthy of each other. Never was one
soul more fully infused into another’s breast; never was so strong an
impression made of virtue as that of your Grace’s into him; but though
the stamp was deep, the subject which received it was of too fine a
composition to be durable. Were not priority of time and nature in the
case, it might have been doubted which of you had been most excellent;
but heaven snatched away the copy, to make the original more precious.
I dare trust myself no farther on this subject; for after years of
mourning, my sorrow is yet so green upon me, that I am ready to tax
Providence for the loss of that heroic son: three nations had a general
concernment in his death, but I had one so very particular, that all
my hopes are almost dead with him; and I have lost so much, that I am
past the danger of a second shipwreck. But he sleeps with an unenvied
commendation; and has left your Grace the sad legacy of all those glories
which he derived from you: an accession which you wanted not, who were so
rich before in your own virtues, and that high reputation which is the
product of them.
A long descent of noble ancestors was not necessary to have made you
great, but heaven threw it in as overplus when you were born. What you
have done and suffered for two royal masters has been enough to render
you illustrious; so that you may safely wave the nobility of your birth,
and rely on your actions for your fame. You have cancelled the debt which
you owed to your progenitors, and reflect more brightness on their memory
than you received from them.
Your native country, which Providence gave you not leave to preserve
under one king, it has given you opportunity under another to restore.
You could not save it from the chastisement which was due to its
rebellion, but you raised it from ruin after its repentance; so that the
trophies of war were the portion of the conqueror, but the triumphs of
peace were reserved for the vanquished. The misfortunes of Ireland were
owing to itself, but its happiness and restoration to your Grace. The
rebellion against a lawful prince was punished by an usurping tyrant, but
the fruits of his victory were the rewards of a loyal subject. How much
that noble kingdom has flourished under your Grace’s government, both
the inhabitants and the crown are sensible: the riches of Ireland are
increased by it, and the revenues of England are augmented. That which
was a charge and burden of the government, is rendered an advantage and
support; the trade and interest of both countries are united in a mutual
benefit; they conspire to make each other happy; the dependance of the
one is an improvement of its commerce, the pre-eminence of the other is
not impaired by the intercourse, and common necessities are supplied by
both. Ireland is no more a scion, to suck the nourishment from the mother
tree; neither is it overtopped, or hindered from growth by the superior
branches; but the roots of England diving, if I may dare to say it,
underneath the seas, rise at a just distance on the neighbouring shore,
and there shoot up, and bear a product scarce inferior to the trunk from
whence they sprung.
I may raise the commendation higher, and yet not fear to offend the
truth; Ireland is a better penitent than England. The crime of rebellion
was common to both countries, but the repentance of one island has been
steady; that of the other, to its shame, has suffered a relapse; which
shews the conversions of their rebels to have been real, that of ours to
have been but counterfeit. The sons of guilty fathers there have made
amends for the disloyalty of their families; but here the descendants
of pardoned rebels have only waited their time to copy the wickedness
of their parents, and, if possible, to outdo it. They disdain to hold
their patrimonies by acts of grace and of indemnity; and by maintaining
their old treasonable principles, make it apparent that they are still
speculative traitors; for whether they are zealous sectaries, or prophane
republicans, (of which two sorts they are principally composed,) both our
reformers of church and state pretend to a power superior to kingship.
The fanatics derive their authority from the Bible, and plead religion
to be antecedent to any secular obligation; by virtue of which argument,
taking it for granted that their own worship is only true, they arrogate
to themselves the right of disposing the temporal power according to
their pleasure,—as that which is subordinate to the spiritual; so
that the same reasons and scriptures which are urged by popes for the
deposition of princes, are produced by sectaries for altering the
succession. The episcopal reformation has manumized kings from the
usurpation of Rome, for it preaches obedience and resignation to the
lawful secular power; but the pretended reformation of our schismatics,
is to set up themselves in the papal chair, and to make their princes
only their trustees; so that, whether they or the Pope were uppermost
in England, the royal authority were equally depressed: the prison of
our kings would be the same; the gaolers only would be altered. The
broad republicans are generally men of atheistic principles, nominal
Christians, who are beholding to the font only, that they are so called;
otherwise Hobbists in their politics and morals. Every church is obliged
to them that they own themselves of none, because their lives are too
scandalous for any. Some of the sectaries are so proud, that they think
they cannot sin; those commonwealth men are so wicked, that they conclude
there is no sin. Lewdness, rioting, cheating, and debauchery, are their
work-a-day practice; their more solemn crimes are unnatural lusts, and
horrid murders.[2] Yet these are the patrons of the nonconformists;
these are the swords and bucklers of God’s cause, if His cause be that
of separatists and rebels. It is not but these associates know each other
at the bottom as well as Simeon knew Levi: the republicans are satisfied
that the schismatics are hypocrites, and the schismatics are assured that
the republicans are atheists; but their common principles of government
are the chains that link them; for both hold kings to be creatures of
their own making, and by inference to be at their own disposing; with
this difference, notwithstanding, that the canting party face their
pretences with a call from God, the debauched party with a commission
from the people. So that if ever this ill-contrived and equivocal
association should get uppermost, they would infallibly contend for the
supreme right; and as it was formerly on their money, so now it would be
in their interest; “God with us” would be set up on one side, and “The
Commonwealth of England” on the other.[3] But I the less wonder at the
mixture of these two natures, because two savage beasts of different
species and sexes shut up together, will forget their enmity, to satisfy
their common lust; and it is no matter what kind of monster is produced
betwixt them, so the brutal appetite be served. I more admire at a third
party, who were loyal when rebellion was uppermost, and have turned
rebels, (at least in principle,) since loyalty has been triumphant. Those
of them whose services have not been rewarded, have some pretence for
discontent; and yet they give the world to understand, that their honour
was not their principle, but their interest. If they are old royalists,
it is a sign their virtue is worn out, and will bear no longer; if sons
to royalists, they have probably been grafted on whig stocks, and grown
out of kind,—like China oranges in Portugal; their mother’s part has
prevailed in them, and they are degenerated from the loyalty of their
fathers.
But if they are such, as many of them evidently are, whose service has
been not only fully but lavishly recompensed with honours and preferment,
theirs is an ingratitude without parallel; they have destroyed their
former merits, disowned the cause for which they fought, belied their
youth, dishonoured their age; they have wrought themselves out of present
enjoyments for imaginary hopes, and can never be trusted by their new
friends, because they have betrayed their old. The greater and the
stronger ties which some of them have had, are the deeper brands of
their apostacy; for archangels were the first and most glorious of the
whole creation; they were the morning work of God, and had the first
impressions of his image, what creatures could be made; they were of kin
to eternity itself, and wanting only that accession to be deities. Their
fall was therefore more opprobrious than that of man, because they had
no clay for their excuse; though I hope and wish the latter part of the
allegory may not hold, and that repentance may be yet allowed them. But I
delight not to dwell on so sad an object; let this part of the landscape
be cast into shadows, that the heightenings of the other may appear more
beautiful. For, as contraries, the nearer they are placed are brighter,
and the Venus is illustrated by the neighbourhood of the lazar, so the
unblemished loyalty of your Grace will shine more clearly, when set in
competition with their stains.
When the malady which had seized the nobler parts of Britain threw itself
out into the limbs, and the first sores of it appeared in Scotland, yet
no effects of it reached your province; Ireland stood untainted with that
pest; the care of the physician prevented the disease, and preserved the
country from infection. When that ulcer was rather stopped than cured,
(for the causes of it still remained,) and that dangerous symptoms
appeared in England; when the royal authority was here trodden under
foot; when one plot was prosecuted openly, and another secretly fomented,
yet even then was Ireland free from our contagion. And if some venomous
creatures were produced in that nation, yet it appeared they could not
live there; they shed their poison without effect; they despaired of
being successfully wicked in their own country, and transported their
evidence to another, where they knew it was vendible; where accusation
was a trade, where forgeries were countenanced, where perjuries were
rewarded, where swearing went for proof, and where the merchandize
of death was gainful. That their testimony was at least discredited,
proceeded not from its incoherence, for they were known by their own
party when they first appeared; but their folly was then managed by the
cunning of their tutors; they had still been believed had they still
followed their instructors; but when their witness fell foul upon their
friends, then they were proclaimed villains, discarded and disowned by
those who sent for them; they seemed then first to be discovered for
what they had been known too well before; they were decried as inventors
of what only they betrayed; nay their very wit was magnified, lest,
being taken for fools, they might be thought too simple to forge an
accusation.[4] Some of them still continue here detested by both sides,
believed by neither; (for even their betters are at last uncased;) and
some of them have received their hire in their own country. For perjury,
which is malice to mankind, is always accompanied with other crimes; and
though not punishable by our laws with death, yet draws a train of vices
after it. The robber, the murderer, and the sodomite, have often hung
up the foresworn villain; and what one sin took on trust, another sin
has paid. These travelling locusts are at length swallowed up in their
own Red Sea. Ireland, as well as England, is delivered from that flying
plague; for the sword of justice in your Grace’s hand, like the rod of
Moses, is stretched out against them; and the third part of his Majesty’s
dominions is owing for its peace to your loyalty and vigilance.
But what Plutarch can this age produce, to immortalize a life so noble?
May some excellent historian at length be found, some writer not unworthy
of his subject; but may his employment be long deferred! May many happy
years continue you to this nation and your own; may your praises be
celebrated late, that we may enjoy you living rather than adore you
dead! And since yet there is not risen up amongst us any historian who
is equal to so great an undertaking, let us hope that Providence has
not assigned the workman, because his employment is to be long delayed;
because it has reserved your Grace for farther proofs of your unwearied
duty, and a farther enjoyment of your fortune; in which, though no man
has been less envied, because no other has more nobly used it, yet some
droppings of the age’s venom have been shed upon you. The supporters of
the crown are placed too near it, to be exempted from the storm which
was breaking over it. It is true, you stood involved in your own virtue,
and the malice of your libellers could not sink through all those folds
to reach you. Your innocence has defended you from their attacks, and
your pen has so nobly vindicated that innocence, that it stands in need
of no other second. The difference is as plainly seen betwixt sophistry
and truth, as it is betwixt the style of a gentleman and the clumsy
stiffness of a pedant. Of all historians, God deliver us from bigots;
and of all bigots, from our sectaries! Truth is never to be expected
from authors whose understandings are warped with enthusiasm; for they
judge all actions, and their causes, by their own perverse principles,
and a crooked line can never be the measure of a straight one. Mr Hobbes
was used to say,—that a man was always against reason, when reason was
against a man:—so these authors are for obscuring truth, because truth
would discover them. They are not historians of an action, but lawyers
of a party; they are retained by their principles, and bribed by their
interests; their narrations are an opening of their cause; and in the
front of their histories there ought to be written the prologue of a
pleading,—“I am for the plaintiff,” or “I am for the defendant.”
We have already seen large volumes of state collections, and church
legends, stuffed with detected forgeries in some parts, and gaping with
omissions of truth in others; not penned, I suppose, with so vain a hope
as to cheat posterity, but to advance some design in the present age; for
these legerdemain authors are for telling stories to keep their trick
undiscovered, and to make their conveyance the more clean. What calumny
your Grace may expect from such writers, is already evident: but it will
fare with them as it does with ill painters; a picture so unlike in all
its features and proportions, reflects not on the original, but on the
artist; for malice will make a piece more unresembling than ignorance;
and he who studies the life, yet bungles, may draw some faint imitation
of it, but he who purposely avoids nature, must fall into grotesque, and
make no likeness. For my own part, I am of the former sort, and therefore
presume not to offer my unskilfulness for so excellent a design as is
your illustrious life. To pray for its prosperity and continuance is my
duty, as it is my ambition to appear on all occasions,
Your Grace’s most obedient and devoted servant,
JOHN DRYDEN.
THE LIFE OF PLUTARCH.
I know not by what fate it comes to pass, that historians, who give
immortality to others, are so ill requited by posterity, that their
actions and their fortunes are usually forgotten; neither themselves
encouraged while they live, nor their memory preserved entire to future
ages. It is the ingratitude of mankind to their greatest benefactors,
that they who teach us wisdom by the surest ways, (setting before us what
we ought to shun or to pursue, by the examples of the most famous men
whom they record, and by the experience of their faults and virtues,)
should generally live poor and unregarded; as if they were born only
for the public, and had no interest in their own well-being, but were
to be lighted up like tapers, and to waste themselves for the benefit
of others. But this is a complaint too general, and the custom has been
too long established to be remedied; neither does it wholly reach our
author. He was born in an age which was sensible of his virtue, and found
a Trajan to reward him, as Aristotle did an Alexander. But the historians
who succeeded him, have either been too envious, or too careless of his
reputation; none of them, not even his own countrymen, having given us
any particular account of him; or if they have, yet their works are not
transmitted to us: so that we are forced to glean from Plutarch what
he has scattered in his writings concerning himself and his original;
which (excepting that little memorial that Suidas, and some few others,
have left concerning him,) is all we can collect relating to this great
philosopher and historian.
He was born at Chæronea, a small city of Bæotia, in Greece, between
Attica and Phosis, and reaching to both seas. The climate not much
befriended by the heavens, for the air is thick and foggy; and
consequently the inhabitants partaking of its influence, gross feeders
and fat-witted, brawny and unthinking,—just the constitution of heroes,
cut out for the executive and brutal business of war; but so stupid in
the designing part, that in all the revolutions of Greece they were never
masters, but only in those few years when they were led by Epaminondas,
or Pelopidas. Yet this foggy air, this country of fat wethers, as Juvenal
calls it, produced three wits, which were comparable to any three
Athenians; Pindar, Epaminondas, and our Plutarch; to whom we may add a
fourth, Sextus Chæronensis, the preceptor of the learned Emperor Marcus
Aurelius, and the nephew of our author.
Chæronea, if we may give credit to Pausanias, in the ninth book of
his description of Greece, was anciently called Arnè, from Arnè, the
daughter of Æolus; but being situated to the west of Parnassus in that
lowland country, the natural unwholesomeness of the air was augmented
by the evening vapours cast upon it from that mountain, which our late
travellers describe to be full of moisture and marshy ground inclosed
in the inequality of its ascents; and being also exposed to the winds
which blew from that quarter, the town was perpetually unhealthful; for
which reason, says my author, Chæron, the son of Apollo and Thero, made
it be rebuilt, and turned it towards the rising sun, from whence the town
became healthful, and consequently populous; in memory of which benefit
it afterwards retained his name. But as etymologies are uncertain, and
the Greeks, above all nations, given to fabulous derivations of names,
especially when they tend to the honour of their country, I think we
may be reasonably content to take the denomination of the town from its
delightful or cheerful standing, as the word Chæron sufficiently implies.
But to lose no time in these grammatical etymologies, which are commonly
uncertain guesses, it is agreed that Plutarch was here born; the year
uncertain; but without dispute in the reign of Claudius.
Joh. Gerrard Vossius has assigned his birth in the latter end of that
Emperor; some other writers of his life have left it undecided whether
then, or in the beginning of Nero’s empire; but the most accurate Rualdus
(as I find it in the Paris edition of Plutarch’s Works) has manifestly
proved him to be born in the middle time of Claudius, or somewhat lower;
for Plutarch, in the inscription at Delphos, (of which more hereafter,)
remembers, that Ammonius, his master, disputed with him and his brother
Lamprias concerning it, when Nero made his progress into Greece, which
was in his twelfth year; and the question disputed could not be managed
with so much learning as it was, by mere boys; therefore he was then
sixteen, or rather eighteen years of age.
Xylander has observed, that Plutarch himself, in the Life of Pericles,
and that of Antony, has mentioned both Nero and Domitian as his
contemporaries. He has also left it on record in his Symposiacks, that
his family was ancient in Chæronea, and that for many descents, they
had borne the most considerable offices in that petty commonwealth; the
chiefest of which was known by the name of Archon amongst the Grecians,
by that of Prætor Urbis among the Romans, and the dignity and power
was not much different from that of our lord mayor of London. His
great-grandfather, Nicarchus, perhaps enjoyed that office in the division
of the empire betwixt Augustus Cæsar and Mark Antony; and when the
civil wars ensued betwixt them, Chæronea was so hardly used by Antony’s
lieutenant or commissary there, that all the citizens, without exception,
were servilely employed to carry on their shoulders a certain proportion
of corn from Chæronea to the coast over against the island of Antycira,
with the scourge held over them, if at any time they were remiss. Which
duty, after once performing, being enjoined the second time with the same
severity, just as they were preparing for their journey, the welcome news
arrived that Mark Antony had lost the battle of Actium;[5] whereupon
both the officers and soldiers belonging to him in Chæronea immediately
fled for their own safety; and the provisions, thus collected, were
distributed among the inhabitants of the city.
This Nicarchus, the great-grandfather of Plutarch, among other sons,
had Lamprias, a man eminent for his learning, and a philosopher, of
whom Plutarch has made frequent mention in his Symposiacks, or Table
Conversations; and amongst the rest there is this observation of
him,—that he disputed best, and unravelled the difficulties of philosophy
with most success, when he was at supper, and well warmed with wine.
These table entertainments were part of the education of those times,
their discourses being commonly the canvassing and solution of some
question, either philosophical or philological, always instructive, and
usually pleasant; for the cups went round with the debate, and men were
merry and wise together, according to the proverb. The father of Plutarch
is also mentioned in those discourses, whom our author represents as
arguing of several points in philosophy; but his name is no where to be
found in any part of the works remaining to us. But yet he speaks of him
as a man not ignorant in learning and poetry, as may appear by what he
says, when he is introduced disputing in the Symposiacks; where also his
prudence and humanity are commended in this following relation: “Being
yet very young,” says Plutarch, “I was joined in commission with another
in an embassy to the Proconsul, and my colleague, falling sick, was
forced to stay behind; so that the whole business was transacted by me
alone. At my return, when I was to give account to the commonwealth of
my proceedings, my father, rising from his seat, openly enjoined me not
to name myself in the singular number,—_I did thus, or thus I said to
the Proconsul_,—but, _thus we did, and thus we said_, always associating
my companion with me, though absent in the management.” This was done to
observe, as I suppose, the point of good manners with his colleague; that
of respect to the government of the city, who had commissioned both, to
avoid envy; and perhaps more especially, to take off the forwardness of
a pert young minister, commonly too apt to overvalue his own services,
and to quote himself on every inconsiderable occasion.
The father of Plutarch had many children besides him; Timon and Lamprias,
his brothers, were bred up with him, all three instructed in the liberal
sciences, and in all parts of philosophy. It is manifest from our author,
that they lived together in great friendliness, and in great veneration
to their grandfather and father. What affection Plutarch bore in
particular to his brother Timon, may be gathered from these words of his:
“As for myself, though fortune on several occasions has been favourable
to me, I have no obligation so great to her as the kindness and entire
friendship which my brother Timon has always borne, and still bears me;
and this is so evident, that it cannot but be noted by every one of our
acquaintance.” Lamprias, the youngest of the three, is introduced by him
in his “Morals,” as one of a sweet and pleasant conversation, inclined to
mirth and raillery; or, as we say in English, a well-humoured man, and a
good companion.
The whole family being thus addicted to philosophy, it is no wonder if
our author was initiated betimes in study, to which he was naturally
inclined; in pursuit of which he was so happy to fall into good hands
at first, being recommended to the care of Ammonius, an Egyptian, who,
having taught philosophy with great reputation at Alexandria, and from
thence travelling into Greece, settled himself at last in Athens, where
he was well received, and generally respected. At the end of Themistocles
his life, Plutarch relates, that being young, he was a pensioner in the
house of this Ammonius; and in his Symposiacks he brings him in disputing
with his scholars, and giving them instruction: for the custom of those
times was very much different from these of ours, where the greatest
part of our youth is spent in learning the words of dead languages. The
Grecians, who thought all barbarians but themselves, despised the use
of foreign tongues; so that the first elements of their breeding was
the knowledge of nature, and the accommodation of that knowledge, by
moral precepts, to the service of the public, and the private offices
of virtue: the masters employing one part of their time in reading to,
and discoursing with, their scholars, and the rest in appointing them
their several exercises either in oratory or philosophy, and setting them
to declaim and to dispute amongst themselves. By this liberal sort of
education, study was so far from being a burden to them, that in a short
time it became a habit; and philosophical questions and criticisms of
humanity were their usual recreations at their meals. Boys lived then as
the better sort of men do now; and their conversation was so well-bred
and manly, that they did not plunge out of their depth into the world,
when they grew up, but slid easily into it, and found no alteration in
their company. Amongst the rest, the reading and quotations of poets were
not forgotten at their suppers, and in their walks; but Homer, Euripides,
and Sophocles, were the entertainment of their hours of freedom. Rods and
ferulas were not used by Ammonius, as being properly the punishment of
slaves, and not the correction of ingenuous freeborn men; at least to be
only exercised by parents, who had the power of life and death over their
own children; as appears by the example of this Ammonius, thus related by
our author:
“Our master,” says he, “one time perceiving, at his afternoon lecture,
that some of his scholars had eaten more largely than became the
moderation of students, immediately commanded one of his freedmen
to take his own son, and scourge him in our sight: because, said the
philosopher, my young gentleman could not eat his dinner without poignant
sauce, or vinegar; and at the same time he cast his eye on all of us; so
that every criminal was given to understand, that he had a share in the
reprehension, and that the punishment was as well deserved by all the
rest, had the philosopher not known that it exceeded his commission to
inflict it.”
Plutarch, therefore, having the assistance of such a master, in few years
advanced to admiration in knowledge; and that without first travelling
into foreign parts, or acquiring any foreign tongue; though the Roman
language at that time was not only vulgar in Rome itself, but generally
through the extent of that vast empire, and in Greece, which was a
member of it, as our author has remarked towards the end of his Platonic
Questions. For, like a true philosopher, who minded things, not words, he
strove not even to cultivate his mother tongue with any great exactness;
and himself confesses, in the beginning of Demosthenes his life, that
during his abode in Italy, and at Rome, he had neither the leisure to
study, nor so much as to exercise the Roman language, (I suppose he
means to write in it, rather than to speak it,) as well by reason of the
affairs he managed, as that he might acquit himself to those who were
desirous to be instructed by him in philosophy: insomuch, that till the
declination of his age, he began not to be conversant in Latin books; in
reading of which it happened somewhat oddly to him, that he learnt not
the knowledge of things by words, but by the understanding and use he
had of things, attained to the knowledge of words which signified them:
just as Adam (setting aside Divine illumination) called the creatures
by their proper names, by first understanding of their natures. But for
the delicacies of the tongue, the turns of the expressions, the figures
and connections of words, in which consist the beauty of that language,
he plainly tells us, that though he much admired them, yet they required
too great labour for a man in age, and plunged in business, to attain
perfectly; which compliment I should be willing to believe from a
philosopher, if I did not consider that Dion Cassius, nay even Herodian
and Appian after him, as well as Polybius before him, by writing the
Roman History in the Greek language, had shewn as manifest a contempt
of Latin, in respect of the other, as Frenchmen now do of English,
which they disdain to speak while they live among us; but, with great
advantage to their trivial conceptions, drawing the discourse into their
own language, have learned to despise our better thoughts, which must
come deformed and lame in conversation to them, as being transmitted in
a tongue of which we are not masters. This is to arrogate a superiority
in nature over us, as undoubtedly the Grecians did over their conquerors,
by establishing their language for a standard; it being become so much a
mode to speak and write Greek in Tully’s time, that with some indignation
I have read his Epistles to Atticus, in which he desires to have his
own consulship written by his friend in the Grecian language, which he
afterwards performed himself; a vain attempt, in my opinion, for any man
to endeavour to excel in a tongue which he was not born to speak. This,
though it be digression, yet deserves to be considered at more leisure;
for the honour of our wit and writings, which are of a more solid make
than that of our neighbours, is concerned in it.
But to return to Plutarch. As it was his good fortune to be moulded first
by masters the most excellent in their kind, so it was his own virtue
to suck in with an incredible desire, and earnest application of mind,
their wise instructions; and it was also his prudence so to manage his
health by moderation of diet and bodily exercise, as to preserve his
parts without decay to a great old age; to be lively and vigorous to the
last, and to preserve himself to his own enjoyments, and to the profit
of mankind: which was not difficult for him to perform, having received
from nature a constitution capable of labour, and from the domestic
example of his parents a sparing sobriety of diet, a temperance in other
pleasures, and, above all, an habitude of commanding his passions in
order to his health. Thus principled and grounded, he considered with
himself, that a larger communication with learned men was necessary for
his accomplishment; and therefore, having a soul insatiable of knowledge,
and being ambitious to excel in all kinds of science, he took up a
resolution to travel. Egypt was at that time, as formerly it had been,
famous for learning; and probably the mysteriousness of their doctrine
might tempt him, as it had done Pythagoras and others, to converse with
the priesthood of that country, which appears to have been particularly
his business by the treatise of “Isis and Osiris,” which he has left
us; in which he shews himself not meanly versed in the ancient theology
and philosophy of those wise men. From Egypt returning into Greece,
he visited in his way all the academies or schools of the several
philosophers, and gathered from them many of those observations with
which he has enriched posterity.
Besides this, he applied himself with extreme diligence to collect
not only all books which were excellent in their kind, and already
published, but also all sayings and discourses of wise men, which he had
heard in conversation, or which he had received from others by tradition;
as likewise the records and public instruments preserved in cities
which he had visited in his travels, and which he afterwards scattered
through his works. To which purpose he took a particular journey to
Sparta, to search the archives of that famous commonwealth, to understand
thoroughly the model of their ancient government, their legislators,
their kings, and their Ephori; digesting all their memorable deeds and
sayings with so much care, that he has not omitted those even of their
women, or their private soldiers; together with their customs, their
decrees, their ceremonies, and the manner of their public and private
living, both in peace and war. The same methods he also took in divers
other commonwealths, as his Lives, and his Greek and Roman Questions,
sufficiently testify. Without these helps, it had been impossible for him
to leave in writing so many particular observations of men and manners,
and as impossible to have gathered them without conversation and commerce
with the learned antiquaries of his time. To these he added a curious
collection of ancient statues, medals, inscriptions, and paintings,
as also of proverbial sayings, epigrams, epitaphs, apophthegms, and
other ornaments of history, that he might leave nothing unswept behind
him. And as he was continually in company with men of learning, in all
professions, so his memory was always on the stretch to receive and lodge
their discourses; and his judgment perpetually employed in separating his
notions, and distinguishing which were fit to be preserved, and which to
be rejected.
By benefit of this, in little time he enlarged his knowledge to a great
extent in every science. Himself, in the beginning of the treatise which
he has composed of Content and Peace of Mind, makes mention of those
collections, or common places, which he had long since drawn together
for his own particular occasions; and it is from this rich cabinet that
he has taken out those excellent pieces which he has distributed to
posterity, and which give us occasion to deplore the loss of the residue,
which either the injury of time, or the negligence of copiers, have
denied to us. On this account, though we need not doubt to give him this
general commendation, that he was ignorant of no sort of learning, yet
we may justly add this farther,—that whoever will consider through the
whole body of his works, either the design, the method, or the contexture
of his discourses, whether historical or moral, or questions of natural
philosophy, or solutions of problems mathematical; whether he arraigns
the opinions of other sects, or establishes the doctrines of his own; in
all these kinds there will be found both the harmony of order, and the
beauty of easiness: his reasons so solid and convincing, his inductions
so pleasant and agreeable to all sorts of readers, that it must be
acknowledged he was master of every subject which he treated, and treated
none but what were improvable to the benefit of instruction. For we may
perceive in his writings the desire he had to imprint his precepts in
the souls of his readers, and to lodge morality in families, nay even to
exalt it to the thrones of sovereign princes, and to make it the rule
and measure of their government. Finding that there were many sects
of philosophers then in vogue, he searched into the foundation of all
their principles and opinions; and not content with this disquisition,
he traced them to their several fountains; so that the Pythagorean,
Epicurean, Stoic, and Peripatetic philosophy, were familiar to him. And
though it may be easily observed, that he was chiefly inclined to follow
Plato, whose memory he so much reverenced, that annually he celebrated
his birth-day, and also that of Socrates; yet he modestly contained
himself within the bounds of the latter academy, and was content, like
Cicero, only to propound and weigh opinions, leaving the judgment of
his readers free, without presuming to decide dogmatically. Yet it
is to be confessed, that in the midst of this moderation, he opposed
the two extremes of the Epicurean and Stoic sects; both which he has
judiciously combated in several of his treatises, and both upon the same
account,—because they pretend too much to certainty in their dogmas, and
to impose them with too great arrogance; which he, who, following the
Academists, doubted more and pretended less, was no way able to support.
The Pyrrhonians, or grosser sort of Sceptics, who bring all certainty in
question, and startle even at the notions of common sense, appeared as
absurd to him on the other side; for there is a kind of positiveness in
granting nothing to be more likely on one part than on another, which
his Academy avoided by inclining the balance to that hand where the
most weighty reasons, and probability of truth, were visible. The moral
philosophy, therefore, was his chiefest aim, because the principles of
it admitted of less doubt; and because they were most conducing to the
benefit of human life. For, after the example of Socrates, he had found,
that the speculations of natural philosophy were more delightful than
solid and profitable; that they were abstruse and thorny, and much of
sophism in the solution of appearances:—that the mathematics, indeed,
could reward his pains with many demonstrations, but though they made
him wiser, they made him not more virtuous, and therefore attained not
the end of happiness: for which reason, though he had far advanced in
that study, yet he made it but his recreation, not his business. Some
problem of it was his usual divertisement at supper, which he mingled
also with pleasant and more light discourses; for he was no sour
philosopher, but passed his time as merrily as he could, with reference
to virtue. He forgot not to be pleasant while he instructed, and
entertained his friends with so much cheerfulness and good humour, that
his learning was not nauseous to them; neither were they afraid of his
company another time. He was not so austere as to despise riches, but,
being in possession of a large fortune, he lived, though not splendidly,
yet plentifully; and suffered not his friends to want that part of his
estate which he thought superfluous to a philosopher.
The religion he professed, to speak the worst of it, was heathen. I say,
the religion he _professed_; for it is no way probable that so great a
philosopher, and so wise a man, should believe the superstitions and
fopperies of Paganism; but that he accommodated himself to the use and
received customs of his country. He was indeed a priest of Apollo, as
himself acknowledges; but that proves him not to have been a Polytheist.
I have ever thought, that the wise men in all ages have not much differed
in their opinions of religion; I mean, as it is grounded on human reason:
for reason, as far as it is right, must be the same in all men; and truth
being but one, they must consequently think in the same train. Thus it
is not to be doubted but the religion of Socrates, Plato, and Plutarch,
was not different in the main; who doubtless believed the identity of
one Supreme Intellectual Being, which we call GOD. But because they who
have written the Life of Plutarch in other languages, are contented
barely to assert that our author believed one God, without quoting those
passages of his which would clear the point, I will give you two of
them, amongst many, in his “Morals.” The first is in his book of the
Cessation of Oracles; where arguing against the Stoics, (in behalf of
the Platonists,) who disputed against the plurality of worlds with this
argument,—“That if there were many worlds, how then could it come to
pass that there was one only Fate, and one Providence to guide them all?
(for it was granted by the Platonists that there was but one;) and why
should not many Jupiters or gods be necessary for government of many
worlds?” To this Plutarch answers,—“That this their captious question
was but trifling; for where is the necessity of supposing many Jupiters
for this plurality of worlds, when one excellent Being, endued with
mind and reason, such as he is, whom we acknowledge to be the Father
and Lord of all things, is sufficient to direct and rule these worlds;
whereas if there were more Supreme Agents, their decrees must still be
the more absurd and contradictious to one another.” I pretend not this
passage to be translated word for word, but it is the sense of the whole,
though the order of the sentence be inverted. The other is more plain;
it is in his comment on the word EI, or those two letters inscribed on
the gates of the temple at Delphos; where, having given the several
opinions concerning it, as first, that ἐι signifies _if_, because all
the questions which were made to Apollo began with _If_; as suppose
they asked,—_If_ the Grecians should overcome the Persians,—_If_ such a
marriage should come to pass, &c.; and afterwards, that ἐι might signify
_thou art_; as the second person of the present tense of ἐιμὶ, intimating
thereby the being or perpetuity of being belonging to Apollo, as a god
(in the same sense that God expressed himself to Moses,—_I AM hath sent
thee_;) Plutarch subjoins, (as inclining to this latter opinion,) these
following words:—“ἐι ἔν (says he) signifies, _thou art one_, for there
are not many deities, but only one:” Continues, “I mean not one in the
aggregate sense, as we say—one army, or one body of men, constituted of
many individuals, but that which is, must of necessity be one; and to be,
implies to be one. One is that which is a simple being, uncompounded, or
free from mixture; therefore, to be one in this sense, is only consistent
with a nature pure in itself, and not capable of alteration or decay.”
That he was no Christian, is manifest; yet he is no where found to have
spoken with contumely of our religion, like the other writers of his
age, and those who succeeded him. Theodoret says of him, “That he had
heard of our holy gospel, and inserted many of our sacred mysteries in
his works;” which we may easily believe, (because the Christian churches
were then spread in Greece, and Pliny the younger was at the same time
conversant amongst them in Asia,) though that part of our author’s works
is not now extant, from whence Theodoret might gather those passages. But
we need not wonder that a philosopher was not easy to embrace the divine
mysteries of our faith. A modern God, as our Saviour was to him, was of
hard digestion to a man, who probably despised the vanities and fabulous
relations of all the old. Besides, a crucified Saviour of mankind; a
doctrine attested by illiterate disciples; the author of it a Jew, whose
nation at that time was despicable, and his doctrine but an innovation
among that despised people, to which the learned of his own country gave
no credit, and which the magistrates of his nation punished with an
ignominious death; the scene of his miracles acted in an obscure corner
of the world; his being from eternity, yet born in time; his resurrection
and ascension; these, and many more particulars, might easily choke the
faith of a philosopher, who believed no more than what he could deduce
from the principles of nature; and that too with a doubtful academical
assent, or rather an inclination to assent to probability, which he
judged was wanting in this new religion. These circumstances considered,
though they plead not an absolute invincible ignorance in his behalf, yet
they amount at least to a degree of it: for either he thought them not
worth weighing, or rejected them when weighed; and in both cases he must
of necessity be ignorant, because he could not know without revelation,
and the revelation was not to him.
But leaving the soul of Plutarch, with our charitable wishes, to his
Maker, we can only trace the rest of his opinions in religion from his
philosophy, which we have said in the general to be Platonic; though it
cannot also be denied, that there was a tincture in it of the Electic
sect, which was begun by Potamon under the empire of Augustus, and which
selected from all the other sects what seemed most probable in their
opinions, not adhering singularly to any of them, nor rejecting every
thing. I will only touch his belief of spirits. In his two Treatises of
Oracles, the one concerning the reason of their cessation, the other,
inquiring why they were not given in verse, as in former times, he seems
to assert the Pythagorean doctrine of transmigration of souls. We have
formerly shewn, that he owned the unity of a Godhead, whom, according to
his attributes, he calls by several names; as Jupiter, from his almighty
power; Apollo, from his wisdom, and so of the rest; but, under him, he
places those beings whom he styles Genii, or Demons, of a middle nature
betwixt divine and human: for he thinks it absurd, that there should be
no mean betwixt the two extremes of an immortal and a mortal being; that
there cannot be in nature so vast a flaw, without some intermedial kind
of life, partaking of them both. As, therefore, we find the intercourse
betwixt the soul and body to be made by the animal spirits, so, betwixt
divinity and humanity, there is this species of demons, who, having
first been men, and following the strict rules of virtue, had purged off
the grossness and feculency of their earthly being, are exalted into
these Genii, and are from thence either raised higher into an ethereal
life, if they still continue virtuous, or tumbled down again into mortal
bodies, and sinking into flesh, after they have lost that purity which
constituted their glorious being. And this sort of Genii are those, who,
as our author imagines, presided over oracles; spirits which have so much
of their terrestrial principles remaining in them, as to be subject to
passions and inclinations; usually beneficent, sometimes malevolent, to
mankind, according as they refine themselves, or gather dross, and are
declining into mortal bodies. The cessation, or rather the decrease of
oracles, (for some of them were still remaining in Plutarch’s time,) he
attributes either to the death of those demons, (as appears by the story
of the Egyptian Thamus, who was commanded to declare that the great god
Pan was dead,) or to their forsaking of those places where they formerly
gave out their oracles, from whence they were driven by stronger genii
into banishment for a certain revolution of ages. Of this last nature
was the war of the giants against the gods; the dispossession of Saturn
by Jupiter; the banishment of Apollo from heaven; the fall of Vulcan,
and many others; all which, according to our author, were the battles of
these Genii, or Demons, amongst themselves. But supposing, as Plutarch
evidently does, that these spirits administered, under the Supreme Being,
the affairs of men, taking care of the virtuous, punishing the bad,
and sometimes communicating with the best, (as particularly the genius
of Socrates always warned him of approaching dangers, and taught him
to avoid them,) I cannot but wonder, that every one who has hitherto
written Plutarch’s life, and particularly Rualdus, the most knowing of
them all, should so confidently affirm, that these oracles were given
by bad spirits, according to Plutarch. As Christians, indeed, we may
think them so; but that Plutarch so thought, it is a most apparent
falsehood. It is enough to convince a reasonable man, that our author,
in his old age, (and that then he doted not we may see by the Treatise
he has written, that old men ought to have the management of public
affairs,) I say, that then he initiated himself in the sacred rites of
Delphos, and died, for aught we know, Apollo’s priest. Now, it is not
to be imagined that he thought the god he served a cacodemon, or, as we
call him, a devil. Nothing could be farther from the opinion and practice
of this holy philosopher than so gross an impiety. The story of the
Pythias, or Priestess of Apollo, which he relates immediately before the
ending of that Treatise concerning the Cessation of Oracles, confirms
my assertion, rather than shakes it; for it is there delivered, “That
going with great reluctation into the sacred place to be inspired, she
came out foaming at the mouth, her eyes gogling, her breast heaving, her
voice undistinguishable and shrill, as if she had an earthquake within
her, labouring for vent; and, in short, that thus tormented with the
god, whom she was not able to support, she died distracted in few days
after.” For he had said before, “that the divineress ought to have no
perturbations of mind, or impure passions, at the time when she was to
consult the oracle; and if she had, she was no more fit to be inspired,
than an instrument untuned to render an harmonious sound.” And he gives
us to suspect, by what he says at the close of this relation, “that this
Pythias had not lived chastely for some time before it.” So that her
death appears more like a punishment inflicted for loose living by some
holy power, than the mere malignancy of a spirit delighted naturally
in mischief.—There is another observation, which indeed comes nearer
to their purpose, which I will digress so far as to relate, because it
somewhat appertains to our own country:—“There are many islands (says he)
which lie scattered about Britain, after the manner of our Sporades. They
are unpeopled, and some of them are called the Islands of the Heroes, or
the Genii. One Demetrius was sent by the emperor [who, by computation of
the time, must either be Caligula or Claudius] to discover those parts;
and arriving at one of the islands, next adjoining to the fore-mentioned,
which was inhabited by some few Britons, (but those held sacred and
inviolable by all their countrymen,) immediately after his arrival, the
air grew black and troubled, strange apparitions were seen, the winds
raised a tempest, and fiery spouts, or whirlwinds, appeared dancing
towards the earth. When these prodigies were ceased, the islanders
informed him, that some one of the aërial beings, superior to our nature,
then ceased to live. For as a taper, while yet burning, affords a
pleasant harmless light, but is noisome and offensive when extinguished,
so those heroes shine benignly on us, and do us good, but at their death
turn all things topsyturvy; raise up tempests, and infect the air with
pestilential vapours.” By those holy and inviolable men, there is no
question but he means our Druids, who were nearest to the Pythagoreans of
any sect; and this opinion of the Genii might probably be one of theirs.
Yet it proves not that all demons were thus malicious; only those who
were to be condemned hereafter into human bodies, for their misdemeanours
in their aërial being.
But it is time to leave a subject so very fanciful, and so little
reasonable as this. I am apt to imagine the natural vapours arising
in the cave where the temple afterwards was built, might work upon
the spirits of those who entered the holy place, (as they did on the
shepherd Coretas, who first found it out by accident,) and incline them
to enthusiasm and prophetic madness: that, as the strength of those
vapours diminished, (which were generally in caverns, as that of Mopsus,
of Trophonius, and this of Delphos,) so the inspiration decreased by the
same measures; that they happened to be stronger when they killed the
Pythias, who being conscious of this, was so unwilling to enter; that the
oracles ceased to be given in verse, when poets ceased to be the priests;
and that the genius of Socrates (whom he confessed never to have seen,
but only to have heard inwardly, and unperceived by others) was no more
than the strength of his imagination; or, to speak in the language of a
Christian Platonist, his guardian angel.
I pretend not to an exactness of method in this Life, which I am forced
to collect by patches from several authors, and therefore without much
regard to the connection of times which are so uncertain.
I will, in the next place, speak of his marriage. His wife’s name, her
parentage, and dowry, are no where mentioned by him, or any other, nor in
what part of his age he married; though it is probable in the flower of
it. But Rualdus has ingeniously gathered, from a convincing circumstance,
that she was called Timoxena; because Plutarch, in a consolatory letter
to her, occasioned by the death of their daughter, in her infancy, uses
these words:—“Your Timoxena is deprived, by death, of small enjoyments;
for the things she knew were of small moment, and she could be delighted
only with trifles.” Now, it appears by the letter, that the name of this
daughter was the same with her mother’s; therefore it could be no other
than Timoxena. Her knowledge, her conjugal virtues, her abhorrency from
the vanities of her sex, and from superstition, her gravity in behaviour,
and her constancy in supporting the loss of children, are likewise
celebrated by our author. No other wife of Plutarch is found mentioned,
and therefore we may conclude he had no more, by the same reason for
which we judge that he had no other master than Ammonius; because it is
evident he was so grateful in his nature, that he would have preserved
their memory.
The number of his children was at least five, so many being mentioned by
him. Four of them were sons; of the other sex only Timoxena, who died
at two years old, as is manifest from the epistle above mentioned. The
French translator, Amiot, from whom our old English translation of the
“Lives” was made, supposes him to have had another daughter, where he
speaks of his son-in-law, Crato. But the word γαμβρὸς, which Plutarch
there uses, is of a larger signification; for it may as well be expounded
father-in-law, his wife’s brother, or his sister’s husband, as Budæus
notes: this I the rather mention, because the same Amiot is tasked for
an infinite number of mistakes by his own countrymen of the present age,
which is enough to recommend this translation of our author into the
English tongue, being not from any copy, but from the Greek original.
Two other sons of Plutarch were already deceased before Timoxena; his
eldest, Autobulus, mentioned in his Symposiacks, and another, whose name
is not recorded. The youngest was called Charon, who also died in his
infancy. The two remaining are supposed to have survived him: the name
of one was Plutarch, after his own; and that of the other Lamprias, so
called in memory of his grandfather. This was he, of all his children,
who seems to have inherited his father’s philosophy; and to him we owe
the Table, or Catalogue, of Plutarch’s writings, and perhaps also the
Apophthegms. His nephew, but whether by his brother or sister remains
uncertain, was Sextus Chæroneus, who was much honoured by that learned
emperor, Marcus Aurelius, and who taught him the Greek tongue, and the
principles of philosophy. This emperor professing Stoicism, (as appears
by his writings,) inclines us to believe, that our Sextus Chæroneus
was of the Stoic sect; and consequently, that the world has generally
been mistaken in supposing him to have been the same man with Sextus
Empiricus, the sceptic, whom Suidas plainly tells us to have been an
African. Now, Empiricus could not but be a sceptic, for he opposes all
dogmatists, and particularly them. But I heard it first observed by an
ingenious and learned old gentleman, lately deceased, that many of Mr
Hobbes his seeming new opinions, are gathered from those which Sextus
Empiricus exposed. The book is extant, and I refer the curious to it, not
pretending to arraign or to excuse him.
Some think the famous critic, Longinus, was of Plutarch’s family,
descended from a sister of his; but the proofs are so weak, that I will
not insert them: they may both of them rely on their proper merits, and
stand not in want of a relation to each other.
It is needless to insist on his behaviour in his family. His love to his
wife, his indulgence to his children, his care of their education, are
all manifest in that part of his works, which is called his “Morals.”
Other parts of his disposition have been touched already; as, that he
was courteous and humane to all men, free from inconstancy, anger, and
the desire of revenge; which qualities of his, as they have been praised
by the authority of other writers, may also be recommended from his own
testimony of himself:—“I had rather (says he) be forgotten in the memory
of men, and that it should be said, there neither is, nor was, a man
called Plutarch, than they should report,—this Plutarch was unconstant,
changeable in his temper, prone to anger and revenge on the least
occasions.”—What he was to his slaves, you may believe from this; that,
in general, he accuses those masters of extreme hardness and injustice,
who use men like oxen, sell them in their age when they can drudge no
longer. “A man (says he) of a merciful disposition, ought not to retrench
the fodder from his cattle, nor the provender from his horses, when
they can work no longer, but to cherish them when worn out and old.”
Yet Plutarch, though he knew how to moderate his anger, was not, on
the contrary, subject to an insensibility of wrongs; not so remiss in
exacting duty, or so tame in suffering the disobedience of his servants,
that he could not correct, when they deserved it; as is manifest from
the following story, which Aulus Gellius had from the mouth of Taurus
the philosopher, concerning him: “Plutarch had a certain slave, a saucy,
stubborn, kind of fellow; in a word, one of those pragmatical servants,
who never make a fault, but they give a reason for it. His justifications
one time would not serve his turn, but his master commanded him to be
stripped, and that the law should be laid on his backside. He no sooner
felt the smart, but he muttered that he was unjustly punished, and that
he had done nothing to deserve the scourge. At last he began to bawl out
louder; and leaving off his groaning, his sighs, and his lamentations, to
argue the matter with more shew of reason; and, as under such a master
he musts needs have gained a smattering of learning, he cried out, that
Plutarch was not the philosopher he pretended himself to be; that he had
heard him waging war against all the passions, and maintaining, that
anger was unbecoming a wise man; nay, that he had written a particular
treatise in commendation of clemency: that therefore he contradicted his
precepts by his practices, since, abandoning himself over to his choler,
he exercised such inhuman cruelty on the body of his fellow-creature.
“How is this, Mr Varlet, (answered Plutarch,) by what signs and tokens
can you prove I am in passion? Is it by my countenance, my voice,
the colour of my face, by my words, or by my gestures, that you have
discovered this my fury? I am not of opinion that my eyes sparkle, that I
foam at mouth, that I gnash my teeth, or that my voice is more vehement,
or that my colour is either more pale or more red than at other times;
that I either shake or stamp with madness; that I say or do any thing
unbecoming a philosopher. These, if you know them not, are the symptoms
of a man in rage. In the mean, (turning to the officer who scourged him,)
while he and I dispute this matter, mind you your business on his back.”
His love to his friends, and his gratitude to his benefactors, are
every where observable in his dedications of his several works; and the
particular treatises he has written to them on several occasions, are
all suitable either to the characters of the men, or to their present
condition, and the circumstances under which they were. His love to his
country is from hence conspicuous, that he professes to have written
the life of Lucullus, and to have preserved the memory of his actions,
because of the favours he conferred on the city of Chæronea; which,
though his country received so long before, yet he thought it appertained
to him to repay them, and took an interest in their acknowledgment: as
also, that he vindicated the Bæotians from the calumnies of Herodotus,
the historian, in his book concerning the malignity of that author. In
which it is observable, that his zeal to his country transported him too
far; for Herodotus had said no more of them than what was generally held
to be true in all ages, concerning the grossness of their wits, their
voracity, and those other national vices which we have already noted
on this account; therefore, Petrarch has accused our author of the same
malignity for which he taxed Herodotus. But they may both stand acquitted
on different accounts: Herodotus for having given a true character of the
Thebans, and Plutarch for endeavouring to palliate the vices of a people
from whom he was descended. The rest of his manners, without entering
into particulars, were unblameable, if we excuse a little proneness to
superstition, and regulating his actions by his dreams. But how far this
will bear an accusation, I determine not; though Tully has endeavoured
to shew the vanity of dreams in his “Treatise of Divinations,” whither I
refer the curious.
On what occasion he repaired to Rome, at what time of his age he came
thither, how long he dwelt there, how often he was there, and in what
year he returned to his own country, are all uncertain. This we know,
that when Nero was in Greece, which was in his eleventh and twelfth
years, our author was at Delphos, under Ammonius, his master, as appears
by the disputation then managed, concerning the inscription of the two
letters, E, I. Nero not living long afterwards, it is almost indisputable
that he came not to Rome in all his reign. It is improbable that he would
undertake the voyage during the troublesome times of Galba, Otho, and
Vitellius: and we are not certain that he lived in Rome in the empire
of Vespasian. Yet we may guess, that the mildness of this emperor’s
dominion, his fame, and the virtues of his son Titus, assumed into the
empire afterwards by his father, might induce Plutarch, amongst other
considerations, to take this journey in his time. It is argued from the
following story, related by himself, that he was at Rome either in the
joint reign of the two Vespasians, or at least in that of the survivor
Titus. He says, then, in his last book concerning Curiosity,—“Reasoning,
or rather reading once at Rome, Arulenus Rusticus, the same man whom
afterwards Domitian put to death out of envy to his glory, stood
hearkening to me amongst my auditors. It so happened, that a soldier,
having letters for him from the emperor, [who was either Titus or his
father Vespasian, as Rualdus thinks,] broke through the crowd, to deliver
him those letters from the emperor. Observing this, I made a pause in my
dissertation, that Rusticus might have the leisure to read the mandate
which was sent him; but he absolutely refused to do it, neither would
he be entreated to break the seals, till I had wholly made an end of
my speech, and dismissed the company.” Now I suppose the stress of the
argument, to prove that this emperor was not Domitian, lies only in this
clause, “whom Domitian afterwards put to death;” but I think it rather
leaves it doubtful; for they might be Domitian’s letters which he then
received, and consequently he might not come to Rome till the reign of
that emperor. This Rusticus was not only a learned, but a good man. He
had been tribune of the people under Nero, was prætor in the time of
Vitellius, and sent ambassador to the forces raised under the name of
Vespasian, to persuade them to a peace. What offices he bore afterwards,
we know not; but the cause of his death, besides the envy of Domitian
to his fame, was, a certain book, or some Commentaries of his, wherein
he had praised too much the sanctity of Thrasea Pætus, whom Nero had
murdered; and the praise of a good citizen was insupportable to the
tyrant; being, I suppose, exasperated farther by some reflections of
Rusticus, who could not commend Thrasea, but at the same time he must
inveigh against the oppressor of the Roman liberty.
That Plutarch was married in his own country, and that before he came
to Rome, is probable. That the fame of him was come before him, by
reason of some part of his works already published, is also credible,
because he had so great resort of the Roman nobility to hear him read
immediately, as we believe, upon his coming: that he was invited thither
by the correspondence he had with Sossius Senecio, might be one reason
of his undertaking that journey, is almost undeniable.[6] It likewise
appears he was divers times at Rome; and perhaps, before he came to
inhabit there, might make acquaintance with this worthy man, Senecio,
to whom he dedicated almost all these Lives of Greeks and Romans. I say
almost all, because one of them, namely, that of Aratus, is inscribed in
most express words to Polycrates, the Sicyonian, the great grandson of
the said Aratus. This worthy patron and friend of Plutarch, Senecio, was
four time consul; the first time in the short reign of Cocceius Nerva, a
virtuous and a learned emperor; which opinion I rather follow than that
of Aurelius Cassiodorus, who puts back his consulship into the last of
Domitian, because it is not probable that vicious tyrant should exalt to
that dignity a man of virtue. This year falls in with the year of Christ,
ninety-nine.
But the great inducement of our author to this journey was certainly
the desire he had to lay in materials for his Roman Lives: that was
the design which he had formed early, and on which he had resolved to
build his fame. Accordingly, we have observed, that he had travelled
over Greece, to peruse the archives of every city, that he might be
able to write properly not only the lives of his Grecian worthies, but
the laws, the customs, the rites, and ceremonies of every place; which
that he might treat with the same mastery of skill, when he came to draw
his PARALLELS of the Romans, he took the invitation of his friends, and
particularly of our Sossius Senecio, to visit this mistress of the world,
this imperial city of Rome; and, by the favour of many great and learned
men then living, to search the records of the capitol, and the libraries,
which might furnish him with instruments for so noble an undertaking. But
that this may not seem to be my own bare opinion, or that of any modern
author whom I follow, Plutarch himself has delivered it as his motive,
in the Life of Demosthenes. The words are these: “Whosoever designs to
write an history, (which it is impossible to form to any excellency from
those materials that are ready at hand, or to take from common report,
while he sits lazily at home in his own study, but must of necessity be
gathered from foreign observations, and the scattered writings of various
authors,) it concerns him to take up his habitation in some renowned and
populous city, where he may command all sorts of books, and be acquainted
also with such particulars as have escaped the pens of writers, and are
only extant in the memories of men. Let him enquire diligently, and
weigh judiciously, what he hears and reads, lest he publish a lame work,
and be destitute of those helps which are required to its perfection.”
It is then most probable, that he passed his days at Rome in reading
philosophy of all kinds to the Roman nobility, who frequented his house,
and heard him as if there were somewhat more than human in his words; and
his nights, which were his only hours of private study, in searching and
examining records concerning Rome. Not but that he was entrusted also
with the management of public affairs in the empire, during his residence
in the metropolis; which may be made out by what Suidas relates of
him:—“Plutarch,” says he, “lived in the time of Trajan, and also before
his reign. That emperor bestowed on him the dignity of consul; [though
the Greek, I suppose, will bear, that he made him consul with himself, at
least transferred that honour on him:] an edict was also made in favour
of him, that the magistrates or officers of Illyria should do nothing
in that province without the knowledge and approbation of Plutarch.”
Now it is my particular guess, (for I have not read it any where,) that
Plutarch had the affairs of Illyria, now called Sclavonia, recommended
to him, because Trajan, we know, had wars on that side the empire with
Decebalus, king of Dacia; after whose defeat and death, the province of
Illyria might stand in need of Plutarch’s wisdom to compose and civilize
it. But this is only hinted as what possibly might be the reason of our
philosopher’s superintendency in those quarters, which the French author
of his life seems to wonder at, as having no relation either to Chæronea
or Greece.
When he was first made known to Trajan, is like the rest uncertain; or
by what means, whether by Senecio, or any other, he was introduced to
his acquaintance; but it is most likely that Trajan, then a private man,
was one of his auditors, amongst others of the nobility of Rome. It is
also thought, this wise emperor made use of him in all his councils; and
that the happiness which attended him in his undertakings, together with
the administration of the government, which in all his reign was just
and regular, proceeded from the instructions which were given him by
Plutarch. Johannes Sarisberiensis, who lived above six hundred years ago,
has transcribed a letter, written, as he supposed, by our author to that
emperor. Whence he had it, is not known, nor the original in Greek to be
produced; but it passed for genuine in that age, and if not Plutarch’s,
is at least worthy of him, and what might well be supposed a man of his
character would write; for which reason I have here translated it.
PLUTARCH TO TRAJAN.
“I am satisfied that your modesty sought not the empire, which
yet you have always studied to deserve by the excellency of
your manners; and by so much the more are you esteemed worthy
of this honour, by how much you are free from the ambition of
desiring it. I therefore congratulate both your virtue and my
own good fortune, if at least your future government shall prove
answerable to your former merit; otherwise you have involved
yourself in dangers, and I shall infallibly be subject to the
censures of detracting tongues; because Rome will never support
an emperor unworthy of her, and the faults of the scholar will
be upbraided to the master. Thus Seneca is reproached, and his
fame still suffers, for the vices of Nero. The miscarriages of
Quintilian’s scholars have been thrown on him; and even Socrates
himself is not free from the imputation of remissness on the
account of his pupil, Alcibiades. But you will certainly
administer all things as becomes you, if you still continue
what you are; if you recede not from yourself, if you begin at
home, and lay the foundation of government on the command of
your own passions; if you make virtue the scope of all your
actions, they will all proceed in harmony and order. I have
set before you the force of laws and civil constitutions of
your predecessors, which if you imitate and obey, Plutarch is
then your guide of living; if otherwise, let this present
letter be my testimony against you, that you shall not ruin
the Roman empire under the pretence of the counsel and
authority of Plutarch.”[7]
It may be conjectured, and with some show of probability, from hence,
that our author not only collected his materials, but also made a rough
draft of many of these parallel Lives at Rome; and that he read them
to Trajan for his instruction in government; and so much the rather
I believe it, because all historians agree that this emperor, though
naturally prudent and inclined to virtue, had more of the soldier than
the scholar in his education, before he had the happiness to know
Plutarch; for which reason the Roman Lives, and the inspection into
ancient laws, might be of necessary use to his direction.
And now for the time of our author’s abode in the imperial city: if he
came so early as Vespasian, and departed not till Trajan’s death, as is
generally thought, he might continue in Italy near forty years. This is
more certain, because gathered from himself,—that his Lives were almost
the latest of his works; and therefore we may well conclude, that having
modelled, but not finished them at Rome, he afterwards resumed the work
in his own country; which perfecting in his old age, he dedicated to his
friend Senecio still living, as appears by what he has written in the
proem to his Lives.
The desire of visiting his own country, so natural to all men, and the
approaches of old age, (for he could not be much less than sixty,) and
perhaps also the death of Trajan, prevailed with him at last to leave
Italy; or, if you will have it in his own words, “he was not willing his
little city should be one the less by his absence.” After his return, he
was, by the unanimous consent of his citizens, chosen Archon, or chief
magistrate of Chæronea, and not long after admitted himself in the number
of Apollo’s priests; in both which employments he seems to have continued
till his death, of which we have no particular account, either as to the
manner of it, or the year; only it is evident that he lived to a great
old age,[8] always continuing his studies. That he died a natural death,
is only presumed, because any violent accident to so famous a man would
have been recorded; and in whatsoever reign he deceased, the days of
tyranny were overpassed, and there was then a golden series of emperors,
every one emulating his predecessor’s virtues.
Thus I have collected from Plutarch himself, and from the best authors,
what was most remarkable concerning him; in performing which, I have
laboured under so many uncertainties, that I have not been able to
satisfy my own curiosity, any more than that of others. It is the life
of a philosopher, not varied with accidents to divert the reader; more
pleasant for himself to live, than for an historian to describe. Those
works of his, which are irrecoverably lost, are named in the catalogue
made by his son, Lamprias, which you will find in the Paris edition,
dedicated to King Louis the Thirteenth. But it is a small comfort to a
merchant to peruse his bill of freight, when he is certain his ship is
cast away; moved by the like reason, I have omitted that ungrateful task.
Yet that the reader may not be imposed on in those which yet remain, it
is but reasonable to let him know, that the Lives of Hannibal and Scipio,
though they pass with the ignorant for genuine, are only the forgery of
Donato Acciaiolo, a Florentine. He pretends to have translated them from
a Greek manuscript, which none of the learned have ever seen, either
before or since. But the cheat is more manifest from this reason, which
is undeniable; that Plutarch did indeed write the Life of Scipio; but
he compared him not with Hannibal, but with Epaminondas; as appears by
the catalogue or nomenclature of Plutarch’s Lives, drawn up by his son
Lamprias, and yet extant. But to make this out more clearly, we find the
Florentine, in his Life of Hannibal, thus relating the famous conference
betwixt Scipio and him:—“Scipio at that time being sent ambassador from
the Romans to King Antiochus, with Publius Villius, it happened then
that these two great captains met together at Ephesus; and amongst other
discourse, it was demanded of Hannibal by Scipio,—whom he thought to
have been the greatest captain? To whom he thus answered—In the first
place, Alexander of Macedon; in the second, Pyrrhus of Epyrus; and in
the third, himself. To which Scipio, smiling, thus replied:—And what
would you have thought, had it been your fortune to have vanquished me?
To whom Hannibal:—I should then have adjudged the first place to myself.
Which answer was not a little pleasing to Scipio, because by it he found
himself not disesteemed, nor put into comparison with the rest; but by
the delicacy and gallantry of a well-turned compliment, set like a man
divine above them all.”
Now this relation is a mere compendium of the same conference, from Livy;
but if we can conceive Plutarch to have written the Life of Hannibal, it
is hard to believe that he should tell the same story after so different,
or rather so contrary a manner, in another place. For, in the Life of
Pyrrhus, he thus writes:—“Hannibal adjudged the pre-eminence to Pyrrhus
above all captains, in conduct, and military skill; next to Pyrrhus he
placed Scipio; and after Scipio, himself; as we have declared in the
Life of Scipio.” It is not that I would excuse Plutarch, as if he never
related the same thing diversly; for it is evident, that, through want
of advertency, he has been often guilty of that error, of which the
reader will find too frequent examples in these Lives; but in this place
he cannot be charged with want of memory or care, because what he says
here is relating to what he had said formerly; so that he may mistake
the story, as I believe he has done, (that other of Livy being much more
probable,) but we must allow him to remember what he had before written.
From hence I might take occasion to note some other lapses of our author,
which yet amount not to falsification of truth, much less to partiality,
or envy, (both which are manifest in his countryman Dion Cassius, who
writ not long after him,) but are only the frailties of human nature;
mistakes not intentional, but accidental. He was not altogether so
well versed either in the Roman language, or in their coins, or in the
value of them; in some customs, rites, and ceremonies, he took passages
on trust from others, relating both to them and the barbarians, which
the reader may particularly find recited in the animadversions of the
often-praised Rualdus on our author. I will name but one, to avoid
tediousness, because I particularly observed it, when I read Plutarch
in the library of Trinity College, in Cambridge, to which foundation
I gratefully acknowledge a great part of my education. It is, that
Plutarch, in the life of Cicero, speaking of Verres, who was accused by
him, and repeating a miserable jest of Tully’s, says that Verres, in
the Roman language, signifies a barrow-pig, that is, one which has been
gelded. But we have a better account of the signification from Varro,
whom we have more reason to believe; that the male of that kind, before
he is cut, is called Verres; after cutting, Majalis, which is perhaps
a diminutive of Mas, though generally the reason of the etymology is
given from its being a sacrifice to the goddess Maja. Yet any man, who
will candidly weigh this and the like errors, may excuse Plutarch, as
he would a stranger mistaking the propriety of an English word; and
besides the humanity of this excuse, it is impossible in nature, that a
man of so various learning, and so covetous of engrossing all, should
perfectly digest such an infinity of notions in many sciences; since to
be excellent in one is so great a labour.
It may now be expected, that, having written the life of an historian, I
should take occasion to write somewhat concerning history itself: but I
think to commend it is unnecessary, for the profit and pleasure of that
study are both so very obvious, that a quick reader will be beforehand
with me, and imagine faster than I can write. Besides that the post
is taken up already; and few authors have travelled this way, but who
have strewed it with rhetoric as they passed. For my own part, who must
confess it to my shame, that I never read any thing but for pleasure, it
has always been the most delightful entertainment of my life; but they
who have employed the study of it as they ought, for their instruction,
for the regulation of their private manners, and the management of
public affairs, must agree with me, that it is the most pleasant school
of wisdom. It is a familiarity with past ages, and an acquaintance with
all the heroes of them; it is, if you will pardon the similitude, a
prospective glass carrying your soul to a vast distance, and taking in
the farthest objects of antiquity. It informs the understanding by the
memory; it helps us to judge of what will happen, by shewing us the like
revolutions of former times. For mankind being the same in all ages,
agitated by the same passions, and moved to action by the same interests,
nothing can come to pass, but some precedent of the like nature has
already been produced; so that having the causes before our eyes, we
cannot easily be deceived in the effects, if we have judgment enough but
to draw the parallel.
God, it is true, with his divine providence overrules and guides all
actions to the secret end he has ordained them; but in the way of human
causes, a wise man may easily discern that there is a natural connection
betwixt them; and though he cannot foresee accidents, or all things that
possibly can come, he may apply examples, and by them foretell, that
from the like counsels will probably succeed the like events; and thereby
in all concernments, and all offices of life, be instructed in the two
main points on which depend our happiness; that is, what to avoid, and
what to choose.
The laws of history, in general, are truth of matter, method, and
clearness of expression. The first propriety is necessary, to keep our
understanding from the impositions of falsehood; for history is an
argument framed from many particular examples or inductions; if these
examples are not true, then those measures of life which we take from
them will be false, and deceive us in their consequence. The second is
grounded on the former; for if the method be confused, if the words or
expressions of thought are any way obscure, then the ideas which we
receive must be imperfect; and if such, we are not taught by them what to
elect or what to shun. Truth, therefore, is required as the foundation
of history, to inform us; disposition and perspicuity, as the manner to
inform us plainly; one is the being, the other the well-being of it.
History is principally divided into these three species; Commentaries,
or Annals; History, properly so called; and Biographia, or the Lives of
particular men.
Commentaries, or Annals, are (as I may so call them,) naked history, or
the plain relation of matter of fact, according to the succession of
time, devested of all other ornaments. The springs and motives of actions
are not here sought, unless they offer themselves, and are open to every
man’s discernment. The method is the most natural that can be imagined,
depending only on the observation of months and years, and drawing, in
the order of them, whatsoever happened worthy of relation. The style
is easy, simple, unforced, and unadorned with the pomp of figures;
councils, guesses, politic observations, sentences, and orations, are
avoided; in few words, a bare narration is its business. Of this kind
the “Commentaries of Cæsar” are certainly the most admirable, and after
him the “Annals of Tacitus” may have place; nay, even the prince of
Greek historians, Thucydides, may almost be adopted into the number.
For, though he instructs every where by sentences, though he gives the
causes of actions, the councils of both parties, and makes orations where
they are necessary, yet it is certain that he first designed his work a
Commentary; every year writing down, like an unconcerned spectator as
he was, the particular occurrences of the time, in the order as they
happened; and his eighth book is wholly written after the way of Annals;
though, outliving the war, he inserted in his others those ornaments
which render his work the most complete and most instructive now extant.
History, properly so called, may be described by the addition of
those parts which are not required to Annals; and therefore there is
little farther to be said concerning it; only, that the dignity and
gravity of style is here necessary. That the guesses of secret causes
inducing to the actions, be drawn at least from the most probable
circumstances, not perverted by the malignity of the author to sinister
interpretations, (of which Tacitus is accused,) but candidly laid down,
and left to the judgment of the reader: That nothing of concernment be
omitted; but things of trivial moment are still to be neglected, as
debasing the majesty of the work: That neither partiality or prejudice
appear, but that truth may every where be sacred: _Ne quid falsi dicere
audeat, ne quid veri non audeat historicus_: That he neither incline
to superstition, in giving too much credit to oracles, prophecies,
divinations, and prodigies, nor to irreligion, in disclaiming the
Almighty Providence; but where general opinion has prevailed of any
miraculous accident or portent, he ought to relate it as such, without
imposing his opinion on our belief. Next to Thucydides, in this kind, may
be accounted Polybius, amongst the Grecians; Livy, though not free from
superstition, nor Tacitus from ill-nature, amongst the Romans; amongst
the modern Italians, Guicciardini, and Davila, if not partial; but
above all men, in my opinion, the plain, sincere, unaffected, and most
instructive Philip de Comines, amongst the French, though he only gives
his History the humble name of Commentaries. I am sorry I cannot find in
our own nation, though it has produced some commendable historians, any
proper to be ranked with these. Buchanan, indeed, for the purity of his
Latin, and for his learning, and for all other endowments belonging to
an historian, might be placed amongst the greatest, if he had not too
much leaned to prejudice, and too manifestly declared himself a party of
a cause, rather than an historian of it. Excepting only that, (which I
desire not to urge too far on so great a man, but only to give caution
to his readers concerning it,) our isle may justly boast in him a writer
comparable to any of the moderns, and excelled by few of the ancients.
Biographia, or the history of particular men’s lives, comes next to be
considered; which in dignity is inferior to the other two, as being
more confined in action, and treating of wars and counsels, and all
other public affairs of nations, only as they relate to him whose life
is written, or as his fortunes have a particular dependance on them, or
connection to them. All things here are circumscribed, and driven to a
point, so as to terminate in one; consequently, if the action or counsel
were managed by colleagues, some part of it must be either lame or
wanting, except it be supplied by the excursion of the writer. Herein,
likewise, must be less of variety, for the same reason; because the
fortunes and actions of one man are related, not those of many. Thus the
actions and achievements of Sylla, Lucullus, and Pompey, are all of them
but the successive parts of the Mithridatic war; of which we could have
no perfect image, if the same hand had not given us the whole, though at
several views, in their particular lives.
Yet though we allow, for the reasons above alleged, that this kind of
writing is in dignity inferior to History and Annals, in pleasure and
instruction it equals, or even excels, both of them. It is not only
commended by ancient practice to celebrate the memory of great and
worthy men, as the best thanks which posterity can pay them, but also
the examples of virtue are of more vigour, when they are thus contracted
into individuals. As the sunbeams, united in a burning-glass to a point,
have greater force than when they are darted from a plain superficies,
so the virtues and actions of one man, drawn together into a single
story, strike upon our minds a stronger and more lively impression, than
the scattered relations of many men, and many actions; and, by the same
means that they give us pleasure, they afford us profit too. For when
the understanding is intent and fixed on a single thing, it carries
closer to the mark; every part of the object sinks into it; and, the soul
receives it unmixed and whole. For this reason Aristotle commends the
unity of action in a poem; because the mind is not capable of digesting
many things at once, nor of conceiving fully any more than one idea at a
time. Whatsoever distracts the pleasure, lessens it; and as the reader
is more concerned at one man’s fortune than those of many, so likewise
the writer is more capable of making a perfect work if he confine himself
to this narrow compass. The lineaments, features, and colourings of
a single picture may be hit exactly; but in a history-piece of many
figures, the general design, the ordonnance or disposition of it, the
relation of one figure to another, the diversity of the posture, habits,
shadowings, and all the other graces conspiring to an uniformity, are of
so difficult performance, that neither is the resemblance of particular
persons often perfect, nor the beauty of the piece complete; for any
considerable error in the parts renders the whole disagreeable and lame.
Thus then, the perfection of the work, and the benefit arising from it,
are both more absolute in biography than in history. All history is only
the precepts of moral philosophy reduced into examples. Moral philosophy
is divided into two parts, ethics and politics; the first instructs us
in our private offices of virtue, the second in those which relate to
the management of the commonwealth. Both of these teach by argumentation
and reasoning, which rush as it were into the mind, and possess it with
violence; but history rather allures than forces us to virtue. There
is nothing of the tyrant in example; but it gently glides into us, is
easy and pleasant in its passage, and in one word reduces into practice
our speculative notions; therefore the more powerful the examples are,
they are the more useful also; and, by being more known, they are more
powerful. Now unity, which is defined, is in its own nature more apt to
be understood than multiplicity, which in some measure participates of
infinity. The reason is Aristotle’s.
Biographia, or the histories of particular lives, though circumscribed
in the subject, is yet more extensive in the style than the other two;
for it not only comprehends them both, but has somewhat superadded,
which neither of them have. The style of it is various, according to the
occasion. There are proper places in it for the plainness and nakedness
of narration, which is ascribed to annals; there is also room reserved
for the loftiness and gravity of general history, when the actions
related shall require that manner of expression. But there is withal
a descent into minute circumstances, and trivial passages of life,
which are natural to this way of writing, and which the dignity of the
other two will not admit. There you are conducted only into the rooms
of state, here you are led into the private lodgings of the hero; you
see him in his undress, and are made familiar with his most private
actions and conversations. You may behold a Scipio and a Lælius gathering
cockle-shells on the shore, Augustus playing at bounding-stones with
boys, and Agesilaus riding on a hobby-horse among his children. The
pageantry of life is taken away; you see the poor reasonable animal as
naked as ever nature made him; are made acquainted with his passions and
his follies, and find the demi-god, a man. Plutarch himself has more than
once defended this kind of relating little passages; for, in the Life
of Alexander, he says thus: “In writing the lives of illustrious men, I
am not tied to the laws of history; nor does it follow, that, because
an action is great, it therefore manifests the greatness and virtue of
him who did it; but, on the other side, sometimes a word, or a casual
jest, betrays a man more to our knowledge of him, than a battle fought
wherein ten thousand men were slain, or sacking of cities, or a course
of victories.” In another place, he quotes Xenophon on the like occasion:
“The sayings of great men in their familiar discourses, and amidst
their wine, have somewhat in them which is worthy to be transmitted to
posterity.” Our author therefore needs no excuse, but rather deserves a
commendation, when he relates, as pleasant, some sayings of his heroes,
which appear (I must confess it) very cold and insipid mirth to us. For
it is not his meaning to commend the jest, but to paint the man; besides,
we may have lost somewhat of the idiotism of that language in which it
was spoken; and where the conceit is couched in a single word, if all the
significations of it are not critically understood, the grace and the
pleasantry are lost.
But in all parts of biography, whether familiar or stately, whether
sublime or low, whether serious or merry, Plutarch equally excelled. If
we compare him to others, Dion Cassius is not so sincere; Herodian, a
lover of truth, is oftentimes deceived himself with what he had falsely
heard reported: then the time of his emperors exceeds not in all above
sixty years; so that his whole history will scarce amount to three Lives
of Plutarch. Suetonius and Tacitus may be called alike either authors of
histories, or writers of lives; but the first of them runs too willingly
into obscene descriptions, which he teaches, while he relates; the other,
besides what has already been noted by him, often falls into obscurity;
and both of them have made so unlucky a choice of times, that they are
forced to describe rather monsters than men; and their emperors are
either extravagant fools or tyrants, and most usually both. Our author,
on the contrary, as he was more inclined to commend than to dispraise,
has generally chosen such great men as were famous for their several
virtues; at least such whose frailties or vices were overpoised by their
excellencies; such from whose examples we may have more to follow than
to shun. Yet, as he was impartial, he disguised not the faults of any
man: an example of which is in the life of Lucullus; where, after he has
told us that the double benefit which his countrymen, the Chæroneans,
received from him, was the chiefest motive which he had to write his
life, he afterwards rips up his luxury, and shews how he lost, through
his mismanagement, his authority and his soldiers’ love.—Then he was
more happy in his digressions than any we have named. I have always been
pleased to see him, and his imitator, Montaigne, when they strike a
little out of the common road; for we are sure to be the better for their
wandering. The best quarry lies not always in the open field; and who
would not be content to follow a good huntsman over hedges and ditches,
when he knows the game will reward his pains? But if we mark him more
narrowly, we may observe, that the great reason of his frequent starts
is the variety of his learning; he knew so much of nature, was so vastly
furnished with all the treasures of the mind, that he was uneasy to
himself, and was forced, as I may say, to lay down some at every passage,
and to scatter his riches as he went: like another Alexander or Adrian,
he built a city, or planted a colony, in every part of his progress, and
left behind him some memorial of his greatness. Sparta, and Thebes, and
Athens, and Rome, the mistress of the world, he has discovered in their
foundations, their institutions, their growth, their height; the decay of
the three first, and the alteration of the last. You see those several
people in their different laws, and policies, and forms of government,
in their warriors, and senators, and demagogues. Nor are the ornaments
of poetry, and the illustrations of similitudes, forgotten by him; in
both which he instructs, as well as pleases; or rather pleases, that he
may instruct.
This last reflection leads me naturally to say somewhat in general
of his style; though after having justly praised him for copiousness
of learning, integrity, perspicuity, and more than all this, for a
certain air of goodness which appears through all his writings, it were
unreasonable to be critical on his elocution. As on a tree which bears
excellent fruit, we consider not the beauty of the blossoms,—for if they
are not pleasant to the eye, or delightful to the scent, we know at the
same time that they are not the prime intention of nature, but are thrust
out in order to their product; so in Plutarch, whose business was not
to please the ear, but to charm and to instruct the mind, we may easily
forgive the cadences of words, and the roughness of expression. Yet,
for manliness of eloquence, if it abounded not in our author, it was
not wanting in him. He neither studied the sublime style, nor affected
the flowery. The choice of words, the numbers of periods, the turns
of sentences, and those other ornaments of speech, he neither sought
nor shunned; but the depth of sense, the accuracy of judgment, the
disposition of the parts, and contexture of the whole, in so admirable
and vast a field of matter, and lastly, the copiousness and variety of
words, appear shining in our author. It is, indeed, observed of him,
that he keeps not always to the style of prose, but if a poetical word,
which carries in it more of emphasis or signification, offer itself at
any time, he refuses it not because Homer or Euripides have used it;
but if this be a fault, I know not how Xenophon will stand excused. Yet
neither do I compare our author with him, or with Herodotus, in the
sweetness and graces of his style, nor with Thucydides in the solidity
and closeness of expression; for Herodotus is acknowledged the prince
of the Ionic, the other two of the Attic eloquence. As for Plutarch,
his style is so particular, that there is none of the ancients to whom
we can properly resemble him. And the reason of this is obvious; for,
being conversant in so great variety of authors, and collecting from
all of them what he thought most excellent, out of the confusion, or
rather mixture, of all their styles, he formed his own, which, partaking
of each, was yet none of them, but a compound of them all; like the
Corinthian metal, which had in it gold, and brass, and silver, and yet
was a species by itself. Add to this, that in Plutarch’s time, and long
before it, the purity of the Greek tongue was corrupted, and the native
splendour of it had taken the tarnish of barbarism, and contracted the
filth and spots of degenerating ages: for the fall of empires always
draws after it the language and eloquence of the people; they, who labour
under misfortunes or servitude, have little leisure to cultivate their
mother tongue. To conclude; when Athens had lost her sovereignty to the
Peloponnesians, and her liberty to Philip, neither a Thucydides nor a
Demosthenes were afterwards produced by her.
I have formerly acknowledged many lapses of our author, occasioned
through his inadvertency; but he is likewise taxed with faults which
reflect on his judgment in matters of fact, and his candour in the
comparisons of his Greeks and Romans; both which are so well vindicated
by Montaigne, that I need but barely to translate him:—“First, then, he
is accused of want of judgment, in reporting things incredible; for proof
of which is alleged the story he tells of the Spartan boy, who suffered
his bowels to be torn out by a young fox which he had stolen, choosing
rather to hide him under his garment till he died, than to confess his
robbery. In the first place, this example is ill chosen, because it is
difficult to set a bound to the force of our internal faculties; it is
not defined how far our resolution may carry us to suffer. The force of
bodies may more easily be determined, than that of souls. Then of all
people, the Lacedemonians, by reason of their rigid institution, were
most hardened to undergo labours, and to suffer pains. Cicero, before
our author’s time, though then the Spartan virtue was degenerated, yet
avows to have seen himself some Lacedemonian boys, who, to make trial of
their patience, were placed before the altar of Diana, where they endured
scourging till they were all over bloody, and that not only without
crying, but even without a sigh or a groan: nay, and some of them so
ambitious of this reputation, that they willingly resigned their lives
under the hands of their tormentors.—The same may be said of another
story, which Plutarch vouches with an hundred witnesses: that in the
time of sacrifice, a burning coal by chance falling into the sleeve of a
Spartan boy, who held the censer, he suffered his arm to be scorched so
long without moving it, that the scent of it reeked up to the noses of
the assistants.
“For my own part, who have taken in so vast an idea of the Lacedemonian
magnanimity, Plutarch’s story is so far from seeming incredible to
me, that I neither think it wonderful nor uncommon; for we ought not
to measure possibilities or impossibilities by our own standard, that
is, by what we ourselves could do or suffer. These, and some other
slight examples, are made use of, to lessen the opinion of Plutarch’s
judgment.—But the common exception against his candour is, that in
his parallels of Greeks and Romans he has done too much honour to
his countrymen, in matching them with heroes with whom they were not
worthy to be compared. For instances of this, there are produced the
comparisons of Demosthenes and Cicero, Aristides and Cato, Lysander and
Sylla, Pelopidas and Marcellus, Agesilaus and Pompey. Now the ground of
this accusation is most probably the lustre of those Roman names, which
strikes on our imagination; for what proportion of glory is there betwixt
a Roman consul or proconsul of so great a commonwealth, and a simple
citizen of Athens? But he who considers the truth more nearly, and weighs
not honours with honours, but men with men, which was Plutarch’s main
design, will find in the balance of their manners, their virtues, their
endowments and abilities, that Cicero and the elder Cato were far from
having the over-weight against Demosthenes and Aristides. I might as well
complain against him in behalf of his own countrymen; for neither was
Camillus so famous as Themistocles, nor were Tiberius and Caius Gracchus
comparable to Agis and Cleomenes, in regard of dignity; much less was
the wisdom of Numa to be put in balance against that of Lycurgus, or
the modesty and temperance of Scipio against the solid philosophy and
perfect virtue of Epaminondas. Yet the disparity of victories, the
reputation, the blaze of glory, in the two last, were evidently on the
Roman side. But, as I said before, to compare them this way was the least
of Plutarch’s aim; he openly declares against it; for, speaking of the
course of Pompey’s fortune, his exploits of war, the greatness of the
armies which he commanded, the splendour and number of his triumphs,
in his comparison betwixt him and Agesilaus,—I believe, says he, that
if Xenophon were now alive, and would indulge himself the liberty to
write all he could to the advantage of his hero, Agesilaus, he would be
ashamed to put their acts in competition. In his comparison of Sylla and
Lysander, there is, says he, no manner of equality either in the number
of their victories, or in the danger of their battles; for Lysander only
gained two naval fights, &c. Now this is far from partiality to the
Grecians. He who would convince him of this vice, must shew us in what
particular judgment he has been too favourable to his countrymen; and
make it out in general, where he has failed in matching such a Greek with
such a Roman; which must be done by shewing how he could have paired
them better, and naming any other in whom the resemblance might have
been more perfect. But an equitable judge, who takes things by the same
handle which Plutarch did, will find there is no injury offered to either
party, though there be some disparity betwixt the persons; for he weighs
every circumstance by itself, and judges separately of it; not comparing
men at a lump, nor endeavouring to prove they were alike in all things,
but allowing for disproportion of quality or fortune, shewing wherein
they agreed or disagreed, and wherein one was to be preferred before the
other.”
I thought I had answered all that could reasonably be objected against
our author’s judgment; but casually casting my eye on the works of a
French gentleman,[9] deservedly famous for wit and criticism, I wondered,
amongst many commendations of Plutarch, to find this one reflection:—“As
for his comparisons, they seem truly to me very great; but I think he
might have carried them yet farther, and have penetrated more deeply
into human nature. There are folds and recesses in our minds, which
have escaped him; he judges man too much in gross, and thinks him not
so different as he is often from himself; the same person being just,
unjust, merciful, and cruel; which qualities seeming to belie each other
in him, he attributes their inconsistencies to foreign causes. In fine,
if he had described Catiline, he would have given him to us, either
prodigal or covetous: that _alieni appetens, sui profusus_, was above his
reach. He could never have reconciled those contrarieties in the same
subject, which Sallust has so well unfolded, and which Montaigne so much
better understood.”
This judgment could not have proceeded but from a man who has a nice
taste in authors; and if it be not altogether just, it is at least
delicate: but I am confident, that if he please to consider this
following passage, taken out of the Life of Sylla, he will moderate, if
not retract, his censure:
“In the rest of his manners he was unequal, irregular different from
himself: ἀνώμαλὸς τις ἔοικε, και διάφορος πρὸς ἑαυτὸν.He took many
things by rapine, he gave more; honoured men immoderately, and used
them contumeliously; was submissive to those of whom he stood in need,
insulting over those who stood in need of him; so that it was doubtful,
whether he were more formed by nature to arrogance or flattery. As to
his uncertain way of punishing, he would sometimes put men to death on
the least occasion; at other times he would pardon the greatest crimes:
so that judging him in the whole, you may conclude him to have been
naturally cruel, and prone to vengeance, but that he could remit of his
severity, when his interests required it.”
Here, methinks, our author seems to have sufficiently understood the
folds and doubles of Sylla’s disposition; for his character is full of
variety and inconsistencies. Yet in the conclusion it is to be confessed,
that Plutarch has assigned him a bloody nature; the clemency was but
artificial and assumed, the cruelty was inborn: but this cannot be said
of his rapine, and his prodigality; for here the _alieni appetens, sui
profusus_, is as plainly described, as if Plutarch had borrowed the
sense from Sallust; and, as he was a great collector, perhaps he did.
Nevertheless he judged rightly of Sylla, that naturally he was cruel,
for that quality was predominant in him; and he was oftener revengeful
than he was merciful. But this is sufficient to vindicate our author’s
judgment from being superficial; and I desire not to press the argument
more strongly against this gentleman, who has honoured our country by his
long residence amongst us.
It seems to me, I must confess, that our author has not been more hardly
treated by his enemies, in his comparing other men, than he has been
by his friends, in their comparing Seneca with him. And herein, even
Montaigne himself is scarcely to be defended; for no man more esteemed
Plutarch, no man was better acquainted with his excellencies; yet, this
notwithstanding, he has done too great an honour to Seneca, by ranking
him with our philosopher and historian; him, I say, who was so much less
a philosopher, and no historian. It is a reputation to Seneca, that any
one has offered at the comparison; the worth of his adversary makes his
defeat advantageous to him; and Plutarch might cry out, with justice,
_Qui cum victus erit, mecum certasse feretur_.
If I had been to find out a parallel for Plutarch, I should rather have
pitched on Varro, the most learned of the Romans, if at least his works
had yet remained; or Pomponius Atticus, if he had written. But the
likeness of Seneca is so little, that except the one’s being tutor to
Nero, and the other to Trajan, both of them strangers to Rome, yet raised
to the highest dignities in that city, and both philosophers, though of
several sects; (for Seneca was a Stoic, Plutarch a Platonician, at least
an Academic, that is, half Platonist, half Sceptic;) besides some such
faint resemblances as these, Seneca and Plutarch seem to have as little
relation to one another as their native countries, Spain and Greece.
If we consider them in their inclinations or humours, Plutarch was
sociable and pleasant, Seneca morose and melancholy: Plutarch a lover of
conversation, and sober feasts; Seneca reserved, uneasy to himself when
alone, to others when in company. Compare them in their manners; Plutarch
every where appears candid, Seneca often is censorious. Plutarch, out
of his natural humanity, is frequent in commending what he can; Seneca,
out of the sourness of his temper, is prone to satire, and still
searching for some occasion to vent his gall. Plutarch is pleased with
an opportunity of praising virtue; and Seneca, to speak the best of him,
is glad of a pretence to reprehend vice. Plutarch endeavours to teach
others, but refuses not to be taught himself; for he is always doubtful
and inquisitive: Seneca is altogether for teaching others, but so teaches
them, that he imposes his opinions, for he was of a sect too imperious
and dogmatical, either to be taught or contradicted; and yet Plutarch
writes like a man of a confirmed probity, Seneca like one of a weak and
staggering virtue. Plutarch seems to have vanquished vice, and to have
triumphed over it; Seneca seems only to be combating and resisting,
and that too but in his own defence: therefore Plutarch is easy in his
discourse, as one who has overcome the difficulty; Seneca is painful, as
he who still labours under it. Plutarch’s virtue is humble and civilized;
Seneca’s haughty and ill-bred: Plutarch allures you, Seneca commands you.
One would make virtue your companion, the other your tyrant. The style
of Plutarch is easy and flowing, that of Seneca precipitous and harsh:
the first is even, the second broken. The arguments of the Grecian, drawn
from reason, work themselves into your understanding, and make a deep
and lasting impression in your mind; those of the Roman, drawn from wit,
flash immediately on your imagination, but leave no durable effect: so
this tickles you by starts with his arguteness, that pleases you for
continuance with his propriety. The course of their fortunes seems also
to have partaken of their styles; for Plutarch’s was equal, smooth,
and of the same tenor,—Seneca’s was turbid, unconstant, and full of
revolutions. The life of Plutarch was unblameable, as the reader cannot
but have observed; and of all his writings, there is nothing to be noted
as having the least tendency to vice, but only that little treatise
which is entitled Ἐρωτικός, wherein he speaks too broadly of a sin to
which the eastern and southern parts of the world are most obnoxious;
but Seneca is said to have been more libertine than suited with the
gravity of a philosopher, or with the austerity of a Stoic. An ingenious
Frenchman esteems, as he tells us, his person rather than his works; and
values him more as the preceptor of Nero, a man ambitious of the empire,
and the gallant of Agrippina, than as a teacher of morality. For my
part, I dare not push the commendation so far. His courage was perhaps
praiseworthy, if he endeavoured to deliver Rome from such a monster of
tyranny as Nero was then beginning to appear; his ambition too was the
more excusable if he found in himself an ability of governing the world,
and a desire of doing good to human kind; but as to his good fortunes
with the empress, I know not what value ought to be set on a wise man
for them: except it be that women generally liking without judgment, it
was a conquest for a philosopher, once in an age, to get the better of a
fool. However, methinks there is something of awkward in the adventure: I
cannot imagine, without laughter, a pedant, and a Stoic, making love in
a long gown; for it puts me in mind of the civilities which are used by
the cardinals and judges in the dance of “The Rehearsal.” If Agrippina
would needs be so lavish of her favours, since a sot grew nauseous to
her, because he was her husband, and nothing under a wit could atone
for Claudius, I am half sorry that Petronius was not the man. We could
have borne it better from his character, than from one who professed the
severity of virtue, to make a cuckold of his emperor and benefactor.
But let the historian answer for his own relation; only, if true, it
is so much the worse that Seneca, after having abused his bed, could
not let him sleep quiet in his grave. The Apocolocynthisis, or mock
deification of Claudius, was too sharp and insulting on his memory; and
Seneca, though he could preach forgiveness to others, did not practise
it himself in that satire. Where was the patience and insensibility of a
Stoic, in revenging his banishment with a libel? Where was the morality
of a philosopher, in defaming and exposing of an harmless fool? And
where was common humanity, in railing against the dead? But the talent
of his malice is visible in other places: he censures Mæcenas, and I
believe justly, for the looseness of his manners, the voluptuousness
of his life, and the effeminacy of his style; but it appears that he
takes pleasure in so doing, and that he never forced his nature when
he spoke ill of any man. For his own style, we see what it is; and if
we may be as bold with him as he has been with our old patron, we may
call it a shattered eloquence, not vigorous, not united, not embodied,
but broken into fragments; every part by itself pompous, but the whole
confused and unharmonious. His Latin, as Monsieur St Evremont has well
observed, has nothing in it of the purity and elegance of Augustus his
times; and it is of him and of his imitators that Petronius said,—_pace
vestrâ liceat dixisse, primi omnium eloquentiam perdidistis_. The
_controversiæ sententiis vibrantibus pictæ_, and the _vanus sententiarum
strepitus_, make it evident that Seneca was taxed under the person of
the old Rhetorician. What quarrel he had to the uncle and the nephew, I
mean Seneca and Lucan, is not known; but Petronius plainly points them
out, one for a bad orator, the other for as bad a poet. His own Essay
of the Civil War is an open defiance of the “Pharsalia;” and the first
oration of Eumolpus as full an arraignment of Seneca’s false eloquence.
After all that has been said, he is certainly to be allowed a great wit,
but not a good philosopher; not fit to be compared with Cicero, of whose
reputation he was emulous, any more than Lucan is with Virgil. To sum up
all in few words:—consider a philosopher declaiming against riches, yet
vastly rich himself; against avarice, yet putting out his money at great
extortion here in Britain; against honours, yet aiming to be emperor;
against pleasure, yet enjoying Agrippina, and in his old age married to
a beautiful young woman; and after this, let him be made a parallel to
Plutarch.
And now with the usual vanity of Dutch prefacers, I could load our author
with the praises and commemorations of writers; for both ancient and
modern have made honourable mention of him: but to cumber pages with
this kind of stuff, were to raise a distrust in common readers that
Plutarch wants them. Rualdus indeed has collected ample testimonies of
them: but I will only recite the names of some, and refer you to him for
the particular quotations. He reckons Gellius, Eusebius, Himerius the
Sophister, Eunapius, Cyrillus of Alexandria, Theodoret, Agathias, Photius
and Xiphilin, patriarchs of Constantinople, Johannes Sarisberiensis, the
famous Petrarch, Petrus Victorius, and Justus Lipsius.
But Theodorus Gaza, a man learned in the Latin, tongue, and a great
restorer of the Greek, who lived above two hundred years ago, deserves
to have his suffrage set down in words at length; for the rest have only
commended Plutarch more than any single author, but he has extolled him
above all together.
It is said, that, having this extravagant question put to him by a
friend,—that if learning must suffer a general shipwreck, and he had
only his choice left him of preserving one author, who should be the man
he would preserve? he answered, Plutarch; and probably might give this
reason, that, in saving him, he should secure the best collection of them
all.
The Epigram of Agathias deserves also to be remembered. This author
flourished about the year five hundred, in the reign of the Emperor
Justinian; the verses are extant in the “Anthologia,” and with the
translation of them I will conclude the praises of our author; having
first admonished you, that they are supposed to be written on a statue
erected by the Romans to his memory:
Σεῖο πολυκλήεντα τύπον στήσαντο Χερωνεῦ
Πλούταρχε κρατερῶν ὑιέες Ἀυσονίων·
Ὅττι παραλλήλοισι βίοις Ἑλληνας ἀρίστους
Ῥώμης ἐυπολέμοις ῆρμοσας ἑνναέταις;
Ἀλλὰ τεοῦ βιοτοιο παράλληλον βίον ἄλλον
Ὀυδὲ σύγ’ ἂν γράψαις, οὐ γὰρ ὅμοιον ἔχεις.
Cheronean Plutarch, to thy deathless praise
Does martial Rome this grateful statue raise;
Because both Greece and she thy fame have shared,
(Their heroes written, and their lives compared;)
But thou thyself could’st never write thy own;
Their lives have parallels, but thine has none.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Sir Thomas North’s translation, published in 1579, was executed
through the medium of the French translation, by Jaques Amiot.
[2] Lord Howard, Sir Thomas Armstrong, Ford Lord Grey, and others among
the opposers of government, notorious for being libertines even beyond
the license of that age, seem to be here pointed at.
[3] These devices were impressed on the coin struck by the Commonwealth.
[4] Alluding to the Irish witnesses in the time of the Popish Plot; one
set of whom came over to England, on purpose to support by their evidence
that supposed conspiracy, but afterwards turned against their employer
Shaftesbury. See Vol. IX. p. 410.
[5] Fought A. U. C. 724.
[6] This sentence is ungrammatical, as has been observed by Mr Malone.
Perhaps we ought to read, “that he was invited thither; _and that_.”
[7] The authenticity of this letter has been doubted. Its dictatorial
tone certainly rather resembles the forgery of some pedant, assuming the
character of a great man, than that of a sage addressing a conquering
emperor.
[8] Plutarch is said to have died in the reign of Antoninus Pius, A. D.
140, aged ninety years.
[9] Mons. de St Evremont.
SPECIMEN OF THE TRANSLATION OF THE HISTORY OF THE LEAGUE.
HISTORY OF THE LEAGUE.
The reader must recal to his mind the state of parties during the last
years of Charles the Second’s reign, to which so many allusions have been
made in the notes upon “Absalom and Achitophel,” and “The Medal.” The
flight of Shaftesbury, and the discovery of the Rye-house conspiracy,
had been deep wounds to the credit of the Whigs. The wealthy part of
the nation dreaded a party, whose chief support was in the riotous mob
of London; and men of principle, while they felt the severity of a
government, which seemed approaching towards despotism, abhorred the
assassination which a part at least of the popular leaders had meditated
as a remedy. The king, meanwhile, was anxious to keep the advantage
he had gained, and to stigmatise his adversaries as leagued together
against him upon principles inimical to all kingly governments. For
this purpose, Dryden was employed to translate from the French of the
Jesuit Maimbourg, the “History of the League,” a work undertaken in
France under the auspices of Louis XIV. The evident intention of bringing
out this translation at the time when it appeared, was, to increase
the unpopularity of the Whigs, by ascribing to the association which
Shaftesbury had proposed, the same motives and principles which actuated
the members of the League, and plunged France into the long and bloody
civil war between their kings and the house of Guise. Dryden had already
drawn such a parallel in the play, called “The Duke of Guise,” which he
wrote in conjunction with Lee. The intended parallel between the faction
of the League in France, and that of the Solemn League and Covenant,
and afterwards of the Whigs in England, was avowed in the first lines
of the prologue,[10] and more largely in the vindication of the play,
which Dryden published shortly after its appearance.[11] Maimbourg, on
the other hand, from whose work the translation was made, was not only a
zealous royalist, but a professed enemy of the Huguenots, and had written
a history of their religion, calculated to place it in the most odious
point of view. There was, therefore, to be found in his “History of the
League,” not only an accurate and terrifying account of that famous
combination, but many hints towards completing the parallel to be deduced
betwixt the principles of the Guisards and those of the Calvinists. With
this intention, and under the immediate auspices of the king, the work
was translated and published.
The title page bears that the translation was made according to his
majesty’s command: and the frontispiece represents Charles enthroned in
state; Justice is seated upon one side, and upon the other is a view
of a harbour, with two light-houses, and a fleet in sail. A hand from
heaven is about to place on the king’s head an imperial crown, from which
glances a ray of light, bearing the motto, _Per me reges regnant_. In
front, are the lords temporal and spiritual, assembled before the throne,
in a dutiful posture, and at their feet a scroll, on which is written,
_Sibi et successoribus suis legitimis_, in allusion to the celebrated
Exclusion Bill.
TO THE KING.
SIR,
Having received the honour of your Majesty’s commands to translate
the “History of the League,” I have applied myself, with my utmost
diligence, to obey them: First, by a thorough understanding of my author,
in which I was assisted by my former knowledge of the French history
in general, and, in particular, of those very transactions which he
has so faithfully and judiciously related; then by giving his thoughts
the same beauty in our language which they had in the original, and,
which I most of all endeavoured, the same force and perspicuity: both
of which, I hope, I have performed with some exactness, and without any
considerable mistake. But of this your Majesty is the truest judge, who
are so great a master of the original; and who, having read this piece
when it was first published, can easily find out my failings, but, to
my comfort, can more easily forgive them. I confess, I could never have
laid hold on that virtue of your royal clemency at a more unseasonable
time; when your enemies have so far abused it, that pardons are grown
dangerous to your safety, and consequently to the welfare of your loyal
subjects. But frequent forgiveness is their encouragement; they have
the sanctuary in their eye before they attempt the crime; and take all
measures of security, either not to need a pardon, if they strike the
blow, or to have it granted, if they fail. Upon the whole matter, your
Majesty is not upon equal terms with them; you are still forgiving, and
they still designing against your sacred life; your principle is mercy,
theirs inveterate malice; when one only wards, and the other strikes, the
prospect is sad on the defensive side. Hercules, as the poets tell us,
had no advantage on Antæus, by his often throwing him on the ground; for
he laid him only in his mother’s lap, which, in effect, was but doubling
his strength to renew the combat. These sons of earth are never to be
trusted in their mother-element; they must be hoisted into the air, and
strangled.[12] If the experiment of clemency were new; if it had not
been often tried without effect, or rather with effects quite contrary
to the intentions of your goodness, your loyal subjects are generous
enough to pity their countrymen, though offenders: but when that pity
has been always found to draw into example of greater mischiefs; when
they continually behold both your Majesty and themselves exposed to
dangers; the church, the government, the succession, still threatened;
ingratitude, so far from being converted by gentle means, that it is
turned at last into the nature of the damned, desirous of revenge, and
hardened in impenitence,—it is time, at length, for self-preservation
to cry out for justice, and to lay by mildness, when it ceases to be a
virtue. Almighty God has hitherto miraculously preserved you; but who
knows how long the miracle will continue? His ordinary operations are by
second causes; and then reason will conclude, that to be preserved, we
ought to use the lawful means of preservation. If, on the other side,
it be thus argued, that, of many attempts, one may possibly take place,
if preventing justice be not employed against offenders; what remains,
but that we implore the divine assistance to avert that judgment; which
is no more than to desire of God to work another and another, and,
in conclusion, a whole series of miracles. This, Sir, is the general
voice of all true Englishmen; I might call it the loyal address of
three nations infinitely solicitous of your safety, which includes
their own prosperity. It is, indeed, an high presumption for a man so
inconsiderable as I am to present it; but zeal and dutiful affection, in
an affair of this importance, will make every good subject a counsellor.
It is, in my opinion, the test of loyalty; and, to be either a friend
or foe to the government needs no other distinction, than to declare
at this time either for remissness or justice. I said at this time,
because I look not on the storm as overblown. It is still a gusty kind
of weather: there is a kind of sickness in the air; it seems, indeed, to
be cleared up for some few hours; but the wind still blowing from the
same corner, and when new matter is gathered into a body, it will not
fail to bring it round, and pour upon us a second tempest. I shall be
glad to be found a false prophet; but he was certainly inspired, who,
when he saw a little cloud arising from the sea, and that no bigger
than a hand, gave immediate notice to the king, that he might mount the
chariot, before he was overtaken by the storm.[13] If so much care was
taken of an idolatrous king, an usurper, a persecutor, and a tyrant,
how much more vigilant ought we to be in the concernments of a lawful
prince, a father of his country, and a defender of the faith, who stands
exposed by his too much mercy to the unwearied and endless conspiracies
of parricides? He was a better prince than the former whom I mentioned
out of the sacred history, and the allusion comes yet more close, who
stopped his hand after the third arrow: Three victories were indeed
obtained; but the effect of often shooting had been the total destruction
of his enemies.[14] To come yet nearer: Henry the Fourth, your royal
grandfather,[15] whose victories, and the subversion of the League, are
the main argument of this history, was a prince most clement in his
nature: he forgave his rebels, and received them all into mercy, and some
of them into favour, but it was not till he had fully vanquished them:
they were sensible of their impiety; they submitted, and his clemency was
not extorted from him; it was his free gift, and it was seasonably given.
I wish the case were here the same: I confess it was not much unlike it
at your Majesty’s happy restoration; yet so much of the parallel was then
wanting, that the amnesty you gave produced not all the desired effects.
For our sects are of a more obstinate nature than were those leaguing
Catholics, who were always for a king, and, yet more, the major part of
them would have him of the royal stem; but our associators and sectaries
are men of commonwealth principles; and though their first stroke was
only aimed at the immediate succession, it was most manifest that it
would not there have ended, for at the same time they were hewing at
your royal prerogatives. So that the next successor, if there had been
any, must have been a precarious prince, and depended on them for the
necessaries of life. But of these and more outrageous proceedings, your
Majesty has already shewn yourself justly sensible in your declaration,
after the dissolution of the last Parliament, which put an end to the
arbitrary encroachments of a popular faction. Since which time it has
pleased Almighty God so to prosper your affairs, that, without searching
into the secrets of Divine Providence, it is evident your magnanimity and
resolution, next under Him, have been the immediate cause of your safety
and our present happiness. By weathering of which storm, may I presume to
say it without flattery, you have performed a greater and more glorious
work than all the conquests of your neighbours. For it is not difficult
for a great monarchy, well united, and making use of advantages, to
extend its limits; but to be pressed with wants, surrounded with dangers,
your authority undermined in popular assemblies, your sacred life
attempted by a conspiracy, your royal brother forced from your arms;
in one word, to govern a kingdom, which was either possessed or turned
into a bedlam, and yet in the midst of ruin to stand firm, undaunted,
and resolved, and at last to break through all these difficulties and
dispel them,—this is indeed an action which is worthy the grandson of
Henry the Great. During all this violence of your enemies, your Majesty
has contended with your natural clemency to make some examples of your
justice; and they themselves will acknowledge, that you have not urged
the law against them, but have been pressed and constrained by it to
inflict punishments in your own defence, and in the mean time to watch
every opportunity of shewing mercy, when there was the least probability
of repentance: so that they, who have suffered, may be truly said to have
forced the sword of justice out of your hand, and to have done execution
on themselves. But by how much the more you have been willing to spare
them, by so much has their impudence increased; and if by this mildness
they recover from the great frost, which has almost blasted them to
the roots, if these venomous plants shoot out again, it will be a sad
comfort to say they have been ungrateful, when it is evident to mankind
that ingratitude is their nature. That sort of pity which is proper for
them, and may be of use to their conversion, is to make them sensible of
their errors; and this your Majesty, out of your fatherly indulgence,
amongst other experiments which you have made, is pleased to allow them
in this book, which you have commanded to be translated for the public
benefit; that at least all such as are not wilfully blind may view in
it, as in a glass, their own deformities: for never was there a plainer
parallel than of the troubles of France and of Great Britain; of their
leagues, covenants, associations, and ours; of their Calvinists and our
Presbyterians: they are all of the same family; and Titian’s famous
table of the Altar-piece, with the pictures of Venetian senators from
great-grandfather to great-grandson, shews not more the resemblance of
a race than this: for as there, so here, the features are alike in all;
there is nothing but the age that makes the difference; otherwise the old
man of an hundred, and the babe in swaddling clouts, that is to say, 1584
and 1684, have but a century and a sea betwixt them, to be the same. But
I have presumed too much upon your Majesty’s time already, and this is
not the place to shew that resemblance, which is but too manifest in the
whole history. It is enough to say, your Majesty has allowed our rebels
a greater favour than the law; you have given them the benefit of their
clergy: if they can but read, and will be honest enough to apply it,
they may be saved. God Almighty give an answerable success to this your
royal act of grace; may they all repent, and be united as the body to
their head! May that treasury of mercy which is within your royal breast
have leave to be poured forth upon them, when they put themselves in a
condition of receiving it! and, in the mean time, permit me to implore
it humbly for myself, and let my presumption in this bold address be
forgiven to the zeal which I have to your service and to the public good.
To conclude: may you never have a worse meaning offender at your feet,
than him, who, besides his duty and his natural inclinations, has all
manner of obligations to be perpetually,
SIR,
Your Majesty’s most humble,
Most obedient, and most faithful
Subject and servant,
JOHN DRYDEN.
THE AUTHOR’S DEDICATION TO THE FRENCH KING.[16]
SIR,
France, which being well united, as we now behold it, under the glorious
reign of your Majesty, might give law to all the world, was upon the
point of self-destruction, by the division which was raised in it by two
fatal leagues of rebels; the one in the middle, and the other towards the
latter end, of the last age.
Heresy produced the first against the true religion;[17] ambition,
under the masque of zeal, gave birth to the second, with pretence of
maintaining what the other would have ruined: and both of them, though
implacable enemies to each other, yet agreed in this, that each of them,
at divers times, set up the standard of rebellion against our kings.
The crimes of the former I have set forth in the history of Calvinism,
which made that impious League in France, against the Lord and his
anointed; and I discover the wickedness of the latter in this work,
which I present to your Majesty, as the fruit of my exact obedience to
those commands with which you have been pleased to honour me. I have
endeavoured to perform them with so much the greater satisfaction to
myself, because I believed that, in reading this history, the falsehood
of some advantages which the Leaguers and Huguenots have ascribed
to themselves, may be easily discerned. These by boasting, as they
frequently do, even at this day, that they set the crown on the head of
King Henry IV.; those, that their League was the cause of his conversion.
I hope the world will soon be disabused of those mistakes; and that it
will be clearly seen, that they were the Catholics of the royal party,
who, next under God, produced those two effects, so advantageous to
France. We are owing for neither of them to those two unhappy Leagues,
which were the most dangerous enemies to the prosperity of the kingdom;
and it is manifest at this present time, that the glory of triumphing
over both of them, was reserved, by the Divine Providence, to our kings
of the imperial stem of Bourbon.
Henry IV. subdued and reduced the League of the false zealots, by the
invincible force of his arms, and by the wonderful attractions of his
clemency; Louis the Just disarmed that of the Calvinists, by the taking
of Rochelle, and other places, which those heretics had moulded into
a kind of commonwealth against their sovereign; and Louis the Great,
without employing other arms than those of his ardent charity and
incomparable zeal for the conversion of Protestants, accompanied by the
justice of his laws,[18] has reduced it to that low condition, that we
have reason to believe, we shall behold its ruin, by the repentance of
those, who, being deluded and held back by their ministers, continue
still in their erroneous belief, rather through ignorance than malice.
And this it is which, when accomplished, will surpass even all those
other wonders which daily are beheld, under your most auspicious
government.
Undoubtedly, Sir, your Majesty has performed, by your victorious arms,
your generous goodness, and your more than royal magnificence, all those
great and heroic actions, which will ever be the admiration of the world,
and infinitely above the commendations which future ages, in imitation
of the present, will consecrate to your immortal memory. I presume not
to undertake that subject, because it has already drained the praises of
the noblest pens, which yet have not been able to raise us to that idea
of you, which we ought justly to conceive: I shall only say, that what
you have done with so much prudence, justice, and glory, by extending
the French monarchy to its ancient bounds, and rendering it, as it is at
present, as flourishing, and as much respected by all the world, as it
ever has been, under the greatest and most renowned of all our monarchs,
is not so great in the sight of God, as what your Majesty performs daily,
with so much piety, zeal, and good success, in augmenting the kingdom of
Jesus Christ, and procuring the conversion of our Protestants, by those
gentle and efficacious means which you have used.
This, Sir, is, without exception, the most glorious of all your
conquests; and while you continue to enjoy on earth that undisputed glory
which your other actions have acquired you, is preparing an eternal
triumph for you in the heavens.
It is what is continually implored of God, in his most ardent prayers,
who, enjoying the abundant favours of your Majesty, lives at this day the
most happy of mankind, under your most powerful protection; and is most
obliged to continue all his life, with all imaginable respect and zeal,
SIR,
Your Majesty’s most obedient
And most faithful subject and servant,
LOUIS MAIMBOURG.
THE AUTHOR’S ADVERTISEMENT TO THE READER.
Since perhaps there are some, who may think themselves concerned in this
history, because they are the grand-children or descendants of those
who are here mentioned, I desire them to consider, that writing like a
faithful historian, I am obliged sincerely to relate either the good
or ill which they have done. If they find themselves offended, they
must take their satisfaction on those who have prescribed the laws of
history: let them give an account of their own rules; for historians
are indispensably bound to follow them; and the sum of our reputation
consists in a punctual execution of their orders.
Thus, as I pretend not to have deserved their thanks in speaking well
of their relations, so I may reasonably conclude, that they ought not
to wish me ill, when I say what is not much to their advantage. I
faithfully relate what I find written in good authors, or in particular
memoirs, which I take for good, after I have thoroughly examined them.
I do yet more; for, considering that no man is bound to believe, when
I say in general that I have had the use of good manuscripts, on whose
credit I give you what is not otherwhere to be had; I sincerely and
particularly point out the originals from whence I drew these truths; and
am fully convinced, that every historian, who hopes to gain the belief
of his reader, ought to transact in the same manner. For, if there were
no more to be done, than barely to say, I have found such or such an
extraordinary passage in an authentic manuscript, without giving a more
particular account of it under pretence of being bound to secrecy, there
is no kind of fable which by this means might not be slurred upon the
reader for a truth. An author might tell many a lusty lie, but a reader,
who were not a very credulous fool, or a very complaisant gentleman,
would have a care of believing him. It is for this reason that I have
always marked in my margins, the books, relations, and memoirs, whether
printed or manuscripts, from whence I take the substance of my relations.
One of those writers, of whom I have made most use, is Monsieur Peter
Victor Cayet, in his nine years chronology, containing the history of the
wars of Henry the Fourth.[19] Because he having always followed that
prince, since he was placed in his service, together with Monsieur de
la Gaucherie, who was his preceptor, it is exceeding probable, that he
was better informed of the passages of those times, of which he was an
eye-witness, than others who had not that advantage.
For what else concerns him, he was one of the most learned and able
ministers which our Protestants have ever had; and in that quality
served Madam Catharine, the king’s sister, till, about two years after
the conversion of that great prince, he acknowledged the true Catholic
religion, and made his solemn abjuration of heresy at Paris. He also
published the motives of his conversion in a learned treatise, which was
received with great applause both in France and in foreign countries; and
his example, fortified with the strong reasons of a man so able as he
was, to which no solid answer was ever given, was immediately followed by
the conversion of a great number of Protestants, who by his means came to
understand the falsehood of their religion pretendedly reformed.
This action so infinitely nettled his former brotherhood of ministers,
that they grew outrageous against him. They ran down his reputation
with full cry, and endeavoured to blacken it with a thousand horrible
calumnies, with which they stuffed their libels; and, amongst others,
that which they have inserted into the memoirs of the League, with
the greatest villainy imaginable, taking no notice of the solid and
convincing answers he made them. Which proceeding of theirs is sufficient
to discover the falsity of all they have written to defame him, according
to the libelling genius of presbytery.
For, of all heretics, none have been more cruel, or more foul-mouthed,
than the Calvinists; none have revenged themselves of their pretended
enemies more barbarously, either by open arms, or private mischiefs, when
the power was in their hands; or more impudently with their pens, and by
their libels, when they had no other way to shew their malice; murdering
their reputations with all sorts of injuries and impostures, who have
once declared themselves against their party.
In effect, what have they not said to defame the memory of Monsieur de
Sponde, lieutenant-general in Rochelle; of Salette, counsellor to the
king of Navarre; of Morlas, counsellor of state and superintendant of
the magazines of France; as also of Du Fay, Clairville, Rohan, and a
hundred others of their most celebrated ministers, who, after having
been esteemed amongst them for good men, and looked on as the leaders of
their consistory, are, by a strange sort of metamorphosis, become, on
the sudden, profligate wretches, and the most infamous of mankind, only
for renouncing Calvinism? By how many forgeries and calumnies have they
endeavoured to ruin the repute of all such Catholics as have the most
vigorously opposed their heresy, history will furnish us with abundant
proofs: and we have but too many in the fragments which Monsieur le
Laboreur has given us of their insolent satires, where they spare not
the most inviolable and sacred things on earth, not even their anointed
sovereigns.
For which reason, that writer, in a certain chapter of his book, wherein
he mentions but a small parcel of those libels, after he has said, “that
the most venomous satirists, and the greatest libertines, were those of
the Huguenot party,” adds these memorable words: “I should have been
ashamed to have read all those libels, for the blasphemies and impieties
with which they are filled, if that very consideration had not been
aiding to confirm me in the belief, that there was more wickedness, than
either error or blindness, in their doctrine; and that their morals were
even more corrupt than their opinions.”
He assures us in another place, that these new evangelists have made
entire volumes of railing, of which he has seen above forty manuscripts;
and that there needed no other arguments to decide the difference betwixt
the two religions, and to elude the fair pretences of these reforming
innovators.
So that all they have scribbled, with so much (I will not say violence,
but) madness, against the Sieur Cayet, immediately upon his conversion,
cannot do him the least manner of prejudice, no more than their
ridiculous prediction, wherein they foretold, that it would not be long
before he would be neither Huguenot nor Catholic, but that he would set
up a third party betwixt the two religions. For he ever continued to live
so well amongst the Catholics, that, after he had given on all occasions
large proofs, both of his virtue and of his faith, he was thought worthy
to receive the order of priesthood, and the degree of doctor in divinity,
and was reader and professor royal of the Oriental tongues.
Now seeing, in the year 1605, ten years after his conversion, he had
published his “Septennary Chronology,” of the peace which was made at
Vervins in the year 1598; some of the greatest lords at court, who
understood his merit, and had seen him with the king, (by whom he had
the honour to be well known, and much esteemed,) obliged him to add
to the history of the peace, that of the war, which that great prince
made during nine years after his coming to the crown, till the peace
of Vervins; which he performed in the three tomes of his “Nine Years
Chronology,” printed at Paris in the year 1608; in which, before he
proceeds to the reign of Henry the Fourth, he makes an abridgment of
the most considerable passages in the League, to the death of Henry the
Third. And it is partly from this author, and partly from such others
as were eye-witnesses of what they wrote, whether in printed books, or
particular memoirs, that I have drawn those things, which are related
by me in this history. I am not therefore myself the witness, nor as an
historian do I take upon me to decide the merit of these actions, whether
they are blameable or praiseworthy; I am only the relater of them: and
since, in that quality, I pretend not to be believed on my own bare
word, and that I quote my authors, who are my warrantees, as I have done
in all my histories, I believe myself to stand exempted from any just
reproaches, which can be fastened on me for my writing.
On which subject I think it may be truly said, that if, instead of
examining matters of fact, and enquiring whether they are truly or
falsely represented, that consideration be laid aside, and the question
taken up, whether such or such actions were good or bad, and matter
of right pleaded, whether they deserved to be condemned or praised;
it would be but loss of time in unprofitable discourses, in which an
historian is no way concerned. For in conclusion, he is only answerable
for such things as he reports, on the credit of those from whom he had
them; taking from each of them some particulars, of which the rest are
silent, and compiling out of all of them a new body of history, which is
of a quite different mould and fashion from any of the authors who have
written before him.
And it is this, in which consists a great part of the delicacy and beauty
of these kinds of works, and which produces this effect; that, keeping
always in the most exact limits of truth, yet an author may lawfully
pretend to the glory of the invention; having the satisfaction of setting
forth a new history, though, writing only the passages of a former age,
he can relate almost nothing, but what has been written formerly, either
in printed books, or manuscripts; which, though kept up in private, and
little known, are notwithstanding, not the work of him who writes the
history.
As to what remains, none ought to wonder, that I make but one single
volume on this subject, though the matter of it is of vast extent. I
take not upon me to tell all that has been done, on occasion of the
League, in all the provinces, nor to describe all the sieges; the taking
and surprising of so many places, which were sometimes for the king,
and at other times for the League; or all those petty skirmishes, which
have drawn (if I may have liberty so to express myself) such deluges of
blood from the veins of France. All these particulars ought to be the
ingredients of the general history of this nation, under the reigns of
the two last Henries, which may be read in many famous historians; and
principally in the last tome of the late Monsieur de Mezeray, who has
surpassed himself, in that part of his great work.
I confine my undertaking within the compass of what is most essential in
the particular history of the League, and have only applied myself to the
discovery of its true origin, to unriddle its intrigues and artifices,
and find out the most secret motives, by which the heads of that
conspiracy have acted, to which the magnificent title of the Holy Union
has been given with so much injustice; and, in consequence of this, to
make an exact description of the principal actions, and the greatest and
most signal events, which decided the fortune of the League; and this, in
short, is the model of my work.
As for the end which I proposed to myself, in conceiving it, I may boldly
say, that it was to give a plain understanding to all such as shall read
this history, that all sorts of associations which are formed against
lawful sovereigns, particularly when the conspirators endeavour to
disguise them under the specious pretence of religion and piety, as did
the Huguenots and Leaguers, are at all times most criminal in the sight
of God, and most commonly of unhappy and fatal consequence to those, who
are either the authors or accomplices of the crime.
THE HISTORY OF THE LEAGUE.
LIB. III.
If I intended to follow the example of Livy, the prince of Latin
historians, who never suffers a prodigy to escape him, and describes
it perhaps with as much superstition as exactness, I should here make
long narrations how the sun was obscured on the sudden, without the
interposition of any cloud appearing in the sky, with a flaming sword
shooting out from the centre of the body; palpable darkness, like that
of the Egyptians at noon-day; extraordinary tempests, earthquakes, fiery
phantasms in the air, and an hundred other prodigies, which are said to
have been produced and seen in this unhappy year of one thousand five
hundred and eighty-eight, and which were fancied to be so many ominous
presages of those horrible disorders that ensued in it.
But because I am not of the opinion, that much credit ought to be given
to those sorts of signs, which are commonly the effects of natural
causes, though very often unknown to us; nor to the predictions of
astrologers, some of which verily believed they had found in the stars,
that this year should be the conclusion of the world, I will only say,
that the most sure presage of so many misfortunes then impending, was the
minds of men too much exasperated on both sides, to live in peace with
each other; and not rather to be searching out for means of making sure
of those whom they suspected, and disposing of them according to their
jealousies.
In order to this, the Duke of Guise, after he had made an end of ruining
the county of Montbelliard, took his way to Nancy, whither he had invited
all the princes of his house to assemble in the month of January, there
to take their resolutions, in reference to the present condition of
affairs; and of that happy success which they had in the war against the
Reyters. Some of them there were, as it is reported, so swollen with
that victory, and so blinded with their prosperity, that they proposed,
in this conference, the most dangerous and most violent expedients; to
which the Duke of Lorraine, a moderate and wary prince, would by no
means listen. Howsoever it were, (for I find nothing to confirm these
relations, not even in the memoirs of their greatest enemies, who have
written most exactly of that assembly,) it is most undoubted, that if
they proceeded not so far as to those terrible extremities, yet what
was then concluded, passed in the world for a most unjust and unlawful
undertaking, and was condemned by all those who were not blindly devoted
to the League.
It was, that a request should be presented to the king, containing
articles, which, under the ordinary pretence of their desire to preserve
in France the Catholic religion, tended manifestly to despoil him of
his authority and power, and to invest the heads of the League in both.
For those scandalous articles bore this substance in them, that, for
the service of God, and the maintenance and security of religion, the
king should not only be most humbly petitioned, but also summoned, to
establish the Holy Inquisition in his realm; to cause the council of
Trent to be there published, suspending nevertheless that article which
revokes the exemption pretended by some chapters and abbeys against
the bishops; to continue the war against the Huguenots, and to cause
the goods both of them and of their associates to be sold, with which
to defray the charges of that war, and to pay the debts in which the
heads of the League had been constrained to involve themselves for the
prosecution of it; to refuse quarter to all prisoners who should be taken
in that war, unless upon condition of paying the full value of their
goods, and giving caution of living afterwards like good Catholics.
Behold here a most specious appearance of zeal for religion; but, in
the next place, observe the venom which lies hidden under all these
fair pretences: That the king shall unite himself more cordially, and
more openly than before, to this holy League; thereby to keep exactly
all its laws, to which men are obliged by this the most solemn and most
inviolable of all oaths: That, besides the forces which he shall be
obliged to set on foot to wage that war against the Huguenots, he shall
maintain an army on the frontiers of Lorraine, to oppose the German
Protestants, if they should determine once again to enter France: That,
besides those places which the Leaguers already held for their security,
there should be delivered to them other towns of more importance, which
should be specified to him, where they might establish for governors
those of their heads which they shall name, with power of introducing
such garrisons, and making such fortifications, as they shall think
fit, at the charges of the provinces in which they are situate: And, in
conclusion, to secure them, that they shall be no more hindered, as till
this present they have always been, in the executing of those things
which have been promised them for the safety of religion, his Majesty
shall displace from his council, and from the court, and shall deprive
of their governments and offices, those who shall be named to him, as
patrons of heretics, and enemies to religion and the state.
These were those extravagant demands which began to open the eyes of many
good Catholics, who had suffered themselves to be innocently seduced
by the appearances of true zeal, which being little illuminated, was
not “according to knowledge,” as the apostle speaks. For they now more
clearly saw into some of those articles; that the League to engage the
Pope and the king of Spain in their interests, would be content to
abandon those privileges and liberties, which our ancestors have always
maintained with so much vigour and resolution; and to subject to the yoke
of a Spanish inquisition, the French, who have never been able to undergo
it. And in others of them, that they designed to bereave the king of all
the solid and essential parts of royalty, to leave him only the shadow
and appearance of it, and afterwards to dispose even of his person, as
the heads of their party should think fit.
And accordingly when the request was presented to the king on the part
of the associated princes, and the cardinal of Bourbon, whose simplicity
and whose name they abused, and made it a cloak to their ambition, he
conceived an extreme indignation against it, which immediately appeared
in his eyes and countenance. Yet he thought it necessary at that time
to dissemble, not finding himself then in a condition of returning such
an answer to it, as was becoming a king justly provoked against his
subjects, who stood on terms with him like lords and masters. For which
reason, and withal to gain farther time, he contented himself to say,
that he would examine those articles in his council, in order to his
answer; which should be in such sort, that all good Catholics should have
reason to be satisfied.
But in the mean time, the Duke of Guise, who took not fair words for
payment, well understanding the king’s design, and resolving not to
give the Duke of Espernon the leisure to conjure down that tempest
which was raised against him, and to infuse into his master those
vigorous resolutions which were necessary for him to take, pressed the
king continually to give a precise answer to every particular in those
articles. For he doubted not, that, in case it proved favourable, he
should ingross all power in himself; and if it were otherwise, that it
would be thought the king resolved to maintain the Huguenots, and that by
consequence the Catholics would enter into a war against him.
On which considerations, being then retired into his government of
Champaigne, to which place he went after the conference at Nancy, he
plied the king incessantly with messages sent by gentlemen, one after
another, to urge him to a speedy and punctual answer. And this he did
with the more eagerness and importunity, because, on the one side, he
found himself more powerful than ever, having a great part of the gentry,
and almost all the people, and especially the Parisians, for him; and, on
the other side, he observed the party of the Huguenots to be very low,
and infinitely weakened, by the defeat of their great German succours,
and by their late loss of the Prince of Conde, a person of all others the
most strictly tied to their religion, and on whom they more relied than
any man, not excepting the King of Navarre himself.
He deceased on the 5th of March, at St Jean de Angely, of an exceeding
violent distemper, with which he was suddenly seized one evening after
supper, and which carried him off in two days time. The sixteen, with
infamous baseness, made a great rejoicing for it; and their preachers
failed not to roar out in their sermons, that it was the effect of the
excommunication, with which he had been thunderstruck by Pope Sixtus.
But besides that the King of Navarre, who had been struck in the same
manner by the bull, had his health never the worse for it, the king, to
whom that poor creature the Cardinal of Bourbon had been telling the
same story, and making wonderful exclamations in relating it, answered
him with a smile, that it might very well be the occasion of his death,
but withal there was something else which helped him on his journey. And
truly the matter was put beyond all doubt, after the attestation of four
physicians, and of two master chirurgeons, who deposed upon their oaths,
that they had manifestly seen, in almost all the parts of his body, all
the most evident signs and effects of a caustic poison, burning and
ulcerating. A most execrable action, which could not be too rigorously
punished; and yet the laws inflicted what was possible on the person of
one of his domestic servants, who was drawn in pieces by four horses in
the place of St Jean de Angely.
As to the rest, he was a prince, who, excepting only his obstinate
adhering to a religion in which he was born, and whose falsehood he might
have known in time, if he had not been too much prepossessed, had, at
the age of five-and-thirty years, at which he died, all the perfections
which can meet together in one man, to render him one of the greatest
and most accomplished persons in the world; if at least there might not
possibly be discerned in his carriage and customs some of those little
failings, from which the most wise are not exempted, and which may easily
be pardoned, without lessening the esteem which we have for them. And if
fortune, which is not always propitious to merit, was not favourable to
him on some occasions, wherein he had need of her assistance, yet in this
she was his friend, that she gave him the greater opportunity of shewing
his invincible courage in his adversities, in which he raised himself
infinitely above her, by the vigour and greatness of his soul.
Accordingly, the death of this great prince was lamented, not only by
those of his own party, who loved him passionately, but also by the
Catholics, and even by the Duke of Guise himself; who, head as he was
of an infamous and wicked faction, which he made subservient to his
ends, had of his own stock, and the excellency of his nature, which was
infinitely noble, all the generosity which is requisite to love and
respect virtue, even in the person of his greatest and most formidable
enemy.
All which, notwithstanding, he was content to make what advantage he
could of so lamentable an accident, towards the compassing of his
designs: And as he observed, not only by this, but by a multitude of
concomitant accidents and misfortunes, that the Huguenot party decreased
in strength and reputation, and his own grew more bold and undertaking,
he set himself more vigorously to push his fortune, and to demand an
entire satisfaction to all the articles of his request; which had so
puffed up the spirits of the sixteen, that they forgot all manner of
moderation, and grew daily more and more insupportable. It happened
also at the same time, that the king received several advertisements
of the resolution which had been taken in their council to seize his
person, and to inclose him in a monastery. And the same lieutenant of the
provost-ship of the Isle of Paris, Nicholas Poulain, who had formerly
discovered the like conspiracy, to which belief was not given, told him
so many particular circumstances in relation to this, that though he
was very diffident of that double-dealing man, whose integrity he much
suspected, yet his evidence concurring with the extreme insolence of the
sixteen, which rendered his report more credible, could not but leave
a strong impression on his soul; insomuch, that at last following the
counsel of those who had so long advised him, to employ his power and
justice against those mutineers, he took up a resolution, once for all,
to take that thorn out of his side, to reduce Paris into that state of
submission and obedience which belongs to subjects; and to extinguish the
faction of sixteen, by the exemplary chastisement of the most seditious
amongst them.
The preparations which of necessity he was to make to secure the success
of this undertaking; the three thousand Swissers, whom he caused to be
quartered at Lagny; the companies of guards, which were reinforced; the
troops which were sent him from the Duke of Espernon, who was gone into
his government of Normandy; and all the passages of the river, both
above Paris and below it, being possessed by him,—were so many alarms
to those mutineers, who, believing themselves already lost, implored
the assistance of the Duke of Guise. That prince, who had advanced
from Rheims as far as Soissons, in favour of the Duke of Aumale, his
cousin, who met with trouble and resistance in his government of Picardy,
satisfied himself at first with sending them some of his most experienced
captains, to regulate and manage their militia in case of need. But
some few days after, finding himself still pressed more eagerly by the
solicitations of those people, who were now driven to despair, and
believing that this foundation of the League, on which he had built his
hopes, being once shaken, he himself must perish under its ruins, (for
that being destroyed, the next design was certainly to fall on him,
who was the head and protector of it;) he gave immediate notice to his
friends and creatures to get into Paris, one after another, at several
gates, and ordered some to assure the sixteen in his name, that he would
suddenly be there in person to live and die with them.
The king, who was advertised of this resolution, and who was under great
apprehensions of his coming, lest his presence might hinder the execution
of his enterprise, and arm with a word speaking that great city, which
was entirely at his devotion, sent the President de Bellievre, a man of
great authority and known prudence, to tell the duke from him, that, in
the present juncture of affairs, and just apprehension which he had,
that his coming would produce great troubles in Paris, he thought good
he should not come till he received new orders from him, for otherwise
he would render himself guilty of all those disorders which might thence
ensue.
To this the duke, who was never to be beaten off from any resolution
which he had once taken, answered calmly, but in doubtful terms, that he
was ready to obey the king; that he had never intended to go to Paris,
but in the condition of a private man, and without a train; that he
desired to justify himself from those aspersions with which he knew
his enemies had basely charged him in his absence; that he had reason
to believe there was a design on foot to oppress the good Catholics,
whose protector he had declared himself; and that he humbly besought
his Majesty to give him some security against so just an apprehension.
Bellievre, who well knew that the king would stick at no manner of verbal
satisfaction, in case that would prove sufficient to break his journey,
promised he should have all the security he could possibly desire. In
effect, the king was fully resolved to have given him all manner of
assurances; but, as ill luck would have it, this was not done at the
same time it was determined; insomuch that, without more delay, he got
on horseback, and, crossing the country out of the common roads, that he
might avoid the messengers which he knew would be sent with new orders
to him, entered Paris on Monday the 9th of May, with eight more in his
company, just about noon, by the gate of St Denis.
It may be said in one sort of meaning, that this day was the most
unfortunate, and yet the most glorious of all his life. For whether it
were that the people, who were made to believe by the sixteen that the
city was to be sacked, were advertised by them of his arrival, or that
the report was spread at an instant, when he was first seen to approach
the Fauxbourg, it is most certain that he had no sooner passed it, but
the whole town running together from all parts of it, crowded up the
street, and all the rest through which he passed; the windows were
filled, and even the tiles of houses; the air echoed with a thousand
sorts of acclamations, and the loud cries of _Vive Guise!_ were repeated
with far higher peals than had been formerly of _Vive le Roy!_ for those
loyal shouts were grown out of date, and the League in a manner had
abolished them.
There was a kind of madness in this transport, or rather in this furious
torrent of their joy, which was so extravagant, that it passed even to
idolatry. They haled and tore each other to get nearest to this prince;
those who were borne off by the throng to a farther distance, stretched
out their arms to him, with their hands clasped over their heads; they
thought themselves happy, who could crowd so near as to touch any part
of his cloak or boots. Some there were amongst them who kneeled to him,
when he was passing by; and others who, when they could not reach him
with their hands, endeavoured to touch him with their chaplets, which
they kissed when they had received that honour, as the custom is in
adoration at the shrines of saints. A thousand praises were given him,
and a thousand blessings. He was called aloud the pillar of the church,
the prop of faith, the protector of the Catholics, the saviour of Paris;
and from all the windows, there fell upon him a shower of flowers and of
greens, with redoubled acclamations of _Vive Guise!_
To conclude, no imaginable demonstrations and testimonies of love,
honour, and veneration, but were shewn to the height at this tumultuous
entry, by that sudden overflow of joy; and that wonderful dilatation of
hearts and affections, which was to him a sort of triumph, more pleasing
than any of the Cæsars. Accordingly he enjoyed the full gust of it, with
all the satisfaction of extreme pleasure; passing on horseback very
leisurely through that infinite press of people, bare-headed, beholding
them with a smiling countenance, and with that courteous and engaging
air, which was so natural to him; saluting on the right and on the left,
bowing to those below in the streets, and to those above in the windows,
not neglecting the very meanest, holding out his hand to the nearest,
and casting his obliging glances on the more remote, he passed in this
manner to the queen-mother’s palace, near St Eustache, where he alighted,
and from thence to the Louvre, following her on foot, who had taken her
chair to conduct him to the king, and was witness to those incredible
transports of public joy, and acclamations of that innumerable herd of
people, which beat her ears incessantly with the name of Guise, bellowed
from more than an hundred thousand mouths.
In the mean time, the king, who had heard, with infinite rage, of this
sudden arrival of the duke, was shut up in his closet, where he was in
consultation on that prince’s life or death; who had been so blindly
rash, as to precipitate himself, in his single person, into inevitable
danger, from whence only his good fortune (of which he was not master)
could deliver him. Some there were, and amongst others the Abbot
d’Elbene, and Colonel Alphonso d’Ornano, with the most resolute of those
Gascons, whom the Duke of Espernon had placed amongst the five-and-forty,
to be always near the king’s person, who counselled that irresolute and
wavering prince to dispatch him on the spot, having so fair a pretence,
and the means so ready in his hand, to punish a rebellious subject; who,
in opposition to his express orders, had audaciously presumed to come
to Paris, as it were on purpose to let him know, that he was absolute
master of it. The rest more moderate, and amongst them the Chancellor de
Chiverny, and the Sieurs de Bellievre, de la Guiche, and de Villequier,
governor of Paris, dissuaded him from that attempt, laying before him,
besides the dangerous consequences which this terrible action might
produce in such a juncture, that it always concerned him, both for his
reputation, and for the maintenance of the most inviolable laws of
natural equity, before he passed to extremities, to hear a man who came
to put himself so freely into the hands of his king, and to be answerable
for all that was alleged against him.
While these things were in debating, and the king in suspense betwixt his
anger and his fear, uncertain which way to resolve, the duke (who had
passed through the French guards commanded by Grillon, who loved him not,
and through the Swissers, which stood ranked on both sides of the great
stair-case, and afterwards had traversed the hall and the antichamber
filled with people, who made no very ceremonious returns to his
salutations and civilities) entered into the presence chamber, disguising
a sudden fright which seized him, intrepid as he was, with the best face
he could set upon the matter, which yet he could not act so well, but
that it was easy to discern through that affectation of bravery, that
he could have been well contented to have been in some other place, and
not to have engaged himself so far, especially when a certain princess
whispered him in the ear to have a care of himself, and that his life and
death were under consideration in the closet. Yet immediately after, as
his courage was usually raised at the sight of the greatest dangers, he
resumed his wonted boldness, and was not able to hinder himself, perhaps
by a sudden motion purely natural, and arising from the magnanimity of
his heart, from laying his hand on the pommel of his sword, without his
own perceiving it, and from stepping hastily two or three paces forward,
with a haughty walk, as if he were putting himself into a posture of
selling his life as dear as he was able to his enemies. But the king
at that instant coming out of the closet with Bellievre, he changed
posture suddenly, made a low reverence, and threw himself almost at
his feet; protesting to him, that not believing his presence ought to
be displeasing to him, he was come to bring him his head, and fully to
justify his carriage against the calumnies of his enemies; and withal to
assure his majesty, that he had not a more faithful servant than himself.
But the king demanding, in a grave and serious tone of voice, who had bid
him come, and if he had not received an express prohibition from him? the
business was then brought to a scanning, and some little contest there
was betwixt him and Bellievre, the last maintaining that he had delivered
him the king’s commands, and the former, instead of answer, asking
him if he had not engaged himself to return, with all possible speed,
to Soissons, which he had not done, and protesting that he had never
received those letters, which Bellievre justified he had written to him.
Then the queen, who, though she seemed to be in much affliction for the
duke’s arrival, yet held a private correspondence with him, broke off
the discourse, and, taking aside the king her son, she managed his mind
so dexterously, that, whether she made him apprehend a general revolt of
Paris, which she had seen so openly to own the Duke of Guise, or whether
he himself were mollified by the submissive humble way of speaking which
that prince had used, he contented himself for that time to tell him,
that his innocence, which he was so desirous to prove, would be more
manifest if his presence should cause no stirs in Paris; and thereupon
he sate down to table, remitting till the afternoon what he had farther
to say to him, and appointing the queen’s garden for the place. Then the
duke bowing very low, retired, without being accompanied by any of the
king’s servants, but as well attended by all the town, to the Hotel de
Guise, as he had been from the gate of St Denis to the Louvre.
When he had made reflection on the danger into which he had so rashly
thrown himself, and which now appeared more formidable, by considering
it with cooler thoughts, than he could possibly in that agitation of
spirits, and that anxiety wherein he was in spite of all his courage,
when he found himself so far engaged; he resolved he would never hazard
his life in that sort again, and took such order concerning it, that from
the next day, and so onward, he had in his palace four hundred gentlemen,
who assembling there from all parts of Paris, according to his orders,
never afterwards abandoned him. Neither would he adventure to go that
afternoon to the queen’s garden, but well accompanied by the bravest of
his officers, amongst whom Captain St Paul, seeing that after his master
was entered, he who kept the door was going to shut it on him, thrust
him back roughly, and entered by force, followed by his companions,
protesting and swearing, that if the game was there to be played, he was
resolved to have his stake in it.
So that if the king had designed to have him murdered in that garden,
which I believe not, though some have written it, it is easy to see that
the presence of those brave men, who were fully resolved to defend their
master, that of the queen, who made the third in this interview, the
daring countenance of the duke, who from time to time was casting his
eyes towards his sword, and to sum up all, that infinite multitude of
Parisians which encompassed the queen’s palace, and many of which were
got upon the walls, had hindered the execution of such a purpose.
For that which passed betwixt them at this conference, since I find
nothing of it in the most exact memoirs of those times, I shall not
offer to relate it, as Davila has done by a certain poetical licence
which he and some other historians have used, to make men think and speak
without their leave, whatever they please to put into their thoughts and
mouths. What I can deliver for undoubted truth is this, that there was
nothing concluded at this interview; and that the king, who had resolved
beforehand to chastise the most seditious of the sixteen, and to make
himself master of Paris, after a long consultation taken by night, with
those in whom he most confided, continued firm to the same resolution,
and set up his rest to stand by it, in spite of the arrival of the duke.
With this determination, he sent the next morning for the prevost of the
merchants, and the sheriffs, and commanded them, in company of the lords
De Villequier and Francis d’O. to make an exact search for all those
strangers who were come to Paris some few days since, without any urgent
occasion to call them thither, and to cause them forthwith to depart the
town, without respect of persons. This was a manifest endeavour to weaken
the Duke of Guise; to reduce him to those seven or eight gentlemen,
who attended him into Paris; and consequently to give him occasion of
believing, that after they had rid themselves of the others, they would
attack him.
Perhaps the design was so laid, as some have conjectured with probability
enough; but if this were really their intention, there are others, who
believe that, according to the advice which was given by the abbot of
Elbene, they had done more wisely to have begun with the Duke of Guise,
when they had him single, and at their mercy, coopt up in the Louvre:
and they ground this opinion on the meaning of that abbot’s words, who
quoted the scripture to this purpose, “It is written, I will strike the
shepherd, and the flock shall be scattered.” However it was intended,
the Parisians immediately took the alarm, perceiving clearly that those
strangers who were to be sent out of the city, were no others but those
very men whom the Duke of Guise had conveyed into the town for their
defence, and for his own. Insomuch that when they went about to execute
that order, and to search their houses, every one opposed them; and the
citizens set themselves with so much obstinacy to conceal their lodgers,
that the deputies and commissaries, fearing a general insurrection
through all the quarters, durst proceed no farther. And in the mean
time, the Duke of Guise, who was the soul that actuated this great body,
forbore not going to the Louvre, but well accompanied; and the very
evening before the barricades he presented the napkin to the king.
But, as after the flashes of the lightning, and the rattling of the
thunder, comes a furious tempest and lays waste the field; so after those
mutual fears and jealousies, those nightly meetings, those murmurs and
menaces, and those preparations which were made on both sides with so
much tumult, either for assaulting or for defence, they came to the fatal
day of the barricadoes, which was followed by that horrible deluge of
misfortunes, with which all France was overflowed.
For at last the king, more incensed than ever by the resistance which
was made to his orders, and fully resolved to make himself be obeyed one
way or other, caused the French guards to enter Paris, with some other
companies, and the Swissers, which in all made up six thousand men: this
was done on Thursday the twelfth of May, just at day break; he being
present himself to receive them on horseback, at the gate of Saint
Honoré. And after having given out his orders to their officers, to post
them according to his direction, he enjoined them above all things, to be
no ways injurious to the citizens, but only to repress the insolence of
such, who should go about to hinder the search for strangers: after which
himself retiring to the Louvre, the marshals d’Aumont and Biron, who were
at the head of the troops, went to post them with beat of drum, in the
church-yard of St Innocent, and the adjoining places, on the Pont Notre
Dame, on that of St Michael, on the Pont Au Change, at the town-house, at
the Greve, and at the avenues of the place Maubert.
It appeared immediately by what followed, that this was in effect to give
the signal of a mutiny and general revolt to all Paris. For a rumour
being spread, that the king had determined to put to death a great
number of the principal of the League, and a list being also forged of
their names who were to be executed, and shewn openly to the people, the
citizens, according to the order of their captains and overseers of their
wards, were in a readiness to put themselves into a posture of defence,
at the least motion that was made. For which reason, so soon as they
heard the drums and fifes, and that they beheld the Swissers and the
guards advancing through the street of Saint Honoré, they doubted not but
the report, which was noised about by the sixteen, was true; and farther
believed, (as they had been also assured,) that the town would be sacked
and exposed to pillage. The alarm therefore was given round the city:
they began by shutting up their shops, and the church doors on that side
of the town: they rang the tocsin (or alarm, bell) first in one parish,
and then in another; and immediately afterwards through all Paris, as if
the whole city had been on fire.
Then the citizens came out in arms, under the overseers of their wards,
and their captains, and other officers of the Duke of Guise, who had
mingled themselves amongst them, to encourage and to marshal them. The
Count of Brissac, who had placed himself at the quarter of the university
towards the place Maubert, (where Crucè, one of the most hot-headed of
the sixteen, caused the alarm to be sounded,) being himself encompassed
with a multitude of students, a rabble of porters, watermen, and
handicraftsmen, all armed, who waited only for the signal to assault
the Swissers, was the first who gave orders to chain the streets, to
unpave them, and erect the barricades, with great logs of timber, and
barrels filled with earth and dung, at the avenues of the palace: and
this word of barricades passing in a moment from mouth to mouth, from the
university into the city, and from the city into the town, the same was
done every where, and that with such exceeding haste, that before noon,
these barricades, which were continued from street to street, at the
distance of thirty paces from each other, well flanked and manned with
musqueteers, were advanced within fifty paces of the Louvre; insomuch
that the king’s soldiers found themselves so encompassed on every side,
that they could neither march forward nor retreat, nor make the least
motion, without exposing themselves unprofitably to the inevitable danger
of the musquet shot, (which the citizens could fire upon them without
missing, from behind their barricades,) or of being beaten down with a
tempest of stones, which came pouring upon their heads from every window.
The marshals d’Aumont and Biron, and Villequier the governor of Paris,
gained little by crying out to the citizens, that they intended them no
harm, for they were too much enraged to give them the hearing; and were
possessed with a belief of what Brissac, Bois Dauphin, and the other
creatures of the Duke of Guise, had told them; who roared out, on purpose
to envenom them against the royalists, that those troops which were
entered into Paris were sent for to no other end, than to make a general
massacre of all good Catholics, who were members of the Holy Union, and
to give up to the soldiers, their houses, their money, and their wives.
Upon this the musquet shot, and the stones from above, were redoubled on
those miserable men, and more especially upon the Swissers, to whom the
citizens were most inexorable.
More than threescore were either slain, or dangerously hurt, as well in
St Innocent’s church-yard, as below on the place Maubert, without giving
quarter, till Brissac (who with his sword in his hand was continually
pushing forward the barricades) arriving there, and beholding those
poor strangers, who cried out for mercy, with clasped hands, and both
knees on the ground, and sometimes making the sign of the cross, in
testimony of their being Catholics, stopped the fury of the citizens, and
commanding them to cry out _vive Guise!_ which they did as loud as they
could for safe-guard of their lives, he satisfied himself with leading
them disarmed and prisoners into the Boucherie of the new market, by the
bridge of St Michael, which he had already mastered.
It cannot be denied, but that this count was he, amongst all the
Leaguers, who acted with the most ardour against the royalists on that
fatal day; as being infinitely exasperated, because the king had refused
him the admiralty, and refused it in a manner so disobliging, as to say
openly he was a man that was good for nothing either by sea or land,
accusing him at the same time, that he had not done his duty in the
battle of the Azores, where the navy of Philippo Strozzi was defeated by
the marquis of Santa-Cruz, he burned inwardly with desire of revenge.
And when he saw the soldiers inclosed on all sides, by the barricades,
which were of his raising, and the Swissers at his mercy, it is reported,
that he cried out, as insulting on the king, with a bitter scoff, and
magnifying himself at the same time; “At least the king shall understand
to day, that I have found my element; and though I am good for nothing,
either at sea or land, yet I am some body in the streets.”
In this manner it was, that the people, making use of their advantage,
still pushed their fortune more and more and seemed to be just upon the
point of investing the Louvre; while the Duke of Guise, by whose secret
orders all things were regularly managed amidst that horrible confusion,
was walking almost unaccompanied in his own house, and coldly answering
the queen, and those who came one on the neck of another, with messages
to him from the king, intreating him to appease the tumult, that he was
not master of those wild beasts which had escaped the toils; and that
they were in the wrong to provoke them as they had done.
But at last, when he perceived that all things were absolutely at his
command, he went himself from barricade to barricade, with only a riding
switch in his hand, forbidding the people who paid a blind obedience to
him, from proceeding any farther; and desiring them to keep themselves
only on the defensive. He spoke also very civilly to the French guards,
who at that time were wholly in his power, to be disposed of as he
thought good, for life or death. Only he complained to their officers, of
the violent counsels which his enemies had given the king to oppress his
innocence, and that of so many good Catholics, who had united themselves
on no other consideration than the defence and support of the ancient
religion. After which, he gave orders to captain St Paul, to reconduct
those soldiers to the Louvre; but their arms were first laid down, and
their heads bare, in the posture of vanquished men, that he might give
that satisfaction to the Parisians, who beheld the spectacle with joy,
as the most pleasing effect of their present victory. He also caused the
Swissers to be returned in the same manner by Brissac, and gave the king
to understand, that, provided the Catholic religion were secured and
maintained in France, in the condition it ought to be, and that himself
and his friends were put in safety from the attempts of their enemies,
they would pay him all manner of duty and service, which is owing from
good subjects to their lord and sovereign.
This, in my opinion, makes it evident, that the duke had never any
intention to seize the person of the king, and to inclose him in
a monastery, as that Nicholas Poulain, who gave in so many false
informations, and many writers, as well of the one religion as of the
other, have endeavoured to make the world believe. For if that had been
his purpose, what could have hindered him from causing the Louvre to be
invested; as he might easily have done the same day, by carrying on the
barricades close to it, while the tumult was at the height; and for what
reason did he return the French guards and Swissers to the king, if his
intention had been to have attacked him in the Louvre? This was not his
business, nor his present aim, but to defend and protect his Leaguers
with a high hand, and to avail himself of so favourable an opportunity,
to obtain the thing which he demanded; and which, doubtless, had put him
into a condition of mounting the throne after the king’s decease, and
becoming absolute master of all affairs even during his life.
In effect, the queen having undertaken to make the reconcilement,
as believing that thereby she might re-enter into the management of
business, from which the favourites had removed her, and having asked
him what were his pretensions, he proposed such extravagant terms, and
with so much haughtiness and resolvedness, speaking like a conqueror, who
took upon him to dispose, at his pleasure, of the vanquished, that, as
dexterous as she was in the art of managing men’s minds, from the very
beginning of the conference she despaired of her success. For, enhancing
upon the articles of Nancy, he demanded, that, for the security of the
Catholic religion in this realm, the king of Navarre, and all the princes
of the house of Bourbon, who had followed him in these last wars, should
be declared to have forfeited for ever their right of succeeding to the
crown: That the duke of Espernon, La Valeite his brother, Francis d’O.,
the marshals of Retz and of Biron, colonel Alphonso d’Ornano, and all
others who, like them, were favourers of the Huguenots, or were found
to have held any correspondence with them, should be deprived of their
governments and offices, and banished from the court, without hope of
ever being restored again: That the spoils of all these should be given
to the princes of his house, and to those lords who had engaged with
him, of whom he made a long list: That the king should cashier his guard
of five-and-forty, as a thing unknown in the time of his predecessors;
protesting that otherwise he could place no manner of confidence in him,
nor ever dare to approach his person: That it would please his majesty
to declare him his lieutenant-general through all his estates, with the
same authority which the late Duke of Guise his father had, under the
reign of Francis the Second; by virtue of which he hoped to give him so
good an account of Huguenots, that in a little time there should remain
no other but the Catholic religion in all his kingdom. To conclude, that
there should be called immediately an assembly of the three estates,
to sit at Paris, where all this should be confirmed, and to hinder for
the future, that the minions, who would dispose of all things at their
pleasure, should not abuse their favour; that there should be established
an unchangeable form of government, which it should not be in the power
of the king to alter.
It is most evident, that demands so unreasonable, so arrogant, and so
offensive, tended to put the government, and the power of it, into the
duke’s hands, who, being master of the armies, the offices, and the
governments of the most principal provinces, in his own person, by his
relations, his creatures, and the estates, where he doubted not of
carrying all before him, especially at Paris, would be the absolute
disposer of affairs; insomuch that there would be nothing wanting to him
but the crown itself, to which it is very probable that at this time he
pretended, in case he should survive the king, to the exclusion of the
Bourbons, whom he would have declared incapable of succeeding to it.
For which reason, the queen seeing that he would recede from no part of
these articles, and beginning to fear that he would go farther than she
desired, counselled the king to get out of Paris with all speed, while
it was yet in his power so to do. And though some of his chief officers,
as amongst others the chancellor de Chiverny, and the Sieurs of Villeroy
and Villequier, who were of opinion that more would be gained by the
negotiation, and who foresaw that the Huguenots and the Duke of Espernon,
whom they had no great cause to love, would make their advantage of this
retreat so unworthy of a king, endeavoured to dissuade him from it, yet
a thousand false advertisements, which came every moment, that they were
going to invest the Louvre, and his accustomed fear, together with the
diffidence he had of the Duke of Guise, whom he considered at that time
as his greatest enemy, caused him at the last to resolve on his departure.
Accordingly, about noon the next day, while the queen-mother went to the
duke with propositions only to amuse him, the king making shew to take a
turn or two in the Thuilleries, put on boots in the stables, and getting
on horseback, attended by fifteen or sixteen gentlemen, and by ten or
twelve lacqueys, having caused notice to be given to his guards to follow
him, went out by the Pont Neuf, riding always on full gallop, for fear
of being pursued by the Parisians, till, having gained the ascent above
Challiot, he stopt his horse to look back on Paris. It is said, that then
reproaching that great city, which he had always honoured, and enriched
by his royal presence, and upbraiding its ingratitude, he swore he would
not return into it but through a breach, and that he would lay it so low,
that it should never more be in a condition of lifting up itself against
the king. After this he went to lodge that night at Trappes, and the next
morning arrived at Chartres; where his officers, those of his council,
and the courtiers, came up to him, one after another, in great disorder;
some on foot, others on horseback without boots, several on their mules,
and in their robes, every man making his escape as he was best able,
and in a great hurry, for fear of being stopped; in short, all of them
in a condition not unlike the servants of David, at his departure from
Jerusalem, travelling in a miserable equipage after their distressed
master, when he fled before the rebel Absalom.
The Duke of Guise, who, on the one side, had been unwilling to push
things to an extremity, to the end he might make his treaty with the
king, and that it might not be said he was not at liberty; and on the
other side, not believing that he would have gone away in that manner, as
if he fled from his subjects, who, stopping short of the Louvre by fifty
paces, seemed unwilling to pursue their advantage any farther, was much
surprised at this retreat, which broke the measures he had taken; but
as he was endued with an admirable presence of mind, and that he could
at a moment’s warning accommodate his resolutions to any accident, how
unexpected or troublesome soever, he immediately applied himself to put
Paris in a condition of fearing nothing, to quiet all things there, and
restore them to their former tranquillity, and withal to give notice to
the whole kingdom how matters had passed at the barricades, as much to
his own advantage as possibly he could.
To this effect he possessed himself of the strongest places in the city,
of the Temple, of the Palace, of the town-house, of the two Chastelets,
of the gates where he set guards, of the arsenal, and of the Bastille,
which was surrendered to him too easily by the governor Testu; the
government of which he gave to Bussy Le Clerc, the most audacious of
the sixteen. He obliged the magistrates to proceed in the courts of
judicature as formerly; he made a new provost of merchants, and sheriffs,
a lieutenant civil, colonels, and captains of the several wards, all
devoted to the League, in the room of those whom he suspected; he
retook, without much trouble, all the places both above and below on the
river, that the passages for provisions might be free; he wrote at last
to the king, to the towns, and to his particular friends, and drew up
manifests (or declarations) in a style, which had nothing in it but what
was great and generous; while he endeavoured to justify his proceedings,
and at the same time to preserve the respect which was owing to the
king, protesting always that he was most ready to pay him an entire
obedience, and that he proposed nothing to himself, but that provision
should be made for the safety of religion, and of good Catholics, which
were designed to be oppressed through the pernicious counsels of such as
held intelligence with heretics, and projected nothing but the ruin of
religion and the state.
These letters, together with those which the Parisians wrote to the
other towns, exhorting all men to combine with them for their common
preservation in the Catholic faith, and those of the king, which on the
contrary were written in too soft a style, and where there appeared
more of fear and of excuse than of resentment and just complaint for so
sacrilegious an attempt, had this effect, that the greatest part of the
people, far from being scandalized at the barricades, approved them,
loudly praising the conduct of the Duke of Guise, whom they believed to
be full of zeal for the Catholic faith, for the good of the kingdom, and
for the service of the king. And as he desired nothing so much as to
confirm them in that opinion, he was willing that the body of the city
should send their deputies to the king, humbly to beseech his majesty,
that he would forget what was passed, and return to his good town of
Paris, where his most loyal subjects were ready to give him all the
highest demonstrations of their obedience and devotion to his service.
He permitted that even processions should be made in the habit of
penitents, to desire of God, that he would please to mollify the king’s
heart; and this was performed with so much ardour, that there was one
which went from Paris as far as Chartres, in a most extraordinary
equipage, under the conduct of the famous friar Ange. This honest
father was Henry de Joyeuse, Count of Bouchage, and brother to the late
duke. He had given up himself to be a capuchin about a year before this
time; having such strong impressions made upon him, by the death and
good example of his wife, Catharine de Nogaret, sister to the Duke of
Espernon, that he was inflamed with a desire of repentance; insomuch,
that neither the tears of his brother, nor the intreaties and favours
of the king, who loved him exceedingly, nor the ardent solicitations
of all the court, were able to remove him from the resolution he had
taken of leading so austere a life. This noble friar, having put a
crown of thorns upon his head, and carrying an overgrown cross upon
his shoulders, followed by his fraternity, and by a great number of
penitents, and others who represented in their habits the several persons
of the Passion, led on that procession, singing psalms and litanies.
The march of these penitents was so well managed, that they entered the
great church of Chartres, just as the king was there at vespers. As they
entered, they began to sing the _Miserere_, in a very doleful tone; and
at the same time, two swinging friars, armed with disciplines, laid
lustily on poor friar Ange, whose back was naked. The application was not
hard to make, nor very advantageous to the Parisians; for the charitable
creature seemed evidently to desire the king, that he would please to
pardon them, as Jesus Christ was willing to forgive the Jews for those
horrible outrages which they had committed against him.
A spectacle so surprising produced different effects in the minds of the
standers by; according to the variety of their tempers, some of them
were melted into compassion, others were moved to laughter, and some
even to indignation; and more than all the rest, the Marshal de Biron,
who, having no manner of relish for this sort of devotion, and fearing,
besides, that some dangerous Leaguers might have crowded in amongst them,
with intention to preach the people into a mutiny, counselled the king
to clap them up in prison every mother’s son. But that good prince, who,
notwithstanding all his faults, had a stock of piety at the bottom, and
much respect for all things that related to religion, rejected wholly
this advice. He listened to them much more favourably than he had heard
all the harangues of the former deputies; and promised to grant them
the pardon they desired for the town, which he had so much favoured,
on condition they would return to their obedience. And truly, it is
exceeding probable, that he had so done from that very time, if they had
not afterwards given him fresh provocations, by proposing the terms on
which they insisted for the peace, which they desired.
For the Duke of Guise, to whom all these fair appearances were very
serviceable, and could be no ways prejudicial, and who always pursued his
designs in a direct line, knew so well to manage the disposition of the
queen-mother, who had seemed at first to be much startled at his demands,
that he recalled her with much dexterity into his interests, by working
on those two passions which were rooted in her soul. She desired to raise
to the throne, after the death of the king her son, her grandson Henry
de Lorrain, Marquis du Pont; and believed that the Duke of Guise would
contribute to it all that was in his power. But as cunning as she was,
she saw not into the bottom of that prince, who fed her only with vain
hopes of that succession for another, to which he personally aspired.
She infinitely hated the Duke of Espernon; and believing he was the
man, who, having possessed himself of the king’s soul, had rendered her
suspected to him, longed to turn him out of court; promising herself,
by that means, to be re-established in the management of affairs, from
which the favourites had removed her. And the Duke of Guise, who had as
little kindness as herself for the Duke of Espernon, concurred in the
same design with at least as much earnestness, but for a much different
end, for he desired to be absolute himself. In this manner, this subtle
prince, always dissembling, and artificially hiding the true motives by
which he acted, drew the queen at last to consent to all that he desired;
and, above all, to give her allowance, that a request should be presented
to the king, in the name of the cardinals, the princes, the peers of
France, the lords, the deputies of Paris, and the other towns, and of
all the Catholics united for the defence of the Catholic, Apostolic, and
Roman religion.
This request, which, in the manner of its expressions, was couched in
most respectful terms, contained, notwithstanding, in the bottom of it,
certain propositions, at least as hard as the Articles of Nancy; and
even as those, which, not long before, were proposed to the queen by the
Duke of Guise. For after a protestation in the beginning of it, that in
whatsoever had passed till that present time, there had been nothing
done, but by a pure zeal for God’s honour, and for the preservation of
his church, they demand of the king, that he would make war with the
Huguenots, and that he would conclude no peace till all heresies were
rooted out: That it would please him to use the service of the Duke of
Guise, in so just and holy an undertaking: That he would drive out of
the court, and despoil of all their offices, all those who held a secret
correspondence with the Huguenots, and principally the Duke of Espernon,
and his brother La Valette; against whom there are recited, in that
request, all imaginable crimes that could be thought most capable of
rendering them odious and insupportable to the whole kingdom: That he
would deliver the nation from the just apprehensions it had, of falling
one day under the power and dominion of heretics: And (that there might
be given to the city of Paris a full assurance henceforth to enjoy a
perfect tranquillity without fear of oppression,) he would not only
please to confirm the new provosts and sheriffs, but that also the said
city may have full and entire liberty for the future, to make choice of
such as shall succeed in those places, and in those of city colonels and
captains.
This request was extremely displeasing to the king, who saw but too
clearly, that their intention was to give the law to him hereafter whom
they had first so haughtily affronted. He therefore caused it to be
examined in his council, where there was but small agreement, because
the members of it were divided in their interests. There were but two
methods to be taken on that subject; either for the king to join with the
League against the Huguenots, as the request demanded, or to make war
against the League with all his power, in conjunction with the Huguenots;
for unless he espoused one of these interests, it was impossible for
him to succeed. Those of the council who loved not the Duke of Espernon,
who were many, and who feared that the acting of the king’s forces, in
combination with the Huguenots, would prove of great prejudice to his
reputation, and of greater to religion, were for the former proposition
and council, that all differences should be accommodated in the best
manner they could with the Duke of Guise,—which was also the desire of
the queen-mother; but the rest, who, for the most part, consisted of
those persons whose disgrace and banishment was demanded in the request,
insisted strongly on the second, and gave their voice for a war to be
made against the duke to the uttermost; fortifying their opinion by
the number of forces which the king might raise promiscuously, both
from Catholics and Protestants, because this was not a war of religion,
but that the sovereign only armed himself to quell and chastise his
rebellious subjects.
It would be a matter of much difficulty to tell precisely, what was
the true resolution which the king took betwixt the extremes of these
different counsels; but it may be told for a certain truth, that having a
long time deliberated, and that much more in his own breast than with his
council, he seemed at length, all on the sudden, to pitch upon the first;
whether it were, that being, as he was, a good Catholic, and hating the
Huguenots, he could not yet come to a resolution of uniting himself to
them; or were it, that he thought not himself at that time strong enough,
even with the king of Navarre’s assistance, to destroy the League, which
was grown more powerful than ever since the barricades, and headed by a
man so able, so bold, and so successful, as the Duke of Guise; or lastly,
as many have believed, that being strongly persuaded he should never be
in safety, nor be master in his kingdom, while that prince, whom he hated
mortally, was living, he took up, from that very moment, a resolution
within himself to dispatch him out of the world; and, that he might draw
him into the net which he was spreading for him, was willing to grant in
a manner whatsoever he desired, as if it were done in contemplation of a
peace.
Whatsoever were his true motive, (for I desire not that random guesses
should be taken for truths,) it is certain, that though the king was
highly exasperated against the League, yet he answered their request with
much gentleness and moderation, assuring them that he would assemble the
three estates at Blois, in the month of September, there to advise of the
means to give them satisfaction, and to deliver them from the jealousy
they had of falling one day under the dominion of a Huguenot prince;
that for what related to the Duke of Espernon, he would do them justice,
like an equitable king, and would make it manifest that he preferred the
public welfare before the consideration of any private person.
Accordingly, in the first place, that duke was despoiled of his
government of Normandy, commanded to depart from court, and retire
himself to Angouleme. Not long time afterwards, the king concluded a
treaty with the lords of the League, to whom, besides the places which
they had already in possession, the towns of Montreuil, Orleans, and
Bourges, were given for six years. A publication of the Council of Trent
was promised, with provision against that part of it which was contrary
to the liberties of the Gallican church. There was given to the Duke of
Guise, instead of the title of constable, that of head of the French
Gendarmerie, which signifies the same thing. Two armies were promised
to be raised against the Huguenots; one in Dauphine, under the command
of the Duke of Mayenne; and the other in Saintonge and Poitou, which
should be commanded by a general of the king’s own choice: For the new
constable, under another name, would not be so far from court, lest
his absence from thence might be of ill consequence to his party. In
conclusion, the king caused to be published the famous edict of July,
which he commanded to be called the Edict of the Reunion, where he did
more in favour of the League, than the League itself desired from him.
For, after having declared in that edict, that he would have all his
subjects united to himself; that, in like manner as their souls are
redeemed with the same price, by the blood of our Lord and Saviour Jesus
Christ, so also they and their posterity should be one body with him,—he
swears, that he will employ all his forces, without sparing his proper
life, to exterminate from his realm all heresies condemned by councils,
and principally by that of Trent, without ever making any peace or
truce with heretics, or any edict in their favour. He wills, that all
princes, lords, gentlemen, and inhabitants of towns, and, generally, all
his subjects, as well ecclesiastical as secular, should take the same
oath: That farther, they should swear and promise, for the time present,
and for ever, after it shall have pleased God to dispose of his life,
without having given him issue male, not to receive for king, any prince
whatsoever who shall be a heretic, or a promoter of heresy. He declares
rebels, and guilty of high treason, and to have forfeited all privileges
which have formerly been granted to them, all persons and all towns which
shall refuse to take this oath, and sign this union. He promises never
to bestow any military employment, but on such as shall make a signal
profession of the Roman Catholic religion; and prohibits, in express
terms, that any man whosoever shall be admitted to the exercise of any
office of judicature, or any employment belonging to the treasury,
whose profession of the Roman Catholic religion appears not under the
attestation of the bishop, or his substitutes, or at least of the curates
or their vicars, together with the deposition of ten witnesses, all
qualified and unsuspected persons. He also swears to hold for his good
and loyal subjects, and to protect and defend, as well those who have
always followed the League, as those others who have formerly united and
associated themselves against the heretics; and that at this present he
unites them to himself, to the end they may all act together in order
to one common end: And that he holds for null, and as never done, that
which seems to have been done against him, as well in the town of Paris
as elsewhere; particularly since the twelfth of May to the day of the
publication of this edict; without future molestation, or bringing into
trouble any person whomsoever, for any thing relating to the premises.
But he also wills, that all his subjects, of what quality soever, swear,
that they will and do renounce all leagues and confederations, as well
without as within the realm, which are contrary to this union, on pain of
being punished as infringers of their oath, and guilty of high treason.
This edict was verified in parliament the one-and-twentieth of July, and
published immediately after; being received with extraordinary transports
of joy by the Leaguers, who believed, that by it they had obtained a
clear victory against the king, whom they beheld entirely subjected to
the will and good pleasure of their heads. He himself also, as it is
reported, with profound dissimulation, endeavoured all he was able to
confirm them in that opinion, by making public demonstrations of his
joy and satisfaction for the peace. He was very solicitous to cause his
edict to be signed by all the princes and lords who were then at court:
He proclaimed the convention of the three estates at Blois, which was to
be at the beginning of October following: He procured the letters patent
for the Duke of Guise’s commission of intendant-general over all his
armies, with the same power which is annexed to that of constable, to be
verified in parliament: He received him at Chartres, with such particular
tokens of esteem, affection, and trust, that it was believed the tender
friendship which was betwixt them, when the king was then but Duke of
Anjou, was once more renewed: He favoured all his creatures, on whom
he bestowed considerable employments; and, at last, to satisfy him in
that point which of all others was most nice, he caused the cardinal of
Bourbon to be solemnly declared the next of blood to him, by allowing him
all the privileges and prerogatives which belong to the heir presumptive
of the crown. After all, as it is almost impossible that a violent
passion in the soul, what care soever be taken to conceal it, should not
discover itself by its consequences, and by some indications which break
out even from the closest men; so this prince, as great a master as he
was in the art of dissimulation, could not act his part so well, but
that he gave occasion to those who were more clear-sighted, to believe,
or at leastwise to suspect, that all which at that time was done by him,
to testify his joy, was only to cover his indignation and his hatred,
which urged him incessantly to revenge himself on those from whom he had
received such unworthy usage.
For, being departed from Chartres, and going thence to Rouen, where he
made the edict of reunion, he would never be persuaded to go to Paris
at his return, what instance soever the deputies of the parliament, and
those of the town, could make to him; always alleging faint excuses,
which he grounded only on the preparations which he was to make in order
to his meeting the estates at Blois. He still retained near his person
his guard of the five-and-forty, which the Duke of Guise had requested
him to dismiss. He gave the command of the army designed for Poitou to
the Duke of Nevers, whom the Duke of Guise, his brother-in-law, could
never endure since his renunciation of the League. He admitted none
to his private friendship but the Marshal d’Aumont, the Lord Nicholas
d’Angennes de Rambouillet, Colonel Alphonso d’Ornano, and some few
others, who were no friends to the Duke of Guise.
In fine, that which made the greatest noise, was, that the Chancellor
de Chiverny, the Presidents Bellievre and Brulart, and the Sieurs de
Villeroy and Pinart, (the two secretaries of state, who had given him
advice to accommodate matters with the Duke of Guise,) were absolutely
disgraced. The queen-mother, who had managed that accommodation, had
little or no part in business, and was wholly excluded from the cabinet
council. The seals were given to Francis de Monthelon, a famous advocate,
a man of rare integrity, and of inviolable fidelity to the king’s
service, who raised him to that high employment, without his own seeking,
at the recommendation of the Duke of Nevers, who was known to be on very
ill terms with the Duke of Guise.
All this was sufficient, without doubt, to alarm that prince, and give
him caution to look about him, or at least to suspect the king’s
intentions towards him; but the flourishing condition wherein he was
placed, the applauses which were given him both by the people and by the
court itself, which admired both his conduct and his perpetual felicity,
and regarded him as arbitrator and master of affairs, and the certain
opinion which he had, that all things would go for him in the estates,
had so far blinded him, that he believed it was not in the power of
fortune to do him any prejudice, not so much as to shake him, or to give
the smallest stop to the full career of his success. Thus he entered as
it were in triumph into Blois at the end of September; and the king came
thither about the same time, to order the preparations for the estates.
He commanded, that all future proceedings should be as it were sanctified
by two solemn and conspicuous acts of piety; which were a most devout and
magnificent procession made on the first Sunday of October, the second
day of that month, and by a general communion, taken by all the deputies
on the Sunday following, the ninth of the same month; on which the king,
in token of a perfect reconcilement, received, with the Duke of Guise,
the precious body of Jesus Christ from the hands of the Cardinal de
Bourbon, in the church of Saint Saviour. After which, all those who were
expected being at length arrived, the assembly of the states was opened
on Sunday the sixteenth of that month, in the great hall of the castle of
Blois.
As it is not my business to say any thing of this assembly, which relates
not precisely to the history of the League, I shall not trouble myself
with every particular which passed in it. I shall only say, that the
king, who was naturally eloquent, opened the assembly with an excellent
oration; wherein, after he had, in a most majestic manner, and with most
pathetic words, exhorted the deputies to their duty, he either could
not, or would not, conceal from them, that he had not so far forgotten
the past actions, but that he had taken up a firm resolution, to inflict
an exemplary punishment on such who should persist in acting against
his authority, and continue to be still possessed with that spirit of
leaguing and caballing, which was upon the point of ruining the state;
neither would he henceforth spare those who should have any other union
than that which the members ought to have with their head, and subjects
with their sovereign.
This touched so sensibly the Leaguers of that assembly, and principally
their head, who looked on this speech as particularly addressed to
himself, that they proceeded even to threatening, that they would break
off the estates by their departure, if the king, who had commanded his
speech to be printed, would not give order to suppress it, or at least
correct that passage. There are some who affirm, that, after a rough
dispute concerning it, the king permitted at last that something should
be altered, and the harshness of his expressions a little mollified;
but there are others, and even of their number, who heard it spoken,
who assure us, that it came out in public in the same terms it was
pronounced. However it were, it is certain, that this complaint of theirs
much exasperated the king’s mind, who saw clearly by this proceeding,
that the League, notwithstanding its reunion with him, had still a
separate interest of its own, and extremely opposite to his.
I will adventure to say farther, that he was then fully persuaded of it,
when he perceived, that the Duke of Guise, who was the true head of it,
was evidently more powerful than himself in those estates. For besides,
that the greatest part of the deputies had been elected by the factious
intrigues of his dependants in the provinces, those who were chosen to
preside over the several orders, that is to say, the Cardinals of Bourbon
and of Guise for the clergy; the Count of Brissac and the Baron of Magnac
for the nobility; and the provost of merchants, La Chapelle Martau, for
the third order, were all of them entirely at the duke’s devotion.
Insomuch, that at the second session, after the edict of reunion had been
solemnly confirmed, sworn to again, and passed into a fundamental law
of the state, when the petitions of the three orders were read, he saw,
that, under pretence of desiring to reform some abuses which were crept
into the state, they were filled with an infinite number of propositions,
which tended to the manifest diminution, or rather the annihilation, of
the royal authority; and to reduce the government to that pass, that
there should remain to the king no more than the empty name and vain
appearance of a sovereign monarch; and that all the real and essential
part of sovereignty should be in the League, which absolutely depended on
the Duke of Guise.
Yet, farther, they were not satisfied barely to propose these things;
leaving to the king, according to the ancient laws and constitution of
the monarchy, the power of either passing or refusing them, according to
his pleasure, after they had been well examined in his council; but they
pretended, that after they had been received by the consent of the three
orders, they should become laws of course, and be inviolable, so that
the king should not have the power either to change or abrogate them in
his council. Then they would have an abatement of taxes and imposts; but
so much out of measure, that they took away from the king the means of
making that war in which themselves had engaged him. They would also,
that the council of Trent should be received absolutely, and without
modification. And the famous attorney-general Jaques de Faye d’Espesses,
who, in a great assembly held on that occasion, maintained, with strength
of reason, against some decrees of that council, the prerogatives of the
king (or regalia,) and the immunities of the Gallican church, was so
ill treated there, though he had baffled the archbishop of Lyons, who
undertook to destroy those privileges, that the king, who was affronted
in the person of his attorney, was not a little displeased at their
proceedings.
But above all things they were urgent with him, and pressed it with
incredible obstinacy, that the king of Navarre, who at the same time
had assembled the estates of his party at Rochelle, and from thence had
sent to those at Blois, intimating his desire of a general council to
be summoned, where all things might be accommodated, should from that
time forward be declared incapable of ever succeeding to the crown. They
had made a decree concerning this, by consent of the three orders, at
the particular instance of the order of the clergy. And the king, who
clearly foresaw the terrible consequences of this unparalleled injustice,
and who was plyed incessantly to subscribe it, was not able to defend
himself otherwise, than by amusing them with delays, and rubs which he
dextrously caused to be thrown in their way, on sundry pretences. It
was not doubted, but that the Duke of Guise, (who, having two thirds
of the estates for him, was consequently the master there,) was author
of all these propositions, so contrary to the true interests and
authority of the king, especially when it was evident, that he employed
all his managers, to cause himself to be declared in the estates,
lieutenant-general through the whole kingdom, as if he would possess
himself of that supreme command, without dependance on the king, and that
he pretended his prince to be no more his master, as not having power to
deprive him of a dignity which he was to hold, from a commission given
him by others.
All these things, so unworthy of the majesty of a great king, at the
length quite wearied out his patience; which, after so long dissembling
his injuries, on the sudden broke out into the extremity of rage;
insomuch, that those among his confidents, who ardently desired the
destruction of the duke for their own advantage, found not the least
trouble in passing on the king for truths, many reports, and oftentimes
very groundless rumours, which ran of the duke; adding to them, that it
was he, who underhand had drawn the Duke of Savoy to possess himself
of the marquisate of Saluces, as he had lately done. And this they
confidently affirmed, though the duke, by his own interest in the
estates, had procured them to vote a war against the Savoyard. Thus,
whether it were that the king had long since resolved to rid his hands
of the Duke of Guise, in revenge of some ancient grudge and sense of
the affronts he had received from him, particularly on that fatal day
of the barricades; or were it, that, being sincerely reconciled to him,
he had taken, or perhaps resumed, that resolution when he saw him act
against him in the estates, of which he had made himself the master, and
believing his own condition desperate, if he made not haste to prevent
him, most certain it is, that he deliberated no more, but only concerning
the manner of executing what he had determined.
He had only two ways to chuse; the one by justice, first committing
him, and afterwards making his process; the other by fact, which was to
have him slain. He managed this consultation with exceeding secrecy,
admitting only four or five of his confidents, on whom he most relied.
One of these was Beauvais Nangis, who, having served the king well, in
his army against the Reyters, was restored so fully to his favour, that
in recompence of the command of colonel of the French infantry, which the
Duke of Espernon had got over his head, he made him afterwards admiral
of France, though he never enjoyed that great dignity, which he had only
under the signet.
This lord, who was as prudent and temperate in council, as prompt and
daring in execution, concluded for the methods of justice, maintaining
that they were not only the more honest, but also the more safe, because
the fear alone which would possess the duke’s party, lest they should
kill him, in case they attempted to deliver him by force, and by that
means hinder the course of justice, would stop all manner of such
proceeding, and restrain them within the terms of duty: That after all,
if he were once made prisoner, which might be done without noise or
tumult, it would be easy to give him such judges, as should soon dispatch
his trial, and that afterwards he might be executed in prison, according
to the laws. But if, on the contrary, they should enter crudely on so
bloody an execution, there was danger lest that action, which was never
to be well justified, and which the Leaguers would certainly cause to
pass in the world for tyrannical and perfidious, might raise a rebellion
in the greatest part of France, which had already declared so loudly for
that prince, whom they regarded as the pillar of religion, and would
afterwards look on as the martyr of it. But the rest, who believed it
impossible on that occasion to observe the ordinary forms of law and
justice, and thought that, the head being once cut off, the body of the
League would immediately fall like a dead body, were of opinion, that he
should be dispatched with all possible speed, which was easy to perform,
especially in the castle, where the Duke was almost hourly in the king’s
power, whom he had in no manner of distrust, as sufficiently appeared by
his lodging there.
In the meantime, it is most certain, that this secret was not kept so
close, but that he received advertisement from more than one of his
imminent danger, and that his death already was resolved. And he slighted
not so much these informations, as intrepid as he was, or as he affected
to appear, by replying continually, they dare not, but that two or three
days before his death, he consulted on this affair, which so nearly
concerned him, with the cardinal of Guise his brother, the archbishop
of Lyons, the president de Neuilly, the provost of the merchants, and
the Sieur de Mandrevile governor of St Menehoud, on whom he principally
relied. In weighing those proofs which in a manner were indubitable,
that a design was laid against him, they were unanimously of opinion,
that the safest course was to be taken, and that under some pretence or
other he should instantly retire. Excepting only the archbishop, who
continued obstinate to the contrary, fortifying his opinion with this
argument, that since he was upon the point of carrying all things in
the estates according to his wish, he ran the hazard of loosing all by
leaving them; and, that for the rest, it was not credible that the king
should be so ill advised, as to incur the manifest danger of ruining
himself, by striking that unhappy blow. To which Mandrevile replied,
swearing, that for a man of sense, as he was, he was the worst arguer he
ever knew. “For,” said he, “you talk of the king, as if he were a wary
and cool-headed prince, looking before him at every step; and will not
understand that he is only a hot-brained fool, who thinks no farther than
how to execute what his two base passions, fear and hatred which possess
him, have once made sink into his imagination, and never considers what
a wise man ought to do on this occasion. It were a folly, therefore, for
the duke to hazard himself in such a manner, and to be moved by so weak a
reason, to lose all in a moment.”
It is wonderful to observe, that the most clear-sighted men, who have
it in their power if they will use the means before them, to avoid that
which is called their destiny, after the misfortune is happened, should
suffer themselves to be dragged and hurried to it as it were by force,
in spite of their understanding and their foresight, which their own
rashness, and not a pretended fatality, renders unprofitable to them.
It is reported, that the Duke of Guise confessed that this discourse
of Mandrevile carried the greater force of reason; yet nevertheless,
he added, that having gone so far forward as he then was, if he should
see death coming in at the windows upon him, he would not give one step
backward to the door, though by so doing, he were certain to avoid it.
Nevertheless, it is very probable, that the encouragement he had to
speak with so much loftiness and resolution, was the assurance, which he
thought he had, that the king, whose genius he knew, particularly since
the day when he entered into the Louvre, where the duke gave himself for
lost, would never afterwards dare to take up so bold a resolution as to
kill him.
It is certain, that when the Sieur de Vins, one of his greatest
confidents, had written to him from Provence, that he should beware of
keeping so near the king, and not rely on those large testimonies of his
affection, which he said he had received; the duke answered him, that he
reposed not the hopes of his own safety on the king’s virtue, whom he
knew to be ill natured, and a hypocrite, but on his judgment and on his
fear; because it was not credible, but he must needs understand, that he
himself was ruined in case he made any attempt against his person. But
he learned, at his own cost, by the unhappy experiment which he made,
that it had been better for him to have followed the wise advice which
was given him, and which he himself had approved, than a bare conjecture,
and the impulse of his inborn generosity, which his bloody and lamentable
death, as things are commonly judged by their event, has caused to pass
in the world for an effect of the greatest rashness.
It ought not here to be expected, that I should dwell on an exact and
long description of all the circumstances of that tragical action, which
has been so unfortunate to France, and so ill received in the world.
Besides that they are recounted, in very different manners, by the
historians of one and the other religion, according to their different
passions, and that the greatest part of them are either false, or have
little in them worth observation; the thing was done with so great
facility and precipitation, and withal in so brutal a manner, that it
cannot be too hastily passed over; this then is the plain and succinct
relation of it.
After that the brave Grillon, Maitre de Camp of the regiment of guards,
had generously refused to kill the Duke of Guise, unless in single duel,
and in an honourable way, the king had recourse to Lognac, the first
gentleman of his chamber, and captain of the forty-five, who promised him
eighteen or twenty of the most resolute amongst them, and for whom he
durst be answerable. They were of the number of those whom the Duke of
Guise, who had always a distrust of those Gascons, as creatures of the
Duke of Espernon, had formerly demanded that they might be dismissed,
from which request he had afterwards desisted; insomuch that it may be
said he foresaw the misfortune that attended him, without being able to
avoid it. For, on Friday the twenty-third of December, being entered
about eight of the clock in the morning into the great hall, where the
king had intimated on Thursday night, that he intended to hold the
council very early, that he might afterwards go to _Nostre dame de
Clery_; some came to tell him that his majesty expected him in the old
closet, yet he was not there, but in the other which looks into the
garden. Upon this, he arose from the fireside, where, finding himself
somewhat indisposed, he had been seated; and passed through a narrow
entry, which was on one side the hall, into the chamber, where he found
Lognac, with seven or eight of the forty-five; the King himself having
caused them to enter into that room very secretly before daybreak: the
rest of them were posted in the old closet, and all of them had great
poniards hid under their cloaks, expecting only the coming of the Duke of
Guise, to make sure work with him, whether it were in the chamber or in
the closet, in case he should retire thither for his defence.
There needed not so great a preparation for the killing of a single
man, who came thither without distrust of any thing that was designed
against him; and who, holding his hat in one hand, and with the other
the lappet of his cloak, which he had wrapt under his left arm, was in
no condition of defence. In this posture he advanced towards the old
closet, saluting very civilly, as his custom was, those gentlemen who
made show of attending him out of respect, as far as the door. And as
in lifting up the hangings, with the help of one of them, he stooped to
enter, he was suddenly seized by the arms, and by the legs; and at the
same instant struck into the body before, with five or six poniards, and
from behind, into the nape of the neck, and the throat, which hindered
him from speaking one single word of all that he is made to say, or so
much as drawing out his sword. All that he could do, was to drag along
his murderers, with the last and strongest effort that he could make,
struggling and striving till he fell down at the beds-feet, where some
while after, with a deep groan, he yielded up his breath.
The cardinal of Guise, and archbishop of Lyons, who were in the council
hall, rising up at the noise, with intention of running to his aid, were
made prisoners by the marshals D’Aumont and de Retz; at the same time,
the cardinal of Bourbon was also seized in the castle, together with Anne
d’Este Duchess of Nemours, and mother of the Guises, and the Prince of
Joinville, the Dukes of Elbeuf, and Nemours, Brissac, and Boisdauphin,
with many other lords, who were confidents of the Duke, and Pericard his
secretary. And in the meantime the grand prevost of the king’s house went
with his archers to the chamber of the third estate, in the town-house,
and there arrested the president Neuilly, the prevost of merchants, the
sheriffs Compan and Cotte-Blanch, who were deputies for Paris, and some
other notorious Leaguers.
This being done, the king himself brought the news of it to the
queen-mother; telling her that now he was a real king, since he had cut
off the Duke of Guise. At which that princess being much surprised and
moved, asking him if he had made provision against future accidents, he
answered her in an angry kind of tone, much differing from his accustomed
manner of speaking to her, that she might set her heart at rest, for he
had taken order for what might happen, and so went out surlily to go to
mass; yet before he went, he sent particularly to cardinal Gondi, and to
the cardinal Legat Morosini, and informed them both of what had passed,
with his reasons to justify his proceedings.
THE POSTSCRIPT OF THE TRANSLATOR.
That government, generally considered, is of divine authority, will
admit of no dispute; for whoever will seriously consider, that no man
has naturally a right over his own life, so as to murder himself, will
find, by consequence, that he has no right to take away another’s life;
and that no pact betwixt man and man, or of corporations and individuals,
or of sovereigns and subjects, can intitle them to this right; so that
no offender can lawfully, and without sin, be punished, unless that
power be derived from God. It is He who has commissioned magistrates,
and authorised them to prevent future crimes, by punishing offenders,
and to redress the injured by distributive justice; subjects therefore
are accountable to superiors, and the superior to Him alone. For, the
sovereign being once invested with lawful authority, the subject has
irrevocably given up his power, and the dependance of a monarch is alone
on God. A king, at his coronation, swears to govern his subjects by the
laws of the land, and to maintain the several orders of men under him, in
their lawful privileges; and those orders swear allegiance and fidelity
to him, but with this distinction, that the failure of the people is
punishable by the king, that of the king is only punishable by the King
of kings. The people then are not judges of good or ill administration
in their king; for it is inconsistent with the nature of sovereignty
that they should be so; and if at some times they suffer, through the
irregularities of a bad prince, they enjoy more often the benefits and
advantages of a good one, as God in his providence shall dispose, either
for their blessing or their punishment. The advantages and disadvantages
of such subjection, are supposed to have been first considered, and
upon this balance they have given up their power without a capacity of
resumption; so that it is in vain for a commonwealth party to plead,
that men, for example, now in being, cannot bind their posterity, or
give up their power; for if subjects can swear only for themselves, when
the father dies the subjection ends, and the son, who has not sworn, can
be no traitor or offender, either to the king or to the laws. And at
this rate, a long-lived prince may outlive his sovereignty, and be no
longer lawfully a king; but in the mean time, it is evident, that the
son enjoys the benefit of the laws and government, which is an implicit
acknowledgment of subjection. It is endless to run through all the
extravagancies of these men, and it is enough for us that we are settled
under a lawful government of a most gracious prince; that our monarchy is
hereditary; that it is naturally poised by our municipal laws, with equal
benefit of prince and people; that he governs, as he has promised, by
explicit laws; and what the laws are silent in, I think I may conclude to
be part of his prerogative; for what the king has not granted away, is
inherent in him. The point of succession has sufficiently been discussed,
both as to the right of it, and to the interest of the people: one main
argument of the other side is, how often it has been removed from the
right line? as in the case of King Stephen, and of Henry the Fourth, and
his descendants of the house of Lancaster. But it is easy to answer them,
that matter of fact, and matter of right, are different considerations:
both those kings were but usurpers in effect, and the providence of God
restored the posterities of those who were dispossessed. By the same
argument, they might as well justify the rebellion and murder of the
late king; for there was not only a prince inhumanly put to death, but
a government overturned; and first an arbitrary commonwealth, then two
usurpers set up against the lawful sovereign; but, to our happiness,
the same providence has miraculously restored the right heir, and, to
their confusion, as miraculously preserved him. In this present history,
to go no further, we see Henry the Third, by a decree of the Sorbonne,
divested, what in them lay, of his imperial rights: a parliament of
Paris, such another as our first Long Parliament, confirming their
decree; a pope authorising all this by his excommunication; and an Holy
League and Covenant prosecuting this deposition by arms: yet an untimely
death only hindered him from reseating himself in glory on the throne,
after he was in manifest possession of the victory.[20] We see also the
same Sorbonists, the same pope, parliament, and league, with greater
force opposing the undoubted right of King Henry the Fourth; and we see
him in the end, surmounting all these difficulties, and triumphing over
all these dangers. God Almighty taking care of his own anointed, and
the true succession; neither the Papist nor Presbyterian Association
prevailing at the last in their attempts, but both baffled and ruined,
and the whole rebellion ending, either in the submission, or destruction
of the conspirators.
It is true, as my author has observed in the beginning of his history,
that before the Catholic League, or Holy Union, which is the subject
of this book, there was a league or combination of Huguenots, against
the government of France, which produced the conspiracy of Amboise;
and the Calvinist preachers (as Mezeray, a most impartial historian,
informs us) gave their opinion, that they might take up arms in their own
defence, and make way for a free access to the king, to present their
remonstrances. But it was ordered at the same time, that they should
seize on the Duke of Guise, and the Cardinal of Lorraine, his brother,
who were then chief ministers, that they might be brought to trial by
process before the States; but he adds immediately, who could answer for
them, that the prisoners should not have been killed out of hand, and
that they would not have made themselves masters of the queen-mother’s
person, and of the young king’s, which was laid afterwards to their
charge? The concealed heads of this conspiracy, were Lewis Prince of
Conde, and the famous Admiral de Coligny: who being discontented at
court, because their enemies, the Guises, had the management of affairs
under the Queen Regent, to their exclusion, and being before turned
Calvinists, made use of that rebellious sect, and the pretence of
religion, to cover their ambition and revenge. The same Mezeray tells us
in one of the next pages, that the name of Huguenots or Fidnos, (from
whence it was corrupted,) signifies, League or Association, in the Swiss
language; and was brought, together with the sect, from Geneva into
France. But from whencesoever they had their name, it is most certain
that pestilent race of people cannot, by their principles, be good
subjects; for whatever enforced obedience they pay to authority, they
believe their class above the king; and how they would order him if they
had him in their power, our most gracious sovereign has sufficiently
experienced when he was in Scotland.[21] As for their boast that they
brought him in, it is much as true as that of the Calvinists, who
pretend, as my author tells you in his preface, that they seated his
grandfather, Henry IV. upon the throne. For both French and English
Presbyterians were fundamentally and practically rebels; and the French
have this advantage over ours, that they came in to the aid of Henry III.
at his greatest need, or rather were brought over by the king of Navarre,
their declared head, on a prospect of great advantage to their religion;
whereas ours never inclined to the king’s restoration, till themselves
had been trodden underfoot by the independent party, and till the voice
of three nations called aloud for him, that is to say, when they had no
possibility of keeping him any longer out of England. But the beginning
of leagues, unions, and associations, by those who called themselves
God’s people, for reformation of religious worship, and for the redress
of pretended grievances in the state, is of a higher rise, and is justly
to be dated from Luther’s time; and the private spirit, or the gift
of interpreting scriptures by private persons without learning, was
certainly the original cause of such cabals in the reformed churches; so
dangerous an instrument of rebellion is the holy scripture in the hands
of ignorant and bigotted men.
The Anabaptists of Germany led up the dance, who had always in their
mouths, faith, charity, the fear of God, and mortifications of the
flesh: prayers, fastings, meditations, contempt of riches and honours,
were their first specious practices. From thence they grew up, by
little and little, to a separation from other men, who, according to
their pharisaical account, were less holy than themselves; and decency,
civility, neatness of attire, good furniture, and order in their houses,
were the brands of carnal-minded men. Then they proceeded to nick-name
the days of the weeks, and Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, &c. as heathen names,
must be rejected for the first, second, and third days, distinguishing
only by their numbers. Thus they began to play, as it were, at cross
purposes with mankind; and to do every thing by contraries, that they
might be esteemed more godly and more illuminated. It had been a wonder,
considering their fanciful perfections, if they had stopped here. They
were now knowing and pure enough to extend their private reformation
to the church and state; for God’s people love always to be dealing as
well in temporals as spirituals; or rather, they love to be fingering
spirituals, in order to their grasping temporals. Therefore they had the
impudence to pretend to inspiration in the exposition of scriptures;
a trick which since that time has been familiarly used by every sect
in its turn, to advance their interests. Not content with this, they
assumed to themselves a more particular intimacy with God’s holy spirit;
as if it guided them, even beyond the power of the scriptures, to know
more of him than was therein taught. For now the Bible began to be a
dead letter of itself; and no virtue was attributed to the reading of
it, but all to the inward man, the call of the Holy Ghost, and the
engrafting of the word, opening their understanding to hidden mysteries
by faith. And here the mountebank way of canting words came first in
use; as if there were something more in religion than could be expressed
in intelligible terms, or nonsense were the way to heaven. This of
necessity must breed divisions amongst them; for every man’s inspiration
being particular to himself, must clash with another’s, who set up for
the same qualification; the Holy Ghost being infallible in all alike,
though he spoke contradictions in several mouths. But they had a way of
licking one another whole; mistakes were to be forgiven to weak brethren;
the failing was excused for the right intention; he who was more
illuminated, would allow some light to be in the less, and degrees were
made in contradictory propositions. But godfathers and godmothers, by
common consent, were already set aside, together with the observation of
festivals, which they said were of antichristian institution. They began
at last to preach openly, that they had no other king but Christ, and
by consequence earthly magistrates were out of doors. All the gracious
promises in scripture they applied to themselves, as God’s chosen, and
all the judgments were the portion of their enemies. These impieties
were at first unregarded, and afterwards tolerated by their sovereigns;
and Luther himself made request to the Duke of Saxony, to deal favourably
with them, as honest-meaning men who were misled. But in the end, when,
by these specious pretences, they had gathered strength, they who had
before concluded, that Christ was the only king on earth, and at the same
time assumed to themselves, that Christ was theirs; inferred by good
consequence, that they were to maintain their king; and not only so, but
to propagate that belief in others; for what God wills, man must obey;
and for that reason, they entered into a league of association amongst
themselves, to deliver their Israel out of Egypt; to seize Canaan, and
to turn the idolaters out of possession. Thus you see by what degrees
of saintship they grew up into rebellion, under their successive heads,
Muncer, Phifer, John of Leyden, and Knipperdolling, where what violences,
impieties, and sacrileges, they committed, those who are not satisfied
may read in Sleidan.[22] The general tradition is, that after they had
been besieged in Munster, and were forced by assault, their ringleaders
being punished, and they dispersed, two ships-lading of these precious
saints was disembogued in Scotland, where they set up again, and broached
anew their pernicious principles. If this be true, we may easily perceive
on what a noble stock presbytery was grafted. From Scotland they had a
blessed passage into England; or at least arriving here from other parts,
they soon came to a considerable increase. Calvin, to do him right,
wrote to King Edward VI. a sharp letter against these people; but our
Presbyterians after him, have been content to make use of them in the
late civil wars, where they and all the rest of the sectaries were joined
in the good old cause of rebellion against his late Majesty; though they
could not agree about dividing the spoils, when they had obtained the
victory: and it is impossible they ever should, for all claiming to the
spirit, no party will suffer another to be uppermost, nor indeed will
they tolerate each other; because the scriptures, interpreted by each
to their own purpose, is always the best weapon in the strongest hand:
observe them all along, and Providence is still the prevailing argument.
They who happen to be in power, will ever urge it against those who
are undermost; as they who are depressed, will never fail to call it
persecution. They are never united but in adversity, for cold gathers
together bodies of contrary natures, and warmth divides them.
How Presbytery was transplanted into England, I have formerly related
out of good authors.[23] The persecution arising in Queen Mary’s reign,
forced many Protestants out of their native country into foreign parts,
where Calvinism having already taken root (as at Frankfort, Strasburg,
and Geneva,) those exiles grew tainted with that new discipline; and
returning in the beginning of Queen Elizabeth’s reign, spread the
contagion of it both amongst the clergy and laity of this nation.
Any man who will look into the tenets of the first sectaries, will find
these to be more or less embued with them: Here they were supported
underhand by great men for private interests. What trouble they gave
that queen and how she curbed them, is notoriously known to all who are
conversant in the histories of those times. How King James was plagued
with them, is known as well to any man who has read the reverend and
sincere Spottiswoode:[24] And how they were baffled by the church of
England, in a disputation which he allowed them at Hampton-Court,[25]
even to the conversion of Dr Sparks, who was one of the two disputants of
their party, and afterwards writ against them; any one who pleases may be
satisfied.
The agreement of their principles with the fiercest Jesuits, is as easy
to be demonstrated, and has already been done, by several hands: I will
only mention some few of them, to show how well prepared they came to
that solemn covenant of theirs, which they borrowed first from the Holy
League of France, and have lately copied out again in their intended
association against his present majesty.
Bellarmine,[26] as the author of this history has told you, was himself a
preacher for the League in Paris during the rebellion there, in the reign
of King Henry the Fourth. Some of his principles are these following:[27]
“In the kingdoms of men, the power of the king is from the people,
because the people make the king.” Observing that he says, “In the
kingdoms of men;” there is no doubt but he restrains this principle to
the subordination of the pope; for his Holiness, in that rebellion, as
you have read, was declared Protector of the League: So that the pope
first excommunicates, (which is the outlawry of the church,) and, by
virtue of this excommunication, the people are left to their own natural
liberty, and may, without farther process from Rome, depose him.
Accordingly, you see it practised, in the same instance: Pope Sixtus
first thunderstruck King Henry the Third and the King of Navarre; then
the Sorbonne make decrees, that they have successively forfeited the
crown; the parliament verifies these decrees, and the pope is petitioned
to confirm the sense of the nation, that is, of the rebels.
But I have related this too favourably for Bellarmine; for we hear him,
in another place, positively affirming it as matter of faith, “If any
Christian prince shall depart from the Catholic religion, and shall
withdraw others from it, he immediately forfeits all power and dignity,
even before the pope has pronounced sentence on him; and his subjects, in
case they have power to do it, may and ought to cast out such an heretic
from his sovereignty over Christians.”
Now, consonant to this is Buchanan’s principle, “That the people may
confer the government on whom they please;” and the maxim of Knox,
“That if princes be tyrants against God and his truth, their subjects
are released from their oath of obedience.” And Goodman’s, “That when
magistrates cease to do their duties, God gives the sword into the
people’s hands: evil princes ought to be deposed by inferior magistrates;
and a private man, having an inward call, may kill a tyrant.”[28]
It is the work of a scavenger, to rake together and carry off all these
dunghills; they are easy to be found at the doors of all our sects, and
all our atheistical commonwealth’s men. And, besides, it is a needless
labour; they are so far from disowning such positions, that they glory
in them; and wear them like marks of honour, as an Indian does a ring in
his nose, or a Soldanian a belt of garbage. In the meantime, I appeal to
any impartial man, whether men of such principles can reasonably expect
any favour from the government in which they live, and which, viper-like,
they would devour.
What I have remarked of them is no more than necessary, to show how
aptly their principles are suited to their practices; the history itself
has sufficiently discovered to the unbiassed reader, that both the
last rebellion, and this present conspiracy, (which is the mystery of
iniquity still working in the three nations,) were originally founded on
the French League: that was their model, according to which they built
their Babel. You have seen how warily the first association in Picardy
was worded; nothing was to be attempted but for the king’s service; and
an acknowledgment was formally made, that both the right and power of
the government was in him: but it was pretended, that, by occasion of
the true Protestant rebels, the crown was not any longer in condition,
either of maintaining itself, or protecting them; and that therefore, in
the name of God, and by the power of the Holy Ghost, they joined together
in their own defence, and that of their religion. But all this while,
though they would seem to act by the king’s authority, and under him, the
combination was kept as secret as possibly they could, and even without
the participation of the sovereign; a sure sign, that they intended him
no good at the bottom. Nay, they had an evasion ready too against his
authority; for it is plain they joined Humieres, the governor of the
province, in commission with him, and only named the king for show; but
engaged themselves at the same time to his lieutenant, to be obedient to
all his commands; levying men and money, without the king’s knowledge,
or any law, but what they made amongst themselves. So that, in effect,
the rebellion and combination of the Huguenots[29] was only a leading
card, and an example to the Papists to rebel on their side. And there
was only this difference in the cause, that the Calvinists set up for
their reformation, by the superior power of religion, and inherent right
of the people, against the king and pope. The Papists pretended the same
popular right for their rebellion against the king, and for the same end
of reformation, only they faced it with church and pope.
Our sectaries, and long parliament of forty-one, had certainly these
French precedents in their eye. They copied their methods of rebellion,
at first with great professions of duty and affection to the king; all
they did was in order to make him glorious; all that was done against
him was pretended to be under his authority, and in his name; and even
the war they raised was pretended for the king and parliament. But
those proceedings are so notoriously known, and have employed so many
pens, that it would be a nauseous work for me to dwell on them. To draw
the likeness of the French transactions and ours, were in effect, to
transcribe the history I have translated; every page is full of it;
every man has seen the parallel of the Holy League and our Covenant; and
cannot but observe, that, besides the names of the countries, France and
England, and the names of religions, Protestant and Papist, there is
scarcely to be found the least difference in the project of the whole,
and in the substance of the articles. In the mean time, I cannot but
take notice, that our rebels have left this eternal brand upon their
memories, that, while all their pretence was for the setting up the
Protestant religion, and pulling down of popery, they have borrowed
from Papists both the model of their design, and their arguments to
defend it; and not from loyal, well-principled Papists, but from the
worst, the most bigotted, and most violent, of that religion; from some
of the Jesuits, an order founded on purpose to combat Lutheranism and
Calvinism. The matter of fact is so palpably true and so notorious,
that they cannot have the impudence to deny it. But some of the Jesuits
are the shame of the Roman church, as the sectaries are of ours. Their
tenets in politics are the same; both of them hate monarchy, and love
democracy; both of them are superlatively violent; they are inveterate
haters of each other in religion, and yet agree in the principles of
government. And if, after so many advices to a painter, I might advise a
Dutch-maker of emblems,[30] he should draw a Presbyterian in arms on one
side, a Jesuit on the other, and a crowned head betwixt them; for it is
perfectly a battle-royal. Each of them is endeavouring the destruction of
his adversary; but the monarch is sure to get blows on both sides. But
for those sectaries and commonwealth’s men of forty-one, before I leave
them, I must crave leave to observe of them, that, generally, they were
a sour sort of thinking men, grim, and surly hypocrites; such as could
cover their vices with an appearance of great devotion and austerity of
manners; neither profaneness nor luxury were encouraged by them, nor
practised publicly, which gave them a great opinion of sanctity amongst
the multitude; and by that opinion, principally, they did their business.
Though their politics were taken from the Catholic League, yet their
Christianity much resembled those Anabaptists, who were their original in
doctrine; and these, indeed, were formidable instruments of a religious
rebellion. But our new conspirators of these seven last years are men of
quite another make: I speak not of their non-conformist preachers, who
pretend to enthusiasm, and are as morose in their worship as were those
first sectaries, but of their leading men, the heads of their faction,
and the principal members of it: what greater looseness of life, more
atheistical discourse, more open lewdness, was ever seen, than generally
was and is to be observed in those men? I am neither making a satire nor
a sermon here; but I would remark a little the ridiculousness of their
management. The strictness of religion is their pretence; and the men
who are to set it up, have theirs to choose. The long-parliament rebels
frequented sermons, and observed prayers and fastings with all solemnity;
but these new reformers, who ought, in prudence, to have trodden in their
steps, because their end was the same, to gull the people by an outside
of devotion, never used the means of insinuating themselves into the
opinion of the multitude. Swearing, drunkenness, blasphemies, and worse
sins than adultery, are the badges of the party: nothing but liberty in
their mouths, nothing but licence in their practice.
For which reason, they were never esteemed by the zealots of their
faction but as their tools; and had they got uppermost, after the
royalists had been crushed, they would have been blown off as too
light for their society. For my own part, when I had once observed
this fundamental error in their politics, I was no longer afraid of
their success. No government was ever ruined by the open scandal of
its opposers. This was just a Catiline’s conspiracy, of profligate,
debauched, and bankrupt men: The wealthy amongst them were the fools of
the party, drawn in by the rest, whose fortunes were desperate; and the
wits of the cabal sought only their private advantages. They had either
lost their preferments, and consequently were piqued, or were in hope
to raise themselves by the general disturbance; upon which account,
they never could be true to one another. There was neither honour nor
conscience in the foundation of their league, but every man, having an
eye to his own particular advancement, was no longer a friend than while
his interest was carrying on: So that treachery was at the bottom of
their design, first against the monarchy, and, if that failed, against
each other; in which, be it spoken to the honour of our nation, the
English are not behind any other country. In few words, just as much
fidelity might be expected from them in a common cause, as there is
amongst a troop of honest murdering and ravishing bandits: while the
booty is in prospect, they combine heartily and faithfully; but when a
proclamation of pardon comes out, and a good reward into the bargain, for
any one who brings in another’s head, the scene is changed, and they are
in more danger of being betrayed, every man by his companion, than they
were formerly by the joint forces of their enemies. It is true, they are
still to be accounted dangerous, because, though they are dispersed at
present, and without an head, yet time and lenity may furnish them again
with a commander; and all men are satisfied, that the debauched party of
them have no principle of godliness to restrain them from violence and
murders; nor the pretended saints any principle of charity,—for it is an
action of piety in them to destroy their enemies, having first pronounced
them enemies of God. What my author says, in general, of the Huguenots,
may justly be applied to all our sectaries: They are a malicious and
bloody generation; they bespatter honest men with their pens when they
are not in power; and when they are uppermost, they hang them up like
dogs. To such kind of people all means of reclaiming, but only severity,
are useless, while they continue obstinate in their designs against
church and government; for though now their claws are pared, they may
grow again to be more sharp. They are still lions in their nature, and
may profit so much by their own errors in late managements, that they may
become more sanctified traitors another time.
In the former part of our history, we see what Henry III. gained from
them by his remisness and concessions. Though our last king was not
only incomparably more pious than that prince, but also was far from
being taxed with any of his vices; yet in this they may be compared,
without the least manner of reflection, that extreme indulgence, and too
great concessions, were the ruin of them both. And by how much the more
a king is subject, by his nature, to this frailty of too much mildness,
which is so near resembling the godlike attribute of mercy, by so much
is he the more liable to be taxed with tyranny. A strange paradox, but
which was sadly verified in the persons of those two princes. For a
faction, appearing zealous for the public liberty, counts him a tyrant
who yields not up whatever they demand, even his most undoubted and just
prerogatives; all that distinguishes a sovereign from a subject; and
the yielding up, or taking away, of which is the very subversion of the
government.
Every point which a monarch loses or relinquishes, but renders him the
weaker to maintain the rest; and, besides, they so construe it, as if
what he gave up were the natural right of the people, which he, or his
ancestors, had usurped from them; which makes it the more dangerous
for him to quit his hold, and is truly the reason why so many mild
princes have been branded with the names of tyrants by their encroaching
subjects. I have not room to enlarge upon this matter as I would, neither
dare I presume to press the argument more closely; but passing by, as I
promised, all the remarkable passages in the late king’s reign, which
resemble the transactions of the League, I will briefly take notice of
some few particulars, wherein our late associators and conspirators have
made a third copy of the League; for the original of their first politics
was certainly no other than the French. This was first copied by the
rebels in forty-one, and since recopied within these late years by some
of those who are lately dead, and by too many others yet alive, and still
drawing after the same design; in which, for want of time, many a fair
blot shall be left unhit; neither do I promise to observe any method of
times, or to take things in order as they happened.
As for the persons who managed the two associations, theirs and ours,
it is most certain that in them is found the least resemblance: And it
is well for us they were not like; for they had men of subtlety and
valour to design, and then to carry on their conspiracy: Ours were but
bunglers in comparison of them, who, having a faction not made by them,
but ready formed and fashioned to their hands, (thanks to their fathers,)
yet failed in every one of their projections, and managed their business
with much less dexterity, though far more wickedness than the French.
They had, indeed, at their head an old conspirator, witty and turbulent,
like the Cardinal of Lorraine,[31] and for courage in execution much
such another. But the good sense and conduct was clearly wanting on the
English side; so that, if we will allow him the contrivance of the plot,
or at least of the conspiracy, which is an honour that no man will be
willing to take from him, in all other circumstances he more resembled
the old decrepit Cardinal of Bourbon, who fed himself with imaginary
hopes of power, dreamed of outliving a king and his successor, much more
young and vigorous than himself, and of governing the world after their
decease. To die in prison, or in banishment, I think, will make no mighty
difference; but this is a main one, that the one was the dupe of all his
party, the other led after him, and made fools of all his faction. As for
a Duke of Guise, or even so much as a Duke of Mayenne, I can find none in
their whole cabal. I cannot believe that any man now living could have
the vanity to pretend to it. It is not every age than can produce a Duke
of Guise,—a man who, without the least shadow of a title, (unless we will
believe the memoirs of the crack-brained advocate David, who gave him one
from Charlemagne,) durst make himself head of a party, and was not only
so in his own conceit, but really; presumed to beard a king, and was upon
the point of being declared his lieutenant-general and his successor.
None of these instances will hold in the comparison; and therefore I
leave it to be boasted, it may be, by one party, but I am sure to be
laughed at by another. Many hot-headed Chevaliers d’Aumale, and ambitious
bravos, like Captain St Paul,[32] may be found amongst them; intriguing
ladies and gallants of the times, such as are described in the army of
the League, at the battle of Yvry;[33] and, besides them, many underling
knaves, pimps, and fools; but these are not worthy to be drawn into
resemblance.
Therefore, to pass by their persons, and consider their design, it is
evident, that on both sides they began with a League, and ended with a
conspiracy. In this they have copied, even to the word Association, which
you may observe was used by Humieres, in the first wary League which was
formed in Picardy; and we see to what it tended in the event: For when
Henry III., by the assistance of the king of Navarre, had in a manner
vanquished his rebels, and was just upon the point of mastering Paris, a
Jacobin, set on by the preachers of the League, most barbarously murdered
him; and, by the way, take notice, that he pretended enthusiasm, or
inspiration of God’s Holy Spirit, for the commission of his parricide.
I leave my superiors to conclude from thence, the danger of tolerating
nonconformists, who, (be it said with reverence,) under pretence of a
whisper from the Holy Ghost, think themselves obliged to perpetrate
the most enormous crimes against the person of their sovereign, when
they have first voted him a tyrant and an enemy to God’s people. This,
indeed, was not so impudent a method as what was used in the formal
process of a pretended high court of justice, in the murder of King
Charles I., and therefore I do not compare those actions; but it is much
resembling the intended murder of our gracious king at the Rye, and
other places: And, that the head of a college might not be wanting to
urge the performance of this horrible attempt, instead of Father Edm.
Bourgoing,[34] let Father Ferguson[35] appear, who was not wanting in his
spiritual exhortations to our conspirators, and to make them believe,
that to assassinate the king was only to take away another Holofernes.
It is true, the Jacobin was but one; and there were many joined in our
conspiracy, and more perhaps than Rumsey or West[36] have ever named:
but this, though it takes from the justness of the comparison, adds
incomparably more to the guilt of it, and makes it fouler on our side of
the water.
My author makes mention of another conspiracy against Henry IV., for
the seizing of his person at Mante, by the young Cardinal of Bourbon,
who was head of the third party, called at that time the Politics, that
is to say, in modern English, Trimmers. This, too, was a limb of our
conspiracy; and the more moderate party of our traitors were engaged in
it.[37] But had it taken effect, the least it could have produced, was
to have overthrown the succession; and no reasonable man would believe,
but they who could forget their duty so much as to have seized the king,
might afterwards have been induced to have him made away, especially when
so fair a provision was made by the House of Commons, that the Papists
were to suffer for it.
But they have not only rummaged the French histories of the League for
conspiracies and parricides of kings; I shall make it apparent, that
they have studied those execrable times, for precedents of undermining
the lawful authority of their sovereigns. Our English are not generally
commended for invention; but these were merchants of small wares, very
pedlers in policy; they must like our tailors, have all their fashions
from the French, and study the French League for every alteration, as our
snippers go over once a year into France, to bring back the newest mode,
and to learn to cut and shape it.
For example: The first estates convened at Blois by Henry III. (the
League being then on foot, and most of the three orders dipped in it,)
demanded of that king, that the articles which should be approved by the
three orders should pass for inviolable laws, without leaving to the king
the power of changing any thing in them. That the same was designed here
by the leading men of their faction, is obvious to every one: for they
had it commonly in their mouths in ordinary discourse; and it was offered
in print by Plato Redivivus,[38] as a good expedient for the nation, in
case his Majesty would have consented to it.
Both in the first and last estates at Blois, the bill of exclusion
against the King of Navarre was pressed; and in the last carried by all
the three orders, though the king would never pass it. The end of that
bill was very evident; it was to have introduced the Duke of Guise into
the throne, after the king’s decease: to which he had no manner of title,
or at least a very cracked one, of which his own party were ashamed. Our
bill of exclusion was copied from hence; but thrown out by the House of
Peers, before it came to the king’s turn to have wholly quashed it.
After the Duke of Guise had forced the king to fly from Paris by the
barricades, the queen-mother being then in the traitor’s interests, when
he had outwitted her so far, as to persuade her to join in the banishment
of the Duke of Espernon, his enemy, and to make her believe, that if the
King of Navarre, whom she hated, were excluded, he would assist her in
bringing her beloved grandchild of Lorraine, to the possession of the
crown: it was proposed by him for the Parisians, that the lieutenancy of
the city might be wholly put into their hands; that the new provost of
merchants, and present sheriffs of the faction, might be confirmed by the
king; and for the future, they should not only elect their sheriffs, but
the colonels and captains of the several wards.
How nearly this was copied in the tumultuous meetings of the city for
their sheriffs, both we and they have cause to remember; and Mr Hunt’s
book, concerning their rights in the city charter, mingled with infamous
aspersions of the government, confirms the notions to have been the
same.[39] And I could produce some very probable instances out of another
libel, (considering the time at which it was written, which was just
before the detection of the conspiracy,) that the author of it, as well
as the supervisor, was engaged in it, or at least privy to it; but let
villainy and ingratitude be safe and flourish.
By the way, an observation of Philip de Comines comes into my mind: That
when the Dukes of Burgundy, who were Lords of Ghent, had the choice of
the sheriffs of that city, in that year all was quiet and well governed;
but when they were elected by the people, nothing but tumults and
seditions followed.[40]
I might carry this resemblance a little farther: for in the heat of the
plot, when the Spanish pilgrims were coming over,[41] nay more, were
reported to be landed; when the representatives of the Commons were
either mortally afraid, or pretended to be so, of this airy invasion, a
request was actually made to the king, that he would put the militia into
their hands; which how prudently he refused, the example of his father
has informed the nation.
To shew how the heads of their party had conned over their lesson of the
barricades of Paris, in the midst of Oates his Popish plot, when they
had fermented the city with the leven of their sedition, and they were
all prepared for a rising against the government; let it be remembered,
that as the Duke of Guise and the council of sixteen forged a list of
names, which they pretended to be of such as the king had set down for
destruction; so a certain earl of blessed memory caused a false report
to be spread of his own danger, and some of his accomplices, who were to
be murdered by the Papists and the royal party; which was a design to
endear themselves to the multitude, as the martyrs of their cause; and at
the same time, to cast an odious reflection on the king and ministers,
as if they sought their blood with unchristian cruelty, without the
ordinary forms of justice. To which may be added, as an appendix, their
pretended fear, when they went to the parliament at Oxford; before which
some of them made their wills, and shewed them publicly; others sent to
search about the places where the two houses were to sit, as if another
gunpowder plot was contriving against them, and almost every man of them,
according to his quality, went attended with his guard of Janizaries,
like Titus:[42] so that what with their followers, and the seditious
townsmen of that city, they made the formidable appearance of an army; at
least sufficient to have swallowed up the guards, and to have seized the
person of the king, in case he had not prevented it by a speedy removal,
as soon as he had dissolved that parliament.
I begin already to be tired with drawing after their deformities, as a
painter would be, who had nothing before him in his table but lazars,
cripples, and hideous faces, which he was obliged to represent: yet I
must not omit some few of their most notorious copyings. Take for example
their Council of Six, which was an imitation of the League, who set up
their famous council, commonly called “Of the Sixteen:” And take notice,
that on both sides they picked out the most heady and violent men of the
whole party; nay, they considered not so much as their natural parts,
but heavy blockheads were thrown in for lumber, to make up the weight.
Their zeal for the party, and their ambition, atoned for their want of
judgment, especially if they were thought to have any interest in the
people. Loud roarers of _aye_ and _no_ in the parliament, without common
sense in ordinary discourses, if they were favourites of the multitude,
were made privy counsellors of their cabal; and fools, who only wanted
a parti-coloured coat, a cap, and a bawble, to pass for such amongst
reasonable men, were to redress the imaginary grievances of a nation,
by murdering, or at least seizing of the king. Men of scandalous lives,
cheats, and murderers, were to reform the nation, and propagate the
Protestant religion; and the rich ideots to hazard their estates and
expectations, to forsake their ease, honour, and preferments, for an
empty name of heading a party; the wittiest man amongst them to encumber
and vex his decrepit age, for a silly pique of revenge, and to maintain
his character to the last, of never being satisfied with any government,
in which he was not more a king than the present master. To give the
last stroke to this resemblance, fortune did her part; and the same
fate, of division amongst themselves, ruined both those councils which
were contriving their king’s destruction. The Duke of Mayenne and his
adherents, who were much the most honest of the Leaguers, were not only
for a king, but for a king of the royal line, in case that duke could not
cause the election to fall on himself, which was impossible, because he
was already married. The rest were, some for this man, some for another,
and all in a lump for the daughter of Spain; this disunited them, and
in the end ruined their conspiracy. In our Council of Six, some were
for murdering, and some for securing of the king; some for a rising in
the west, and some for an insurrection of the Brisk Boys of Wapping:
in short, some were for a mongrel kind of kingship, to the exclusion
of the royal line, but the greater part for a bare-faced commonwealth.
This raised a division in their council; that division was fomented into
a mutual hatred of each other; and the conclusion was, that instead of
one conspiracy, the machines played double, and produced two, which were
carried on at the same time. A kind of spread eagle plot was hatched,
with two heads growing out of the same body: such twin treasons are apt
to struggle like Esau and Jacob in the womb, and both endeavouring to be
first born, the younger pulls back the elder by the heel.
I promised to observe no order, and am performing my word before I was
aware. After the barricades, and at many other times, the Duke of Guise,
and Council of Sixteen, amongst the rest of the articles, demanded of the
king to cashier his guards of the forty-five gentlemen, as unknown in the
times of his predecessors, and unlawful; as also, to remove his surest
friends from about his person, and from their places, both military and
civil. I leave any man to judge, whether our conspirators did not play
the second part to the same tune; whether his majesty’s guards were not
alleged to be unlawful, and a grievance to the subjects; and whether
frequent votes did not pass in the House of Commons at several times,
for removing and turning out of office those, who, on all occasions,
behaved themselves most loyally to the king, without so much as giving
any other reason of their misdemeanors than public fame; that is to say,
reports forged and spread by their own faction, or without allowing them
the common justice of vindicating themselves from those calumnies and
aspersions.
I omit the many illegal imprisonments of freeborn men, by their own
representatives, who, from a jury, erected themselves into judges;
because I find nothing resembling it in the worst and most seditious
times of France. But let the history be searched, and I believe Bussy
Le Clerc never committed more outrages in pillaging of houses, than
Waller in pretending to search for Popish relics:[43] Neither do I
remember that the French Leaguers ever took the evidence of a Jew, as
ours did of Faria.[44] But this I wonder at the less, considering
what Christian witnesses have been used, if at least the chief of them
was ever christened. Bussy Le Clerc, it is true, turned out a whole
parliament together, and brought them prisoners to the Bastile; and Bussy
Oates was for garbling too, when he informed against a worthy and loyal
member, whom he caused to be expelled the House, and sent prisoner to the
Tower:[45] But that which was then accounted a disgrace to him, will make
him be remembered with honour to posterity.
I will trouble the reader but with one observation more, and that shall
be to show how dully and pedantically they have copied even the false
steps of the League in politics, and those very maxims which ruined the
heads of it. The Duke of Guise was always ostentatious of his power in
the states, where he carried all things in opposition to the king: but,
by relying too much on the power he had there, and not using arms when
he had them in his hand, I mean by not prosecuting his victory to the
uttermost, when he had the king enclosed in the Louvre, he missed his
opportunity, and fortune never gave it him again.
The late Earl of Shaftesbury, who was the undoubted head and soul of
that party, went upon the same maxims; being (as we may reasonably
conclude) fearful of hazarding his fortunes, and observing, that the
late rebellion, under the former king, though successful in war, yet
ended in the restoration of his present majesty, his aim was to have
excluded his royal highness by an act of parliament; and to have forced
such concessions from the king, by pressing the chimerical dangers of a
popish plot, as would not only have destroyed the succession, but have
subverted the monarchy; for he presumed he ventured nothing, if he could
have executed his design by form of law, and in a parliamentary way. In
the mean time, he made notorious mistakes: first, in imagining that his
pretensions would have passed in the House of Peers, and afterwards by
the king. When the death of Sir Edmondbury Godfrey had fermented the
people; when the city had taken the alarm of a popish plot, and the
government of it was in fanatic hands; when a body of White Boys was
already appearing in the west,[46] and many other counties waited but the
word to rise—then was the time to have pushed his business: but Almighty
God, who had otherwise disposed of the event, infatuated his counsels,
and made him slip his opportunity; which he himself observed too late,
and would have redressed by an insurrection, which was to have begun at
Wapping, after the king had been murdered at the Rye.
And now, it will be but justice, before I conclude, to say a word or two
of my author.[47] He was formerly a Jesuit. He has, amongst others of his
works, written the history of Arianism, of Lutheranism, of Calvinism,
the Holy War, and the Fall of the Western Empire. In all his writings,
he has supported the temporal power of sovereigns, and especially of his
master the French king, against the usurpations and encroachments of the
papacy. For which reason, being in disgrace at Rome, he was in a manner
forced to quit his order, and, from Father Maimbourg, is now become
Monsieur Maimbourg. The great king, his patron, has provided plentifully
for him by a large salary, and indeed he has deserved it from him. As
for his style, it is rather Ciceronian, copious, florid, and figurative,
than succinct: He is esteemed in the French court equal to their best
writers, which has procured him the envy of some who set up for critics.
Being a professed enemy of the Calvinists, he is particularly hated by
them; so that their testimonies against him stand suspected of prejudice.
This History of the League is generally allowed to be one of his best
pieces.[48] He has quoted everywhere his authors in the margin, to show
his impartiality; in which, if I have not followed him, it is because
the chiefest of them are unknown to us, as not being hitherto translated
into English. His particular commendations of men and families, is all
which I think superfluous in his book; but that, too, is pardonable in a
man, who, having created himself many enemies, has need of the support
of friends. This particular work was written by express order of the
French king, and is now translated by our king’s command. I hope the
effect of it in this nation will be, to make the well-meaning men of the
other party sensible of their past errors, the worst of them ashamed, and
prevent posterity from the like unlawful and impious design.
FOOTNOTES:
[10]
Our play’s a parallel: the Holy League
Begot our Covenant; Guisards got the Whig.
Vol. VII. p. 19.
[11] “Our attention, therefore, was to make the play a parallel betwixt
the Holy League plotted by the house of Guise and its adherents, with the
Covenant plotted by the rebels in the time of Charles I. and those of the
New Association, which was the spawn of the Old Covenant.”—Vol. VII. p.
146.
[12] I wish the fervour of Dryden’s loyalty had left this exhortation
to such writers as the author of “Justice Triumphant,” an excellent new
song, in commendation of Sir George Jefferies, Lord Chief Justice of
England. To a pleasant new tune, called, _Now the Tories that glories_.
Loyal Jefferies is judge again. }
Let the Brimighams grudge amain, }
Who to Tyburn must trudge amain. }
[13] “And Elijah said unto Ahab, Get thee up, eat and drink, for there is
a sound of abundance of rain.
“So Ahab went up to eat and to drink; and Elijah went up to the top of
Carmel, and cast himself down upon the earth, and put his head between
his knees;
“And said to his servant, Go up now, look toward the sea; and he went up
and looked, and said there is nothing; and he said, Go again seven times.
“And it came to pass at the seventh time, that he said, Behold there
comes a little cloud out of the sea, like a man’s hand: And he said, Go,
say unto Ahab, prepare thy chariot, and get thee down, that the rain stop
thee not.
“And it came to pass in the mean while, that the heaven was black with
clouds and wind; and there was a great rain. And Ahab rode and went to
Jezreel.”—1 _Kings_, xviii. 41-46.
[14] Joash king of Israel, having visited the prophet Elisha while on
his death-bed, was desired, by the dying seer, to take a bow, and shoot
an arrow towards the east, and he shot. “And he said, the arrow of the
Lord’s deliverance, and the arrow of deliverance from Syria; for thou
shalt smite the Syrians in Aphek till thou have consumed them.
“And he said, Take the arrows, and he took them. And he said unto the
king of Israel, Smite upon the ground, and he smote thrice and stayed.
“And the man of God was wroth with him, and said, Thou shouldst have
smitten five and six times, then hadst thou smitten Syria till thou hadst
consumed it, whereas now thou shalt smite Syria but thrice.”—2 _Kings_,
xiii. 14-20.
[15] Our readers need hardly be reminded, that the League was a
confederacy formed under pretence of maintaining the Catholic religion,
and excluding Henry of Navarre, afterwards Henry IV., from the throne, on
account of his being a Huguenot. It was only dispersed and subdued after
the long and bloody war which was terminated by his ascending the throne
in 1594.
[16] Louis XIV.
[17] _i.e._ The association of the Huguenots, under the Prince of Conde,
Coligni, and others.
[18] It would not have been decent to remind the Grand Monarque of such
arguments, as dragoons, banishment, and the gallies.
[19] Peter Victor Palma Cayet studied at Geneva, and was a domestic
in the house of Calvin. He afterwards became a reformed minister and
chaplain to Catherine, sister to Henry IV. Being addicted to alchemy,
and having written a work in defence of public stews, he was deposed by
a synod from his ministerial functions, as a wizard and a libertine.
Upon this disgrace, he abjured the reformed doctrine, and was considered
by the Catholics as a convert of such importance, that the Pope himself
honoured his proselyte with a letter of congratulation. His historical
works are, an Account of the War between the Turks and Hungarians,
published in 1598; his “Septennary Chronology” comprizing from 1598 to
1604; and his “Novennary Chronology,” giving an account of the nine years
war, which broke out in 1589, and was terminated by the peace of Vervins.
Cayet died in 1610.
[20] He was assassinated, by Jaques Clement, on the 2d August, 1589, when
he had besieged Paris with every prospect of success.
[21] To which kingdom Charles repaired upon the invitation of the
Presbyterians, whose clergy, however, treated him with an indecent
rigour, which he never forgave to the sect.
[22] See some account of these fanatics, and the ravages which they
committed in Munster, in the Notes on “Hind and Panther,” Vol. X. p. 145.
[23] In the preface to “Religio Laici,” Vol. X. p. 25.
[24] John Spottiswoode, archbishop of St Andrews, who wrote a valuable,
and, the times considered, a moderate history of the church of Scotland,
with a bias, as was natural, to the interests of episcopacy. It is a
valuable record of Scottish history. James’s harassing disputes with the
Presbyterian clergymen, of course make a great figure in his annals.
Spottiswoode was born in 1565, and died in 1639, just about the breaking
out of those troubles which ruined the Scottish episcopal church.
[25] In 1603, when the king heard, at Hampton-Court, the bishops’ dispute
against Dr Reynolds, Dr Sparks, Mr Knewstubs, and Mr Chadderton, James,
infinitely better skilled in the subtleties of polemical divinity, than
in the arts of ruling a great kingdom, threw his influence into the
scale of episcopacy with such ingenuity, that even the pious Whitegift,
then primate of England, did not hesitate to avow his persuasion, that
“the king spoke by the very spirit of God.” It was therefore no wonder,
that Dr Thomas Sparks, although so learned as to be called the Pillar of
Puritanism, and so zealous a despiser of forms, as to appear in a Turkey
merchant’s gown at the conference, instead of canonicals, should be so
melted and overcome by the king’s eloquence and argument, as to become,
in future, a strict conformist. He died in 1616, after having experienced
the favour of James, which indeed was due to a proselyte of his own
making. Sparks wrote several tracts in favour of the establishment; as,
“A Brotherly persuasion to Unity and Uniformity,” &c.
[26] Robert Bellarmine, one of the most able controversialists whom
the church of Rome has produced, and whose very name became a sort of
war-cry of polemical divinity. He was born at Monte Pulciano, in 1542,
and entered, in 1560, the order of Jesuits, of which he soon became
a distinguished ornament. In the year 1599, he was honoured with a
cardinal’s hat, but not till he had carried the principle of “Nolo
Episcopari” so far, that the pope was obliged to threaten an anathema,
should he persist in declining the proffered honour. Bellarmine died 17th
September, 1621, leaving behind him sundry huge volumes of polemical
divinity.
[27] See similar arguments for fixing the same principles of disregard
to civil authority upon the Catholics and the Puritans, in the preface
to “Religio Laici,” Vol. X. p. 18. Our author little foresaw his near
approaching conversion to the faith of Rome.
[28] Queen Elizabeth was very much startled by these and other similar
reasons which John Knox assigned to persuade the nobility to depose the
queen-regent, Mary of Lorraine; and the reformer was obliged to humble
himself before he could obtain her forgiveness for broaching doctrines so
deeply fraught with danger to monarchy.
[29] Dryden alludes to the conspiracy of Amboise, in 1559, by which, the
Huguenots, under direction of the Prince of Conde and Coligni, meditated
to surprise the court, possess themselves of the person of the king, and
drive from his councils the family of Guise. It was dissipated by the
policy of Catherine of Medicis and the bravery of the Duke of Guise.
[30] This passage affords Tom Brown grounds for a flat sneer at our
author. See Vol. X. p. 267. The “Advices to a Painter,” to which Dryden
alludes, were a series to satires upon Charles II. and his court,
published under the name of Denham, but, which in reality, were written
by Andrew Marvell. They are printed in the State Poems.
[31] The Cardinal of Lorraine, brother to the Duke of Guise, and the
political head of the Leaguers. He was assassinated at the same time with
his brother. Dryden compares him to Shaftesbury.
[32] A fiery and gallant adherent of the Duke of Guise. He distinguished
himself by his bravery in the battles, and his forwardness in the
councils, of the League; and, on the famous day of the barricades,
entered the Queen’s garden by force, supposing his patron’s life in
danger, and swearing, if the game was to be played, he would have his
stake in it. He was created Marshal of France in 1593, by the Duke of
Mayenne, and afterwards governor of Champagne. These honours cost him his
life; for the young Duke of Guise having requested him to withdraw some
troops from Rheims, and receiving an insolent refusal, drew his sword and
killed him on the spot.
[33] “There was scarcely any thing to be seen in the army of the League
but gold and silver embroideries, upon costly and magnificent coats of
velvet, of all sorts of colours, and an infinite number of banderolles
fluttering about their thick forest of lances.”—DRYDEN’S _Translation of
the History of the League_, p. 778.
[34] Father Edmund Bourgoing, prior of the convent in which Jaques
Clement, who assassinated Henry III., was a jacobin monk. As he
vindicated the action when committed, and compared the murderer, in his
sermons, to Judith, it was not doubted, that he had prompted, or at least
confirmed, his execrable resolution.
[35] Robert Ferguson, called the Plotter, who told the conspirators, that
if they took off Charles on a Sunday, the day would sanctify the deed,
and proposed to consecrate the blunderbuss with which he was to be shot.
See Vol. IX. p. 363.
[36] Evidences for the king on the trial of the conspirators for the
Rye-house plot.
[37] This is apparently an allusion to the designs of Lord Russell and
others, who meditated a change of councils, not of government, by the
schemes which they agitated.
[38] A tract in octavo, published in October 1680, shortly after the
sitting of the short parliament. The author was Henry Neville, second son
of Sir Henry Neville, knight, who made some figure among the speculative
commonwealth’s men, yet was not so much attached to their doctrines, as
to prevent his submitting to be one of Cromwell’s council of state. He
died 20th September, 1694.
[39] Mr Hunt’s book was entitled, a “Defence of the Charter and Municipal
Rights of the City of London.” See vol. vii. p. 127. Our author was
fiercely attacked in that work, and defended himself in the Vindication
of the Duke of Guise.
[40] The author alludes to the exertions made by the crown to secure the
election of sheriffs; see vol. ix. p. 450.
[41] Among the absurdities sworn to, and believed at the time of the
Popish plot, Bedloe’s assertion, that 40,000 pilgrims, assembled in Spain
to pay their devotion to Saint James, were to be employed in the invasion
of England, was not the less terrifying because so eminently incredible.
A false report that the Pilgrims had actually landed, obtained general
credit, and one nobleman gallopped to London with the news.
[42] Many of the opposition members, particularly those for the city of
London, went armed and escorted to the parliament of Oxford, so that they
resembled Titus Oates, who in his days of splendour was always attended
by a guard. See vol. ix. p. 355.
[43] Jean Le Clerc, otherwise called Bussy, once a _procureur_ before
the parliament of Paris; being a bold, active, and ferocious man, he
was created governor of the Bastile by the Duke of Guise, and employed
in seizing the persons of the President Harlai, and other counsellors
of parliament, and exercising severities on all those suspected of
disaffection to the cause of the League. Dryden compares him to Waller,
whom the Catholics accused of pillaging their houses, under pretence of
searching for relics during the times of the plot. See him described
under the character of Arod in “Absalom and Achitophel,” pp. 11. 335; and
the note, p. 381, Vol. IX.
[44] Francisco de Faria, who designed himself interpreter and secretary
of languages to Gaspar de Abreu de Freitas, ambassador from the crown
of Portugal, was one of the witnesses concerning the popish plot.
He pretended he had been employed by the Portuguese ambassador to
assassinate Oates, Bedlow, and Shaftesbury. His narrative was licenced
for publication on 19th November, 1680; and concludes with an impudent
affectation of admiring the Divine Providence, which had brought him,
“from almost the utmost parts of the far distant habitable world, to be
an instrument, in England, to detect, or at least more convincingly to
prove the truth of these horrid treasons and conspiracies.” Faria was a
native of Fernambuco, in Brazil, and apparently a Portuguese Jew.
[45] Sir Robert Peyton was expelled the House, and committed to the
Tower, on account of expressing some hesitation as to the credibility of
Oates.
[46] White was the dress affected by those who crowded to see Monmouth in
his western tour. See Vol. VII. p. 257. Mr Trenchard undertook to raise
1500 men in and about Taunton alone. See _Lord Grey’s Account of the
Rye-house Plot_, p. 18; where the plan of the city insurrection is also
distinctly detailed.—Pp. 32-40.
[47] Louis Maimbourg was born at Nanci, in 1610, and became a Jesuit
in 1626. But he was degraded from that order by the General, because
he espoused, in some of his writings, the cause of the Gallican church
against the claims of the Roman see. He retired to the Abbey of St
Victor, where he died in 1686. His historical writings, which are
numerous, are now held in little esteem, being all composed in the spirit
of a partizan, and without even the affectation of impartiality. They
are, however, lively and interesting during the perusal; which led an
Italian to say, that Maimbourg was among the historians, what Momus was
among the deities.
[48] Maimbourg’s History of the League was first published at Paris in
1683.
CONTROVERSY BETWEEN DRYDEN AND STILLINGFLEET, CONCERNING THE DUCHESS OF
YORK’S PAPER.
CONTROVERSY BETWEEN DRYDEN AND STILLINGFLEET, CONCERNING THE DUCHESS OF
YORK’S PAPER.
One of the first acts of King James the Second’s reign, was the
publication of two papers found in the strong box of his deceased brother
Charles, assigning various reasons to prove, that the church of Rome
was the only true church; with a copy of another written by his first
duchess, Anne Hyde, stating the grounds of her conversion to the Catholic
faith.[49] These papers were announced to be published by his majesty’s
command; and, thus authenticated, were industriously dispersed over the
kingdom. The learned Stillingfleet stood forward as the champion of the
church of England, in refutation of the arguments alleged in the papers
of the royal proselytes.[50] In answer, appeared “A Defence of the Papers
written by the late King, of blessed Memory, and Duchess of York, against
the Answer made to them. _By Command_. London, 1686.” This defence, like
the answer of Stillingfleet, was divided into three parts, applying to
the three papers; and it seems that these were drawn up by different
hands.
Dryden informs us, that he was concerned in the _last_, which seems to
exclude the idea of his having any share in the first and second parts of
the Defence;[51] which, indeed, are written in a style more approaching
to polemic controversy than that assumed by Dryden. Stillingfleet
returned to the conflict, and published a “Vindication of his Answer;” in
which he is severely personal upon Dryden, “the brisk defender,” as he
calls him, of the duchess’s paper, and the “new convert” to the church of
Rome. Dryden, personally assaulted, made a personal retort, both directly
upon Stillingfleet, and upon Burnet, his coadjutor in the controversy;
and to this we probably owe the character of the Buzzard in “The Hind and
Panther,” as well as the reflections upon the moderate clergy, or Low
Church divines, with which that piece abounds.[52]
In order to understand Dryden’s defence, it is necessary to prefix the
duchess’s paper, and Stillingfleet’s answer to it.
COPY OF A PAPER WRITTEN BY THE LATE DUCHESS OF YORK, &c.
It is so reasonable to expect, that a person always bred up in the church
of England,[53] and as well instructed in the doctrine of it, as the
best divines and her capacity could make her, should be liable to many
censures for leaving that, and making herself a member of the Roman
Catholic church, to which, I confess, I was one of the greatest enemies
it ever had;[54] that I rather choose to satisfy my friends by reading
this paper, than to have the trouble to answer all the questions that may
be daily asked me. And first, I do protest, in the presence of Almighty
God, that no person, man or woman, directly or indirectly, ever said any
thing to me since I came into England, or used the least endeavour to
make me change my religion: it is a blessing I wholly owe to Almighty
God, and, I hope, the hearing of a prayer I daily made him ever since I
was in France and Flanders; where, seeing much of the devotion of the
Catholics, (though I had very little myself,) I made it my continual
request to Almighty God, that, if I were not, I might, before I died,
be in the true religion. I did not in the least doubt but that I was
so, and never had any scruple till November last; when, reading a book
called “The History of the Reformation,” by Dr Heylin,[55] which I had
heard very much commended, and have been told, if ever I had any doubt
of my religion, that would settle me; instead of which, I found it the
description of the horridest sacrileges in the world; and could find
no reason why we left the church, but for three, the most abominable
ones that were ever heard of among Christians. First, Henry VIII.
renounces the Pope’s authority, because he would not give him leave to
part with his wife, and marry another in her lifetime; secondly, Edward
VI. was a child, and governed by his uncle, who made his estate out of
church-lands; and then Queen Elizabeth, who, being no lawful heiress
to the crown, could have no way to keep it but by renouncing a church
that could never suffer so unlawful a thing to be done by one of her
children. I confess I cannot think the Holy Ghost could ever be in such
counsels; and it is very strange, that if the bishops had no design but
(as they say) the restoring us to the doctrine of the primitive church,
they could never think upon it, till Henry VIII. made the breach upon so
unlawful a pretence. These scruples being raised, I began to consider of
the difference between the Catholics and us, and examined them as well as
I could by Holy Scripture, which though I do not pretend to be able to
understand, yet there are some things I found so easy, that I cannot but
wonder I had been so long without finding them out; as—the real presence
in the blessed sacrament, the infallibility of the church, confession,
and praying for the dead. After this I spoke severally to two of the
bishops[56] we have in England, who both told me, there were many things
in the Romish church which were very much to be wished we had kept: as
confession, which was no doubt commanded by God; that praying for the
dead was one of the ancient things in Christianity; that, for their
parts, they did it daily, though they would not own it. And afterwards,
pressing one of them very much upon the other points, he told me,—that if
he had been bred a Catholic, he would not change his religion; but that
being of another church, (wherein he was sure were all things necessary
to salvation,) he thought it very ill to give that scandal, as to leave
that church wherein he received his baptism.
All these discourses did but add more to the desire I had to be a
Catholic, and gave me the most terrible agonies in the world within
myself: for all this, fearing to be rash in a matter of that weight, I
did all I could to satisfy myself; made it my daily prayer to God, to
settle me in the right; and so went on Christmas-day to receive in the
king’s chapel: after which, I was more troubled than ever, and could
never be at quiet till I had told my design to a Catholic, who brought
a priest to me; and that was the first I ever did converse with, upon my
word. The more I spoke to him, the more I was confirmed in my design; and
as it is impossible for me to doubt the words of our blessed Saviour,
who says,—the holy sacrament is his body and blood; so cannot believe,
that he, who is the Author of all truth, and has promised to be “with
his church to the end of the world,” would permit them to give that holy
mystery to the laity but in one kind, if it were not lawful so to do.
I am not able, or if I were, would I enter into disputes with any body;
I only, in short, say this for the changing of my religion, which I take
God to witness I would never have done, if I had thought it possible to
save my soul otherwise. I think I need not say, it is not any interest in
this world leads me to it. It will be plain enough to every body, that
I must lose all the friends and credit I have here by it; and have very
well weighed which I could best part with,—my share in this world, or the
next: I thank God, I found no difficulty in the choice.
My only prayer is, “That the poor Catholics of this nation may not suffer
for my being of their religion; that God would but give me patience to
bear them, and then send me any afflictions in this world, so I may enjoy
a blessed eternity hereafter.”
_St James’s, Aug. 20, 1670._
AN ANSWER TO THE DUCHESS’S PAPER.
BY THE REVEREND EDWARD STILLINGFLEET.[57]
The third paper is said to be written by a great lady, for the
satisfaction of her friends, as to the reasons of her leaving the
communion of the church of England, and making herself a member of the
Roman Catholic church. If she had written nothing concerning it, none
could have been a competent judge of those reasons or motives she had
for it, but herself; but since she was pleased to write this paper, to
satisfy her friends, and it is thought fit to be published for general
satisfaction, all readers have a right to judge of the strength of them;
and those of the church of England, an obligation to vindicate the honour
of it, so far as it may be thought to suffer by them.
I am sensible how nice and tender a thing it is, to meddle in a matter
wherein the memory of so great a lady is so nearly concerned, and wherein
such circumstances are mentioned which cannot fully be cleared, the
parties themselves having been many years dead; but I shall endeavour to
keep within due bounds, and consider this paper with respect to the main
design of it, and take notice of other particulars, so far as they are
subservient to it.
The way of her satisfaction must needs appear very extraordinary; for,
towards the conclusion, she confesses she was not able, nor would she
enter into disputes with any body. Now, where the difference between the
two churches lies wholly in matters of dispute, how any one could be
truly satisfied as to the grounds of leaving one church and going to the
other, without entering into matter of dispute with any body, is hard to
understand. If persons be resolved beforehand what to do, and therefore
will hear nothing said against it, there is no such way as to declare
they will enter into no dispute about it. But what satisfaction is to be
had in this manner of proceeding? How could one, bred up in the church
of England, and so well instructed in the doctrines of it, ever satisfy
herself in forsaking the communion of it, without enquiring into, and
comparing the doctrines and practices of both churches? It is possible
for persons of learning, who will take the pains of examining things
themselves, to do that without entering into disputes with any body;
but this was not to be presumed of a person of her condition: For many
things must fall in her way, which she could neither have the leisure to
examine, nor the capacity to judge of, without the assistance of such who
have made it their business to search into them. Had she no divines of
the church of England about her, to have proposed her scruples to? None
able and willing to give her their utmost assistance in a matter of such
importance, before she took up a resolution of forsaking our church? This
cannot be imagined, considering not only her great quality, but that just
esteem they had for her, whilst she continued so zealous and devout in
the communion of our church.
But we have more than this to say. One of the bishops,[58] who had
nearest relation to her for many years, and who owns in print,[59] that
he bred her up in the principles of the church of England, was both able
and willing to have removed any doubts and scruples with respect to our
church, if she would have been pleased to have communicated them to him.
And however she endeavoured to conceal her scruples, he tells her in his
letter[60] to her, which he since printed for his own vindication, “that
he had heard much discourse concerning her wavering in religion, and that
he had acquainted her highness with it, the Lent before the date of this
paper;” and was so much concerned at it, that he obtained a promise from
her, that if any writing were put into her hands by those of the church
of Rome, that she would send it either to him, or to the then bishop of
Oxford, whom he left in attendance upon her.[61] After which, he saith,
“she was many days with him at Farnham; in all which time she spake not
one word to him of any doubt she had about her religion.” And yet this
paper bears date, August 20th, that year, wherein she declares herself
changed in her religion; so that it is evident she did not make use of
the ordinary means for her own satisfaction, at least as to those bishops
who had known her longest.
But she saith, “that she spoke severally to two of the best bishops[62]
we have in England, who both told her, there were many things in the
Roman church, which it were much to be wished we had kept; as confession,
which was no doubt commanded of God; that praying for the dead, was one
of the ancient things in Christianity; that, for their parts, they did
it daily, though they would not own it. And afterwards, pressing one[63]
of them very much upon the other points, he told her, that if he had
been bred a Catholic, he would not change his religion; but that being
of another church, wherein he was sure were all things necessary to
salvation, he thought it very ill to give that scandal, as to leave that
church wherein he received his baptism. Which discourses,” she said, “did
but add more to the desire she had to be a Catholic.”
This, I confess, seems to be to the purpose; if there were not some
circumstances and expressions very much mistaken in the representation
of it: but yet suppose the utmost to be allowed, there could be no
argument from hence drawn for leaving the communion of our church, if
this bishop’s authority or example did signify any thing with her. For
supposing he did say, “that if he had been bred in the communion of the
church of Rome, he would not change his religion;” yet he added, “that
being of another church, wherein were all things necessary to salvation,
he thought it very ill to give that scandal, as to leave that church
wherein he had received his baptism.” Now, why should not the last words
have greater force to have kept her in the communion of our church, than
the former to have drawn her from it? For why should any person forsake
the communion of our church, unless it appears necessary to salvation
so to do; and yet this yielding bishop did affirm, “that all things
necessary to salvation were certainly in our church; and that it was an
ill thing to leave it.” How could this “add to her desire of leaving
our church?” unless there were some other motive to draw her thither,
and then such small inducements would serve to inflame such a desire.
But it is evident from her own words afterwards, that these concessions
of the bishop could have no influence upon her; for she declares, and
calls God to witness, “that she would never have changed her religion, if
she had thought it possible to save her soul otherwise.” Now what could
the bishop’s words signify towards her turning, when he declares just
contrary, viz. not only that it was possible for her to be saved without
turning, “but that he was sure we had all things necessary to salvation;
and that it was a very ill thing to leave our church?” There must
therefore have been some more secret reason, which encreased her desire
to be a Catholic after these discourses; unless the advantage were taken
from the bishop’s calling the church of Rome the Catholic religion; “if
he had been bred a Catholic, he would not have changed his religion.” But
if we take these words so strictly, he must have contradicted himself;
for how could he be sure we had all things necessary to salvation, if we
were out of the Catholic church? Was a bishop of our church, and one of
the best bishops of our church, as she said, so weak as to yield, “that
he was sure all things necessary to salvation were to be had out of the
communion of the Catholic church?”
But again; there is an inconsistency in his saying, “that he thought it
very ill to leave our church;” which no man of common sense would have
said, if he had believed the Roman church to be the Catholic, exclusive
of all others that do not join in communion with it.
The utmost then that can be made of all this, is, that there was a
certain bishop of this church, who held both churches to be so far
parts of the Catholic church, that there was no necessity of going from
one church to another. But if he asserted that, he must overthrow the
necessity of the Reformation, and consequently not believe our articles
and homilies, and so could not be any true member of the church of
England.
But the late bishop of Winchester hath made a shorter answer to all this;
for he first doubts whether there ever were any such bishops who made
such answers; and afterwards he affirms, that he believes there never
was, in _rerum naturâ_,[64] such a discourse as is pretended to have
been between this great person, and two of the most learned bishops of
England. But God be thanked, the cause of our church doth not depend upon
the singular opinion of one or two bishops in it, wherein they apparently
recede from the established doctrine of it. And I am sure those of the
church of Rome take it ill from us, to be charged with the opinion
of particular divines, against the known sentiments of their church.
Therefore, supposing the matter of fact true, it ought not to have moved
her to any inclination to leave the church of England.
But after all, she protests, in the presence of Almighty God, that no
person, man or woman, directly or indirectly, ever said any thing to
her since she came into England, or used the least endeavour to make
her change her religion; and that it is a blessing she wholly owes to
Almighty God. So that the bishops are acquitted from having any hand
in it, by her own words; and, as far as we can understand her meaning,
she thought herself converted by immediate divine illumination. We had
thought the pretence to a private spirit had not been at this time
allowed in the church of Rome; but I observe, that many things are
allowed to bring persons to the church of Rome, which they will not
permit in those who go from it; as the use of reason in the choice of a
church; the judgment of sense; and here, that which they would severely
condemn in others as a private spirit, or enthusiasm, will pass well
enough if it doth but lead one to their communion: any motive or method
is good enough which tends to that end; and none can be sufficient
against it. But why may not others set up for the change, as to other
opinions, upon the same grounds, as well as this great person does,
as to the change from our church to the church of Rome? and we have
no pretenders to enthusiasm among us, but do as solemnly ascribe the
blessing wholly to Almighty God, and look on it as the effect of such
prayers as she made to him in France and Flanders.
But I wonder a person, who owed her change so wholly to Almighty God,
should need the direction of an infallible church; since the utmost they
can pretend to, is no more than to have such an immediate conduct; and
the least that can be meant by it is, that she had no assistance from any
other persons, which may not exclude her own endeavours: but supposing
them to be employed, and an account to be here given of them, yet there
is no connection between any of the premises, and the conclusion she drew
from them; and therefore it must be immediate impulse, or some concealed
motive, which determined her choice.
The conclusion was, “that she would never have changed, if she could have
saved her soul otherwise.” If this were true, she had good reason for
her change; if it were not true, she had none, as it is most certain it
was not. Now let us examine how she came to this conclusion, and I will
suppose it to have been just in the method she sets it down in.
First, she saith, she never had any scruples till the November
before; and then they began upon reading Dr Heylin’s “History of the
Reformation,” which was commended to her as a book to settle her; and
there she found such abominable sacrilege upon Henry the Eighth’s
divorce, King Edward’s minority, and Queen Elizabeth’s succession, that
she could not believe the Holy Ghost could ever be in such counsels.
This was none of the best advices given to such a person, to read Dr
Heylin’s History for her satisfaction:[65] For there are two distinct
parts in the history of our Reformation; the one ecclesiastical, the
other political: the former was built on scripture and antiquity, and the
rights of particular churches; the other on such maxims which are common
to statesmen at all times, and in all churches, who labour to turn all
revolutions and changes to their own advantage. And it is strange to me,
that a person of so great understanding, should not distinguish these
two. Whether Henry VIII. were a good man or not, whether the Duke of
Somerset raised his estate out of the church-lands, doth not concern our
present enquiry; which is, whether there was not sufficient cause for a
reformation in the church? and if there was, whether our church had not
sufficient authority to reform itself? and if so, whether the proceedings
of our Reformation were not justifiable by the rules of scripture,
and the ancient church? These were the proper points for her to have
considered, and not the particular faults of princes, or the miscarriages
of ministers of state. Were not the vices of Alexander the Sixth, and
many other heads of the church of Rome, for a whole age together, by the
confession of their own greatest writers, as great at least as those of
Henry the Eighth? And were these not thought sufficient to keep her from
the church of Rome; and yet the others were sufficient to make her think
of leaving our church? But Henry the Eighth’s church was, in truth, the
church of Rome under a political head, much as the church of Sicily is
under the king of Spain. All the difference is, Henry the Eighth took it
as his own right; the king of Spain pretends to have it from the pope, by
such concessions, which the popes deny. And suppose the king of Spain’s
pretence were unlawful to that jurisdiction which he challengeth in the
kingdom of Sicily, were this a sufficient ground to justify the thoughts
of separation from the church of Rome?
But the Duke of Somerset raised his estate out of church lands, and so
did many courtiers in the reign of Queen Elizabeth.
Are there not miscarriages of the like nature in the church of Rome? What
is the pope’s making great estates out of the church lands, for their
nephews to be princes and dukes? a thing not unheard of in our age: And
is it not so much worse to be done by the head of the church?
These, she confesses, were but scruples, but such as occasioned her
examining the points in difference by the holy scripture. Now she was
in the right way for satisfaction, provided she made use of the best
helps and means for understanding it, and took in the assistance of her
spiritual guides. But it seems, contrary to the doctrine of the church of
Rome, she found some things so easy there, that she wondered she had been
so long without finding them out. And what were these? No less than the
real presence in the blessed sacrament, the infallibility of the church
confession, and praying for the dead.
These were great discoveries to be made so easily; considering how those
of the church of Rome, who have been most versed in these matters, have
found it so difficult to make them out from thence.
(1.) As to the real presence, as it is in the dispute between us and
the church of Rome, it implies the real and substantial change of the
elements into the body and blood of Christ. But where do our Saviour’s
words, in calling the sacrament his body and blood, imply any such thing?
The wisest persons of the church of Rome have confessed, that the bare
words of our Saviour can never prove it; but there needs the authority of
the church to interpret them in that sense. How then could she so easily
find out that, which their most learned men could not? But there is
nothing goes so far in such discoveries as a willing mind.
(2.) As to confession, no doubt the word is often used in scripture,
and therefore easily found. But the question between us is not about
the usefulness, or advantage, of confession in particular cases; but
the necessity of it in all cases, in order to remission of sins. And I
can hardly believe any bishop of our church would ever say to her, that
confession, in this sense, was ever commanded by God; for then he must
be damned himself, if he did not confess every known sin to a priest.
But some general expressions might be used, that confession of sin was
commanded by God; “confess your sins one to another:” but here is nothing
of a particular confession to a priest necessary, in order to forgiveness
of sin.
(3.) As to praying for the dead, it is hard to find any place of
scripture which seems to have any tendency that way, unless it be with
respect to the day of judgment, and that very doubtfully. But how came
this great person to think it not possible to be saved in our church,
unless we prayed for the dead? How did this come to be a point of
salvation? And, for the practice of it, she saith, the bishops told her
they did it daily. Whether they did it or not, or in what sense they did
it, we cannot now be better informed; but we are sure this could be no
argument for her to leave the communion of our church, because she was
told by these bishops they did it, and continued in the communion of it.
(4.) Lastly; as to the infallibility of the church; if this, as applied
to the Roman church, could be any where found in scripture, we should
then indeed be to blame not to submit to all the definitions of it.
But where is this to be found? Yes, Christ hath promised to be with
his church to the end of the world; not with his church, but with his
apostles: And if it be restrained to them, then the end of the world is
no more than always. But suppose it be understood of the successors of
the apostles; were there none but at Rome? How comes this promise to be
limited to the church of Rome; and the bishops of Antioch and Alexandria,
and all the other eastern churches (where the bishops as certainly
succeeded the apostles as at Rome itself) not to enjoy the equal benefit
of this promise? But they who can find the infallibility of the church of
Rome in scripture, need not despair of finding whatever they have a mind
to there.
But from this promise she concludes, that our Saviour would not permit
the church to give the laity the communion in one kind, if it were
not lawful so to do. Now, in my opinion, the argument is stronger the
other way: the church of Rome forbids the doing of that, which Christ
enjoined; therefore it cannot be infallible, since the command of Christ
is so much plainer than the promise of infallibility to the church of
Rome.
But, from all these things laid together, I can see no imaginable reason
of any force to conclude, that she could not think it possible to save
her soul otherwise, than by embracing the communion of the church of
Rome: And the public will receive this advantage by these papers,
that thereby it appears, how very little is to be said by persons of
the greatest capacity, as well as place, either against the church of
England, or for the church of Rome.
A DEFENCE OF THE PAPER WRITTEN BY THE DUCHESS OF YORK, AGAINST THE ANSWER
MADE TO IT.
I dare appeal to all unprejudiced readers, and especially to those who
have any sense of piety, whether, upon perusal of the Paper written by
her late highness the Duchess, they have not found in it somewhat which
touched them to the very soul; whether they did not plainly and perfectly
discern in it the spirit of meekness, devotion, and sincerity, which
animates the whole discourse; and whether the reader be not satisfied,
that she who writ it has opened her heart without disguise, so as not to
leave a scruple, that she was not in earnest. I am sure I can say, for
my own particular, that when I read it first in manuscript, I could not
but consider it as a discourse extremely moving; plain, without artifice,
and discovering the piety of the soul from which it flowed. Truth has
a language to itself, which it is impossible for hypocrisy to imitate:
dissimulation could never write so warmly, nor with so much life. What
less than the spirit of primitive Christianity could have dictated her
words? The loss of friends, of worldly honours and esteem, the defamation
of ill tongues, and the reproach of the cross,—all these, though not
without the strugglings of flesh and blood, were surmounted by her; as if
the saying of our Saviour were always sounding in her ears, “What will it
profit a man to gain the whole world, and lose his soul!”
I think I have amplified nothing in relation either to this pious lady,
or her discourse: I am sure I need not. And now let any unbiassed and
indifferent reader compare the spirit of the answerer with hers. Does
there not manifestly appear in him a quite different character? Need the
reader be informed, that he is disingenuous, foul-mouthed, and shuffling;
and that, not being able to answer plain matter of fact, he endeavours to
evade it by suppositions, circumstances, and conjectures; like a cunning
barreter of law, who is to manage a single cause, the dishonesty of which
he cannot otherwise support than by defaming his adversary? Her only
business is, to satisfy her friends of the inward workings of her soul,
in order to her conversion, and by what methods she quitted the religion
in which she was educated. He, on the contrary, is not satisfied, unless
he question the integrity of her proceedings, and the truth of her
plain relations, even so far as to blast, what in him lies, her blessed
memory, with the imputation of forgery and deceit; as if she had given
a false account, not only of the passages in her soul, and the agonies
of a troubled conscience, only known to God and to herself, but also of
the discourses which she had with others concerning those disquiets.
Everywhere the lie is to be cast upon her, either directly, in the words
of the bishop of Winchester, which he quotes; or indirectly, in his own,
in which his spiteful diligence is most remarkable.
In his answer to the two former papers, there seems to have been some
restraint upon the virulence of his genius, though even there he has
manifestly past the bounds of decency and respect; but so soon as he
had got loose from disputing with crowned heads, he shews himself in
his pure naturals, and is as busy in raking up the ashes of their next
relations, as if they were no more of kin to the crown than the new
church of England is to the old reformation of their great-grandfathers.
But God forbid that I should think the whole episcopal clergy of this
nation to be of his latitudinarian stamp; many of them, as learned as
himself, are much more moderate; and such, I am confident, will be as far
from abetting his irreverence to the royal family, as they are from the
juggling designs of his faction to draw in the nonconformists to their
party, by assuring them they shall not be prosecuted (as indeed, upon
their principles, they cannot be by them); but, in the mean time, this
is to wrest the favour out of the king’s hands, and take the bestowing
it into their own, and to re-assume to themselves that headship of the
English church which their ancestors gave away to king Henry VIII. And
now let any loyal subject but consider, whether this new way of their
proceeding does not rather tend to bring the church of England into the
fanatics, than the fanatics into the church of England.
These are the arts which are common to him and his fellow-labourers; but
his own peculiar talent is that of subtle calumny and sly aspersion, by
which he insinuates into his readers an ill opinion of his adversaries,
before he comes to argument; and takes away their good name rather by
theft than open robbery. He lays a kind of accumulative dishonesty to
their charge, and touches them here and there with circumstances, instead
of positive proofs, till at last he leaves a bad impression of them; like
a painter who makes blotches of hard colouring in several parts of the
face, which he smooths afterwards into a likeness. After this manner he,
or one of his brethren in iniquity, has used Monsieur de Condom,[66] by
picking up stories against him in his Preface, which he props up with
little circumstances, but seldom so positive, that he cannot come off
when their falsity shall be detected. In the mean time, his cause goes
forward with the common reader, who, prepossessed by the Preface, is
made partial to his answer. The same kind of artifice, with some little
variation, has been used in other of their books, besides this present
libel against the duchess.
But the cloven foot of this our answerer appears from underneath the
cassock, even in the first step he makes towards his answer to the
present paper; “which,” he tells us, “is _said_ to be written by a great
lady.” How doubtfully he speaks, as if there were no certainty of the
author! But surely it is more than barely said, for it is published by
the same authority which ordered the two other papers written by his
late majesty, to the press; and the original of it is still remaining
in the hands of the present king. Indeed, the bishop of Winchester may
seem to have given him some encouragement for this in the Preface to
his Treatises, where he tell us,—that “Maimbourg, the Jesuit, recites
something which,” he says, “was written by the late duchess,” and which
he afterwards calls,—“the papers _pretended_ to be written by her.” But
if that bishop had lived to see what our answerer has seen, her paper
printed and published by his majesty, I cannot think he would have
been so incredulous as to have made that doubt. It may be allowed him
to suspect a stranger of forgery; but with what face can this son of
the church of England suspect the integrity of his king? In the mean
time, observe what an excellent voucher he has got of this dead bishop,
and what an excellent argument he has drawn from him. Because he would
not believe what he did not think she said, we must not believe what
we know she did say. Let our author, therefore, come out of his mists
and ambiguities, or give us some better authority for his unreasonable
doubts; for, at this rate, if it be already suspected, whether what she
writes be matter of fact, and, indeed, whether she writ at all, it may be
doubted hereafter, whether she changed, and, perhaps, whether there were
ever such a woman.
After he had thus begun, that “this paper was said to be written by
a great lady, for the satisfaction of her friends,” he shuffles in
commodious words for an answerer, and which afford him elbow-room; for
he talks of the reasons and motives which she had for her leaving the
communion of the church of England, &c. and of the right which all
readers have to judge of the strength of them. Now, as luck will have it,
none of those motives and reasons are to be found in the paper of her
highness. She expresses herself clearly to write for the satisfaction
of her friends, not as to the reasons she had herself for changing, but
as to the censures which she might expect from them for so doing; and
her whole paper shews this was her only design: So that, against the law
of all romances, he first builds the enchanted castle, and then sets up
to be the doughty knight who conquers it. It seems, he found that a bare
denial, which is the proper answer to matter of fact, was a dry business,
and would make no sport; and therefore he would be sure to cut himself
out sufficient work. But it is not every man’s talent to force a trade;
for a customer may choose whether he will buy or not.
This great person changed not lightly, nor in haste; but after all the
endeavours which could be used by a soul which was true to itself, and
to its eternal interest. She was sensible, as I before hinted, that she
should lose her friends and credit; and, what to her condition at that
time was more sharply piercing, expose the Catholics of England to the
danger of suffering for her sake. On these considerations, she makes a
plain relation of all the passages in her change; and, expecting severe
censures from the world, took care to satisfy her friends concerning it.
As for the reasons of it, they were only betwixt God and her own soul,
and the priest with whom she spoke at last. What a wonderful art has this
gentleman, to turn a bare narrative into motives and inducements? When he
is arrived to the perfection of calling down a saint from heaven, he may
examine her concerning them; in the mean time, he must be content with
the relation which she has left behind her here on earth; and if he will
needs be mistaking her scruples for her motives, who can help it?
His design, as he tells us a little after the beginning, is, “to
vindicate the honour of the church of England, so far as it may be
thought to suffer by the paper of her late highness.” I might here tell
him, that he has an obligation antecedent to the honour of his community,
which is that to God and his own conscience. But the honour of the church
of England is no farther concerned in the paper of her highness, than in
relation to the persons of two or three prelates; and those he leaves
at last to shift for themselves as they are able, with this melancholy
farewell, that—“God be thanked, the cause of our church does not depend
upon the singular opinion of one or two bishops in it, wherein they
apparently recede from the established doctrine of it.”
In the next place, “he is sensible how nice and tender a thing it is to
meddle in a matter wherein the memory of so great a lady is concerned.”
Here he is sensible, once for all; for, after this one civility, you
hear no more of his good manners, to the end of the chapter; but the
honour of the church of England so wholly takes up his thoughts, that he
forgets the respect which is due to her sex, her quality, her memory, her
relations, and confutes her as coarsely as the parson did Bellarmine.[67]
He goes on to inform us, how hard a task he has undertaken in answering
these papers, “wherein such circumstances are mentioned as cannot fully
be cleared, the parties themselves having been many years dead; yet he
shall endeavour to keep within due bounds,” &c.
These due bounds either are, or ought to be, respect to the great lady,
and caution in regard of circumstances, which I hope he will not put upon
his readers for arguments, the parties being dead so long ago.
But let the reader here take notice, that in this very place he is
clapping his cups together, and shuffling his balls from hand to hand, to
lay the foundation of his juggling, and to prepare the way for all the
tricks which he is to play hereafter.
For, the parties being dead long since, that is, the duchess, in the
first place, not being alive to justify the several conferences which she
had with the bishops; nor they, in the second, to answer, as in the sight
of God, whether she had such discourse with them, the field is open for
him, as he vainly imagines, by laying circumstances of time and place
together, and racking her own paper till it seemingly speaks against her,
to render it suspected to his good friends, the rabble, that she has
falsified the whole matter.
Well, we shall see what he builds upon this foundation: let him speak for
himself.
“The way of her satisfaction was very extraordinary; for, towards the
conclusion, she confesses she was not able, nor would she enter into
disputes with any body.”
Commend me to him for a man of quick dispatch. At the first dash, he is
bringing the two ends of her paper together; for he says,—“towards the
conclusion she confesses.” It was well searched of him, however, to hunt
counter, and run to the end of her discourse for the beginning of his
own. He will lose no advantages, I warrant him. Press that home, doctor.
She modestly owns, that she was neither able nor willing to enter into
disputes; therefore she had no other way to satisfy herself: when the
whole drift of this pious and sincere discourse is to inform her friends
of the methods by which God Almighty brought her into his church; her
paper being a plain and short history of her conversion.
The answerer is of opinion, there is nothing to be done, no satisfaction
to be had in matters of religion, without dispute; that is his only
recipe, his nostrum for attaining a true belief. But doctors differ
in this point: For another witty gentleman of his church[68] desired
no other epitaph upon his tomb than this: “Here lies the author of
this sentence, _Disputandi pruritus, scabies ecclesiæ_;” the itch of
disputation is the scab or tetter of the church. Now, if the learned
avail themselves so little of dispute, that it is as rare as a prodigy
for one of them to convince another, what shall become of the ignorant,
when they are to deal with those fencers of divinity, who can hit
them in tierce and quart at pleasure, while they are ignorant how to
stand upon their guard? And yet such poor people have souls to save, as
precious in the sight of God as the grim logician’s. Must they be damned
unless they can make a regular approach to heaven in mood and figure?
Is there no entering there without a syllogism? or _ergoteering_ it
with a _nego, concedo, et distinguo_? The best on it is, our Saviour’s
disciples were but poor fishermen, and we read but of one of his apostles
who was bred up at the feet of Gamaliel. I would beseech our answerer to
consider, whether he has argued upon his own principles, in affirming,
that none can be satisfied as to the grounds of leaving one church and
going to the other, without entering into dispute? Has he not allowed,
that every man is to interpret the Scripture for himself, in reference
to his own salvation? With what face then can he positively say,—“That
this lady,” who had not only read the Scriptures, but found them in
her judgment plainly to decide the great controversy betwixt Catholics
and Protestants, “might not leave his church, and enter into that of
Christ, by interpreting ‘this is my body,’ in the literal and obvious
meaning?” If, from a Catholic, she had become a Protestant, by expounding
those words in a figurative sense, he would have applauded her for not
discerning the Lord’s body, and said, she was in the right to interpret
for herself. But she, it seems, must be an exception to his general rule,
and not have that privilege allowed her, which he dare not deny to any
sectary of the nonconformists. The fanatics think the Scripture is clear
in all matters of salvation; and if so, what need, say they, of those
spiritual directors? Even the pillars of the church by law established,
from their own concessions, are found to be but broken staffs; for,
after all their undertaking to heal a wounded conscience, when the arrows
of the Almighty are stuck into it, they leave their proselytes finally
to the Scripture, as our physicians, when they have emptied the pockets
of their patients without curing them, send them at last to Tunbridge
waters, or the air of Montpellier.
“But if persons be resolved beforehand what to do, (says our answerer,)
there is no such way as to declare—they will not enter into dispute.”
Here he would make us believe, that she swallowed a new religion without
chewing it, because she disputed not. I have shewed already what is
the common fate of disputation. But had she no other way of satisfying
her conscience? (as he immediately infers she had not.) If he were not
obstinately blind, or rather had not an intention to blind his reader,
he might have observed the methods and gradations of her change, and
that, though she disputed not, yet she discoursed (which is entering into
matter of dispute) with some of the ablest of the English clergy, even
with him particularly who was left by the bishop of Winchester to be her
spiritual director; by which it plainly appears, notwithstanding all the
jugglings and glosses of our answerer, that the better part even of his
own prescription was put in practice by her, though without effect, as
to her satisfaction. Why, then, does he ask so many idle questions? “Had
she no divines of the church of England about her? none able and willing
to afford her their utmost assistance?” when she takes care to inform the
world that she had such divines, that she imparted her scruples, and,
after all, remained unsatisfied with their answers.
“Persons of learning,” indeed, he says, “may possibly be satisfied
without entering into disputes of matters which she had neither the
leisure to examine, nor the capacity to judge of.”
Then, as I said before, the kingdom of heaven is chiefly, if not only,
for the wise and learned of this world, though our Saviour was not of
this judgement. But is not every man to be satisfied _pro modulo suo_,
according to the measure of his own understanding? Can an ignorant
person enter into the knowledge of the mysteries of our faith, when
even the most learned cannot understand them? Can the answerer himself
unriddle the secrets of the incarnation, fathom the undivided Trinity,
or the consubstantiality of the Eternal Son, with all his readings and
examinations? From whence comes it then, that he believes them, since
neither the scripture is plain about them, nor the wit of man can
comprehend them? As for her comparing the doctrines of both churches,
no question she did it to the best of her ability; for if he will
believe her in any thing, she both read the scriptures, and conferred
with the most learned Protestants, before she had any discourses with a
Catholic priest. But if she had not, as he rudely says, the capacity of
judging in deep controversies, it is very probable she might want that
of understanding the instructions of her guides; for, if I may similize
in my turn, a dull fellow might ask the meaning of a problem in Euclid
from the bishop of Salisbury,[69] without being ever the better for his
learned solution of it. So then her capacity will break no squares, at
least from the doctrine of the English church, and the Presbyterians, put
them both together, as they now stand united; for, either the scriptures
are clear, and then a mean capacity will serve to understand them, or,
though they are never so obscure, yet the upshot of all is, that every
man is to interpret for himself.
What farther quarrel he can have against the lady in this particular, I
know not, unless it be upon the bishop of Winchester’s account; namely,
that she refused to advise with him, and admitted the two others[70]
to a conference; and what reason she had for so doing, if I were as
penetrating as my author, I should undertake to demonstrate by the
infallible evidence of circumstances and inferences: but since the
parties are dead, and so long since, I will not give my own opinion why
she refused him, and of what principles she might possibly have thought
him. At present I will not trouble myself farther with that prelate of
rich memory, whom I warrant you our author would not commend so much for
his great abilities and willingness to resolve the lady’s doubts, if he
had not some journey-work for him to do hereafter; neither will I meddle
much with the long impertinent story of his letter to the duchess, and
her silence at Farnham, where she would not consult him in any of her
doubts. Whatever great matters are made of these by our answerer, she had
a very sufficient reason for not asking his advice, as will instantly
be made appear. But now our author is at another of his dodging tricks,
comparing times and dates of letters, the bishop’s bearing date the 24th
of January, that very year in which she changed; but that he may not
puzzle himself too much in reckoning, I will unriddle the matter of fact
to him, which I have from a most authentic hand. The duke and duchess
were at Farnham in the beginning of September, where they continued
about three days, in the year 1670. Her highness’s paper bears date the
20th of August, 1670; by which it is manifest, that it was written twelve
or fourteen days before her visit to the bishop. Now where, I beseech
you, is the wonder, that she spoke nothing to him concerning any points
of a religion in which she was already satisfied? Would any man ask
another—what’s o’clock, after he had been just looking upon a sun-dial?
So that all his aggravations dwindle at length into this poor inference,
that it is evident she did not make use of the ordinary means for her own
satisfaction; at least (mark how he mollifies, for fear of being trapped)
as to those bishops who had known her longest.
Now this is so pitiful, that it requires no answer; for it amounts to
no more than that she liked not the bishop, and therefore, from the
beginning, concealed her scruples from him; and she changed her religion
the same year, (though before he writ to her,) because she was satisfied
of another. But does it follow from hence, as he infers, that, in the
mean while, she did not use the ordinary means for her satisfaction?
Supposing she had liked the other two bishops as little as she did him,
had she no other ordinary means but by those two, or even by any other
bishops? Satisfied, to be sure, she was, or she had not changed; and if
the means had been wholly extraordinary, from the inspirations of God’s
holy spirit only, she had thereby received the greater favour; but not
omitting to give God thanks for his supernatural assistance, she used
also the ordinary means.
It appears that her first emotions were from her observing the devotions
of the Catholics in France and Flanders; and this is no news to any
traveller. Ask even our Protestant gentlemen at their return from
Catholic countries, and they cannot but confess that the exercises of
their devotion, their mortifications, their austerities, their humility,
their charity, and in short, all the ways of good living, are practised
there in a far greater measure than they are in England; but these are
the virtues from which we are blessedly reformed by the example and
precept of that lean, mortified apostle, St Martin Luther.
Her first scruples were raised in her by reading Doctor Heylin’s “History
of the Reformation,” and what she found in it we shall see hereafter.
It appears, that history had given her some new apprehensions; and to
satisfy them, she considered of the matters in difference betwixt the
Catholics and Protestants; and so considered them, as to examine them
the best she could by scripture, which she found to speak clearly for
the Catholics; and she, upon our author’s principles, was judge of this:
after which, she spoke with two of the best bishops in England, and their
doubtful or rather favourable answers, did but add more to the desire
she had to be a Catholic. All these ordinary ways she took, before she
could persuade herself to send for a priest, whose endeavours it pleased
the Almighty so to bless, that she was reconciled to his church, and her
troubled conscience was immediately at rest.
I have been forced to recapitulate these things, and to give them the
reader at one view; for our answerer is so cunning at his trade, that he
shews them only in parcels, and by retail, that it might not be thought
she used the ordinary means. One thing I had omitted, which was, that the
bishop affirms in his letter to her Highness, that she had made him a
promise, in case any writing were put into her hand by those of the Roman
church, she would send it either to him or the bishop of Oxford.[71]
Why does our author put down that promise thus at large? If he means any
thing more by it, besides a justification of his bishop for having done
his part, which signifies just nothing, he would tacitly insinuate that
she broke her word, by not sending any such writing to him. If so, he
is at his legerdemain again. He would have it thought she kept not her
promise, but does not positively affirm it; but since it is manifest, by
the order of time in her paper, that she neither sent for any priest, nor
conferred with any learned Catholic, till after she had done with the two
bishops, it may, and ought to be supposed, that she received no writings
from any of that religion; for if she had, she would certainly have
mentioned them.
If then the bishop of Winchester would insinuate, that she had such
papers, which she sent not to him, according to her engagement, I may
at least answer with my author, that the lady was dead long before the
bishop published his letter, so that the circumstances therein mentioned
cannot be so fully cleared.
But to return to our answerer. He has brought us at length to the several
discourses which her Highness had with the two bishops, his Grace of
Canterbury, and the bishop of Worcester; and since he has thought fit to
put all that concerned this matter into one long paragraph, quoted from
the Duchess, I must follow his example. These are her words:—“After
this, I spoke severally to two of the best bishops we have in England,
who both told me there were many things in the Roman church, which it
were very much to be wished we had kept; as confession, which was no
doubt commanded of God; that praying for the dead was one of the ancient
things in Christianity; that for their parts, they did it daily, though
they would not own it. And afterwards, pressing one of them very much
upon the other points, he told me—that if he had been bred a Catholic, he
would not change his religion; but that being of another church, wherein
he was sure were all things necessary to salvation, he thought it very
ill to give that scandal, as to leave that church wherein he had received
his baptism. All these discourses did but add more to the desire I had to
be a Catholic, and gave me the most terrible agonies in the world,” &c.
“This (he confesses) seems to be to the purpose;” and where he confesses
the least advantage on our side, the reader may swear there is somewhat
more than ordinary in the matter. But he retrenches immediately, and
kicks down the pail, by adding this restriction—“if there were not some
circumstances and expressions very much mistaken in the representation
of it.” Yet in the next line again, as if he were ashamed of his own
fearfulness, he is for making a bold sally, and putting all to the push;
for, “supposing the utmost to be allowed (says he) there could be no
argument from hence drawn for leaving the communion of our church;”
but he restrains that too with this caution—“if the bishop’s authority
and example did signify any thing with her.” Thus, from yielding at
first, he comes to modify his concession, and from thence to strike out
magnanimously.
But then he retreats again with another _if_. It is a sign he is uneasy,
when he tosses and turns so often in a breath; and that he is diffident
of his cause, when he shifts his plea. It is evident that the Duchess
laid a great stress on these concessions: and well she might; for what
a startle would it give to a doubting soul, which already had taken the
alarm, to hear two bishops, whereof one was primate of all England,
renouncing and condemning two of the established articles of their
church? But it is well known, that those two prelates were not, nor,
if they were now living, would be, the only clergymen of the church of
England who are of opinion they have over-reformed themselves in casting
off prayers for the dead, and consequently, the doctrine of a third
place. But these are church of England men of the old stamp; betwixt
whom, and the faction of this answerer, there is just as much difference
as betwixt a true episcopal man and a latitudinarian; and this latter,
in plain terms, is no otherwise different from a presbyterian, than by
whatsoever titles and dignities he is distinguished. So that our answerer
was much in the right to skip over the first half of this paragraph
without answering in this place, and to gallop to the last sentence of
it, which begins with Bishop Blandford’s saying,—“That if he had been
bred in the communion of the Roman church, he would not change his
religion:” whither, as in duty bound, I follow him.
To overbalance the weight of these concessions, our author would have us
think, that the subsequent words of the bishop ought to have had greater
force to have kept her in the communion of the Protestant church, than
the former to have drawn her from it; for the bishop comes off with
this excuse,—“That being of another church, wherein he was sure were
all things necessary to salvation, he thought it very ill to give that
scandal, as to leave that church wherein he received his baptism.”
First, take notice, that the Duchess says, the bishop was pressed by
her very much before he made the concession—that if he had been bred
a Catholic, he would not have changed; which shews, that a truth was
forced out of him, which he would willingly have concealed. For, both in
regard to his own credit, and the retaining of so great a person in his
church, it was not his interest to have yielded—that a Catholic might be
saved, at least on as easy terms as a Protestant. But he goes farther,
when he confesses—that if he had been bred a Catholic, he would not have
altered his religion; for therein he seems even to regret his being bred
a Protestant, at least he yields, that all things necessary to salvation
were in the Roman Catholic church; for otherwise, had he been educated
in it, he ought, in conscience, to have changed, which he owns he would
not have done. Now this is manifestly more than what he said for the
church of England; for his following words are rather an excuse for his
continuance in his church, than an argument to dissuade her Highness
from turning Catholic:—“He thought it very ill to give that scandal
to leave the church wherein he was baptized.” Now the word _scandal_,
plainly relates to his own person, and signifies no more than that he
was ashamed to change; for it was impossible for him to think he should
sin against his conscience in changing, who had declared—that he would
not have changed, in case he had been bred a Catholic. And the reason he
gives is made of the same yielding metal, viz. that he had his baptism
in the Protestant church; for that argument in itself is of no weight,
since the right reverend well knew that the baptism even of heretics is
good; so that, if he had been christened in the Lutheran, the Abyssine,
or the Russian church, he must for that reason have continued in it. But
he timorously pleads his fear of giving scandal, which is, as I said,
no justification of himself, no dissuasive to her, but only a mean,
interested apology for his not changing.
As for his intimating,—that all things necessary to salvation were to be
had in the church of England, let any reasonable man be judge whether he
could possibly have said less in defence of himself for continuing in it;
for this only shewed, that he thought salvation was to be had in both
churches, as even this author himself is forced to confess afterwards,
in these words: “The utmost that can be made of this is, that a certain
bishop of our church” [who in the mean time has proved himself an
uncertain one,] “held both churches so far parts of the Catholic church,
that there was no necessity of going from one church to another.”
That which he calls—the utmost we can make of it, is in truth the least
which the bishop’s words will naturally bear; and I may safely put the
cause upon this issue,—whether such a discourse might not reasonably add
more to the desire she had to be a Catholic?
Let us hear now what he has to answer; and I will reply briefly, because
I have taken away the strength of his argument already.
First, he says in effect, That the bishop’s authority and example ought
to have prevailed with her on the one side, more than his concessions on
the other.
I reply—Not his authority, because he spoke more for the church of Rome
than against it: nor his example, for he gave her no encouragement to
follow it, by saying, that if he had been bred a Catholic, he would
not have changed. His example of praying daily for the dead shewed his
opinion at the bottom; but his not publicly owning that he did so, has
proved him little better than a black bishop, who has entered privately
into the white one’s walk.[72]
Our author asks, in the second place,—Why any person should forsake the
communion of the Protestant church, wherein the bishop affirmed were all
things necessary to salvation? And I enquire, How she could be bound to
believe him, since confession, and prayers for the dead, are wanting in
it? one of which he had before acknowledged to be commanded of God; the
other, to be one of the ancient things in Christianity!
Thirdly, he urges, That the bishop had told her, it was an ill thing to
leave the church of England. And I reply, That the answerer has falsified
his words. “The bishop only thought it very ill to give that scandal, as
to leave the church wherein he was baptized.” First, he spoke of himself
only, not of her. Mark that fallacy. And then he said not,—it was ill
to leave the church; but—very ill to give that scandal, as to leave the
church; relating again to his own particular.
Fourthly, he says, It is evident that the bishops could have no influence
upon her; though she positively says those discourses, in which were
those concessions, did but add more to the desire she had to be a
Catholic. This is full upon the vizor[73]; but the dead are to take
all things patiently. Well! How, if he can convince her of falsity from
her own words? why then he will carry his argument, as well as his good
manners, to the height; and how broad soever the word may be which he has
slily given her, yet he will tell you, that freedom ought to be permitted
him, as sustaining the honour of the church of England.
His argument is this: “She declares afterwards, that she would not have
changed, if she had thought it possible otherwise to have saved her soul;
but the bishop had told her, that all things necessary for salvation were
in the English church; therefore the bishop contributed nothing to her
change.”
So the mitre be safe in its reputation, no matter what becomes of the
ducal coronet. Now I can be very well content that the bishop should have
no part in the honour of her conversion; for it is plain that he desired
it not; and why should he do good against his will?
I wish my author would have furnished me with an argument to have brought
him wholly off; but I will bring him on his way as far as by the help of
the answerer’s scarf I can fairly drag him. I say therefore, that though
her Highness changed not her belief upon the concessions of the bishop,
yet his concessions were an occasion of her farther scruples, in order
to her change; for, she says, “they added to the desire she had to be a
Catholic.”
The bishop did indeed tell her, that all things necessary to salvation
were in the English church; but tell me, Sir, I beseech you, was that
all he told her? By your favour, you have left out the better half of
what he said; for he told her also, “that if he had been bred a Catholic,
he would not have changed.” And she had reason to believe what he said
to the advantage of a church of which he was no member, as being sure
he would say no more than scanty truth. And he acknowledges into the
bargain, that “confession was commanded of God;” and, that “praying for
the dead was one of the ancient things in Christianity.” What a shameful
way of arguing is this, to make a general negative conclusion from
half the premises? or, in other words, to maintain, that the bishop’s
concessions could have no influence upon her, because they had not the
greatest influence? And you in a manner confess it before you were aware,
in the close of your argument, where you say, “There must therefore
have been some more secret reason, which increased her desire to be a
Catholic, after these discourses.” Now some more secret reason does not
hinder the bishop’s concessions from being one; nay, it argues, that they
were one of the reasons, though not the most prevalent, because there was
one more secret. You have now contradicted yourself so plainly, that you
have wholly justified the Duchess; and the broad word, without naming it,
is fairly brought back to your own door.
After this, our answerer does but piddle, and play at small game, as if
her Highness might possibly take encouragement from the bishop’s calling
the church of Rome the Catholic religion; but she was too much in earnest
to lay hold upon a word. Neither is more advantage to be taken from
his calling the church of Rome the Catholic religion, than we receive
disadvantage from the playing upon the word of Roman Catholic.
Next, for want of a quarrel, he is falling upon his late dear friend
the bishop: “Was he,” says our answerer, “so weak, to mean the word
_Catholic_ in the strictest sense, he must then have contradicted
himself; there was an inconsistency in his words,”—and so forth.
From the inconsistency of the bishop’s words in this and other places,
our answerer, perhaps, would make a secret inference, that he never said
them; and obliquely draw the Duchess into the statute of coining; so that
the two spiritual hectors may make a sham-duel of it, for aught we know.
For it is a common trick with robbers to clash their swords together in
the dark, to draw company together, and then some third person pays for
it. Take it in this manner, and then the argument against her Highness
will stand thus: the sayings which she relates are inconsistent, and
therefore she must not be believed, though she affirms she heard them.
Why, do not as many as have ears hear inconsistent things said every day?
and must every body needs lie, who reports them again? That inconsistency
of the words is, in truth, an argument, that these things were said; for
what bids fairer for adding to the desire she had of being a Catholic,
and of giving her the terrible agonies she felt? But after all, if the
answerer’s quarrel be in earnest with the bishop, it is pity they should
fall out for such a trifle. As weak as the bishop was, and as strong as
our answerer makes his inconsistencies appear, I dare answer for him, he
meant nothing less than to convert her.
You do ill therefore, to play the bully with a peaceable old gentleman,
who only desired to possess his conscience and his bishopric in peace,
without offence to any man, either of the Catholic church, or that of
England.
But if he held, that both churches were so far parts of the Catholic,
that there was no necessity of going from one church to another to be
saved, if he asserted that you say, he must overthrow the necessity of
your Reformation; and then down goes his belief of your homilies and
articles, (thirty-nine at a tip,) and consequently he could be no true
member of the church of England.
And now what can I do more for the poor bishop? for most certainly he
did imply thus much in saying, that “if he had been bred a Catholic, he
would not change his religion.” Therefore, Take him, Topham![74] there’s
no help, but he must be turned out of the church of England, even so long
after he has been dead.
In the mean time, let us a little examine this proposition. Our answerer
affirms, “That he cannot be a true member of the church of England, who
asserts both churches to be so far parts of the Catholic church, that
there is no necessity of going from one church to another to be saved.”
If this be true, then, to be a member of the church of England, one
must assert,—that either both churches are not parts of the Catholic,
or that they are so parts, that there is a necessity of going from one
to another. Of these two, the first is not for the honour of one of
the churches, and the second is direct nonsense. A necessity of change
consists not with their being both parts; for parts constitute one whole,
and leave not one and another, to go to or from. There is no church in
France or Italy, to which a Spanish Catholic can go, but what he left in
Spain; nor can he leave his own, by going to either of them. He may be
under other governors in the same church; but let him go wheresoever he
shall please, he cannot be of another, so long as he remains a Catholic.
In short, necessity of change makes it absolutely impossible for both
churches to be parts of the Catholic, and forces the church of England to
maintain—either that she is a part, and the Roman Catholic none, or else
that it is no matter whether she be a part or no; to which I wish they
may not, with the pretence of zeal for her honour, desire to drive her,
who have nothing better to say in their own behalf.
But though our answerer has laid one bishop flat, I warrant you he has
another in reserve; for now the bishop of Winchester (who, as I said
formerly, was not commended so much for nothing,) is brought back in
triumph from his palace of Farnham, to make a short end of the dispute.
At first he doubts, whether ever there were any such bishops who made
such answers; and then affirms, that he believes there never was _in
rerum naturâ_ such a discourse as is pretended to have been betwixt this
great person and two of the most learned bishops in England.
This is downright indeed; for our answerer, to do him justice, has
often collaterally accused the Duchess for her good invention at making
stories: but here is plain English upon the point. What pity is it, in
the mean time, that my Lord of Winton gives not so much as one single
reason, either for his doubt, or his contrary belief? So that having only
his lordship’s opinion, and her highness’s affirmation before me, I might
say, with at least as much good manners as that prelate, that I believe
as little of his pretended letter sent to the Duchess so long after her
decease, as he does of her pretended discourse with the two bishops.
In the mean time, what use would my gentleman here make of his lordship’s
doubts, his belief, or his affirmation? Are the embers too hot for him,
that he uses the bishop’s foot to pull out the chesnut? Suppose our
prelate had believed there were no Antipodes, is this a time of day to
give him credit? But I wonder the less why our author attributes so
much to his _ipse dixit_ upon all occasions; for the whole body of his
answer to this paper is in effect a transcript from the bishop’s preface.
He purloins his arguments, without altering, sometime, so much as the
property of his words. He has quoted him five times only in the margin,
and ought to have quoted him in almost every line of his pamphlet. In
short, if the master had not eaten, the man (saving reverence) could not
have vomited. But it is easy to be seen through all the grimaces of that
bishop, that he found himself aggrieved he was not thought on, when her
Highness spoke of the two best or most learned bishops of England; and
that his opinion was not consulted, when, indeed, he had offered it,
though unasked.
I know his defender will reply, that his lordship has modestly disclaimed
any such pretence to learning, in his preface, where he says, “No, I am
not, I know I am not, I am sure I am not the most learned bishop.” See,
how he mounts in his expressions at three several bounds. It is true,
all these asseverations, like his three _nolos_,[75] needed not; for any
reasonable man, who had read his works, would have taken his bare word,
without repetition. Yet this notwithstanding, he might have some inward
grudgings, that his pupil thought him not so great a doctor.[76]
But it is not fit that a matter of such importance should end in a bare
_Ay_ and _No_ on either side; for though the parties have been so long
dead, yet there is a witness still alive, and such a one, that all loyal
subjects are bound to join with me in prayers for the long continuance of
his life, and even for his continuance in the true religion, as far as
the English liturgy can oblige them.
The Duchess thought herself bound to make his Royal Highness acquainted
with every one of these several conferences which she had either with
archbishop Sheldon, or bishop Blandford; and that account was the very
same in substance with what she communicates to her friends in this
present paper, as he is pleased to permit me to assure the world, after
having had the honour to hear him solemnly affirm it, which puts an end
to the whole matter of dispute; and this which follows is as authentic.
The day it pleased Almighty God to call her to his mercy, some relations
of hers, who are yet living,[77] were desirous that she should speak
with the bishop of Worcester; which the Duchess did not absolutely
refuse upon their importunity, but requested the then Duke to stop the
bishop a little in the antechamber, and prepare him, according to her
directions, before he entered the bedchamber. Accordingly his Highness,
having met the bishop, acquainted him, “that she was actually reconciled
to the Catholic church:” he then enquired, “whether she were fully
satisfied in all points of the doctrine which she had embraced?” and the
Duke answered, “that she was entirely satisfied in the doctrine of the
Catholic church.” At length the bishop asked, “whether she had already
received the last sacraments of the church?” naming particularly those
of the blessed Eucharist, and the Extreme Unction; and it being replied
by the Duke, that she had received them, the bishop answered, “That then
he doubted not but that her soul was in a very safe condition.” Before
they parted, his Royal Highness told him, “That it was the desire of the
Duchess, he would not trouble her with any matter of dispute, nor offer
to pray with her; but if he had any spiritual counsel fitting for a
person in her condition, in order to prepare her for her death, he might
freely tender it:” upon this he was admitted to her bedchamber, and made
her a brief exhortation; after which, his stay there was very short.[78]
This being matter of fact, and of unquestionable truth, I hope the
answerer will acquiesce in it. What he will think of his bishop, concerns
not me; but as a Protestant, he has reason for his thanking God, that
the cause of his church does not depend on the singular opinion of one
bishop in it. It appears plainly by this relation, that the bishop of
Worcester was ignorant, almost to the last, of her conversion; so that
if that will serve our author’s turn, he is acquitted from intending
any such act of charity; but that he contributed to it without any such
intention, is apparent.
Yet our author will not so sit down; he will condemn her Highness from
her own words again; and prove, from her saying,—“that she owed the
blessing of her conversion to God Almighty,” that therefore the bishop
could have no hand in it.
What obligation has he to defend the honour of his church by a piece of
sophistry? She owed it wholly to Almighty God; for “of ourselves we can
do nothing.” But, as the answerer confesses, this excluded not her own
endeavours; God inspired her with a desire of being reconciled to his
church, in answer to her frequent prayers,—not by immediate illumination,
or shewing her the right belief miraculously, but by affording her the
ordinary means, and conducting her by his good spirit in the use of
them. If she had been immediately enlightened, she needed not to have
recourse to any of the bishops; but it pleased God, who often works good
out of evil, that the arguments they used, or rather the answers which
they made, produced a contrary effect, and added more to the desire she
had to be a Catholic: in this sense, therefore, it may be said, that the
bishops sent her to the priest; for an unresistable, overruling power
made them contribute to her change, by opposing it; and the very hands
which laboured to hold her fast in the Protestant persuasion, carried
her half seas over, and put her into other hands, which carried her the
other half. Truly they would have received hard measure, if they had been
found guilty on the statute of persuasion, who, far from endeavouring
to make her change, dissuaded her from changing, though the Protestant
flints happened to strike Catholic fire; so that I cannot but think there
was an extraordinary hand of Providence in her case, and of which she
had reason to be extraordinary sensible. But we must have, I perceive, a
care of praying, and owning benefits from God; for that, or nothing, made
her pass for an enthusiast with the answerer; she did nothing besides
praying, which our author does not acknowledge it her duty to have done.
She read the history which was put into her hands, to confirm her in her
first belief; she examined the scripture; she conferred with her divines;
and yet he can make an obstinate woman of her, for doing that very thing
to which he would advise her. “But,” says our author, “all pretenders to
enthusiasm do as solemnly and wholly ascribe the blessing to Almighty
God, and look on it as the effects of such prayers as she made to him in
France and Flanders.”
They ascribe it indeed wholly to God in our author’s sense, but not in
her’s; for she meant not immediate illumination by the word _wholly_, as
I have already proved; they may look on their false light as the effect
of their prayers; but she looks on her conversion as the effect of her’s,
after having used the means.
“He had thought,” he says, “that the pretence to a private spirit, or
enthusiasm,” (for he joins them both afterwards,) “had not been at this
time allowed in the church of Rome.”
Somebody once thought otherwise, or he had never diverted the young
gallants of the town with his merry book, concerning the fanaticism of
the church of Rome.
He next enquires, what need she had of an infallible church, if she owed
her change so wholly to Almighty God?
_Wholly_ is already explained to him, and then his argument is of no
more force against her, than against all Catholics who have once been
Protestants; which is a new subject of dispute, and foreign to the
argument in hand.
“Her conclusion,” as he tells us, “is, that she would never have changed,
if she could have saved her soul otherwise;” whereupon he infers, “if
this were true, she had good reason for her change; if it were not true,
(as most certainly it was not,) she had none.”
But her words (which he hath falsified in this place) are these: “I would
never have changed, if I had thought it possible to have saved my soul
otherwise.” He never misquotes without design. Now by altering these
words—_if I had thought it possible to save my soul_, into these—_if I
could have saved my soul_, he would shuffle off her true meaning; which
was, that her conscience obliged her to this change. And that is a
point he would not willingly have touched; for he cannot deny, upon his
own principles, but that, after having examined the scriptures, as she
professes to have done as well as she was able, concerning the points in
dispute, and afterwards using the assistance of her spiritual guides, the
two bishops, she was to judge for herself in the last resort; and the
judgment she made, according to her conscience, was, that the scripture
spoke clearly in behalf of the Catholic church, or church of Rome, as he
calls it: therefore, according to his principles, and her conscience, she
was to be of that church, of whose truth she was thus convinced; so that
whether she could be otherwise saved or no, was not the proposition to be
advanced, but whether she thought it possible to be otherwise saved. And
therefore, though it were true that she could otherwise be saved, yet she
had a sufficient reason for her change, (though he says she had none,)
which was, her conscience; and supposing that were erroneous, yet, upon
his principles, she must be the judge of it without appeal.
“Her scruples began upon reading Dr Heylin’s ‘History of the
Reformation;’ and there she found such abominable sacrilege upon Harry
the Eighth’s divorce, King Edward’s minority, and Queen Elizabeth’s
succession, that she could not believe the Holy Ghost could ever be in
such councils.” Thus he compendiously quotes her paper, as being, it
seems, ashamed of the particulars therein mentioned; but for once I will
follow him his own way.
To read Dr Heylin’s history, in order to settle her, he confesses, was
none of the best advices given to such a person. He is much in the
right on’t, as appears by the success; and I add, nor any other, either
Protestant or Catholic writer then extant; for no paint is capable of
making lovely the hideous face of the pretended Reformation. “But,”
says he, “there are two distinct parts in the history of it, the one
ecclesiastical, the other political; the first built on scripture,
antiquity, and the rights of particular churches; the other on such
maxims as are common to statesmen at all times, and in all churches, who
labour to turn all revolutions and changes to their own advantage.”
But why might not her Highness consider it her own way, which is that
of nature, in the causes which produced it, and the effects which it
produced; though I doubt not but she considered it his way too, because a
child could not have missed it, that very distinction being inserted into
the history by the author himself. Now the immediate cause which produced
the separation of Harry the Eighth from the church of Rome, was the
refusal of the Pope to grant him a divorce from his first wife, and to
gratify his desires in a dispensation for a second marriage. Neither the
answerer, nor I, nor any man, can carry it so high as the original cause
with any certainty; for the king only knew whether it was conscience
and love, or love alone, which moved him to sue for a divorce. But this
we may say, that if conscience had any part in it, she had taken a long
nap of almost twenty years together before she awakened, and perhaps had
slept on till doomsday, if Anne Bolleyn, or some other fair lady, had not
given her a jog: so the satisfying of an inordinate and a brutal passion
cannot be denied to have had a great share at least in the production of
that schism, which led the very way to our pretended Reformation; for
breaking the unity of Christ’s church was the foundation of it.
I pass over the manner of those first proceedings, and the degrees by
which they came to terminate in schism, though I doubt not but her
Highness was sufficiently scandalized in both, and could not also
but observe some of the concomitant causes, as revenge, ambition, and
covetousness; all which, and others, drew with a strong bias towards
it. But the immediate effects, even of this schism, were sacrilege, and
a bloody persecution of such as denied the king’s supremacy in matters
wholly spiritual; which no layman, no king of Israel, ever exercised, as
is observed by my Lord Herbert[79]. As for the Reformation itself, what
that produced is full as obvious in the sequel of history, where we find
that chanteries and hospitals, undevoured by Henry the Eighth, were left
only to be morsels for Edward the Sixth, or rather for his ministers
of state; and the reason was given, that the revenues of them were
fruitlessly spent on those who said prayers for the dead. Now this was as
naturally produced from the Reformation, as an effect is from the cause;
so that, as it is observed by some, had that young king reigned any
considerable time longer, the church of England had been left the poorest
of any one in Christendom; the rich bishopric of Durham having been much
retrenched by him, and it is probable those of Rochester and Westminster.
Harry the Eighth had indeed eaten so much of the church’s bread out of
his son’s mouth beforehand, that even Calvin complains of it in a letter
to Cranmer, (concerning the paucity of good pastors in England,) in these
words: _Unum apertum obstaculum esse intelligo, quod prædæ expositi sunt
ecclesiæ redditus_; “one open obstacle I find to this, (he meaneth the
increase of good pastors,) is, that your church revenues are exposed to
rapine.”
Besides these things, what an usurpation this change of religion caused
is most notorious; that of the Lady Jane Gray being evidently grounded on
the testament of Edward the Sixth, by which she was made his successor,
because she was of the Protestant religion.
As for the title of Queen Elizabeth to the crown, the histories lie
open; and I shall not be over-forward to meddle with the rights of
princes, especially since the answerer has avoided that dispute. It is
enough in general to say, that her interest carried her against the
Pope, whose power if good, she was illegitimate. She had also been
informed by the English resident at Rome, that the Pope expected she
should acknowledge her crown from him, and not take upon her to be queen
without his leave. These were strong solicitations, in a new unsettled
succession, for her to shake off a religion, whereof his Holiness is head
on earth. What matter of conscience was in the case, I say not; but her
temporal interest lies bare-faced and uppermost to view, in reassuming
of the supremacy, and (to make the breach yet wider) in subverting the
foundations of the faith. For the affront is the same, to turn round
a man’s hat, and to strike him on the face; but the advantage is the
greater in a lusty blow.
But the handle by which our answerer would have the Reformation taken,
is not by the causes and effects, the means and management, and indeed
the whole series of history: these are nothing to concern his present
enquiry, though they raised such scruples in the Duchess, and will
do in any other conscientious reader; he will have the Reformation
considered his own way, that is, in the political part of it, and the
ecclesiastical. Now the political part (if you observe him,) he gives for
gone at the first dash: “It was grounded,” he says, “on such maxims as
are common to statesmen at all times, and in all churches, who labour to
turn all revolutions and changes to their own advantage.”
That is, it is common for statesmen to be atheists at the bottom; to be
seemingly of that religion which is most for their interest; to crush
and ruin that from which they have no future prospect of advantage,
and to join with its most inveterate enemies, without consideration of
their king’s interest: and this was the case of the Duke of Somerset.
All which together amounts to this; that it is no matter by what means a
Reformation be compassed, by what instruments it be brought to pass, or
with what design, though all these be never so ungodly; it is enough if
the Reformation itself be made by the legislative power of the land. The
matter of fact then is given up, only it is faced with recriminations;
that Alexander the Sixth, for example, was as wicked a Pope as King Henry
was a king: as if any Catholic denied, that God Almighty, for causes
best known to his divine wisdom, has not sometimes permitted impious men
to sit in that supreme seat, and even to intrude into it by unlawful
means. That Alexander the Sixth was one of the worst of men, I freely
grant; which is more than I can in conscience say of Henry the Eighth,
who had great and kingly virtues mingled with his vices. That the Duke
of Somerset raised his estate out of church lands, our author excuses
no other ways than by retorting, that Popes are accustomed to do the
like in consideration of their nephews, whom they would greaten. But
though it is a wicked thing for a Pope to mispend the church revenues
on his relations, it is to be considered he is a secular prince, and
may as lawfully give out of his temporal incomes what he pleases to his
favourite, as another prince to his. But as our author charges this
miscarriage home upon some late Popes of the former and the present
age, so I hope he will exempt his present Holiness[80] from that note.
No common father of God’s church, from St Peter even to him, having
ever been more bountiful, in expending his revenues for the defence of
Christendom; or less interested, in respect of his relations, whom he
has neither greatened, nor so much as suffered to enter into the least
administration of the government.
But after all, what have these examples to do with this lady’s
conversion? Why, our author pretends, that these bad Popes, and their
ill proceedings, ought as reasonably to have hindered the Duchess from
entering into the Catholic church, as the like proceedings under Henry
the Eighth, Edward the Sixth, and Queen Elizabeth, might move her
Highness to leave the Protestant.
The subject in hand was the pretended Reformation: the Duchess observed
the scandalous and abominable effects of it;—that an inordinate lust was
one principal cause of the separation; that the Reformation itself was
begun by worldly interests in the Duke of Somerset, and carried on by the
ambition of Queen Elizabeth. Have the examples produced by our author
on the contrary side any thing to do with a Reformation? Suppose, in
the first place, that she had never read nor heard any of those things
concerning Pope Alexander, or the advancing of nephews by profusion of
the church treasure; the first is very possible, and she might interpret
candidly the latter. But make the worst of it; on the one side there
was only a male administration of a settled government, from which no
state, either spiritual or temporal, can always be exempt; on the other
side, here is a total subversion of the old church in England, and the
setting up a new; a changing of received doctrines, and the direction of
God’s holy spirit pretended for the change; so that she might reasonably
judge that the Holy Ghost had little to do with the practices of ill
popes, without thinking the worse of the established faith: but she
could never see a new one erected on the foundations of lust, sacrilege,
and usurpation, without great scruples whether the spirit of God were
assisting in those counsels.
As for his method of enquiry, “Whether there was not a sufficient cause
for the Reformation in the church? Whether the church of England had not
sufficient authority to reform itself?” and, “Whether the proceedings of
the Reformation were not justifiable by the rules of scripture and the
ancient church?” I may safely join issue with him upon all three points,
and conclude in the negative,—that there was no sufficient cause to
reform the church in matters of faith, because there neither were, nor
can be, any such errors embraced and owned by it. The church of England
has no authority of reforming herself, because the doctrine of Christ
cannot be reformed, nor a national synod lawfully make any definitions
in matters of faith, contrary to the judgment of the church universal
of the present age, shewn in her public liturgies; that judgment being
equivalent to that of a general council of the present age. And, for the
third point, the proceedings of the Reformation were not justifiable by
the rule of scripture, according to the right interpretation of it by the
fathers and councils, which are the true judges of it; nor, consequently,
by the rules of the ancient church. But Calvin’s excuse must be your
last refuge; _Nos discessionem a toto mundo facere coacti sumus_: “We are
compelled to forsake the communion, or to separate from all the churches
of the world.”
“These,” says our author, “she confesses, were but scruples.” According
to his mannerly way of arguing with the king, I might ask him, “These”
what? Does he mean—these scruples were but scruples? for the word _these_
begins a paragraph. But I am ashamed of playing the pedant, as he has
done. I suppose he means—these passages of Heylin only raised some
scruples in her, which occasioned her to examine the points in difference
by the holy scripture. “And now,” says he, “she was in the right way
of satisfaction, provided she made use of the best helps and means for
understanding it, and took in the assistance of her spiritual guides.”
That she did take in those guides, is manifest by her own papers, though
both of them (the more the pity) did but help to mislead her into the
enemy’s country; but then, for our comfort, neither of them were church
of England men, though they were both bishops, and one of them no less
than primate of all England.
And now, for a relishing bit before we rise, he has kept in store for us
the four points, which, about the midst of her paper, the Duchess told
us she found so easy in the scripture, that she wondered she had been so
long without finding them. He will needs fall into dispute with her about
them, though he knows beforehand that she will not dispute with him.
This is a kind of petition to her, that she will permit him to make that
difficult which she found easy; for every thing becomes hard by chopping
logic upon it. I am sure enough, that the wall before me is white, and
that I can go to it; but put me once upon unriddling sophisms, I shall
not be satisfied of what colour the wall is, nor how it is possible for
me to stir from the place in which I am. Alas! if people would be as much
in earnest as she was, and read the scriptures with the same disposition,
the same unprejudiced sincerity in their hearts, and docility in their
understanding, seeking to bend their judgments to what they find, not
what they find to their judgments, more, I believe, would find things as
easy as she did, and give the answerer more frequent occasion for his
derision of a willing mind.
But not to dilate on that matter, I presume he will not pretend, by his
disputing, to make any thing plainly appear against her; if he can, let
him do it, and end controversy in a moment; for every one can see plain
things, and all Christians must be concluded by the scripture. But he
knows well enough there is no such thing to be performed. A mist may be
raised, and interposed, through which the eye shall not discern what
otherwise it would, if nothing but the due medium were betwixt, and the
object before it. And that is all the fruit of this sort of disputation,
and all the assistance, for which the answerer was so earnest. Upon the
whole, his mortal quarrel to the Duchess is, that she would not become
an experiment of the perfection to which the art of learned obscurity is
improved in this our age; and the honour he has done to the church of
England is, that he has used her name to countenance the defamation of
a lady. I suspected whither he would bring it, when I saw that honour
pretended in the beginning of his pamphlet. If he thinks his bishops have
reflected a scandal on his church by their discourses with the Duchess,
he ought to have proceeded a more reasonable way than to insinuate, that
she forged them, without proving it. If she had been living, and he
had subscribed his name to so infamous a libel, he knows the English of
a _scandalum magnatum_; for an inuendo is considered in that case; and
three indirect insinuations will go as far in law towards the giving a
downright lie, as three foils will go towards a fall in wrestling.
To conclude: I leave it to the judgment of the impartial reader what
occasion our answerer has had for his song of triumph at the end of his
scurrilous saucy pamphlet. I have treated him as one single answerer,
though, properly speaking, his name is Legion;[81] but though the body
be possessed with many evil spirits, it is but one of them who talks.
Let him disguise his defeat by the ringing of his bells: it was an old
Dutch policy, when the Duke[82] had beaten them, to make bonfires;
for that kept the populace in heart. Our author knows he has all the
common people on his side, and they only read the gazettes of their own
writers; so that every thing which is called an answer, is with them a
confutation, and the Turk and Pope are their sworn enemies, ever since
Robin Wisdom[83] was inspired to join them together in a godly ballad. In
the mean time, the spirit of meekness and humble charity would become
our author better than his boasts for this imaginary victory, or his
reflection upon God’s anointed; but it is the less to be admired that
he is such a stranger to that spirit, because, among all the volumes of
divinity written by the Protestants, there is not one original treatise,
at least that I have seen or heard of, which has handled distinctly, and
by itself, that Christian virtue of humility.[84]
AN ANSWER TO THE DEFENCE OF THE THIRD PAPER.
I have now done as to matter of reason and argument:[85] the third
paper chiefly relates to matter of fact; which, if I were mistaken in,
even the brisk defender of it doth me that right to say, the bishop of
Winchester did mislead me: For “the whole body of my answer,” he saith,
“is in effect a transcript from the bishop’s preface; that I purloin his
arguments without altering sometime so much as the property of his words;
that I have quoted him five times only in the margin, and ought to have
quoted him in almost every leaf of my pamphlet; in short, if the master
had not eaten, the man (saving reverence) could not have vomited.” This
is a taste of the decency and cleanliness of his style, especially in
writing for princes and great ladies, who are not accustomed to such a
sort of courtship to others, in their presence; but, as coarse as the
compliment is, it clears me from being the author of any mistakes, and
lays the blame on the bishop, who is not able to answer for himself: yet,
as if I had been the sole contriver and inventor of all, he bestows those
civil and obliging epithets upon me, of “disingenuous, foul-mouthed,
and shuffling;” one of “a virulent genius, of spiteful diligence, and
irreverence to the royal family, of subtle calumny and sly aspersion;”
and he adds to these ornaments of speech, “that I have a cloven foot,
and my name is Legion;”[86] and that my answer is an “infamous libel, a
scurrilous saucy pamphlet.” Is this, indeed, the spirit of a new convert?
Is this the meekness and temper you intend to gain proselytes by, and
to convert the nation? He tells us in the beginning, that “truth has a
language peculiar to itself:” I desire to be informed, whether these be
any of the characters of it, and how the language of reproach and evil
speaking may be distinguished from it? But zeal in a new convert is a
terrible thing; for it not only burns, but rages like the eruptions
of Mount Ætna: it fills the air with noise and smoke, and throws out
such a torrent of liquid fire, that there is no standing before it. The
answerer alone was too mean a sacrifice for such a Hector in controversy:
all that standeth in his way must fall at his feet. He calls me Legion,
that he may be sure to have number enough to overcome. But he is a great
proficient indeed, if he be such an exorcist to cast out a whole legion
already. But he hopes it may be done “without fasting and prayer.”
If the people continue stedfast to their religion, they are the rabble,
and the only friends I can perceive he allows us. “My good friends the
rabble,” in one place, and in another, “our author knows he has all the
common people of his side.” What! nothing of honour, or dignity, or
wit, or sense, or learning, left of our side? Not so much as a poet,
unless it be Robin Wisdom. I pray, sir, when was it that all our friends
degenerated into the rabble? Do you think that heresy, as you call it,
doth _ipse facto_ degrade all mankind, and turn all orders of men, even
the House of Lords itself, to a mere rabble? If all the common people be
of our side, we have no reason to be troubled at it. But there is another
thing of our side which you like worse, and that is common sense, which
is more useful to the world than school divinity. But methinks he should
not be angry with the common people, when he takes such pains to prove,
“that the kingdom of heaven is not only for the wise and learned,”[87]
and that “our Saviour’s disciples were but poor fishermen; and we read
but of one of his apostles who was bred up at the feet of Gamaliel, and
that poor people have souls to save, as precious in the sight of God
as the grim logicians.” Would not any one take this for an apology for
the common people, rather than for the Duchess of York, whose wit and
understanding put her far beyond the need of such a mean defence? Could
she be vindicated in no other manner than by putting her into the rank of
the persons of the meanest capacities? But this is another part of the
decency of this defence. He had several pretty sayings, as he thought,
upon this subject; and therefore out they come, without regarding the
reflection implied in them on a person of her capacity, as well as
dignity. And so he goes on, in his plea for the ignorant, _i.e._ for the
common people, as I am resolved to understand it. “Must they be damned
unless they can make a regular approach to heaven in mood and figure? Is
there no entering there without a syllogism? or ergoteering it with a
_nego, concedo, et distinguo_?”[88] This may pass for wit and eloquence
among those I think he pleads for; and so I am content to let it go,
for the sake of my friends, the common people. But this is somewhat an
unusual way of defending, to plead for those he professes to despise, and
in such a manner as to reproach the person he undertakes to defend.
From the common people we come to churchmen, to see how he uses them.
And he hath soon found out a faction among them, whom he charges
with “juggling designs;”[89] but romantic heroes must be allowed to
make armies of a field of thistles, and to encounter wind-mills for
giants. He would fain be the instrument to divide our clergy, and to
fill them with suspicions of one another; and to this end he talks of
men of a “latitudinarian stamp:” For it goes a great way towards the
making divisions, to be able to fasten a name of distinction among
brethren,—this being to create jealousies of each other. But there is
nothing should make them more careful to avoid such names of distinction,
than to observe how ready their common enemies are to make use of them,
to create animosities by them; which hath made this worthy gentleman to
start this different character of churchmen among us, as though there
were any who were not true to the principles of the church of England,
as by law established. If he knows them, he is better acquainted with
them than the answerer is, for he professes to know none such. But who
then are these men of the “latitudinarian stamp?” To speak in his own
language, they are a sort of “ergoteerers, who are for a _concedo_ rather
than a _nego_.” And now I hope they are well explained: Or, in other
words of his, “they are,” saith he, “for drawing the nonconformists to
their party,” _i.e._ they are for having no nonconformists. And is this
their crime? “But they would take the headship of the church out of the
king’s hands.” How is that possible? They would (by his own description)
be glad to see differences lessened, and all that agree in the same
doctrine to be one entire body. But this is that which their enemies
fear, and this politician hath too much discovered; for then such a party
would be wanting, which might be played upon the church of England, or
be brought to join with others against it. But how this should touch the
king’s supremacy, I cannot imagine. As for his desiring loyal subjects to
consider this matter, I hope they will, and the more for his desiring it;
and assure themselves, that they have no cause to apprehend “any juggling
designs of their brethren,” who, I hope, will always show themselves to
be loyal subjects, and dutiful sons of the church of England.
The next he falls upon, is the worthy answerer of the bishop of Condom’s
exposition, and him he charges “with picking up stories against him, and
wrapping them up with little circumstances.”[90] How many fields doth
he range for game, to find matter to fill up an answer, and make it
look big enough to be considered? But that author hath so well acquitted
himself in his defence, as to all the little objections made against him,
that I can do the reader no greater kindness than to refer him to it.
I must not say, the _poor_ bishop of Winchester is used unmercifully by
him, for he calls him “that prelate of rich memory;”[91] as though, like
some popes, he had been considerable for nothing but for leaving a rich
nephew. But as he was a person of known loyalty, piety, and learning, so
he was of great charity, and a public spirit, which he showed, both in
his lifetime, and at his death. Could nothing be said of him, then, but
“that prelate of rich memory?” or, had he a mind to tell us he was no
poet? or, that he was out of the temptation of changing his religion for
bread?
The bishop of Worcester is charged with downright prevarication,
_i.e._ being in his heart for the church of Rome, but for mean reasons
continuing in the communion of the church of England. “Therefore,”
saith he, “take him, Topham; and now what can I do more for the poor
bishop?”[92] The most he will allow him is, “that he was a peaceable old
gentleman, who only desired to possess his conscience and his bishopric
in peace, without offence to any man, either of the Catholic church, or
that of England.” Yet he hath so much kindness left for the poor bishop,
that for his sake he goes about to defend, “that a man may be a true
member of the church of England, who asserts both churches to be so far
parts of the Catholic church, that there is no necessity of going from
one church to another to be saved.”[93]
This is a very surprising argument from a new convert. Why might he not
then have continued still in the communion of this church, though he
might look on the church of Rome as part of the Catholic church? The
reason I gave against it was, that every true member of this church must
own the doctrine of it contained in the Articles and Homilies, which
charge the church of Rome with such errors and unlawful practices, as no
man who believes them to be such, can continue in the communion of that
church; and therefore he must believe a necessity of the forsaking of one
communion for the other; and that no true member of this church can, with
a good conscience, leave this church, and embrace the other.
Let us now see what a talent he hath at ergoteering: “If this be true,”
saith he, “then to be a member of the church of England, one must assert,
that either both churches are not parts of the Catholic, or that they
are so parts, that there is a necessity of going from one to another.”
He would be a strange member of the church of England, who should hold,
that both churches are not parts of the Catholic, for then he must deny
that parts are parts; for every true church is so far a part of the
Catholic church. Therefore, I say, he must hold, though it be in some
respects a part of the Catholic church, yet it may have so many errors
and corruptions mixed with it, as may make it necessary for salvation to
leave it. “The second,” he saith, “is nonsense.” How nonsense? He doth
well to hope, that men may be saved that do not understand controversy,
nor approach heaven in mood and figure. “A necessity of a change,” saith
he, “consists not with their being parts, for parts constitute one whole,
and leave not one and another to go to or from.” We are not speaking of
the parts leaving one another, but of a person leaving one part to go to
another. Suppose a pestilential disease rage in one part of the city,
and not in another, may it not be necessary to leave one part, and go
to the other, though they are both parts of the same city, and do not
remove from one to the other? But he saith, with great assurance, “that
necessity of change makes it absolutely impossible for both churches to
be parts of the Catholic,” which plainly shews he never understood the
terms of communion with both churches; for no church in the world can lay
an obligation upon a man to be dishonest, _i.e._ to profess one thing,
and to do another, which is dissimulation and hypocrisy; and no church
can oblige a man to believe what is false, or to do what is unlawful; and
rather than do either, he must forsake the communion of that church.
Thus I have given a sufficient taste of the spirit and reasoning of this
gentleman.
As to the main design of the third paper, I declared that I considered
it, as it was supposed, to contain the reasons and motives of the
conversion of so great a lady to the church of Rome.
But this gentleman hath now eased me of the necessity of further
considering it on that account: for he declares, “that none of those
motives or reasons are to be found in the paper of her Highness,”[94]
which he repeats several times. “She writ this paper, not as to the
reasons she had herself for changing, &c. As for the reasons of it, they
were only betwixt God and her own soul, and the priest with whom she
spoke at last.”[95]
And so my work is at an end as to her paper; for I never intended to
ransack the private papers, or secret narratives, of great persons; and
I do not in the least question the relation now given, from so great
authority as that he mentions, of the passages concerning her; and
therefore I have nothing more to say as to what relates to the person of
the Duchess.
But I shall take notice of what this defender saith, which reflects on
the honour of the church of England.
(1.) “The pillars of the church established by law,” saith he, “are to
be found but broken staffs by their own concessions.”[96] What! is the
church of England _felo de se_? But how, I pray: “for after all their
undertaking to heal a wounded conscience, they leave their proselytes
finally to the scripture; as our physicians when they have emptied the
pockets of their patients, without curing them, send them at last to
Tunbridge waters, or the air of Montpellier.” As though the scripture
were looked on by us as a mere help at a dead lift, when we have nothing
to say. One would think he had never read the Articles of the church of
England; for there he might have seen, that the scripture is made the
rule and ground of our faith. And, I pray, whither should any persons be
directed under trouble of mind, but to the word of God? Can any thing
else give real satisfaction? Must they go to an infallible church? But
whence should they know it to be infallible, but from the scriptures? So
that on all hands persons must go to the scriptures, if they will have
satisfaction. But this gentleman talks like a mere novice as to matters
of faith, as though believing were a new thing to him, and he did not
yet know that true faith must be grounded on divine revelation, which
the pillars of our church have always asserted to be contained only in
the scripture; and therefore whither can they send persons but to the
scripture? But it seems he is got no farther than the collier’s faith; he
believes as the church believes, and the church believes as he believes,
and by this he hopes to be too hard for “a legion of devils.”
(2.) He saith, “we are reformed from the virtues of good living,”[97]
_i.e._ from the devotions, mortifications, austerities, humility, and
charity, which are practised in Catholic countries, by the example and
precept of that lean, mortified apostle, St Martin Luther.
He knows we pretend not to canonize saints; and he may know, that a very
great man in the church of Rome once said, “that the new saints they
canonized would make one question the old ones.” We neither make a saint
nor an apostle of Martin Luther, and we know of no authority he ever
had in this church. Our church was reformed by itself, and neither by
Luther nor Calvin, whom he had mentioned as well as the other, but for
his lean and mortified aspect. But after all, Luther was as lean and
mortified an apostle as Bishop Bonner; but a man of far greater worth,
and fit for the work he undertook, being of an undaunted spirit. What a
strange sort of calumny is this to upbraid our church, as if it followed
the example and precept of Martin Luther? He knows how very easy it is
for us to retort such things with mighty advantage; when for more than
an age together that church was governed by such dissolute and profane
heads of the church, that it is a shame to mention them; and all this by
the confession of their own writers. But as to Luther’s person, if his
crimes were his corpulency, what became of all the fat abbots and monks?
“But they were no apostles, or reformers:” I easily grant it; but must
God choose instruments, as some do horses, by their fatness to run races.
As to Luther’s conversation, it is justified by those who best knew him,
and are persons of undoubted reputation; I mean, Erasmus, Melancthon, and
Camerarius. And as to matters in dispute, if he acted according to his
principles, his fault lay in his opinions, and not in acting according to
them.
But whether our church follow Luther or not, it is objected, “that we
have reformed away the virtues of good living.” God forbid; but I dare
not think there is any church in the world, where the necessity of good
living is more earnestly pressed: but I confess, we of the church of
England do think, the examples and precepts of Christ, and his apostles,
are to be our rules for the virtues of good living; and, according
to them, I doubt not, but there are as great examples of devotion,
mortification, humility, and charity, as in any place whatsoever. But I
am afraid this gentleman’s acquaintance did not lie much that way, nor
doth he seem to be a very competent judge of the ways of good living, if
he did not know how to distinguish between outward appearances and true
Christian virtues. And, according to his way of judging, the disciples
of the Pharisees did very much outdo those of our blessed Saviour, as
appears by a book we esteem very much, called the New Testament: but
if I mention it to him, I am afraid he should think I am “like the
physicians, who send their patients to Tunbridge wells, or the air of
Montpellier.”
(3.) “That two of our bishops, whereof one was primate of all England,
renounced and condemned two of the established articles of our church.”
But what two articles were these? It seems “they wished we had kept
confession, which, no doubt, was commanded of God, and praying for the
dead, which was one of the ancient things of Christianity.” But which of
our thirty-nine articles did they renounce hereby? I think I have read
and considered them, as much as this gentleman, and I can find no such
articles against confession, and praying for the dead. Our church, as
appears by the office of the visitation of the sick, doth not disallow
of confession in particular cases; but the necessity of it, in order
to forgiveness, in all cases: And if any bishop asserted this, then
he exceeded the doctrine of our church, but he renounced no article
of it. As to the other point, we have an article against the Romish
doctrine of purgatory, article 22d, but not a word concerning praying
for the dead, without respect to it: But he, out of his great skill in
controversy, believes, that prayer for the dead, and the Romish doctrine
of purgatory, are the same; whereas, this relates to the deliverance of
souls out of purgatory, by the suffrages of the living, which makes all
the gainful trade of masses for the dead, &c; but the other related to
the day of judgment, as is known to all who are versed in the writings
of the ancient church. But this our church wisely passes over, neither
condemning it, because so ancient, nor approving it because not grounded
on scripture, and therefore not necessary to be observed.
(4.) But his great spite is at the reformation of this church, “which,”
he saith, “was erected on the foundation of lust, sacrilege, and
usurpation: and that no paint is capable of making lovely the hideous
face of the pretended Reformation.”
These are severe sayings, and might be requited with sharper, if such
hard words and blustering expressions had any good effect on mankind: But
instead thereof, I shall gently wipe off the dirt he hath thrown in the
face of our church, that it may appear in its proper colours.
And now this gentleman sets himself to ergoteering, and looks and talks
like any “grim logician, of the causes which produced it, and the effects
which it produced. The schism led the way to the Reformation, for
breaking the unity of Christ’s church, which was the foundation of it;
but the immediate cause of this, which produced the separation of Henry
VIII. from the church of Rome, was the refusal of the Pope to grant him a
divorce from his first wife, and to gratify his desires in a dispensation
for a second marriage.”
Ergo, the first cause of the Reformation was “the satisfying an
inordinate and brutal passion.” But is he sure of this? If he be not, it
is a horrible calumny upon our church, upon King Henry VIII., and the
whole nation, as I shall presently show. No, he confesses he cannot be
sure of it: for, saith he, “no man can carry it so high as the original
cause with any certainty:” and at the same time, he undertakes to
demonstrate, “the immediate cause to be Henry the Eighth’s inordinate
and brutal passion:” And afterwards affirms, as confidently as if he had
demonstrated it, that “our Reformation was erected on the foundations of
lust, sacrilege, and usurpation. Yet,” saith he, “the king only knew
whether it was conscience or love, or love alone, which moved him to
sue for a divorce.”[98] Then, by his favour, the king only could know
what was the immediate cause of that which he calls the schism. Well!
but he offers at some probabilities, that lust was the true cause. Is
ergoteering come to this already? “But this we may say, if conscience
had any part in it, she had taken a long nap of almost twenty years
together before she awakened.” Doth he think that conscience doth not
take a longer nap than this in some men, and yet they pretend to have it
truly awakened at last? What thinks he of late converts? Cannot they be
true, because conscience hath slept so long in them? Must we conclude
in such cases, that “some inordinate passion gives conscience a jog at
last? so that it cannot be denied,” he saith, “that an inordinate and
brutal passion had a great share, at least, in the production of the
schism.” How, cannot be denied! I say, from his own words, it ought to be
denied; for he confesses “none could know but the king himself;” he never
pretends that the king confessed it; how then cannot it be denied? yea,
how dare any one affirm it? especially when the king himself declared,
in a solemn assembly, in these words, saith Hall, (as near, saith he,
as I could carry them away,) speaking of the dissatisfaction of his
conscience—“For this only cause, I protest before God, and in the word of
a prince, I have asked counsel of the greatest clerks in Christendom; and
for this cause I have sent for this legate, as a man indifferent, only to
know the truth, and to settle my conscience, and for none other cause,
as God can judge.” And both then, and afterwards, he declared, that his
scruples began upon the French ambassador’s making a question about the
legitimacy of the marriage, when the match was proposed between the Duke
of Orleans and his daughter; and he affirms, that he moved it himself in
confession to the bishop of Lincoln, and appeals to him concerning the
truth of it in open court. Sanders[99] himself doth not deny, that the
French ambassador (whom he calls the bishop of Tarbe, afterwards Cardinal
Grammont; others say it was Anthony Vesey, one of the presidents of the
parliament of Paris) did start this difficulty in the debate about this
marriage of the king’s daughter; and he makes a set speech for him,
wherein he saith, “that the king’s marriage had an ill report abroad;”
but then he adds, “that this was done by the king’s appointment, and that
Cardinal Wolsey put him upon it;” but he produces no manner of proofs
concerning it, but only, “that it was so believed by the people at that
time, who cursed the French ambassador.” As though the suspicions of the
people were of greater authority than the solemn protestation of the king
himself.
But I think it may be demonstrated, as far as such things are capable
of it, from Sanders his own story, that the king’s first scruples, or
the jogging of his conscience, as our author styles it, could not come
from an inordinate passion to Ann Bolleyn; for he makes Cardinal Wolsey
the chief instrument in the intrigue. Let us then see what accounts he
gives of his motives to undertake it: he not only takes notice of the
great discontent he took at the emperor Charles V., the queen’s nephew,
but how studious he was upon the first intimation of the king’s scruples,
to recommend to him the Duchess of Alençon, the King of France’s sister;
and that, when there were none present but the king, Wolsey, and the
confessor. Afterwards Wolsey was sent on a very splendid embassy into
France, and had secret instructions to carry on the match with the King
of France’s sister. But when he was at Calais, he received orders from
the king to manage other matters as he was appointed, but not to say a
word of that match. “At which,” saith Sanders,[100] “he was in a mighty
rage, because he carried on the divorce for nothing more than to oblige
the most Christian king wholly to himself by this marriage.” How could
this be, if from the beginning of his scruples he knew the king designed
to marry Ann Bolleyn? But Sanders thinks to come off with saying, “that
Wolsey knew of the king’s love, but he thought he designed her only for
his concubine.” But this is plainly to contradict himself; for before
he said,[101] “that Wolsey knew from the beginning whom he intended to
marry.” Besides, what reason could there be, if the king had only a
design to corrupt her, that he should put himself and the world to so
much trouble to sue out a divorce? for the divorce was the main thing
aimed at in all the negociations at Rome; other applications had been
more proper, if his design was only upon having her for a concubine;
“but she would not be corrupted.” If this were the reason, he must
again contradict himself, for he makes her a lewd vicious woman. And it
doth not seem so probable, if she had been such a person as he describes
her, that she would have put the king to so much trouble, and such a
tedious method of proceeding, by so many forms of law. But again, Sanders
saith,[102] “when she returned from France, and was at court, she found
out what Wolsey designed;” which makes it evident, by Sanders his own
words, that the design of the divorce was before the thoughts of Ann
Bolleyn: and it seems very probable, that Cardinal Wolsey might carry
on a public design by it, to draw the king off from the emperor, and to
unite him with France. And the Pope at that time being highly displeased
with the Emperor, he might think it no difficult thing to procure a
dispensation, the King of France’s interest being joined with our
king’s. Some have written, “that the Pope himself was in this intrigue
at first;”[103] but seeing no proof of it, I dare not affirm it: It is
sufficient for my purpose, that the first design was laid quite another
way. I confess afterwards, when Wolsey, upon his return from France,
saw how things were like to go, he struck in with the king’s humour, as
appears by the letters of Ann Bolleyn to him; but yet carried himself
so coldly afterwards in the matter of the divorce, that it proved one
occasion of his fall. Thuanus, being an historian of great judgment, saw
the inconsistencies of Sanders his relations; and therefore concludes,
that Wolsey was surprised with the business of Ann Bolleyn, after he went
into France, having notice sent him by his friends; and that Wolsey
wholly aimed at the French match. Mezeray saith, “the cardinal could
not foresee the love of Ann Bolleyn, but his design was to be revenged
on the emperor;” and he questions whether the king were smitten with
her, till Wolsey was sent into France; when the king so unexpectedly
forbade him to proceed in that match, _cum summo eras dolore_, as Sanders
confesses.[104] From all this we see plainly, that since Sanders makes
Cardinal Wolsey the great contriver and manager of this business, the
immediate cause of the schism could not be the love of Ann Bolleyn.
But we have other kind of proofs concerning this matter, besides Sanders
his inconsistencies; and those shall be from some of the greatest and
most active men of that time, and some remarkable circumstances.
The first is a person of unquestionable integrity, and accounted a
martyr for his conscience at that time, I mean Sir Thomas More, then
lord chancellor; who, after he had delivered to the House of Commons
the original papers of the universities in favour of the divorce, he
then said, “that all men should clearly perceive, that the king hath not
attempted this matter of will and pleasure, as strangers say, but only
for the discharge of his conscience, and the security of the succession
to the crown.” Which was a reason alleged by the king himself, and seems
to have been built on the grounds which Charles V. assigned for breaking
his oath, which he made to marry the Lady Mary, by the first article of
the treaty at Windsor. Lord Herbert owns,[105] that the emperor, to avoid
the force of this treaty, had alleged something against the marriage
between the king and his aunt. But another author, who lived much
nearer the time, doth affirm,[106] “that, when the match was debated in
the Spanish council, it was then said, that although the match between
the king and his brother’s relict were not yet disputed, yet, if the
king should die without issue male, rather than the kingdom should
pass to foreigners, the English nation would dispute the validity of
the marriage;” and to confirm this, in Sir Henry Spelman’s Manuscript
Register of the proceedings of the Legatine Court about the divorce,
subscribed by the three notaries there present, the witnesses deposed,
“that at the time of the marriage, the people said commonly, that it was
unfit one brother should marry the other brother’s wife.” And archbishop
Warham, then upon oath, declared, “that he told King Henry VII., that the
marriage seemed to him neither honourable nor well pleasing to God;” and
he confesses the people then murmured at it, but that the murmuring was
quieted by the Pope’s dispensation: So that all the satisfaction that
was given about it, arose from the Pope’s extraordinary dispensing power
with the laws of God, which was a thing vehemently opposed by many in the
church of Rome; and the university of Bononia itself afterwards declared,
“that the match was abominable, and that the Pope himself could not
dispense with it;” and this they say was “after they had read Cardinal
Cajetan’s defence of the marriage.” The like was done by the university
of Padua, besides many others which I shall not mention, and are easily
to be seen.
So that the succession to the crown by this match must depend upon an
extravagant power in the Pope, which the Roman church itself never
owned, and the wisest statesmen thought by no means fit to depend upon.
The notice of this debate in the Spanish council being sent over to
Cardinal Wolsey, seems to have been the first occasion taken of starting
the question about the lawfulness of the king’s marriage; which Wolsey,
out of a private grudge to the Emperor, as well as for other reasons, was
not wanting to carry on till he saw which way it was like to end. And the
Pope himself was willing enough to grant the bull for the divorce, till
he made a secret peace with the Emperor; and it is easy to see, that the
Pope went forwards and backwards in the whole affair, merely as politic
considerations moved him; which being fully known to so discerning a
prince as Henry VIII., it gave him just occasion to question, whether
that authority were so divine as was pretended, which, in so great a
matter, did not govern itself by any rule of conscience, but by political
measures.
One remarkable circumstance in this matter ought not to be omitted, viz.
that the king’s agent at Rome sent him word, “that the Pope’s advice was,
that if the king’s conscience were satisfied, he should presently marry
another wife, and then prosecute the suit; and that this was the only way
for the king to attain his desires;”[107] but the king refused to do it.
And when Cardinal Wolsey sent a message to the king to the same purpose,
the king replied, “if the bull be naught, let it be so declared; and if
it be good, it shall never be broken by any by-ways for me.” And when he
objected the tediousness of the suit, he answered, “since he had patience
eighteen years, he would stay yet four or five more, since the opinion
of all the clerks of his kingdom (besides two) were lately declared for
him;” adding, “that he had studied the matter himself, and writers of it,
and that he found it was unlawful _de jure divino_, and undispensible.”
Thus we have found the king himself declaring, in public and private,
his real dissatisfaction in point of conscience; and that it was no
inordinate affection to Ann Bolleyn which put him upon it; and the same
attested by Sir Thomas More, and the circumstances of affairs. I now
proceed to another witness.
The next is Bishop Bonner himself, in his preface to Gardiner’s book
of “True Obedience;” for thus he begins: “Forasmuch as there be some
doubtless now at this present, which think the controversy between
the king’s royal majesty and the bishop of Rome, consisteth in this
point, for that his majesty hath taken the most excellent and most
noble lady Ann to his wife; whereas in very deed, notwithstanding the
matter is far otherwise, and nothing so.” So that, if Bishop Bonner may
be believed, there was no such immediate cause of the schism, as the
love to Ann Bolleyn. And withal he adds, “that this book was published,
that the world might understand what was the whole voice and resolute
determination of the best and greatest learned bishops, with all the
nobles and commons of England, not only in the cause of matrimony, but
also in defending the gospel’s doctrine, _i.e._ against the Pope’s
usurped authority over the church.” Again he saith, “that the king’s
marriage was made by the ripe judgment, authority, and privilege, of the
most and principal universities of the world; and then with the consent
of the whole church of England; and that the false pretended supremacy
of the bishop of Rome was most justly abrogated: and that if there were
no other cause but this marriage, the bishop of Rome would content
himself, _i.e._ if he might enjoy his power and revenues still, which,”
he saith, “were so insupportable, that there lay the true cause of the
breach: For his revenues here were near as great as the king’s; and his
tyranny was cruel and bitter, which he had exercised here under the title
of the Catholic church, and the authority of the apostles Peter and Paul,
when notwithstanding he was a very ravening wolf, dressed in sheep’s
cloathing, calling himself the servant of servants.” These are Bonner’s
words, as I have transcribed them out of two several translations,
whereof one was published while he was bishop of London.
Stephen Gardiner, bishop of Winchester, in his book, not only affirms
the king’s former marriage to be unlawful, and the second to be just
and lawful, but that he had the consent of the nation, and the judgment
of his church, as well as foreign learned men for it; and afterwards
he strenuously argues against the Pope’s authority here, as a mere
usurpation. And the whole clergy not only then owned the king’s
supremacy, (Fisher excepted,) but in the book published by authority,
called “A Necessary Doctrine and Erudition of a Christian Man,” &c., the
Pope’s authority was rejected as an usurpation, and confuted by Scripture
and antiquity. King James I. declares, “that there was a general and
catholic conclusion of the whole church of England in this case;” and
when some persons suspected, that it all came from the king’s marriage,
Bishop Bonner, we see, undertakes to assure the world it was no such
thing.[108]
The separation was made, then, by a general consent of the nation; the
king, and church, and people all concurring: and the reasons inducing
them to cast off the Pope’s usurpation were published to the world at
that time; and those reasons have no relation at all to the king’s
marriage: and if they are good, as they thought they were, and this
gentleman saith not a word to disprove them, then the foundation of the
disunion between the church of Rome and us, was not laid in the king’s
inordinate passion, but on just and sufficient reasons.
Thus it appears, that this gentleman hath by no means proved two parts of
his assertion, viz. “That our Reformation was erected on the foundations
of lust and usurpation.”
But our grim logician proceeds from immediate and original, to
concomitant causes; which, he saith, “were revenge, ambition, and
covetousness.”[109] But the skill of logicians used to lie in proving;
but this is not our author’s talent, for not a word is produced to
that purpose. If bold sayings, and confident declarations, will do the
business, he is never unprovided; but if you expect any reason from him,
he begs your pardon; he finds how ill the character of a grim logician
suits with his inclination. However, he takes a leap from causes to
effects; and here he tells us, “the immediate effects of this schism,
were sacrilege, and a bloody persecution, of such as denied the king’s
supremacy in matters wholly spiritual, which no layman, no king of Israel
ever exercised.”[110]
What the supremacy was, is best understood by the book published by
the king’s order, and drawn up by the bishops of that time. By which
it appears, that the main thing insisted on was, rejecting the Pope’s
authority; and as to the positive part, it lies in these things: 1. In
defending and protecting the church. 2. In overseeing the bishops and
priests in the execution of their office. 3. In reforming the church to
the old limits and pristine estate of that power which was given to them
by Christ, and used in the primitive church. “For it is out of doubt,”
saith that book, “that Christ’s faith was then most pure and firm, and
the Scriptures of God were then best understood, and virtue did then most
abound and excel; and therefore it must needs follow, that the customs
and ordinances then used and made, be more conform and agreeable unto the
true doctrine of Christ, and more conducing unto the edifying and benefit
of the church of Christ, than any custom or laws used or made by the
bishop of Rome, or any other addicted to that see and usurped power since
that time.”
This book was published with the king’s declaration before it; and
therefore we have reason to look on the supremacy to be taken as it is
there explained. And what is there now “so wholly spiritual, that no
layman, or king of Israel, ever exercised in this supremacy?” But this
writer never took the pains to search into these things, and therefore
talks so at random about them.
As to the persecutions that followed, it is well known that both sides
blame King Henry the Eighth for his severity; and therefore this
cannot be laid to the charge of his separation. For the other effect
of sacrilege, I do not see how this follows from the Reformation; for
although some uses might cease by the doctrines of it, as monks to pray
the dead out of purgatory; yet there were others to have employed the
church lands about, as some of them were in founding new bishoprics, &c.
And I have nothing to say in justification of any abuses committed that
way; only that the king and parliament could not discern the difference
between greater and lesser, as to the point of sacrilege; and since the
Pope had shewed them the way, by granting bulls for the dissolution of
the lesser monasteries, they thought, since the Pope’s power was taken
away, they might, with as little sacrilege, dissolve the rest. I will
shut up this with the words of archbishop Laud: “But if there have been
any wilful and gross errors, not so much in opinion as fact, (sacrilege
too often pretending to reform superstition,) that’s the crime of the
reformers, not of the Reformation, and they are long since gone to God to
answer it, to whom I leave them.”[111]
The method I proposed for satisfaction of conscience about the
Reformation, was to consider, whether there were not sufficient cause
for it? Whether there were not sufficient authority? And, whether the
proceedings of our Reformation were not justifiable by the rules of
scripture, and the ancient church? He tells me, “he may safely join issue
with me upon all three points, and conclude in the negative.” But upon
second thoughts, he finds he may much more safely let it alone: and very
fairly would have me take it for granted, “That the church of Rome cannot
err in matters of faith;” (for that he must mean by the church there,)
“and that our church hath no authority of reforming herself; and that our
proceedings were not justifiable, according to the right interpretation
of scriptures by the fathers and councils.” But if I will not allow his
affirmations for proofs, for his part he will act the grim logician no
longer; and in truth, it becomes him so ill, that he doth well to give
it over. When he will undertake to prove, that the church of Rome is
the one Catholic and infallible church of Christ, and answer what I
have produced in the former discourses, I will ease him of any farther
trouble; for then I will grant that our Reformation cannot be justified.
But till then, I shall think it no want of humility to conclude the
victory to be on our side. And I would desire him not to end with such
a bare-faced assertion of a thing so well known to be false, viz. “That
there is not one original treatise written by a Protestant, which hath
handled distinctly, and by itself, that Christian virtue of humility.”
Since within a few years, (besides what hath been printed formerly,) such
a book hath been published in London. But he doth well to bring it off
with, “at least that I have seen or heard of;” for such books have not
lain much in the way of his enquiries. Suppose we had not such particular
books, we think the Holy Scripture gives the best rules and examples of
humility of any book in the world; but I am afraid he should look on
his case as desperate, if I send him to the scripture, since he saith,
“Our divines do that, as physicians do with their patients whom they
think incurable, send them at last to Tunbridge-waters, or to the air of
Montpellier.”
FOOTNOTES:
[49] “Copies of Two Papers written by the late King Charles II., together
with a Copy of a Paper written by the late Duchess of York. Published by
his Majesty’s command. London, 1686.”
[50] His pamphlet is entitled, “An Answer to some Papers lately printed,
concerning the authority of the Catholic Church in matters of Faith, and
the Reformation of the Church of England. London, 1686.”—Stillingfleet
withheld his name.
[51] “I refer myself to the judgment of those who have read the answer
to the defence of the late king’s papers, and that of the duchess, _in
which last_ I was concerned, how charitably I have been represented
there.”—_Preface to the Hind and Panther_, Vol. X. p. 113, 114.
[52] See Vol. X. p. 203-208, and the notes there referred to.
[53] Morley, bishop of Winchester, who, as presently will be noticed,
was chaplain in the family of Sir Edward Hyde during the usurpation,
tells us, “that the duchess, (then Miss Hyde,) as she was the eldest,
so was she the forwardest, and most capable to receive instruction; for
God having given her an extraordinary good understanding for one of her
sex and years, so he had given her an extraordinary good inclination to
the exercises of piety and devotion; so that, when she was not, as I
remember, above twelve years of age, I did think her every way fit to be
admitted to the receiving the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper, which she
did then, and always afterwards, with very great devotion, so long as
she and I staid together in her father’s house at Antwerp.”—_Preface to
Bishop Morley’s Treatise_, p. vi.
[54] Morley says, that he continued to be the duchess’s spiritual
director “until after her father’s banishment; and all that time I must
bear her witness, that she was not only a zealous Protestant herself,
according as it is by law established in the church of England, but
zealous to make proselytes.”—_Preface as above_, p. xii.
[55] Dr Peter Heylin was born at Burford, in Oxfordshire, in 1600, and
rose high in the church, being one of the chaplains in ordinary to
Charles I. During the great civil war, he was reduced to distress, but
survived the Restoration, and died in 1662. In 1661, he published his
history of the Reformation, under the title of “_Ecclesia Restaurata_.”
[56] These were Sheldon and Morley. Sheldon was bishop of London, and was
promoted to the see of Canterbury on the death of the venerable Juxon.
Burnet describes him as generous and charitable, and extremely dexterous
in politics; but adds, that he only spoke of religion as an engine of
government, and _thus_ gained with the king the character of a wise and
honest clergyman. He was much blamed by the Low Church divines, for the
rigour with which he followed up the parliamentary deprivation, by which
two thousand divines, as was alleged, were ejected for non-conformity.
Blandford, successively bishop of Oxford and Worcester, was an able
and excellent divine, modest and humble, says Burnet, even to a fault.
Morley, bishop of Winchester, had recommended him to the duchess to
be her spiritual director in his stead, when he himself retired from
court in 1667: “And I made choice of him,” says that prelate, “not only
because, in regard of his learning, piety, gravity, and modesty, together
with the gentleness and sweetness of his address and conversation, he
was at least as fit as any I could think of for that employment, but in
regard of his former relation of chaplain to her father, to whom he owed
his rise in the church.”—_Preface to Bishop Morley’s Treatise_, p. xiv.
[57] Stillingfleet, being at this time dean of St Paul’s, stood in the
van of the controversy with the Papists. He had learning, penetration,
some power of language, without much nicety of expression, and, above
all, that intrepidity and undaunted resolution which the times required.
After the Revolution, he reaped the harvest of his labours in the
bishopric of Worcester. This eminent divine was born in 1635, and died
in 1699. The tract which follows, is the third part of his Answer to the
Papers published by James, respecting the conversion of his brother and
wife to the Roman Catholic faith.
[58] This prelate was Dr George Morley, who, during the time of the
usurpation, was domestic chaplain to Sir Edward Hyde, afterwards Lord
Clarendon; and educated his daughter, Anne Hyde, in the faith of the
church of England. See page 189. Upon the Restoration, Morley was made
successively bishop of Worcester and Winchester. “He was,” says Burnet,
“a pious, charitable man, of an exemplary life, but extremely passionate
and obstinate.” This prelate, who was deeply and justly afflicted with
the Duchess’s change of religion, vindicated himself from the suspicion
of having neglected his duty towards her, by publishing, in 1683, a
collection of tracts, with an apologetical preface already quoted, and a
letter which he had written to the Duchess in 1670-1, some months before
her death, upon hearing a rumour that she was shaken in her adherence to
the Protestant faith.
[59] Preface to his Treatise, p. 5.
[60] Letter to her Royal Highness, p. 3, 4.
[61] “And this I am the rather obliged to believe, because, the last time
I had any discourse with your Highness of things of this nature, you did
seriously affirm to me, that never any priest of the church of Rome had
ever been so bold as to enter into any discourse of religion with you.
Whereupon, when I humbly besought your Highness, that if any of them
should be so bold at any time afterwards, and you should think fit to
hear what they could say, either for their own church, or against ours;
your Highness would be pleased to command them to give it you in writing,
and that you would be pleased to show me, or my lord of Oxford, any such
papers, or paper, they should give you to consider of, and to reply to:
the which, because you were pleased to promise me you would do, and have
never as yet done, (not to me I am sure, nor to him either for aught I
know,) I cannot believe that any thing of that kind hath been as yet said
to you, at least, not so as to make any impression on you, and much less
to gain an absolute belief from you, that there is no salvation to be
had but in the church of Rome only, and consequently, that if ever you
mean to be saved, you must of necessity quit our communion, and embrace
theirs.”—_Letter to the Duchess_.
[62] Sheldon, and Blandford. The former, as already mentioned, was bishop
of London, and afterwards archbishop of Canterbury; the latter bishop of
Oxford, afterwards of Worcester.
[63] Blandford.
[64] The bishop of Winchester had only heard of this paper from
Maimbourg’s publication, “wherein,” says Morley, “he reciteth something,
which he saith was written by the late Duchess of York, to justify her
leaving the communion of the church of England, to embrace that of Rome.
But why should I say any more, or indeed so much as I have said of a
_non-ens_, or of what I believe never was in _rerum naturâ_; I mean such
a discourse, as is pretended to have been betwixt the Dutchess of York,
and two of the most learned bishops of England; I know no proof we have,
that there was ever any such thing, at least in print, or publicly known,
and avowed, but this attestation of Maimbourg the Jesuit, who I am sure
was neither eye nor ear witness of it, but must have it by hearsay only,
from others, who had it from others, that might be the devisers of it.”
[65] Heylin’s extreme animosity against the Puritans, hurries him into
the opposite extreme of favouring the Catholics. Nicolson has observed,
that he falls foul of all the princes of the time, without regard
to their good or ill wishes to the Protestant interest. _Historical
Library_, p. 98.—Burnet even charges him with delivering “many things
in such a manner, and so strangely, that one would think he had been
secretly set on to it by those of the church of Rome;” but adds, “I doubt
not he was a sincere Protestant, but violently carried away by some
particular conceits.”—_Burnet’s History of the Reformation_, Preface.
[66] The treatise alluded to, seems to be “An Exposition of the Doctrine
of the Church of England, in the several Articles proposed by the late
Bishop of Condom,” 4to, 1689. This was circulated by the Protestant
divines, in reply to “An Exposition of the Doctrine of the Catholic
Church in Matters of Controversy. By the Reverend James Benigne Bossuet,
Counsellor to the King, Bishop of Meaux, formerly of Condom. Done into
English,” &c. 4to, 1685.
[67] This alludes to a story of an Oxford divine, who imagined he had
utterly confounded the grand advocate of the Catholic church, by the
stout, though unsupported asseveration, “Bellarmine, thou liest!”
This egregious argument is alluded to in the Preface to “The Royal
Medal Vindicated;” and in another tract, entitled, “Letter to a Friend
concerning Dr Owen’s Principles,” 1670.
[68] Sir Henry Wotton, provost of Eton College, who died in 1639,
directed his grave-stone to be thus inscribed:
_Hic jacet hujus Sententiæ primus Author;
Disputandi Pruritus, Ecclesiæ Scabies,
Nomen Alias Quære._
Wotton’s biographer, honest Isaac Walton, seems to allow, that this
sentence, or something like it, was to be elsewhere found, and that Sir
Henry was not the first author of it. But he contends, that reason, mixed
with charity, must persuade all readers to believe that a holy lethargy
had surprised his memory when he assumed the merit of inventing it.
[69] Dr Seth Ward, an eminent mathematician.
[70] Sheldon and Blandford. _Vide Supra_, p. 198.
[71] Dr Blandford, at the time of the conference with the duchess of
York, was bishop of Oxford. Being afterwards translated to the diocese
of Worcester, he is elsewhere always in this tract called by the latter
title. He died bishop of Worcester in 1675.—MALONE.
[72] In allusion to the game of chess, where one of the two pieces,
called bishops, always moves on the white, and the other on the black
spaces of the chequer.
[73] From the French _rompre en visiere_; a phrase taken from tilting,
and used metaphorically for giving an open affront.
[74] During the parliamentary struggles of 1680, the Commons used
many arbitrary measures to support their authority, and especially
by summarily committing those who, having expressed by petition to
the king their abhorrence of addresses for calling a parliament, were
called _abhorrers_. “Scarce a day passed, but some _abhorrer_ was
dragged before them, and committed to the custody of the serjeant at
arms, at the pleasure of the House; and this strange despotism they
exercised with so much wantonness, as well as cruelty, that Mr Treby
was pleased to say, _they kept an hawk_, (meaning the said serjeant,)
_and they must every day find flesh for him_. And the quantity he was
this sessions gorged with, gave rise to this proverbial expression—_Take
him, Topham!_ [the name of the serjeant,] in all discourse of peremptory
commitment.”—_North’s Examen_, p. 561. These arbitrary commitments are
elsewhere censured by Dryden, particularly in the Postscript to the
History of the League.—See p. 179.
[75] _Nolo episcopare._
[76] Morley is anxious to vindicate himself from being one of the two
bishops consulted, for, in Maimbourg’s copy of the Duchesses paper,
they were not named. “Supposing,” said he, “there was such a conference
betwixt her Highness and two bishops of the church of England, and that
what they said to her did increase her desire to embrace the Roman
Catholic religion; yet what doth that concern you, (may some man say,)
as to your own particular? Are you one of the two of the most learned
bishops of the church of England? (for so it is said they were, to whom
the Duchess proposed her scruples,) No; I am not, I know I am not, I
am sure I am not; but yet (how unlearned, and how unworthy soever,) I
am a bishop, and a bishop of the church of England; and therefore as
he, to whom it was said, _Tantumne otii tibi à re tuâ est, aliena ut
cures?_ answered, _Homo sum, Humani nihil à me alienum puto_; so say I,
_Episcopus sum, et Episcopus Ecclesiæ Anglicanæ_, and therefore think
myself concerned in whatsoever was said in reproach of episcopacy;
especially in reproach of any of the bishops of our own church.”
[77] Probably her brothers, Clarendon and Rochester.
[78] Such was James’s account of the dying hours of his first wife.
Burnet gives a different statement, which may be here transcribed:—
“While things were in fermentation, the Duchess of York died. It was
observed, that for fifteen months before that time, she had not received
the sacrament; and that upon all occasions, she was excusing the errors
that the church of Rome was charged with, and was giving them the best
colours they were capable of. An unmarried clergy was also a common
topic with her. Morley had been her father confessor; for he told me,
she practised secret confession to him from the time that she was twelve
years old; and, when he was sent away from the court, he put her in the
hands of Blandford, who died bishop of Worcester. Morley also told me,
that upon the reports that were brought him of her slackness in receiving
the sacrament, she having been for many years punctual to once a month,
he had spoken plainly to her about it, and told her what inferences were
made upon it. She pretended ill health, and business; but protested to
him, she had no scruples with relation to her religion, and was still of
the church of England; and assured him, that no Popish priest had ever
taken the confidence to speak to her of those matters. He took a solemn
engagement of her, that if scruples should arise in her mind, she would
let him know them, and hear what he should offer to her upon all of them.
And he protested to me, that to her death she never owned to him that
she had any scruples, though she was for some days entertained by him
at Farnham, after the date of the paper, which was afterwards published
in her name. All this passed between the bishop and me, upon the duke’s
shewing me that paper, all writ in her own hand, which was afterwards
published by Maimbourg. He would not let me take a copy of it; but he
gave me leave to read it twice. And I went immediately to Morley, and
gave him an account of it; from whom I had all the particulars already
mentioned. And upon that he concluded, that that unhappy princess had
been prevailed on to give falsehoods under her hand, and to pretend that
these were the grounds of her conversion. A long decay of health came at
last to a quicker crisis than had been apprehended. All of the sudden
she fell into the agony of death. Blandford was sent for, to prepare her
for it, and to offer her the sacrament. Before he could come, the queen
came in, and sat by her. He was modest and humble, even to a fault. So
he had not presence of mind enough to begin prayers, which probably
would have driven the queen out of the room. But, that not being done,
she pretending kindness, would not leave her. The bishop spoke but
little, and fearfully. He happened to say, he hoped she continued still
in the truth: Upon which she asked, what is truth; and then, her agony
encreasing, she repeated the word truth, truth, often; and in a few
minutes after she died, very little beloved, or lamented. Her haughtiness
had raised her many enemies. She was indeed a firm and a kind friend:
But the change of her religion made her friends reckon her death rather
a blessing than a loss at that time to them all. Her father, when he
heard of her shaking in her religion, was more troubled at it, than at
all his own misfortunes. He writ her a very grave and long letter upon
it, enclosed in one to the duke. But she was dead before it came into
England.”—_Burnet’s History of his own Times_, Book II.
[79] History of Henry VIII. p. 402, according to Dryden. I cannot find
the passage alluded to.
[80] Clement the Tenth.
[81] The church of England Divines made a common cause at this important
crisis. Those who directed the warfare, were Tillotson, Stillingfleet,
Tennison, and Patrick; and under their banners, Burnet numbers Sherlock,
Williams, Claget, Gee, Aldrich, Atterbury, Whitby, Hooper, and Wake. It
is probable, that when a piece of such consequence as the Answer to the
Royal Papers was to be brought forward, more than one of these would be
employed in revising, at least, and correcting it.
[82] The Duke of York, who commanded the fleet in the Dutch wars.
[83] Robert Wisdom was a fugitive in the reign of Queen Mary; in that of
Elizabeth, he became rector of Stysted in Essex, and of Settrington in
Yorkshire, and died in 1568. He was a zealous puritan, and the author of
a hymn, printed at the end of Sternhold’s psalms, which begins with the
passage referred to in the text:
Preserve us, Lord, by thy dear word;
From Turk and Pope defend us, Lord.
The witty Bishop Corbet thus addresses the ghost of Robert Wisdom:
Thou, once a body, now but aire,
Arch-botcher of a psalme or prayer,
From Carfax come;
And patch me up a zealous lay,
With an old _ever and for aye_,
Or _all and some_.
Or such a spirit lend mee,
As may a hymne down send mee,
To purge my braine.
So, Robert, look behind thee,
Least _Turk or Pope_ do find thee,
And goe to bed againe.
[84] This assertion Stillingfleet denied. See the conclusion of his
Answer to the Defence, where he affirms “such a book had been lately
published in London.” To this Dryden replied, that “the magnified piece
of Duncombe on this subject, which his opponent must have meant, was
stolen, or translated, without acknowledgment, from the Spanish of
Rodriguez;” meaning, probably, the Jesuit Alonso Rodriguez, who wrote
“_Exercio de perfecion y Virtudes Christianas, Sevilla, 1609_.” But while
Dryden claimed for the Catholic church the merit of this work, he seems
to have mistaken the name of the translator; for in the preface to the
“Town and Country Mouse,” Prior, or Montague, upbraid him with having
confounded _Allen_ with _Duncombe_; names which did not so much as rhyme.
In a list of books subjoined to “The Practice of a Holy Life, by Thomas
Allen, rector of Kettering, in Northamptonshire,” I find “The Virtue of
Humility, recommended to be printed by the late Reverend and Learned Dr
Henry Hammond,” which may be the book alluded to by Stillingfleet. See
Vol. X. pages 114. 249.
[85] Hitherto Stillingfleet had been encountering the person who defended
the two papers which were found in the king’s strong box, with which part
of the controversy Dryden had nothing to do.
[86] Defence, p. 250.
[87] Defence, p. 219.
[88] Defence, p. 217.
[89] Ibid. p. 210.
[90] Defence, p. 211.
[91] Defence, p. 220.
[92] Ibid. p. 232.
[93] Defence, p. 232.
[94] Defence, p. 212.
[95] Defence, p. 213.
[96] Ibid, p. 217, 218.
[97] Defence, p. 222.
[98] Defence, p. 242.
[99] Nicholas Sanders, some time regius professor of the canon law at
Oxford. Upon the Reformation, he fled to Rome, where he was long a
retainer of Cardinal Hosius. At last Gregory XIII. sent him as Nuncio
into Ireland, where he died in 1580. His work here alluded to, is a
history of the Reformation, under the opprobrious title _De Origine et
Progressu Schismatis Anglicani_. Stillingfleet refers to the passage, l.
i. p. 11.
[100] Page 15.
[101] Page 10.
[102] Page 18.
[103] Acworth. c. Sander. l. 2. c. 14, 17.
[104] Page 22.
[105] History of Hen. VIII. p. 216.
[106] _Servi Fidelis Responsio, &c._
[107] Lord Herbert, p. 219.
[108] Apology for the Oath of Allegiance.
[109] Defence, p. 243.
[110] Ibid.
[111] Conference, § 24. p. 156.
THE
ART OF PAINTING;
BY
C. A. DU FRESNOY.
WITH REMARKS.
TRANSLATED INTO ENGLISH;
WITH AN ORIGINAL PREFACE, CONTAINING
A PARALLEL BETWEEN PAINTING AND POETRY.
FIRST PRINTED IN QUARTO IN 1695.
ART OF PAINTING, &c.
Charles Alphonse Du Fresnoy, as we learn from his life by Mason, was
born in Paris in the year 1611. He studied the art of painting in Rome
and Venice, and afterwards practised it in France with great reputation.
Meanwhile, he did not neglect the sister pursuit of poetry; and combining
it with the studies of an artist, he composed his poem on the Art of
Painting. It did not appear till after the author’s death, in 1658, when
it was published with the French version, and remarks of De Piles. The
first edition was printed in 1661. This poem, as containing, in elegant
and perspicuous language, the most just rules for artists and amateurs,
has been always held in esteem by the admirers of the art which it
professes to teach.
The version of Dryden first appeared in 4to, in 1695, and was republished
by Richard Graham in 1716, by whom it is inscribed to Lord Burlington.
The editor of 1716, informs us, that Mr Jervas had undertaken to correct
such passages of the translation as Dryden had erred in by following, too
closely, the French version of De Piles. To Graham’s edition is prefixed
the epistle from Pope to Jervas, with Dryden’s version; an honourable
and beautiful testimony from the living to the dead poet, which I have
retained with pleasure, as also the epistle from Mason to Sir Joshua
Reynolds, which contains some remarks on Dryden’s version.
The late Mr Mason, as a juvenile exercise, executed a poetical version of
Fresnoy’s poem, which has had the honour to be admitted into the works of
Sir Joshua Reynolds, vol. iii. and might have superseded the necessity of
here reprinting the prose of Dryden. But there is something so singular
in a great poet undertaking to render into prose the admired poem of a
foreign bard, that, as a specimen of such an uncommon task, as well as on
account of its brevity, I have retained this translation.
Being no judge of the art to which the poem refers, I follow the readings
of Jervas, as published by Graham in 1716.
Mason has retained the Parallel between Painting and Poetry, in his
edition of Fresnoy, with the following note:
“It was thought proper to insert in this place the pleasing preface,
which Mr Dryden printed before his translation of M. Du Fresnoy’s poem.
There is a charm in that great writer’s prose, peculiar to itself; and
though, perhaps, the parallel between the two arts, which he has here
drawn, be too superficial to stand the test of strict criticism, yet it
will always give pleasure to readers of taste, even when it fails to
satisfy their judgment.”
TO MR JERVAS, WITH FRESNOY’S ART OF PAINTING, TRANSLATED BY MR DRYDEN.
This verse be thine, my friend; nor thou refuse
This from no venal or ungrateful muse.
Whether thy hand strike out some free design,
Where life awakes, and dawns at every line;
Or blend in beauteous tints the coloured mass,
And from the canvas call the mimic face;
Read these instructive leaves, in which conspire
Fresnoy’s close art, and Dryden’s native fire;
And reading wish, like theirs, our fate and fame,
So mixed our studies, and so joined our name;
Like them to shine through long succeeding age,
So just thy skill, so regular my rage.
Smit with the love of sister-arts we came,
And met congenial, mingling flame with flame;
Like friendly colours found our arts unite,
And each from each contract new strength and light.
How oft in pleasing tasks we wear the day,
While summer suns roll unperceived away?
How oft our slowly growing works impart,
While images reflect from art to art?
How oft review; each finding like a friend
Something to blame, and something to commend?
What flattering scenes our wandering fancy wrought,
Rome’s pompous glories rising to our thought!
Together o’er the Alps methinks we fly,
Fired with ideas of fair Italy.
With thee, on Raphael’s monument I mourn,
Or wait inspiring dreams at Maro’s urn;
With thee repose where Tully once was laid,
Or seek some ruin’s formidable shade;
While fancy brings the vanished piles to view,
And builds imaginary Rome anew.
Here thy well studied marbles fix our eye;
A fading Fresco here demands a sigh;
Each heavenly piece unwearied we compare,
Match Raphael’s grace, with thy loved Guido’s air,
Caracci’s strength, Correggio’s softer line,
Paulo’s free stroke, and Titian’s warmth divine.
How finished with illustrious toil appears,
This small well polished gem, the work of years![112]
Yet still how faint by precept is exprest,
The living image in the painter’s breast?
Thence endless streams of fair ideas flow,
Strike in the sketch, or in the picture glow;
Thence beauty, waking all her forms, supplies
An angel’s sweetness, or Bridgewater’s eyes.
Muse! at that name thy sacred sorrows shed,
Those tears eternal that embalm the dead;
Call round her tomb each object of desire,
Each purer frame informed with purer fire;
Bid her be all that chears or softens life,
The tender sister, daughter, friend, and wife!
Bid her be all that makes mankind adore;
Then view this marble, and be vain no more!
Yet still her charms in breathing paint engage;
Her modest cheek shall warm a future age.
Beauty, frail flower, that every season fears,
Blooms in thy colours for a thousand years.
Thus Churchil’s race shall other hearts surprise,
And other beauties envy Wortley’s eyes;
Each pleasing Blount shall endless smiles bestow,
And soft Belinda’s blush for ever glow.
Oh! lasting as those colours may they shine,
Free as thy stroke, yet faultless as thy line!
New graces yearly, like thy works, display;
Soft without weakness, without glaring gay;
Led by some rule, that guides, but not constrains;
And finished more through happiness than pains!
The kindred arts shall in their praise conspire,
One dip the pencil, and one string the lyre.
Yet should the Graces all thy figures place,
And breath an air divine on every face;
Yet should the Muses bid my numbers roll,
Strong as their charms, and gentle as their soul;
With Zeuxis’ Helen thy Bridgewater vie,
And these be sung till Granville’s Myra die;
Alas! how little from the grave we claim?
Thou but preservest a Form, and I a Name.
A. POPE.
TO SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS.
When Dryden, worn with sickness, bowed with years,
Was doomed (my friend, let pity warm thy tears,)
The galling pang of penury to feel,
For ill-placed loyalty, and courtly zeal;
To see that laurel which his brows o’erspread,
Transplanted droop on Shadwell’s barren head,
The bard oppressed, yet not subdued by fate,
For very bread descended to translate;
And he, whose fancy, copious as his phrase,
Could light at will expression’s brightest blaze,
On Fresnoy’s lay employed his studious hour;
But niggard there of that melodious power,
His pen in haste the hireling task to close,
Transformed the studied strain to careless prose,
Which, fondly lending faith to French pretence,
Mistook its meaning, or obscured its sense.
Yet still he pleased, for Dryden still must please,
Whether with artless elegance and ease
He glides in prose, or from its tinkling chime, }
By varied pauses, purifies his rhyme, }
And mounts on Maro’s plumes, and soars his heights sublime. }
This artless elegance, this native fire,
Provoked his tuneful heir to strike the lyre,
Who, proud his numbers with that prose to join,
Wove an illustrious wreath for friendship’s shrine.
How oft, on that fair shrine when poets bind
The flowers of song, does partial passion blind
Their judgment’s eye! How oft does truth disclaim
The deed, and scorn to call it genuine fame!
How did she here, when Jervas was the theme,
Waft through the ivory gate the poet’s dream!
How view, indignant, error’s base alloy
The sterling lustre of his praise destroy,
Which now, if praise like his my muse could coin,
Current through ages, she would stamp for thine!
Let friendship, as she caused, excuse the deed;
With thee, and such as thee, she must succeed.
But what if fashion tempted Pope astray?
The witch has spells, and Jervas knew a day,
When mode-struck belles and beaux were proud to come,
And buy of him a thousand years of bloom.
Even then I deem it but a venal crime;
Perish alone that selfish sordid rhyme,
Which flatters lawless sway, or tinsel pride;
Let black oblivion plunge it in her tide.
From fate like this my truth-supported lays,
Even if aspiring to thy pencil’s praise,
Would flow secure; but humbler aims are mine;
Know, when to thee I consecrate the line,
’Tis but to thank thy genius for the ray,
Which pours on Fresnoy’s rules a fuller day;
Those candid strictures, those reflections new,
Refined by taste, yet still as nature true,
Which, blended here with his instructive strains,
Shall bid thy art inherit new domains;
Give her in Albion as in Greece to rule,
And guide (what thou hast formed) a British school.
And O, if aught thy poet can pretend
Beyond his favourite wish to call thee friend,
Be it that here his tuneful toil has drest
The muse of Fresnoy in a modern vest;
And, with what skill his fancy could bestow,
Taught the close folds to take an easier flow;
Be it, that here thy partial smile approved,
The pains he lavished on the art he loved.
A. MASON.
A PARALLEL OF POETRY AND PAINTING.
It may be reasonably expected that I should say something on my own
behalf, in respect to my present undertaking. First, then, the reader may
be pleased to know, that it was not of my own choice that I undertook
this work. Many of our most skilful painters, and other artists, were
pleased to recommend this author to me, as one who perfectly understood
the rules of painting; who gave the best and most concise instructions
for performance, and the surest to inform the judgment of all who loved
this noble art: that they who before, were rather fond of it, than
knowingly admired it, might defend their inclination by their reason;
that they might understand those excellencies which they blindly valued,
so as not to be farther imposed on by bad pieces, and to know when nature
was well imitated by the most able masters. It is true indeed, and they
acknowledge it, that beside the rules which are given in this treatise,
or which can be given in any other, to make a perfect judgment of good
pictures, and to value them more or less, when compared with one another,
there is farther required a long conversation with the best pieces, which
are not very frequent either in France or England; yet some we have,
not only from the hands of Holbein, Rubens, and Vandyck, (one of them
admirable for history-painting, and the other two for portraits,) but of
many Flemish masters, and those not inconsiderable, though for design not
equal to the Italians. And of these latter also, we are not unfurnished
with some pieces of Raphaell, Titian, Correggio, Michael Angelo, and
others.
But to return to my own undertaking of this translation. I freely own
that I thought myself incapable of performing it, either to their
satisfaction, or my own credit. Not but that I understood the original
Latin, and the French author, perhaps as well as most Englishmen; but I
was not sufficiently versed in the terms of art; and therefore thought
that many of those persons who put this honourable task on me, were
more able to perform it themselves,—as undoubtedly they were. But they,
assuring me of their assistance in correcting my faults where I spoke
improperly, I was encouraged to attempt it, that I might not be wanting
in what I could, to satisfy the desires of so many gentlemen, who were
willing to give the world this useful work. They have effectually
performed their promise to me, and I have been as careful, on my side, to
take their advice in all things; so that the reader may assure himself of
a tolerable translation,—not elegant, for I proposed not that to myself,
but familiar, clear, and instructive: in any of which parts if I have
failed, the fault lies wholly at my door. In this one particular only,
I must beg the reader’s pardon. The prose translation of this poem is
not free from poetical expressions, and I dare not promise that some of
them are not fustian, or at least highly metaphorical; but this being a
fault in the first digestion, (that is, the original Latin,) was not to
be remedied in the second, viz. the translation. And I may confidently
say, that whoever had attempted it must have fallen into the same
inconvenience, or a much greater, that of a false version.
When I undertook this work, I was already engaged in the translation
of Virgil,[113] from whom I have borrowed only two months; and am now
returning to that which I ought to understand better. In the mean time
I beg the reader’s pardon, for entertaining him so long with myself:
it is an usual part of ill manners in all authors, and almost in all
mankind, to trouble others with their business; and I was so sensible of
it beforehand, that I had not now committed it, unless some concernments
of the reader’s had been interwoven with my own. But I know not, while I
am atoning for one error, if I am not falling into another; for I have
been importuned to say something farther of this art; and to make some
observations on it, in relation to the likeness and agreement which it
has with poetry, its sister. But before I proceed, it will not be amiss,
if I copy from Bellori, (a most ingenious author yet living,) some part
of his idea of a painter,[114] which cannot be unpleasing, at least
to such who are conversant in the philosophy of Plato; and, to avoid
tediousness, I will not translate the whole discourse, but take and leave
as I find occasion.
“God Almighty, in the fabric of the universe, first contemplated himself,
and reflected on his own excellencies; from which he drew and constituted
those first forms which are called ideas; so that every species which was
afterwards expressed, was produced from that first idea, forming that
wonderful contexture of all created beings. But the celestial bodies
above the moon being incorruptible, and not subject to change, remained
for ever fair, and in perpetual order. On the contrary, all things which
are sublunary are subject to change, to deformity, and to decay. And
though nature always intends a consummate beauty in her productions,
yet through the inequality of the matter, the forms are altered; and in
particular, human beauty suffers alteration for the worse, as we see to
our mortification, in the deformities and disproportions which are in
us. For which reason, the artful painter and the sculptor, imitating the
Divine Maker, form to themselves, as well as they are able, a model of
the superior beauties; and reflecting on them, endeavour to correct and
amend the common nature, and to represent it as it was at first created,
without fault, either in colour, or in lineament.
“This idea, which we may call the goddess of painting and of sculpture,
descends upon the marble and the cloth, and becomes the original of those
arts; and being measured by the compass of the intellect, is itself the
measure of the performing hand; and being animated by the imagination,
infuses life into the image. The idea of the painter and the sculptor is
undoubtedly that perfect and excellent example of the mind, by imitation
of which imagined form all things are represented which fall under human
sight: such is the definition which is made by Cicero in his book of the
“Orator” to Brutus:—‘As therefore in forms and figures there is somewhat
which is excellent and perfect, to which imagined species all things are
referred by imitation, which are the objects of sight, in like manner we
behold the species of eloquence in our minds, the _effigies_ or actual
image of which we seek in the organs of our hearing.’ This is likewise
confirmed by Proclus in the dialogue of Plato, called “Timæus.” ‘If, says
he, you take a man as he is made by nature, and compare him with another,
who is the effect of art, the work of nature will always appear the
less beautiful, because art is more accurate than nature.’ But Zeuxis,
who, from the choice which he made of five virgins, drew that wonderful
picture of Helena, which Cicero, in his “Orator” before-mentioned,
sets before us as the most perfect example of beauty, at the same time
admonishes a painter, to contemplate the ideas of the most natural forms,
and to make a judicious choice of several bodies, all of them the most
elegant which he can find; by which we may plainly understand, that he
thought it impossible to find in any one body all those perfections which
he sought for the accomplishment of a Helena, because nature in any
individual person makes nothing that is perfect in all its parts. For
this reason Maximus Tyrius also says, that the image which is taken by
a painter from several bodies, produces a beauty which it is impossible
to find in any single natural body, approaching to the perfection of
the fairest statues. Thus nature on this account is so much inferior to
art, that those artists who propose to themselves only the imitation and
likeness of such or such a particular person, without election of those
ideas before-mentioned, have often been reproached for that omission.
Demetrius was taxed for being too natural; Dionysius was also blamed for
drawing men like us, and was commonly called ανθρωπόγραφος, that is, a
painter of men. In our times, Michael Angelo da Caravaggio was esteemed
too natural. He drew persons as they were; and Bamboccio, and most of the
Dutch painters, have drawn the worst likeness. Lysippus of old upbraided
the common sort of sculptors, for making men such as they were found in
nature; and boasted of himself, that he made them as they ought to be:
which is a precept of Aristotle, given as well to poets as to painters.
Phidias raised an admiration, even to astonishment, in those who beheld
his statues, with the forms which he gave to his gods and heroes, by
imitating the idea, rather than nature. And Cicero, speaking of him,
affirms, that figuring Jupiter and Pallas, he did not contemplate any
object from whence he took the likeness, but considered in his own mind
a great and admirable form of beauty; and according to that image in
his soul, he directed the operation of his hand. Seneca also seems to
wonder, that Phidias, having never beheld either Jove or Pallas, yet
could conceive their divine images in his mind. Apollonius Tyanæus says
the same in other words,—that the fancy more instructs the painter, than
the imitation; for the last makes only the things which it sees, but the
first makes also the things which it never sees.
“Leon Battista Alberti tells us, that we ought not so much to love the
likeness as the beauty, and to choose from the fairest bodies severally
the fairest parts. Leonardo da Vinci instructs the painter to form this
idea to himself; and Raffaelle, the greatest of all modern masters,
writes thus to Castiglione, concerning his Galatea: ‘To paint a fair
one, it is necessary for me to see many fair ones; but because there is
so great a scarcity of lovely women, I am constrained to make use of
one certain idea, which I have formed to myself in my own fancy.’ Guido
Rheni sending to Rome his St Michael, which he had painted for the church
of the Capuchins, at the same time wrote to Monsignor Massano, who was
_Maestro di Casa_, (or Steward of the House,) to Pope Urban the Eighth,
in this manner: ‘I wish I had the wings of an angel, to have ascended
into Paradise, and there to have beheld the forms of those beautiful
spirits, from which I might have copied my archangel. But not being able
to mount so high, it was in vain for me to search his resemblance here
below; so that I was forced to make an introspection into my own mind,
and into that idea of beauty which I have formed in my own imagination. I
have likewise created there the contrary idea of deformity and ugliness;
but I leave the consideration of it, till I paint the devil; and in the
mean time, shun the very thought of it as much as possibly I can, and am
even endeavouring to blot it wholly out of my remembrance.’
“There was not any lady in all antiquity, who was mistress of so much
beauty as was to be found in the Venus of Gnidus, made by Praxiteles,
or the Minerva of Athens, by Phidias; which was therefore called the
_beautiful form_. Neither is there any man of the present age equal in
the strength, proportion, and knitting of his limbs, to the Hercules
of Farnese, made by Glycon; or any woman, who can justly be compared
with the Medicean Venus of Cleomenes. And upon this account, the
noblest poets and the best orators, when they desired to celebrate any
extraordinary beauty, are forced to have recourse to statues and pictures
and to draw their persons and faces into comparison. Ovid, endeavouring
to express the beauty of Cyllarus, the fairest of the Centaurs,
celebrates him as next in perfection to the most admirable statues:
_Gratus in ore vigor, cervix, humerique, manusque,_
_Pectoraque artificum laudatis proxima signis._
A pleasing vigour his fair face expressed;
His neck, his hands, his shoulders, and his breast,
Did next, in gracefulness and beauty, stand
To breathing figures of the sculptor’s hand.
In another place he sets Apelles above Venus:
_Si Venerem Cous nunquam pinxisset Apelles,_
_Mersa sub æquoreis illa lateret aquis._
Thus varied:
One birth to seas the Cyprian goddess owed,
A second birth the painter’s art bestowed:
Less by the seas than by his power was given;
They made her live, but he advanced to heaven.
“The idea of this beauty is indeed various, according to the several
forms which the painter or sculptor would describe; as one in strength,
another in magnanimity: and sometimes it consists in cheerfulness, and
sometimes in delicacy; and is always diversified by the sex and age.
“The beauty of Jove is one, and that of Juno another; Hercules and Cupid
are perfect beauties, though of different kinds; for beauty is only
that which makes all things as they are in their proper and perfect
nature, which the best painters always choose by contemplating the
forms of each. We ought farther to consider, that a picture being the
representation of a human action, the painter ought to retain in his mind
the examples of all affections and passions, as a poet preserves the
idea of an angry man, of one who is fearful, sad, or merry, and so of
all the rest; for it is impossible to express that with the hand, which
never entered into the imagination. In this manner, as I have rudely and
briefly shewn you, painters and sculptors, choosing the most elegant
natural beauties, perfectionate the idea, and advance their art even
above nature itself in her individual productions; which is the utmost
mastery of human performance.
“From hence arises that astonishment, and almost adoration, which is
paid by the knowing to those divine remainders of antiquity. From
hence Phidias, Lysippus, and other noble sculptors, are still held
in veneration; and Apelles, Zeuxis, Protogenes, and other admirable
painters, though their works are perished, are and will be eternally
admired; who all of them drew after the ideas of perfection, which
are the miracles of nature, the providence of the understanding, the
exemplars of the mind, the light of the fancy; the sun, which, from its
rising, inspired the statue of Memnon, and the fire, which warmed into
life the image of Prometheus. It is this, which causes the Graces and the
Loves to take up their habitations in the hardest marble, and to subsist
in the emptiness of light and shadows. But since the idea of eloquence
is as far inferior to that of painting, as the force of words is to the
sight, I must here break off abruptly, and having conducted the reader,
as it were, to a secret walk, there leave him in the midst of silence, to
contemplate those ideas which I have only sketched, and which every man
must finish for himself.”
In these pompous expressions, or such as these, the Italian has given you
his idea of a Painter; and though I cannot much commend the style, I must
needs say, there is somewhat in the matter. Plato himself is accustomed
to write loftily, imitating, as the critics tell us, the manner of Homer;
but surely that inimitable poet had not so much of smoke in his writing,
though not less of fire. But, in short, this is the present genius of
Italy. What Philostratus tells us in the proem of his Figures,[115] is
somewhat plainer; and therefore I will translate it almost word for
word:—“He who will rightly govern the art of painting, ought of necessity
first to understand human nature. He ought likewise to be endued with a
genius to express the signs of their passions, whom he represents; and to
make the dumb, as it were, to speak. He must yet further understand what
is contained in the constitution of the cheeks, in the temperament of
the eyes, in the naturalness (if I may so call it) of the eyebrows; and
in short, whatsoever belongs to the mind and thought. He, who thoroughly
possesses all these things, will obtain the whole; and the hand will
exquisitely represent the action of every particular person. If it happen
that he be either mad or angry, melancholic or cheerful, a sprightly
youth or a languishing lover; in one word, he will be able to paint
whatsoever is proportionable to any one. And even in all this there is
a sweet error, without causing any shame; for the eyes and minds of the
beholders being fastened on objects which have no real being, as if they
were truly existent, and being induced by them to believe them so, what
pleasure is it not capable of giving? The ancients, and other wise men,
have written many things concerning the symmetry which is in the art of
painting,—constituting, as it were, some certain laws for the proportion
of every member; not thinking it possible for a painter to undertake the
expression of those motions which are in the mind, without a concurrent
harmony in the natural measure; for that which is out of its own kind and
measure, is not received from nature, whose motion is always right. On a
serious consideration of this matter, it will be found, that the art of
painting has a wonderful affinity with that of poetry; and that there is
betwixt them a certain common imagination. For, as the poets introduce
the gods and heroes, and all those things which are either majestical,
honest, or delightful, in like manner the painters, by the virtue of
their outlines, colours, lights, and shadows, represent the same things
and persons in their pictures.”
Thus, as convoy-ships either accompany or should accompany their
merchants,[116] till they may prosecute the rest of their voyage without
danger; so Philostratus has brought me thus far on my way, and I can now
sail on without him. He has begun to speak of the great relation betwixt
painting and poetry, and thither the greatest part of this discourse,
by my promise, was directed. I have not engaged myself to any perfect
method, neither am I loaded with a full cargo; it is sufficient if I
bring a sample of some goods in this voyage. It will be easy for others
to add more, when the commerce is settled; for a treatise twice as large
as this of painting, could not contain all that might be said on the
parallel of these two sister arts. I will take my rise from Bellori,
before I proceed to the author of this book.
The business of his preface is to prove, that a learned painter should
form to himself an idea of perfect nature. This image he is to set before
his mind in all his undertakings, and to draw from thence, as from a
storehouse, the beauties which are to enter into his work; thereby
correcting nature from what actually she is in individuals, to what she
ought to be, and what she was created. Now, as this idea of perfection is
of little use in portraits, or the resemblances of particular persons, so
neither is it in the characters of comedy and tragedy, which are never
to be made perfect, but always to be drawn with some specks of frailty
and deficience; such as they have been described to us in history, if
they were real characters, or such as the poet began to shew them at
their first appearance, if they were only fictitious or imaginary. The
perfection of such stage-characters consists chiefly in their likeness
to the deficient faulty nature, which is their original; only, as it is
observed more at large hereafter, in such cases there will always be
found a better likeness and a worse, and the better is constantly to be
chosen; I mean in tragedy, which represents the figures of the highest
form amongst mankind. Thus in portraits, the painter will not take that
side of the face, which has some notorious blemish in it; but either
draw it in profile, (as Apelles did Antigonus, who had lost one of his
eyes,) or else shadow the more imperfect side; for an ingenious flattery
is to be allowed to the professors of both arts, so long as the likeness
is not destroyed. It is true, that all manner of imperfections must not
be taken away from the characters; and the reason is, that there may be
left some grounds of pity for their misfortunes. We can never be grieved
for their miseries, who are thoroughly wicked, and have thereby justly
called their calamities on themselves. Such men are the natural objects
of our hatred, not of our commiseration. If, on the other side, their
characters were wholly perfect, (such as, for example, the character of a
saint or martyr in a play,) his or her misfortunes would produce impious
thoughts in the beholders; they would accuse the heavens of injustice,
and think of leaving a religion where piety was so ill requited. I say,
the greater part would be tempted so to do, I say not that they ought;
and the consequence is too dangerous for the practice. In this I have
accused myself for my own St Catharine;[117] but let truth prevail.
Sophocles has taken the just medium in his “Œdipus.” He is somewhat
arrogant at his first entrance, and is too inquisitive through the whole
tragedy; yet these imperfections being balanced by great virtues, they
hinder not our compassion for his miseries; neither yet can they destroy
that horror, which the nature of his crimes has excited in us. Such in
painting are the warts and moles, which, adding a likeness to the face,
are not therefore to be omitted; but these produce no loathing in us;
but how far to proceed, and where to stop, is left to the judgment of
the poet and the painter. In comedy there is somewhat more of the worse
likeness to be taken, because that is often to produce laughter, which
is occasioned by the sight of some deformity; but for this I refer the
reader to Aristotle. It is a sharp manner of instruction for the vulgar,
who are never well amended, till they are more than sufficiently exposed.
That I may return to the beginning of this remark concerning perfect
ideas, I have only this to say,—that the parallel is often true in epic
poetry. The heroes of the poets are to be drawn according to this rule.
There is scarce a frailty to be left in the best of them, any more than
is to be found in a divine nature; and if Æneas sometimes weeps, it is
not in bemoaning his own miseries, but those which his people undergo.
If this be an imperfection, the Son of God, when he was incarnate, shed
tears of compassion over Jerusalem; and Lentulus[118] describes him
often weeping, but never laughing; so that Virgil is justified even from
the holy scriptures. I have but one word more, which for once I will
anticipate from the author of this book. Though it must be an idea of
perfection, from which both the epic poet and the history-painter draws,
yet all perfections are not suitable to all subjects; but every one must
be designed according to that perfect beauty which is proper to him.
An Apollo must be distinguished from a Jupiter, a Pallas from a Venus;
and so, in poetry, an Æneas from any other hero; for piety is his chief
perfection. Homer’s Achilles is a kind of exception to this rule; but
then he is not a perfect hero, nor so intended by the poet. All his gods
had somewhat of human imperfection, for which he has been taxed by Plato,
as an imitator of what was bad; but Virgil observed his fault, and mended
it. Yet Achilles was perfect in the strength of his body, and the vigour
of his mind. Had he been less passionate, or less revengeful, the poet
well foresaw that Hector had been killed, and Troy taken, at the first
assault; which had destroyed the beautiful contrivance of his Iliads, and
the moral of preventing discord amongst confederate princes, which was
his principal intention. For the moral (as Bossu observes,[119]) is the
first business of the poet, as being the groundwork of his instruction.
This being formed, he contrives such a design, or fable, as may be most
suitable to the moral; after this he begins to think of the persons whom
he is to employ in carrying on his design; and gives them the manners
which are most proper to their several characters. The thoughts and words
are the last parts, which give beauty and colouring to the piece.
When I say that the manners of the hero ought to be good in perfection,
I contradict not the Marquis of Normanby’s opinion, in that admirable
verse,[120] where, speaking of a perfect character, he calls it
“A faultless monster, which the world ne’er knew;”
for that excellent critic intended only to speak of dramatic characters,
and not of epic.
Thus at least I have shewn, that in the most perfect poem, which is that
of Virgil, a perfect idea was required and followed; and consequently
that all succeeding poets ought rather to imitate him, than even Homer. I
will now proceed as I promised, to the author of this book.
He tells you almost in the first lines of it, that “the chief end of
painting is, to please the eyes; and it is one great end of poetry to
please the mind.” Thus far the parallel of the arts holds true; with this
difference, that the principal end of painting is to please, and the
chief design of poetry is to instruct. In this the latter seems to have
the advantage of the former; but if we consider the artists themselves
on both sides, certainly their aims are the very same; they would both
make sure of pleasing, and that in preference to instruction.—Next, the
means of this pleasure is by deceit; one imposes on the sight, and the
other on the understanding. Fiction is of the essence of poetry, as well
as of painting; there is a resemblance in one, of human bodies, things,
and actions, which are not real; and in the other, of a true story by a
fiction; and as all stories are not proper subjects for an epic poem or
a tragedy, so neither are they for a noble picture. The subjects both
of the one and of the other, ought to have nothing of immoral, low, or
filthy in them; but this being treated at large in the book itself, I
wave it, to avoid repetition. Only I must add, that though Catullus,[121]
Ovid, and others, were of another opinion,—that the subject of poets,
and even their thoughts and expressions, might be loose, provided their
lives were chaste and holy, yet there are no such licences permitted
in that art, any more than, in painting, to design and colour obscene
nudities. _Vita proba est_, is no excuse; for it will scarcely be
admitted, that either a poet or a painter can be chaste, who give us the
contrary examples in their writings and their pictures. We see nothing of
this kind in Virgil; that which comes the nearest to it, is the Adventure
of the Cave, where Dido and Æneas were driven by the storm; yet even
there the poet pretends a marriage before the consummation, and Juno
herself was present at it. Neither is there any expression in that story,
which a Roman matron might not read without a blush. Besides, the poet
passes it over as hastily as he can, as if he were afraid of staying in
the cave with the two lovers, and of being a witness to their actions.
Now I suppose that a painter would not be much commended, who should pick
out this cavern from the whole Æneids, when there is not another in the
work. He had better leave them in their obscurity, than let in a flash of
lightning to clear the natural darkness of the place, by which he must
discover himself, as much as them. The altar-pieces, and holy decorations
of painting, shew, _that_ art may be applied to better uses, as well as
poetry; and amongst many other instances, the Farnesian gallery, painted
by Annibale Caracci, is a sufficient witness yet remaining; the whole
work being morally instructive, and particularly the _Herculis Bivium_,
which is a perfect triumph of virtue over vice; as it is wonderfully well
described by the ingenious Bellori.
Hitherto I have only told the reader, what ought not to be the subject
of a picture or of a poem. What it ought to be on either side, our
author tells us: it must in general be great and noble; and in this the
parallel is exactly true. The subject of a poet, either in tragedy or
in an epic poem, is a great action of some illustrious hero. It is the
same in painting; not every action, nor every person, is considerable
enough to enter into the cloth. It must be the anger of an Achilles, the
piety of an Æneas, the sacrifice of an Iphigenia, for heroines as well as
heroes are comprehended in the rule; but the parallel is more complete
in tragedy, than in an epic poem. For as a tragedy may be made out of
many particular episodes of Homer or of Virgil, so may a noble picture be
designed out of this or that particular story in either author. History
is also fruitful of designs both for the painter and the tragic poet:
Curtius throwing himself into a gulph, and the two Decii sacrificing
themselves for the safety of their country, are subjects for tragedy and
picture. Such is Scipio restoring the Spanish bride,[122] whom he either
loved, or may be supposed to love; by which he gained the hearts of a
great nation to interest themselves for Rome against Carthage. These are
all but particular pieces in Livy’s History; and yet are full complete
subjects for the pen and pencil. Now the reason of this is evident.
Tragedy and Picture are more narrowly circumscribed by the mechanic rules
of time and place, than the epic poem. The time of this last is left
indefinite. It is true, Homer took up only the space of eight-and-forty
days for his Iliads; but whether Virgil’s action was comprehended in a
year, or somewhat more, is not determined by Bossu. Homer made the place
of his action, Troy, and the Grecian camp besieging it. Virgil introduces
his Æneas sometimes in Sicily, sometimes in Carthage, and other times at
Cumæ, before he brings him to Laurentum; and even after that, he wanders
again to the kingdom of Evander, and some parts of Tuscany, before he
returns to finish the war by the death of Turnus. But tragedy, according
to the practice of the ancients, was always confined within the compass
of twenty-four hours, and seldom takes up so much time. As for the
place of it, it was always one, and that not in a larger sense, (as for
example, a whole city, or two or three several houses in it,) but the
market, or some other public, place, common to the chorus and all the
actors; which established law of theirs I have not an opportunity to
examine in this place, because I cannot do it without digression from
my subject; though it seems too strict at the first appearance, because
it excludes all secret intrigues, which are the beauties of the modern
stage; for nothing can be carried on with privacy, when the chorus is
supposed to be always present.—But to proceed; I must say this to the
advantage of painting, even above tragedy, that what this last represents
in the space of many hours, the former shews us in one moment.[123] The
action, the passion, and the manners of so many persons as are contained
in a picture are to be discerned at once, in the twinkling of an eye; at
least they would be so, if the sight could travel over so many different
objects all at once, or the mind could digest them all at the same
instant, or point of time. Thus, in the famous picture of Poussin, which
represents the Institution of the Blessed Sacrament, you see our Saviour
and his twelve disciples, all concurring in the same action, after
different manners, and in different postures; only the manners of Judas
are distinguished from the rest. Here is but one indivisible point of
time observed; but one action performed by so many persons, in one room,
and at the same table; yet the eye cannot comprehend at once the whole
object, nor the mind follow it so fast; it is considered at leisure, and
seen by intervals. Such are the subjects of noble pictures; and such are
only to be undertaken by noble hands.
There are other parts of nature, which are meaner, and yet are the
subjects both of painters and of poets. For, to proceed in the parallel;
as comedy is a representation of human life in inferior persons, and
low subjects, and by that means creeps into the nature of poetry, and
is a kind of juniper, a shrub belonging to the species of cedar, so
is the painting of clowns, the representation of a Dutch kermis,[124]
the brutal sport of snick-or-snee, and a thousand other things of this
mean invention; a kind of picture which belongs to nature, but of the
lowest form. Such is a lazar in comparison to a Venus: both are drawn
in human figures; they have faces alike, though not like faces. There
is yet a lower sort of poetry and painting, which is out of nature; for
a farce is that in poetry, which grotesque is in a picture. The persons
and action of a farce are all unnatural, and the manners false, that
is, inconsisting with the characters of mankind. Grotesque painting is
the just resemblance of this; and Horace begins his “Art of Poetry” by
describing such a figure, with a man’s head, a horse’s neck, the wings of
a bird, and a fish’s tail; parts of different species jumbled together,
according to the mad imagination of the dauber; and the end of all
this, as he tells you afterward, to cause laughter: a very monster in a
Bartholomew-fair, for the mob to gape at for their two-pence. Laughter
is indeed the propriety of a man, but just enough to distinguish him
from his elder brother with four legs. It is a kind of bastard-pleasure
too, taken in at the eyes of the vulgar gazers, and at the ears of the
beastly audience. Church-painters use it to divert the honest countryman
at public prayers, and keep his eyes open at a heavy sermon; and farce
scribblers make use of the same noble invention, to entertain citizens,
country-gentlemen, and Covent-Garden fops. If they are merry, all goes
well on the poet’s side. The better sort go thither too, but in despair
of sense and the just images of nature, which are the adequate pleasures
of the mind; but the author can give the stage no better than what was
given him by nature; and the actors must represent such things as they
are capable to perform, and by which both they and the scribbler may get
their living. After all, it is a good thing to laugh at any rate; and
if a straw can tickle a man, it is an instrument of happiness. Beasts
can weep when they suffer, but they cannot laugh. And as Sir William
D’Avenant observes in his Preface to “Gondibert,” “It is the wisdom of a
government to permit plays, (he might have added—farces,) as it is the
prudence of a carter to put bells upon his horses, to make them carry
their burthens cheerfully.”
I have already shewn, that one main end of poetry and painting is to
please, and have said something of the kinds of both, and of their
subjects, in which they bear a great resemblance to each other. I must
now consider them, as they are great and noble arts; and as they are
arts, they must have rules, which may direct them to their common end.
To all arts and sciences, but more particularly to these, may be applied
what Hippocrates says of physic, as I find him cited by an eminent French
critic: “Medicine has long subsisted in the world. The principles of
it are certain, and it has a certain way; by both which there has been
found, in the course of many ages, an infinite number of things, the
experience of which has confirmed its usefulness and goodness. All that
is wanting to the perfection of this art will undoubtedly be found, if
able men, and such as are instructed in the ancient rules, will make
a farther inquiry into it; and endeavour to arrive at that which is
hitherto unknown, by that which is already known. But all who, having
rejected the ancient rules, and taken the opposite ways, yet boast
themselves to be masters of this art, do but deceive others, and are
themselves deceived; for that is absolutely impossible.”
This is notoriously true in these two arts; for the way to please being
to imitate nature, both the poets and the painters in ancient times,
and in the best ages, have studied her; and from the practice of both
these arts the rules have been drawn, by which we are instructed how
to please, and to compass that end which they obtained, by following
their example; for nature is still the same in all ages, and can never
be contrary to herself. Thus, from the practice of Æschylus, Sophocles,
and Euripides, Aristotle drew his rules for tragedy, and Philostratus
for painting. Thus, amongst the moderns, the Italian and French critics,
by studying the precepts of Aristotle and Horace, and having the example
of the Grecian poets before their eyes, have given us the rules of
modern tragedy; and thus the critics of the same countries in the art of
painting, have given the precepts of perfecting that art.
It is true that poetry has one advantage over painting in these last
ages, that we have still the remaining examples both of the Greek and
Latin poets; whereas the painters have nothing left them from Apelles,
Protogenes, Parrhasius, Xeuxis, and the rest, but only the testimonies
which are given of their incomparable works. But instead of this, they
have some of their best statues, bass-relievos, columns, obelisks, &c.
which were saved out of the common ruin, and are still preserved in
Italy; and by well distinguishing what is proper to sculpture, and what
to painting, and what is common to them both, they have judiciously
repaired that loss. And the great genius of Raffaelle, and others, having
succeeded to the times of barbarism and ignorance, the knowledge of
painting is now arrived to a supreme perfection, though the performance
of it is much declined in the present age. The greatest age for poetry
amongst the Romans was certainly that of Augustus Cæsar: and yet we are
told that painting was then at its lowest ebb; and perhaps sculpture
was also declining at the same time. In the reign of Domitian, and some
who succeeded him, poetry was but meanly cultivated, but painting
eminently flourished. I am not here to give the history of the two
arts; how they were both in a manner extinguished by the irruption of
the barbarous nations, and both restored about the times of Leo the
Tenth, Charles the Fifth, and Francis the First; though I might observe,
that neither Ariosto, nor any of his contemporary poets, ever arrived
at the excellency of Raffaelle, Titian, and the rest, in painting.
But in revenge, at this time, or lately, in many countries, poetry is
better practised than her sister-art. To what height the magnificence
and encouragement of the present king of France may carry painting and
sculpture, is uncertain; but by what he has done before the war in which
he is engaged, we may expect what he will do after the happy conclusion
of a peace, which is the prayer and wish of all those who have not an
interest to prolong the miseries of Europe. For it is most certain,
as our author, amongst others, has observed, that reward is the spur
of virtue, as well in all good arts, as in all laudable attempts; and
emulation, which is the other spur, will never be wanting, either amongst
poets or painters, when particular rewards and prizes are proposed to the
best deservers.
But to return from this digression, though it was almost necessary.
All the rules of painting are methodically, concisely, and yet clearly
delivered in this present treatise, which I have translated. Bossu has
not given more exact rules for the epic poem, nor Dacier for tragedy,
in his late excellent translation of Aristotle, and his notes upon him,
than our Fresnoy has made for painting; with the parallel of which I must
resume my discourse, following my author’s text, though with more brevity
than I intended, because Virgil calls me.
The principal and most important part of painting is, to know what is
most beautiful in nature, and most proper for that art. That which is the
most beautiful is the most noble subject: so in poetry, tragedy is more
beautiful than comedy; because, as I said, the persons are greater whom
the poet instructs, and consequently the instructions of more benefit to
mankind: the action is likewise greater and more noble, and thence is
derived the greater and more noble pleasure.
To imitate nature well in whatsoever subject, is the perfection of
both arts; and that picture, and that poem, which comes nearest to the
resemblance of nature, is the best. But it follows not, that what pleases
most in either kind is therefore good, but what ought to please. Our
depraved appetites, and ignorance of the arts, mislead our judgments,
and cause us often to take that for true imitation of nature, which has
no resemblance of nature in it. To inform our judgments, and to reform
our tastes, rules were invented, that by them we might discern—when
nature was imitated, and how nearly. I have been forced to recapitulate
these things, because mankind is not more liable to deceit, than it is
willing to continue in a pleasing error, strengthened by a long habitude.
The imitation of nature is therefore justly constituted as the general,
and indeed the only, rule of pleasing, both in poetry and painting.
Aristotle tells us, that imitation pleases, because it affords matter
for a reasoner to inquire into the truth or falsehood of imitation,[125]
by comparing its likeness, or unlikeness, with the original; but by
this rule, every speculation in nature, whose truth falls under the
inquiry of a philosopher, must produce the same delight, which is not
true. I should rather assign another reason. Truth is the object of our
understanding, as good is of our will; and the understanding can no more
be delighted with a lie, than the will can choose an apparent evil. As
truth is the end of all our speculations, so the discovery of it is the
pleasure of them; and since a true knowledge of nature gives us pleasure,
a lively imitation of it, either in poetry or painting, must of necessity
produce a much greater: for both these arts, as I said before, are not
only true imitations of nature, but of the best nature, of that which is
wrought up to a nobler pitch. They present us with images more perfect
than the life in any individual; and we have the pleasure to see all
the scattered beauties of nature united by a happy chemistry, without
its deformities or faults. They are imitations of the passions, which
always move, and therefore consequently please; for without motion there
can be no delight, which cannot be considered but as an active passion.
When we view these elevated ideas of nature, the result of that view is
admiration, which is always the cause of pleasure.
This foregoing remark, which gives the reason why imitation pleases, was
sent me by Mr Walter Moyle, a most ingenious young gentleman, conversant
in all the studies of humanity much above his years. He had also
furnished me, according to my request, with all the particular passages
in Aristotle and Horace, which are used by them to explain the art of
poetry by that of painting; which, if ever I have time to retouch this
Essay, shall be inserted in their places.
Having thus shewn that imitation pleases, and why it pleases in both
these arts, it follows, that some rules of imitation are necessary to
obtain the end; for without rules there can be no art, any more than
there can be a house without a door to conduct you into it.
The principal parts of painting and poetry next follow. Invention is the
first part, and absolutely necessary to them both; yet no rule ever was
or ever can be given, how to compass it. A happy genius is the gift of
nature: it depends on the influence of the stars, say the astrologers; on
the organs of the body, say the naturalists; it is the particular gift of
heaven, say the divines, both Christians and heathens. How to improve it,
many books can teach us; how to obtain it, none; that nothing can be done
without it, all agree:
_Tu nihil invitâ dices faciesve Minervâ._
Without invention, a painter is but a copier, and a poet but a plagiary
of others. Both are allowed sometimes to copy, and translate; but, as
our author tells you, that is not the best part of their reputation.
“Imitators are but a servile kind of cattle,” says the poet; or at
best, the keepers of cattle for other men: they have nothing which is
properly their own: that is a sufficient mortification for me, while I
am translating Virgil. But to copy the best author, is a kind of praise,
if I perform it as I ought; as a copy after Raffaelle is more to be
commended than an original of any indifferent painter.
Under this head of _Invention_ is placed the disposition of the work,—to
put all things in a beautiful order and harmony, that the whole may be
of a piece. The compositions of the painter should be conformable to
the text of ancient authors, to the customs, and the times. And this
is exactly the same in poetry; Homer and Virgil are to be our guides
in the epic; Sophocles and Euripides in tragedy: in all things we are
to imitate the customs and the times of those persons and things which
we represent: not to make new rules of the drama, as Lopez de Vega has
attempted unsuccessfully to do,[126] but to be content to follow our
masters, who understood nature better than we. But if the story which we
treat be modern, we are to vary the customs, according to the time and
the country where the scene of action lies; for this is still to imitate
nature, which is always the same, though in a different dress.
As in the composition of a picture the painter is to take care that
nothing enter into it, which is not proper or convenient to the subject,
so likewise is the poet to reject all incidents which are foreign to
his poem, and are naturally no parts of it; they are wens, and other
excrescences, which belong not to the body, but deform it. No person, no
incident, in the piece, or in the play, but must be of use to carry on
the main design. All things else are like six fingers to the hand, when
nature, which is superfluous in nothing, can do her work with five. A
painter must reject all trifling ornaments; so must a poet refuse all
tedious and unnecessary descriptions. A robe which is too heavy is less
an ornament than a burthen.
In poetry Horace calls these things—_versus inopes rerum, nugæque
canoræ_; there are also the _lucus et ara Dianæ_, which he mentions
in the same “Art of Poetry.” But since there must be ornaments both
in painting and poetry, if they are not necessary, they must at least
be decent; that is, in their due place, and but moderately used. The
painter is not to take so much pains about the drapery, as about the
face, where the principal resemblance lies; neither is the poet, who
is working up a passion, to makes similes, which will certainly make
it languish. My Montezuma dies with a fine one in his mouth;[127] but
it is ambitious, and out of season. When there are more figures in a
picture than are necessary, or at least ornamental, our author calls them
“figures to be let;” because the picture has no use of them. So I have
seen in some modern plays above twenty actors, when the action has not
required half the number.[128] In the principal figures of a picture, the
painter is to employ the sinews of his art; for in them consists the
principal beauty of his work. Our author saves me the comparison with
tragedy; for he says, that herein he is to imitate the tragic poet, who
employs his utmost force in those places, wherein consists the height and
beauty of the action.
Du Fresnoy, whom I follow, makes _design_, or _drawing_, the second
part of painting; but the rules which he gives concerning the posture
of the figures, are almost wholly proper to that art, and admit not any
comparison, that I know, with poetry. The posture of a poetic figure is,
as I conceive, the description of his heroes in the performance of such
or such an action; as of Achilles, just in the act of killing Hector, or
of Æneas, who has Turnus under him. Both the poet and the painter vary
the posture, according to the action or passion which they represent, of
the same person; but all must be great and graceful in them. The same
Æneas must be drawn a suppliant to Dido, with respect in his gestures,
and humility in his eyes; but when he is forced, in his own defence, to
kill Lausus, the poet shews him compassionate, and tempering the severity
of his looks with a reluctance to the action which he is going to
perform. He has pity on his beauty and his youth, and is loth to destroy
such a masterpiece of nature. He considers Lausus rescuing his father at
the hazard of his own life, as an image of himself, when he took Anchises
on his shoulders, and bore him safe through the rage of the fire, and the
opposition of his enemies; and therefore, in the posture of a retiring
man, who avoids the combat, he stretches out his arm in sign of peace,
with his right foot drawn a little back, and his breast bending inward,
more like an orator than a soldier; and seems to dissuade the young man
from pulling on his destiny, by attempting more than he was able to
perform. Take the passage as I have thus translated it:
Shouts of applause ran ringing through the field,
To see the son the vanquished father shield:
All, fired with noble emulation, strive,
And with a storm of darts to distance drive
The Trojan chief; who, held at bay, from far
On his Vulcanian orb sustained the war.
Æneas, thus o’erwhelmed on every side, }
Their first assault undaunted did abide, }
And thus to Lausus, loud with friendly threatening cried:— }
Why wilt thou rush to certain death, and rage,
In rash attempts, beyond thy tender age,
Betrayed by pious love?——
And afterwards:
He grieved, he wept; the sight an image brought
Of his own filial love; a sadly pleasing thought.
But beside the outlines of the posture, the design of the picture
comprehends, in the next place, the forms of faces, which are to be
different; and so in a poem or a play must the several characters of the
persons be distinguished from each other. I knew a poet, whom out of
respect I will not name, who, being too witty himself, could draw nothing
but wits in a comedy of his; even his fools were infected with the
disease of their author. They overflowed with smart repartees, and were
only distinguished from the intended wits by being called coxcombs,[129]
though they deserved not so scandalous a name. Another, who had a great
genius for tragedy,[130] following the fury of his natural temper, made
every man, and woman too, in his plays, stark raging mad; there was not
a sober person to be had for love or money. All was tempestuous and
blustering; heaven and earth were coming together at every word; a mere
hurricane from the beginning to the end,—and every actor seemed to be
hastening on the day of judgment.[131]
“Let every member be made for its own head,” says our author; not a
withered hand to a young face. So, in the persons of a play, whatsoever
is said or done by any of them, must be consistent with the manners which
the poet has given them distinctly; and even the habits must be proper
to the degrees and humours of the persons, as well as in a picture. He
who entered in the first act a young man, like Pericles, Prince of
Tyre,[132] must not be in danger in the fifth act, of committing incest
with his daughter; nor an usurer, without great probability and causes of
repentance, be turned into a _cutting_ Morecraft.[133]
I am not satisfied, that the comparison betwixt the two arts in the last
paragraph is altogether so just as it might have been; but I am sure of
this which follows:
“The principal figure of the subject must appear in the midst of the
picture, under the principal light, to distinguish it from the rest,
which are only its attendants.” Thus, in a tragedy, or an epic poem, the
hero of the piece must be advanced foremost to the view of the reader,
or spectator: he must outshine the rest of all the characters; he must
appear the prince of them, like the sun in the Copernican system,
encompassed with the less noble planets: because the hero is the centre
of the main action; all the lines from the circumference tend to him
alone: he is the chief object of pity in the drama, and of admiration in
the epic poem.
As in a picture, besides the principal figures which compose it, and are
placed in the midst of it, there are less groups or knots of figures
disposed at proper distances, which are parts of the piece, and seem
to carry on the same design in a more inferior manner; so, in epic
poetry there are episodes, and a chorus in tragedy, which are members
of the action, as growing out of it, not inserted into it. Such in
the ninth book of the “Æneids” is the episode of Nisus and Euryalus.
The adventure belongs to them alone; they alone are the objects of
compassion and admiration; but their business which they carry on, is
the general concernment of the Trojan camp, then beleaguered by Turnus
and the Latins, as the Christians were lately by the Turks. They were to
advertise the chief hero of the distresses of his subjects occasioned by
his absence, to crave his succour, and solicit him to hasten his return.
The Grecian tragedy was at first nothing but a chorus of singers;
afterwards one actor was introduced, which was the poet himself, who
entertained the people with a discourse in verse, betwixt the pauses of
the singing. This succeeding with the people, more actors were added, to
make the variety the greater; and, in process of time, the chorus only
sung betwixt the acts, and the Coryphæus, or chief of them, spoke for the
rest, as an actor concerned in the business of the play.
Thus tragedy was perfected by degrees; and being arrived at that
perfection, the painters might probably take the hint from thence of
adding groups to their pictures. But as a good picture may be without a
group, so a good tragedy may subsist without a chorus, notwithstanding
any reasons which have been given by Dacier to the contrary.
Monsieur Racine has, indeed, used it in his “Esther;” but not that
he found any necessity of it, as the French critic would insinuate.
The chorus at St Cyr was only to give the young ladies an occasion
of entertaining the king with vocal music, and of commending their
own voices. The play itself was never intended for the public stage,
nor, without disparagement to the learned author, could possibly have
succeeded there; and much less the translation of it here. Mr Wycherley,
when we read it together, was of my opinion in this, or rather I of his;
for it becomes me so to speak of so excellent a poet, and so great a
judge. But since I am in this place, as Virgil says, _spatiis exclusus
iniquis_, that is, shortened in my time, I will give no other reason,
than that it is impracticable on our stage. A new theatre, much more
ample and much deeper, must be made for that purpose, besides the cost
of sometimes forty or fifty habits, which is an expence too large to be
supplied by a company of actors. It is true, I should not be sorry to see
a chorus on a theatre more than as large and as deep again as ours, built
and adorned at a king’s charges; and on that condition, and another,
which is, that my hands were not bound behind me, as now they are,[134] I
should not despair of making such a tragedy as might be both instructive
and delightful, according to the manner of the Grecians.
To make a sketch, or a more perfect model of a picture, is, in the
language of poets, to draw up the scenery of a play; and the reason
is the same for both; to guide the undertaking, and to preserve the
remembrance of such things, whose natures are difficult to retain.
To avoid absurdities and incongruities, is the same law established
for both arts. The painter is not to paint a cloud at the bottom of a
picture, but in the uppermost parts; nor the poet to place what is proper
to the end or middle, in the beginning of a poem. I might enlarge on
this; but there are few poets or painters, who can be supposed to sin
so grossly against the laws of nature and of art. I remember only one
play, and for once I will call it by its name, “The Slighted Maid,”[135]
where there is nothing in the first act, but what might have been
said or done in the fifth; nor any thing in the midst, which might not
have been placed as well in the beginning, or the end. To express the
passions which are seated in the heart, by outward signs, is one great
precept of the painters, and very difficult to perform. In poetry, the
same passions and motions of the mind are to be expressed; and in this
consists the principal difficulty, as well as the excellency of that art.
This, says my author, is the gift of Jupiter; and, to speak in the same
heathen language, we call it the gift of our Apollo,—not to be obtained
by pains or study, if we are not born to it; for the motions which are
studied, are never so natural as those which break out in the height of
a real passion. Mr Otway possessed this part as thoroughly as any of
the ancients or moderns. I will not defend every thing in his “Venice
Preserved;” but I must bear this testimony to his memory,—that the
passions are truly touched in it,[136] though perhaps there is somewhat
to be desired, both in the grounds of them, and in the height and
elegance of expression; but nature is there, which is the greatest beauty.
“In the passions,” says our author, “we must have a very great regard
to the quality of the persons, who are actually possessed with them.”
The joy of a monarch for the news of a victory, must not be expressed
like the ecstacy of a Harlequin on the receipt of a letter from his
mistress:—this is so much the same in both the arts, that it is no longer
a comparison. What he says of face-painting, or the portrait of any
one particular person,—concerning the likeness,—is also as applicable
to poetry. In the character of an hero, as well as in an inferior
figure, there is a better or worse likeness to be taken: the better is a
panegyric, if it be not false, and the worse is a libel. Sophocles, says
Aristotle, always drew men as they ought to be, that is, better than they
were; another, whose name I have forgotten,[137] drew them worse than
naturally they were: Euripides altered nothing in the character, but made
them such as they were represented by history, epic poetry, or tradition.
Of the three, the draught of Sophocles is most commended by Aristotle.
I have followed it in that part of “Œdipus” which I writ,[138] though
perhaps I have made him too good a man. But my characters of Antony and
Cleopatra, though they are favourable to them, have nothing of outrageous
panegyric. Their passions were their own, and such as were given them by
history; only the deformities of them were cast into shadows, that they
might be objects of compassion: whereas if I had chosen a noon-day light
for them, somewhat must have been discovered, which would rather have
moved our hatred than our pity.
The Gothic manner, and the barbarous ornaments, which are to be avoided
in a picture, are just the same with those in an ill-ordered play. For
example, our English tragi-comedy must be confessed to be wholly Gothic,
notwithstanding the success which it has found upon our theatre, and
in the “Pastor Fido” of Guarini; even though Corisca and the Satyr
contribute somewhat to the main action. Neither can I defend my “Spanish
Friar,” as fond as otherwise I am of it, from this imputation: for though
the comical parts are diverting, and the serious moving, yet they are of
an unnatural mingle: for mirth and gravity destroy each other, and are no
more to be allowed for decent, than a gay widow laughing in a mourning
habit.
I had almost forgotten one considerable resemblance. Du Fresnoy tells us,
“That the figures of the groups must not be all on a side, that is, with
their face and bodies all turned the same way; but must contrast each
other by their several positions.” Thus in a play, some characters must
be raised, to oppose others, and to set them off the better; according to
the old maxim, _contraria juxta se posita, magis elucescunt_. Thus, in
“The Scornful Lady,” the usurer is set to confront the prodigal: thus, in
my “Tyrannic Love,” the atheist Maximin is opposed to the character of St
Catherine.
I am now come, though with the omission of many likenesses, to the Third
Part of Painting, which is called the Cromatic, or Colouring. Expression,
and all that belongs to words, is that in a poem, which colouring is in
a picture. The colours well chosen in their proper places, together with
the lights and shadows which belong to them, lighten the design, and
make it pleasing to the eye. The words, the expressions, the tropes and
figures, the versification, and all the other elegancies of sound, as
cadences, turns of words upon the thought, and many other things, which
are all parts of expression, perform exactly the same office both in
dramatic and epic poetry. Our author calls Colouring, _lena sororis_;
in plain English, the bawd of her sister, the design or drawing: she
clothes, she dresses her up, she paints her, she makes her appear more
lovely than naturally she is; she _procures_ for the design, and makes
lovers for her: for the design of itself is only so many naked lines.
Thus in poetry, the expression is that which charms the reader, and
beautifies the design, which is only the outlines of the fable. It is
true, the design must of itself be good; if it be vicious, or, in one
word, unpleasing, the cost of colouring is thrown away upon it: it is an
ugly woman in a rich habit set out with jewels;—nothing can become her;
but granting the design to be moderately good, it is like an excellent
complexion with indifferent features: the white and red well mingled on
the face, make what was before but passable, appear beautiful. _Operum
colores_ is the very word which Horace uses, to signify words and elegant
expressions, of which he himself was so great a master, in his Odes.
Amongst the ancients, Zeuxis was most famous for his colouring; amongst
the moderns, Titian and Correggio. Of the two ancient epic poets, who
have so far excelled all the moderns, the invention and design were
the particular talents of Homer. Virgil must yield to him in both; for
the design of the Latin was borrowed from the Grecian: but the _dictio
Virgiliana_, the expression of Virgil, his colouring, was incomparably
the better; and in that I have always endeavoured to copy him. Most of
the pedants, I know, maintain the contrary, and will have Homer excel
even in this part. But of all people, as they are the most ill-mannered,
so they are the worst judges. Even of words, which are their province,
they seldom know more than the grammatical construction, unless they are
born with a poetical genius, which is a rare portion amongst them. Yet
some I know may stand excepted; and such I honour. Virgil is so exact in
every word, that none can be changed but for a worse; nor any one removed
from its place, but the harmony will be altered. He pretends sometimes to
trip; but it is only to make you think him in danger of a fall, when he
is most secure: like a skilful dancer on the ropes, (if you will pardon
the meanness of the similitude,) who slips willingly, and makes a seeming
stumble, that you may think him in great hazard of breaking his neck,
while at the same time he is only giving you a proof of his dexterity. My
late Lord Roscommon was often pleased with this reflection, and with the
examples of it in this admirable author.
I have not leisure to run through the whole comparison of lights and
shadows with tropes and figures; yet I cannot but take notice of
metaphors, which like them have power to lessen or greaten any thing.
Strong and glowing colours are the just resemblances of bold metaphors:
but both must be judiciously applied; for there is a difference betwixt
daring and fool-hardiness. Lucan and Statius often ventured them too
far; our Virgil never. But the great defect of the “Pharsalia” and the
“Thebais” was in the design: if that had been more perfect, we might
have forgiven many of their bold strokes in the colouring, or at least
excused them: yet some of them are such as Demosthenes or Cicero could
not have defended. Virgil, if he could have seen the first verses of the
“Sylvæ,”[139] would have thought Statius mad, in his fustian description
of the statue on the brazen horse. But that poet was always in a foam at
his setting out, even before the motion of the race had warmed him. The
soberness of Virgil, whom he read, it seems, to little purpose, might
have shewn him the difference betwixt
_Arma virumque cano——_
and
_Magnanimum Æacidem, formidatamque tonanti_
_Progeniem._
But Virgil knew how to rise by degrees in his expressions: Statius was in
his towering heights at the first stretch of his pinions. The description
of his running horse, just starting in the Funeral Games for Archemorus,
though the verses are wonderfully fine, are the true image of their
author:
_Stare adeò nescit, pereunt vestigia mille_
_Ante fugam; absentemque ferit gravis ungula campum;_[140]
which would cost me an hour, if I had the leisure to translate them,
there is so much of beauty in the original.
Virgil, as he better knew his colours, so he knew better how and where
to place them. In as much haste as I am, I cannot forbear giving one
example. It is said of him, that he read the Second, Fourth, and Sixth
Books of his Æneids to Augustus Cæsar. In the Sixth, (which we are
sure he read, because we know Octavia was present, who rewarded him
so bountifully for the twenty verses which were made in honour of her
deceased son, Marcellus,)[141]—in this Sixth Book, I say, the poet,
speaking of Misenus, the trumpeter, says,
_——quo non præstantior alter_
_Ære ciere viros,——_
and broke off in the hemistic, or midst of the verse; but in the very
reading, seized as it were with a divine fury, he made up the latter part
of the hemistic with these following words,
_——martemque accendere cantu._
How warm, nay, how glowing a colouring is this! In the beginning of
his verse, the word _æs_, or brass, was taken for a trumpet, because
the instrument was made of that metal,—which of itself was fine; but
in the latter end, which was made extempore, you see three metaphors,
_martemque_,—_accendere_,—_cantu_. Good heavens! how the plain sense is
raised by the beauty of the words! But this was happiness, the former
might be only judgment: this was the _curiosa felicitas_, which Petronius
attributes to Horace; it is the pencil thrown luckily full upon the
horse’s mouth, to express the foam which the painter with all his skill
could not perform without it. These hits of words a true poet often
finds, as I may say, without seeking; but he knows their value when he
finds them, and is infinitely pleased. A bad poet may sometimes light on
them, but he discerns not a diamond from a Bristol-stone; and would have
been of the cock’s mind in Æsop,—a grain of barley would have pleased him
better than the jewel.
The lights and shadows which belong to colouring, put me in mind of that
verse in Horace,
_Hoc amat obscurum, vult hoc sub luce videri._
Some parts of a poem require to be amply written, and with all the force
and elegance of words; others must be cast into shadows, that is, passed
over in silence, or but faintly touched. This belongs wholly to the
judgment of the poet and the painter. The most beautiful parts of the
picture, and the poem, must be the most finished, the colours and words
most chosen; many things in both, which are not deserving of this care,
must be shifted off; content with vulgar expressions, and those very
short, and left, as in a shadow, to the imagination of the reader.
We have the proverb, _manum de tabulâ_, from the painters; which
signifies, to know when to give over, and to lay by the pencil. Both
Homer and Virgil practised this precept wonderfully well, but Virgil
the better of the two. Homer knew, that when Hector was slain, Troy
was as good as already taken; therefore he concludes his action there:
for what follows in the funerals of Patroclus, and the redemption of
Hector’s body, is not, properly speaking, a part of the main action. But
Virgil concludes with the death of Turnus; for after that difficulty was
removed, Æneas might marry, and establish the Trojans, when he pleased.
This rule I had before my eyes in the conclusion of the “Spanish Friar,”
when the discovery was made that the king was living, which was the knot
of the play untied; the rest is shut up in the compass of some few lines,
because nothing then hindered the happiness of Torrismond and Leonora.
The faults of that drama are in the kind of it, which is tragi-comedy.
But it was given to the people: and I never writ any thing for myself but
“Antony and Cleopatra.”
This remark, I must acknowledge, is not so proper for the colouring, as
the design; but it will hold for both. As the words, &c. are evidently
shown to be the cloathing of the thought, in the same sense as colours
are the cloathing of the design, so the painter and the poet ought to
judge exactly, when the colouring and expressions are perfect, and then
to think their work is truly finished. Apelles said of Protogenes,—that
he knew not when to give over. A work may be over-wrought, as well as
under-wrought; too much labour often takes away the spirit by adding to
the polishing, so that there remains nothing but a dull correctness,
a piece without any considerable faults, but with few beauties; for
when the spirits are drawn off, there is nothing but a _caput mortuum_.
Statius never thought an expression could be bold enough; and if a
bolder could be found, he rejected the first. Virgil had judgment enough
to know daring was necessary; but he knew the difference betwixt a
glowing colour and a glaring. As, when he compared the shocking of the
fleets at Actium to the jostling of islands rent from their foundations,
and meeting in the ocean, he knew the comparison was forced beyond
nature, and raised too high; he therefore softens the metaphor with a
_credas_: “you would _almost believe_—that mountains or islands rushed
against each other:”
_——pelago credas innare revulsas_
_Cycladas, aut montes concurrere montibus altos._
But here I must break off without finishing the discourse.
_Cynthius aurem vellit, et admonuit_, &c. The things which are behind
are of too nice a consideration for an essay, begun and ended in twelve
mornings; and perhaps the judges of painting and poetry, when I tell
them how short a time it cost me, may make me the same answer which my
late Lord Rochester made to one, who, to commend a tragedy, said it was
written in three weeks: “How the devil could he be so long about it?” For
that poem was infamously bad; and I doubt this Parallel is little better;
and then the shortness of the time is so far from being a commendation,
that it is scarcely an excuse. But if I have really drawn a portrait
to the knees, or an half-length, with a tolerable likeness, then I may
plead, with some justice, for myself, that the rest is left to the
imagination. Let some better artist provide himself of a deeper canvas,
and, taking these hints which I have given, set the figure on its legs,
and finish it in the invention, design, and colouring.
THE PREFACE OF MONSIEUR DE PILES, THE FRENCH TRANSLATOR.
Among all the beautiful and delightful arts, that of painting has always
found the most lovers; the number of them almost including all mankind.
Of whom great multitudes are daily found, who value themselves on the
knowledge of it: either because they keep company with painters, or that
they have seen good pieces; or, lastly, because their gusto is naturally
good. Which notwithstanding, that knowledge of theirs (if we may so call
it) is so very superficial, and so ill grounded, that it is impossible
for them to describe in what consists the beauty of those works, which
they admire; or the faults, which are in the greatest part of those which
they condemn. And truly it is not hard to find, that this proceeds from
no other cause, than that they are not furnished with rules by which to
judge; nor have any solid foundations, which are as so many lights set
up to clear their understanding, and lead them to an entire and certain
knowledge. I think it superfluous to prove, that this is necessary to the
knowledge of painting. It is sufficient, that painting be acknowledged
for an art; for that being granted, it follows, without dispute, that
no arts are without their precepts. I shall satisfy myself with telling
you, that this little treatise will furnish you with infallible rules
of judging truly; since they are not only founded upon right reason,
but upon the best pieces of the best masters, which our author hath
carefully examined, during the space of more than thirty years; and on
which he has made all the reflections which are necessary, to render this
treatise worthy of posterity; which, though little in bulk, yet contains
most judicious remarks; and suffers nothing to escape, that is essential
to the subject which it handles. If you will please to read it with
attention, you will find it capable of giving the most nice and delicate
sort of knowledge, not only to the lovers, but even to the professors of
that art.
It would be too long to tell you the particular advantages, which it
has above all the books that have appeared before it, in this kind; you
need only read it, and that will convince you of this truth. All that
I will allow myself to say, is only this, that there is not a word in
it which carries not its weight; whereas in all others, there are two
considerable faults, which lie open to the sight, viz. that saying too
much, they always say too little. I assure myself, that the reader will
own it is a work of general profit: to the lovers of painting, for their
instruction how to judge knowingly, from the reason of the thing; and to
the painters themselves, by removing their difficulties, that they may
work with pleasure; because they may be in some manner certain, that
their productions are good. It is to be used like spirits, and precious
liquors: the less you drink of it at a time, it is with the greater
pleasure. Read it often, and but little at once, that you may digest it
better; and dwell particularly on those passages which you find marked
with an asterism *. For the observations which follow such a note, will
give you a clearer light on the matter which is there treated. You will
find them by the numbers which are on the side of the translation, from
five to five verses, by searching for the like number in the remarks
which are at the end of it, and which are distinguished from each other
by this note †. You will find in the latter pages of this book, the
judgment of the author on those painters, who have acquired the greatest
reputation in the world; amongst whom, he was not willing to comprehend
those who are now living. They are undoubtedly his, as being found among
his papers, written in his own hand.
As for the prose translation, which you will find on the other side
of the Latin poem, I must inform you on what occasion, and in what
manner, it was performed. The love which I had for painting, and the
pleasure which I found in the exercise of that noble art, at my leisure
hours, gave me the desire of being acquainted with the late Monsieur du
Fresnoy, who was generally reputed to have a thorough knowledge of it.
Our acquaintance at length proceeded to that degree of intimacy, that
he entrusted me with his poem, which he believed me capable both of
understanding, and translating; and accordingly desired me to undertake
it. The truth is, we had conversed so often on that subject, and he had
communicated his thoughts of it so fully to me, that I had not the least
remaining difficulty concerning it. I undertook therefore to translate
it, and employed myself in it with pleasure, care, and assiduity; after
which, I put it into his hands, and he altered in it what he pleased;
till at last, it was wholly to his mind. And then he gave his consent
that it should be published; but his death preventing that design, I
thought it a wrong to his memory, to deprive mankind any longer of this
translation, which I may safely affirm to be done according to the true
sense of the author, and to his liking: since he himself has given
great testimonies of his approbation to many of his friends. And they,
who are acquainted with him, know his humour to be such, that he would
never constrain himself so far, as to commend what he did not really
approve. I thought myself obliged to say thus much, in vindication of the
faithfulness of my work, to those who understand not the Latin; for as to
those who are conversant in both the tongues, I leave them to make their
own judgment of it.
The remarks which I have added to his work, are also wholly conformable
to his opinions; and I am certain that he would not have disapproved
them. I have endeavoured in them to explain some of the most obscure
passages, and those which are most necessary to be understood: and I have
done this according to the manner wherein he used to express himself,
in many conversations which we had together. I have confined them also
to the narrowest compass I was able, that I might not tire the patience
of the reader, and that they might be read by all persons. But if it
happens, that they are not to the taste of some readers, (as doubtless
it will so fall out,) I leave them entirely to their own discretion; and
shall not be displeased that another hand should succeed better. I shall
only beg this favour from them, that in reading what I have written,
they will bring no particular gusto along with them, or any prevention of
mind; and that whatsoever judgment they make, it may be purely their own,
whether it be in my favour, or in my condemnation.
DE ARTE GRAPHICA LIBER.
_Ut pictura poesis erit; similisque poesi_
_Sit pictura; refert par œmula quæque sororem,_
_Alternantque vices et nomina; muta poesis_
_Dicitur hæc, pictura loquens solet illa vocari._
_Quod fuit auditu gratum cecinere poetæ;_ {5.}
_Quod pulchrum aspectu pictores pingere curant:_
_Quæque poetarum numeris indigna fuêre,_
_Non eadem pictorum operam studiumq. merentur:_
_Ambæ quippe sacros ad religionis honores_
_Sydereos superant ignes, aulamque tonantis_ {10.}
_Ingressæ divûm aspectu, alloquioque fruuntur;_
_Oraque magna deûm, et dicta observata reportant,_
_Cœlestemque suorum operum mortalibus ignem._
_Inde per hunc orbem studiis coeuntibus errant,_
_Carpentes quæ digna sui, revolutaque lustrant_ {15.}
_Tempora, quærendis consortibus argumentis._
_Denique quæcunq. in cœlo, terraque, marique_
_Longius in tempus durare, ut pulchra, merentur,_
_Nobilitate sua, claroque insignia casu_
_Dives et ampla manet pictores atque poetas_ {20.}
_Materies; inde alta sonant per sæcula mundo_
_Nomina, magnanimis heroibus inde superstes_
_Gloria, perpetuoque operum miracula restant._
_Tantus inest divis honor artibus atque potestas._
_Non mihi Pieridum chorus hic, nec Apollo vocandus,_ {25.}
_Majus ut eloquium numeris, aut gratia fandi_
_Dogmaticis illustret opus rationibus horrens:_
_Cum nitidâ tantum et facili digesta loquelâ,_
_Ornari præcepta negent, contenta doceri._
_Nec mihi mens animusve fuit constringere nodos_ {30.}
_Artificum manibus, quos tantùm dirigit usus;_
_Indolis ut vigor inde potens obstrictus hebescat,_
_Normarum numero immani, geniumq. moretur:_
_Sed rerum ut pollens ars cognitione, gradatim_
_Naturæ sese insinuet, verique capacem_ {35.}
_Transeat in genium, geniusq. usu induat artem._
[Sidenote: Primum præceptum. i.e. pulchro.]
_Præcipua imprimis artisque potissima pars est,_
_Nôsse quid in rebus natura creârit ad artem_
_Pulchrius, idque modum juxta, mentemque vetustam:_
_Qua sine barbaries cæca et temeraria pulchrum_ {40.}
_Negligit, insultans ignotæ audacior arti,_
_Ut curare nequit, quæ non modo noverit esse;_
_Illud aput veteres fuit unde notabile dictum,_
_Nil pictore malo securius atque poeta._
_Cognita amas, et amata cupis, sequerisq. cupita;_ {45.}
_Passibus assequeris tandem quæ fervidus urges:_
_Illa tamen quæ pulchra decent; non omnia casus_
_Qualiacumque dabunt, etiamve simillima veris:_
_Nam quamcumque modo servili haud sufficit ipsam_
_Naturam exprimere ad vivum; sed ut arbiter artis,_ {50.}
_Seliget ex illa tantùm pulcherrima pictor._
_Quodque minus pulchrum, aut mendosum, corriget ipse_
_Marte suo, formæ veneres captando fugaces._
[Sidenote: II. De speculatione et praxi.]
_Utque manus grandi nil nomine practica dignum_
_Assequitur, purum arcanæ quam deficit artis_ {55.}
_Lumen, et in præceps abitura ut cæca vagatur;_
_Sic nihil ars operâ manuum privata supremum_
_Exequitur, sed languet iners uti vincta lacertos;_
_Dispositumque typum non linguâ pinxit Apelles._
_Ergo licèt totâ normam haud possimus in arte_ {60.}
_Ponere (cùm nequeant quæ sunt pulcherrima dici)_
_Nitimur hæc paucis, scrutati summa magistræ_
_Dogmata naturæ, artisque exemplaria prima_
_Altiùs intuiti; sic mens, habilisque facultas_
_Indolis excolitur, geniumque scientia complet;_ {65.}
_Luxuriansque in monstra furor compescitur arte:_
_Est modus in rebus, sunt certi denique fines,_
_Quos ultra citraque nequit consistere rectum._
[Sidenote: III. De Argumento.]
_His positis, erit optandum thema nobile, pulchrum,_
_Quodque venustatum circa formam atque colorem_ {70.}
_Sponte capax, amplam emeritæ mox præbeat arti_
_Materiam, retegens aliquid salis et documenti._
_Tandem opus aggredior; primoq. occurrit in albo_
_Disponenda typi, concepta potente Minervâ,_
_Machina, quæ nostris ~Inventio~ dicitur oris._ {75.}
[Sidenote: Inventio prima picturæ pars.]
_Ilia quidem priùs ingenuis instructa sororum_
_Artibus Aonidum, et Phœbi sublimior æstu._
[Sidenote: IV. Dispositio, sive operis totius œconomia.]
_Quræendasque inter posituras, luminis, umbræ,_
_Atque futurorum jam præsentire colorum_
_Par erit harmoniam, captando ab utrisque venustum._ {80.}
[Sidenote: V. Fidelitas argumenti.]
_Sit thematis genuina ac viva expressio, juxtà_
_Textum antiquorum, propriis cum tempore formis._
[Sidenote: VI. Inane rejiciendum.]
_Nec quod inane, nihil facit ad rem, sive videtur_
_Improprium, miniméque urgens, potiora tenebit_
_Ornamenta operis; tragicæ sed lege sororis,_ {85.}
_Summa ubi res agitur, vis summa requiritur artis._
_Ista labore gravi, studio, monitisque magistri_
_Ardua pars nequit addisci rarissima: namque,_
_Ni priùs æthereo rapuit quod ab axe Prometheus_
_Sit jubar infusum menti cum flamine vitæ,_ {90.}
_Mortali haud cuivis divina hæc munera dantur;_
_Non uti Dædaleam licet omnibus ire Corinthum._
_Ægypto informis quondam pictura reperta,_
_Græcorum studiis, et mentis acumine crevit:_
_Egregiis tandem illustrata, et adulta magistris,_ {95.}
_Naturam visa est miro superare labore._
_Quos inter, graphidos gymnasia prima fuêre_
_Portus Athenarum, Sicyon, Rhodes, atque Corinthus,_
_Disparia inter se, modicùm ratione laboris;_
_Ut patet ex veterum statuis, formæ atque decoris_
_Achetypis; queis posterior nil protulit Ætas_ {100.}
_Condignum, et non inferius longè, arte, modoque_.
[Sidenote: VII. Graphis, seu positura, secunda picturæ pars.]
_Horum igitur vera ad normam Positura legetur:_
_Grandia, inæqualis, formosaque partibus amplis_
_Anteriora dabit membra, in contraria motu_
_Diverso variata, suo librataque centro._ {105.}
_Membrorumque sinus ignis flammantis ad instar,_
_Serpenti undantes flexu; sed lævia, plana,_
_Magnaque signa, quasi sine tubere subdita tactu,_
_Ex longo deducta fluant, non secta minutim._
_Insertisque toris sint nota ligamina, juxta_ {110.}
_Compagem anatomes, et membrificatio Græco_
_Deformata modo, paucisque expressa lacertis,_
_Qualis apud veteres; totoque Eurythmia partes_
_Componat; genitumque suo generante sequenti_
_Sit minus, et puncto videantur cuncta sub uno._ {115.}
_Regula certa licet nequeat prospectica dici,_
_Aut complementum graphidos; sed in arte juvamen_
_Et modus accelerans operandi: at corpora falso_
_Sub visu in multis referens, mendosa labascit;_
_Nam geometralem nunquam sunt corpora juxtà_ {120.}
_Mensuram depicta oculis, sed qualia visa_.
[Sidenote: VIII. Varietas in figuris.]
_Non eadem formæ species, non omnibus ætas_
_Æqualis, similisque color, crinesque figuris:_
_Nam variis velut orta plagis gens dispare vultu est._ {125.}
[Sidenote: IX. Figura sit una cum membris et vestibus.
X. Mutorum actiones imitandæ.]
_Singula membra, suo capiti conformia, fiant_
_Unum idemque simul corpus cum vestibus ipsis:_
_Mutorumque silens positura imitabitur actus._
[Sidenote: XI. Figura princeps.]
_Prima figurarum, seu princeps dramatis, ultrò_
_Prosiliat media in tabula, sub lumine primo_ {130.}
_Pulchrior ante alias, reliquis nec operta figuris._
[Sidenote: XII. Figurarum globi, seu cumuli.]
_Agglomerata simul sint membra, ipsæque figuræ_
_Stipentur, circumque globos locus usque vacabit;_
_Nè, malè dispersis dum visus ubique figuris_
_Dividitur, cunctisque operis fervente tumultu_ {135.}
_Partibus implicitis, crepitans confusio surgat._
[Sidenote: XIII. Positurarum diversitas in cumulis.]
_Inque figurarum cumulis non omnibus idem_
_Corporis inflexus, motusque; vel artubus omnes_
_Conversis pariter non connitantur eodem;_
_Sed quædam in diversa trahant contraria membra,_ {140.}
_Transverséque aliis pugnent, et cætera frangant._
_Pluribus adversis aversam oppone figuram,_
_Pectoribusque humeros, et dextera membra sinistris._
_Seu multis constabit opus, paucisve figuris._
[Sidenote: XIV. Tabulæ libramentum.]
_Altera pars tabulæ vacuo ne frigida campo,_ {145.}
_Aut deserta fiet, dum pluribus altera formis_
_Fervida mole sua supremam exurgit ad oram._
_Sed tibi sic positis respondeat utraque rebus,_
_Ut si aliquid sursum se parte attollat in unâ,_
_Sic aliquid parte ex aliâ consurgat, et ambas_ {150.}
_Æquiparet, geminas cumulando æqualiter oras._
[Sidenote: XV. Numerus figurarum.]
_Pluribus implicitum personis drama supremo_
_In genere ut rarum est; multis ita densa figuris_
_Rarior est tabula excellens; vel adhuc ferè nulla_
_Præstitit in multis, quod vix bene præstat in unâ:_ {155.}
_Quippe solet rerum nimio dispersa tumultu,_
_Majestate carere gravi, requieque decora;_
_Nec speciosa nitet vacuo nisi libera campo._
_Sed, si opere in magno, plures thema grande requirat_
_Esse figurarum cumulos, spectabitur unà_ {160.}
_Machina tota rei; non singula quæque seorsim._
[Sidenote: XVI. Internodia et pedes, exhibendi.]
_Præcipua extremis raro internodia membris_
_Adbdita sint: sed summa pedum vestigia nunquam._
[Sidenote: XVII. Motus manuum motui capitis jungendus.]
_Gratia nulla manet, motusque, vigorque figuras_
_Retro aliis subter majori ex parte latentes,_ {165.}
_Ni capitis motum manibus comitentur agendo._
[Sidenote: XVIII. Quæ fugienda in distributione et compositione.]
_Difficiles fugito aspectus, contractaque visu_
_Membra sub ingrato, motusque, actusq. coactos;_
_Quodq. refert signis, rectos quodammodo tractus,_
_Sive parallelos plures simul, et vel acutas,_ {170.}
_Vel geometrales, (ut quadra, triangula,) formas:_
_Ingratamque pari signorum ex ordine quandam_
_Symmetriam: sed præcipua in contraria semper_
_Signa volunt duci transversa, ut diximus antè._
_Summa igitur ratio signorum habeatur in omni_ {175.}
_Composito; dat enim reliquis pretium, atq. vigorem._
[Sidenote: XIX. Natura genio accommodanda.]
[Sidenote: XX. Signa antiqua naturæ modum constituunt.]
_Non ita naturæ astrictè sis cuique revinctus,_
_Hanc præter nihil ut genio studioque relinquas;_
_Nec sine teste rei natura, artisque magistra,_ {180.}
_Quidlibet ingenio, memor ut tantummodo rerum,_
_Pingere posse putes; errorum est plurima sylva,_
_Multiplicesque viæ, bene agendi terminus unus;_
_Linea recta velut sola est, et mille recurvæ._
_Sed juxta antiquos naturam imitabere pulchram,_ {185.}
_Qualem forma rei propria, objectumque requirit._
[Sidenote: XXI. Sola figura quomodo tractanda.]
_Non te igitur lateant antiqua numismata, gemmæ,_
_Vasa, typi, statuæ, cælataque marmora signis,_
_Quodq. refert specie veterum post sæcula mentem;_
_Splendidior quippe ex illis assurgit imago,_ {190.}
_Magnaque se rerum facies aperit meditanti;_
_Tunc nostri tenuem sæcli miserebere sortem,_
_Cùm spes nulla siet redituræ æqualis in ævum._
_Exquisita siet formâ, dum sola figura_
_Pingitur; et multis variata coloribus esto._
[Sidenote: XXII. Quid in pannis observandum.]
_Lati, ampliq. sinus pannorum, et nobilis ordo_ {195.}
_Membra sequens, subter latitantia, lumine et umbrâ_
_Exprimet; ille licet transversus sæpe feratur,_
_Et circumfusos pannorum porrigat extra_
_Membra sinus; non contiguos, ipsisque figuræ_
_Partibus impressos, quasi pannus adhæreat illis;_ {200.}
_Sed modicè expressos cum lumine servet et umbris:_
[Sidenote: XXIII. Quid multum conferat ad tabulæ ornamentum.
XXIV. Ornamentum auri et gemmarum. XXV. Prototypus. XXVI.
Convenientia rerum cum scena. XXVII. Charites et nobilitas.
XXVIII. Res quæque locum suum teneat.]
_Quæque intermissis passim sunt dissita vanis,_
_Copulet, inductis subtérve, supérve lacernis_
_Et membra, ut magnis, paucisque expressa lacertis,_
_Majestate aliis præstant, forma, atque decore:_ {205.}
_Haud secus in pannis, quos supra optavimus amplos,_
_Perpaucos sinuum flexus, rugasque, striasque,_
_Membra super, versu faciles, inducere præstat._
_Naturæque rei proprius sit pannus, abundans_
_Patriciis; succinctus erit, crassusque bubulcis,_ {210.}
_Mancipiisque; levis, teneris, gracilisque puellis._
_Inque cavis maculisque umbrarum aliquando tumescet,_
_Lumen ut excipiens, operis quà massa requirit,_
_Latius extendat, sublatisque aggreget umbris._
_Nobilia arma juvant virtutum, ornantque figuras,_ {215.}
_Qualia musarum, belli, cultusque deorum._
_Nec sit opus nimiùm gemmis auroq. refertum;_
_Rara etenim magno in pretio, sed plurima vili._
_Quæ deinde ex vero nequeunt præsente videri,_
_Prototypum prius illorum formare juvabit._ {220.}
_Conveniat locus, atque habitus: ritusq. decusque_
_Servetur: sit nobilitas, charitumque venustas,_
_(Rarum homini munus, cœlo, non arte petendum.)_
_Naturæ sit ubique tenor, ratioque sequenda._ {225.}
_Non vicina pedum tabulato excelsa tonantis_
_Astra domus depicta gerent, nubesque notosque;_
_Nec mare depressum laquearia summa, vel orcum:_
_Marmoreamque feret cannis vaga pergula molem:_
_Congrua sed propriâ semper statione locentur._
[Sidenote: XXIX. Affectus.]
_Hæc præter, motus animorum, et corde repostos_ {230.}
_Exprimere affectus, paucisque coloribus ipsam_
_Pingere posse animam, atque, oculis præbere videndam,_
_~Hoc opus, hic labor est. Pauci, quos æquus amavit~_
_~Jupiter, aut ardens evexit ad æthera virtus,~_
_Dis similes, potuere manu miracula tanta._ {235.}
_Hos ego rhetoribus tractandos desero; tantùm_
_Egregii antiquum memorabo sophisma magistri_,
_~Verius affectus animi vigor exprimit ardens,~_
_~Solliciti nimiùm quam sedula cura laboris.~_
[Sidenote: XXX. Gothorum ornamenta fugienda.]
[Sidenote: Chromatice tertia pars picturæ.]
_Denique nil sapiat Gothorum barbara trito_ {240.}
_Ornamenta modo, sæclorum et monstra malorum:_
_Queis ubi bella, famem, et pestem, discordia, luxus,_
_Et Romanorum res grandior intulit orbi,_
_Ingenuæ periere artes, periere superbæ_
_Artificum moles; sua tunc miracula vidit_ {245.}
_Ignibus absumi pictura; latere coacta_
_Fornicibus, sortem et reliquam confidere cryptis;_
_Marmoribusque diu sculptura jacere sepultis._
_Imperium interea, scelerum gravitate fatiscens,_
_Horrida nox totum invasit, donoque superni_ {250.}
_Luminis indignum, errorum caligine mersit,_
_Impiaque ignaris damnavit sæcla tenebris._
_Unde coloratum graiis huc usque magistris_
_Nil superest tantorum hominum, quod mente modoque_
_Nostrates juvet artifices, doceatque laborem;_ {255.}
_Nec qui chromatices nobis, hoc tempore, partes_
_Restituat, quales Zeuxis tractaverat olim,_
_Hujus quando magnâ velut arte æquavit Apellem_
_Pictorum Archigraphum, meruitque coloribus altam_
_Nominis æterni famam, toto orbe sonantem._ {260.}
_Hæc quidem ut in tabulis fallax, sed grata venustas,_
_Et complementum graphidos (mirabile visu)_
_Pulchra vocabatur, sed subdola, lena sororis:_
_Non tamen hoc lenocinium, fucusque, dolusque_
_Dedecori fuit unquam; illi sed semper honori,_ {265.}
_Laudibus et meritis; hanc ergo nosse juvabit._
_Lux varium, vivumque dabit, nullum umbra, colorem._
_Quo magis adversum est corpus, lucique propinquum,_
_Clarius est lumen; nam debilitatur eundo._
_Quo magis est corpus directum, oculisque propinquum,_ {270.}
_Conspicitur melius; nam visus hebescit eundo._
[Sidenote: XXXI. Tonorum luminum et umbrarum ratio.]
_Ergo in corporibus, quæ visa adversa, rotundis,_
_Integra sint, extrema abscedant perdita signis_
_Confusis, non præcipiti labantur in umbram_
_Clara gradu, nec adumbrata in clara alta repentè,_ {275.}
_Prorumpant; sed erit sensim hinc atque inde meatus_
_Lucis et umbrarum; capitisque unius ad instar,_
_Totum opus, ex multis quamquam sit partibus, unus_
_Luminis umbrarumque globus tantummodo fiet,_
_Sive duas, vel tres ad summum, ubi grandius esset_ {280.}
_Divisum pegma in partes statione remotas._
_Sintque ita discreti inter se, ratione colorum,_
_Luminis, umbrarumque, antrorsum ut corpora clara_
_Obscura umbrarum requies spectanda relinquat;_
_Claroque exiliant umbrata atque aspera campo._ {285.}
_Ac veluti in speculis convexis, eminet ante_
_Asperior reipsâ vigor, et vis aucta colorum_
_Partibus adversis; magis et fuga rupta retrorsum_
_Illorum est (ut visa minùs vergentibus oris)_
_Corporibus dabimus formas hoc more rotundas._ {290.}
_Mente modoque igitur plastes, et pictor, eodem_
_Dispositum tractabit opus: quæ sculptor in orbem_
_Atterit, hæc rupto procul abscedente colore_
_Assequitur pictor, fugientiaque illa retrorsum_ {295.}
_Jam signata minùs confusa coloribus aufert:_
_Anteriora quidem directè adversa, colore_
_Integra vivaci, summo cum lumine et umbra_
_Antrorsum distincta refert, velut aspera visu._
_Sicque super planum inducit leucoma colores._
_Hos velut ex ipsâ naturâ immotus eodem_ {300.}
_Intuitu circum statuas daret inde rotundas._
[Sidenote: XXXII. Corpora densa et opaca cum translucentibus.]
_Densa figurarum solidis quæ corpora formis_
_Subdita sunt tactu, non translucent, sed opaca_
_In translucendi spacio ut super aera, nubes,_
_Lympida stagna undarum, et inania cætera debent_ {305.}
_Asperiora illis prope circumstantibus esse;_
_Ut distincta magis firmo cum lumine et umbra,_
_Et gravioribus ut sustenta coloribus, inter_
_Aerias species subsistant semper opaca:_
_Sed contra, procul abscedant perlucida, densis_ {310.}
_Corporibus leviora; uti nubes, aer, et undæ._
[Sidenote: XXXIII. Non duo ex cœlo lumina in tabulam æqualia.]
_Non poterunt diversa locis duo lumina eádem_
_In tabulâ paria admitti, aut æqualia pingi:_
_Majus at in mediam lumen cadet usque tabellam_
_Latius infusum, primis qua summa figuris_ {315.}
_Res agitur, circumque oras minuetur eundo:_
_Utque in progressu jubar attenuatur ab ortu_
_Solis, ad occasum paulatìm, et cessat eundo;_
_Sic tabulis lumen, tota in compage colorum,_
_Primo à fonte, minus sensim declinat eundo._ {320.}
_Majus ut in statuis, per compita stantibus urbis,_
_Lumen habent partes superæ, minus inferiores;_
_Idem erit in tabulis: majorque nec umbra, vel ater_
_Membra figurarum intrabit color, atque secabit:_
_Corpora sed circum umbra cavis latitabit oberrans:_ {325.}
_Atquè ita quæretur lux opportuna figuris,_
_Ut late infusum lumen lata umbra sequatur._
_Unde, nec immeritò, fertur Titianus ubique_
_Lucis et umbrarum Normam appellâsse Racemum._
[Sidenote: XXXIV. Album et nigrum.]
_Purum album esse potest propiusque magisque remotum:_ {330.}
_Cum nigro antevenit propiùs; fugit absq. remotum._
_Purum autem nigrum antrorsum venit usque propinquum._
_Lux fucata suo tingit, miscetque colore_
_Corpora, sicque suo, per quem lux funditur, aer._
[Sidenote: XXXV. Colorum reflectio.]
_Corpora juncta simul, circumfusosque colores_ {335.}
_Excipiunt, propriumque aliis radiosa reflectunt._
[Sidenote: XXXVI. Unio colorum.]
_Pluribus in solidis liquida sub luce propinquis,_
_Participes, mixtosque simul decet esse colores._
_Hanc Normam Veneti pictores ritè sequuti,_
_(Quæ fuit antiquis corruptio dicta colorum)_ {340.}
_Cùm plures opere in magno posuêre figuras;_
_Nè conjuncta simul variorum inimica colorum_
_Congeries formam implicitam, et concisa minutis_
_Membra daret pannis, totam unamquamque figuram_
_Affini, aut uno tantùm vestire colore,_ {345.}
_Sunt soliti; variando tonis tunicamq. togamq._
_Carbaseosque sinus, vel amicum in lumine et umbra_
_Contiguis circum rebus sociando colorem._
[Sidenote: XXXVII. Aër interpositus.]
_Qua minus est spacii aërii, aut quà purior aër,_
_Cuncta magis distincta patent, speciesq. reservant:_ {350.}
_Quâque magis densus nebulis, aut plurimus aër_
_Amplum inter fuerit spatium porrectus, in auras_
_Confundet rerum species, et perdet inanes._
[Sidenote: XXXVII. Distantiarum relatio.]
_Anteriora magis semper finita, remotis_
_Incertis dominentur et abscedentibus, idque_
_More relativo, ut majora minoribus extent._ {355.}
[Sidenote: XXXIX. Corpora procul distantia.]
_Cuncta minuta procul massam densantur in unam;_
_Ut folia arboribus sylvarum, et in æquore fluctus._
[Sidenote: XL. Contigua et dissita. XLI. Contraria
extrema fugienda. XLII. Tonus et color varii.]
_Contigua inter se coëant, sed dissita distent,_
_Distabuntque tamen grato, et discrimine parvo._ {360.}
_Extrema extremis contraria jungere noli;_
_Sed medio sint usque gradu sociata coloris._
_Corporum erit tonus atque color variatus ubique;_
_Quærat amicitiam retro; ferus emicet ante._
[Sidenote: XLIII. Luminis delectus.]
_Supremum in tabulis lumen captare diei,_ {365.}
_Insanus labor artificum; cùm attingere tantùm_
_Non pigmenta queant: auream sed vespere lucem;_
_Seu modicùm mane albentem; sive ætheris actam_
_Post hyemem nimbis transfuso sole caducam;_
_Seu nebulis fultam accipient, tonitruque rubentem._ {370.}
[Sidenote: XLIV. Quædam circa praxim.]
_Lævia quæ lucent, veluti crystalla, metalla,_
_Ligna, ossa, et lapides; villosa, ut vellera, pelles,_
_Barbæ, aqueique oculi, crines, holoserica, plumæ;_
_Et liquida, ut stagnans aqua, reflexæque sub undis_
_Corporeæ species, et aquis contermina cuncta,_ {375.}
_Subter ad extremum liquidè sint picta, superque_
_Luminibus percussa suis, signisque repostis._
[Sidenote: XLV. Campus tabulæ. XLVI. Color vividus, non
tamen pallidus.]
_Area, vel campus tabulæ vagus esto, levisque_
_Abscedat latus, liquidèque bene unctus amicis_
_Tota ex mole coloribus, unâ sive patellâ;_ {380.}
_Quæque cadunt retro in campum, confinia campo._
_Vividus esto color, nimio non pallidus albo;_
_Adversisque locis ingestus plurimus ardens:_
_Sed levitèr parcèque datus vergentibus oris._
[Sidenote: XLVII. Umbra. XLVIII. Ex una patella sit
tabula.]
_Cuncta labore simul coëant, velut umbrâ in eâdem._ {385.}
_Tota sit tabula ex unâ depicta patellâ._
[Sidenote: XLIX. Speculum pictorum magister.]
_Multa ex naturâ speculum præclara docebit;_
_Quæque procul sero spatiis spectantur in amplis._
[Sidenote: L. Dimidia figura, vel integra ante alias.]
_Dimidia effigies, quæ sola, vel integra plures_ {390.}
_Ante alias posita ad lucem, stat proxima visu,_
_Et latis spectanda locis, oculisque remota,_
_Luminis umbrarumque gradu sit picta supremo._
[Sidenote: LI. Effigies.]
_Partibus in minimis imitatio justa juvabit_
_Effigiem, alternas referendo tempore eodem_
_Consimiles partes; cum luminis atque coloris_ {395.}
_Compositis, justisque tonis; tunc parta labore_
_Si facili et vegeto micat ardens, viva videtur._
[Sidenote: LII. Locus tabulæ. LIII. Lumina lata. LIV.
Quantitas luminis loci in quo tabula est exponenda.]
_Visa loco angusto tenerè pingantur, amico_
_Juncta colore, graduque; procul quæ picta, feroci_
_Sint et in æquali variata colore, tonoque._ {400.}
_Grandia signa volunt spacia ampla, ferosque colores._
_Lumina lata, unctas simul undique copulet umbras_
_Extremus labor. In tabulas demissa fenestris_
_Si fuerit lux parva, color clarissimus esto:_
_Vividus at contra, obscurusque, in lumine aperto._ {405.}
[Sidenote: LV. Errores et vitia picturæ.]
_Quæ vacuis divisa cavis, vitare memento;_
_Trita, minuta, simul quæ non stipata dehiscunt;_
_Barbara, cruda oculis, rugis fucata colorum,_
_Luminis umbrarumque tonis æqualia cuncta;_
_Fœda, cruenta, cruces, obscœna, ingrata, chimeras,_ {410.}
_Sordidaque et misera, et vel acuta, vel aspera tactu;_
_Quæque dabunt formæ, temerè congesta, ruinam,_
_Implicitas aliis confundent mixtaque partes._
[Sidenote: LVI. Prudentia in pictore.]
_Dumque fugis vitiosa, cave in contraria labi_
_Damna mali; vitium extremis nam semper inhæret._ {415.}
[Sidenote: LVII. Elegantium idea tabularum.]
_Pulchra gradu summo, graphidos stabilita vetustæ_
_Nobilibu signis, sunt grandia, dissita, pura,_
_Tersa, velut minimè confusa, labore ligata,_
_Partibus ex magnis paucisque efficta, colorum_
_Corporibus distincta feris, sed semper amicis._ {420.}
[Sidenote: LVIII. Pintor tyro.]
_Qui bene cœpit, uti facti jam fertur habere_
_Dimidium; picturam ita nil, sub limine primo_
_Ingrediens, puer, offendit damnosius arti,_
_Quàm varia errorum genera, ignorante magistro,_
_Ex pravis libare ~Typis~ mentemque veneno_ {425.}
_Inficere in toto quod non abstergitur ævo._
[Sidenote: LIX. Ars debet servire pictori non pictor arti.]
_Nec graphidos rudis artis adhuc citò qualiacunque_
_Corpora viva super, studium meditabitur, ante_
_Illorum quam symmetriam, internodia, formam_
_Noverit, inspectis, docto evolvente magistro,_ {430.}
_~Archetypis~, dulcesque dolos præsenserit artis._
_Plusque manu ante oculos quam voce docebitur usus._
_Quære artem quæcumque juvant; fuge quæque repugnant._
[Sidenote: LX. Oculos recreant diverstias et operis facilitas, quæ
speciatim ars dictur.]
_Corpora diversæ naturæ juncta placebunt;_
_Sic ea quæ facili contempta labore videntur:_ {435.}
_Æthereus quippe ignis inest et spiritus illis;_
_Mente diu versata, manu celeranda repenti._
_Arsque laborque operis grata sic fraude latebit:_
_Maxima deinde erit ars, nihil artis inesse videri._
[Sidenote: LXI. Archetypus in mente apographum in tela.]
_Nec prius inducas tabulæ, pigmenta colorum,_ {440.}
_Expensi quàm signa typi stabilita nitescant,_
_Et menti præsens operis sit pegma futuri._
[Sidenote: LXII. Circinus in oculis.]
_Prævaleat sensus rationi, quæ officit arti_
_Conspicuæ; inque oculis tantummodo circinus esto._
[Sidenote: LXIII. Superbia pictori nocet plurimùm.]
_Utere doctorum monitis, nec sperne superbus_ {445.}
_Discere, quæ de te fuerit sententia vulgi._
_Est cæcus nam quisque suis in rebus, et expers_
_Judicii, prolemque suam miratur amatque._
_Ast ubi consilium deerit sapientis amici,_
_Id tempus dabit, atque mora intermissa labori._ {450.}
_Non facilis tamen ad nutus, et inania vulgi_
_Dicta, levis mutabis opus, geniumque relinques:_
_Nam qui parte sua sperat bene posse mereri_
_Multivaga de plebe, nocet sibi, nec placet ulli._
[Sidenote: LXIV. γνῶθι σεαυτὸν. LXV. Quod mente
conceperis manu comproba.]
_Cumq. opere in proprio soleat se pingere pictor,_ {455.}
_(Prolem adeo sibi ferre parem natura suevit)_
_Proderit imprimis pictori γνῶθι σεαυτὸν,_
_Ut data quæ genio colat, abstineat que negatis._
_Fructibus utque suus nunquam est sapor, atque venustas_
_Floribus, insueto in fundo, præcoce sub anni_ {460.}
_Tempore, quos cultus violentus et ignis adegit:_
_Sic nunquam, nimio quæ sunt extorta labore,_
_Et picta invito genio, nunquam illa placebunt._
_Vera super meditando, manûs labor improbus adsit._
_Nec tamen obtundat genium, mentisq. vigorem._ {465.}
[Sidenote: LXVI. Matutinum tempus labori aptum.]
_Optima nostrorum pars matutina dierum,_
_Difficili hanc igitur potiorem impende labori._
[Sidenote: LXVII. Singulis diebus aliquid faciendum.
LXVIII. Affectus inobservati et naturales. LXIX. Non
desint pugillares.]
_Nulla dies abeat, quin linea ducta supersit._
_Perq. vias, vultus hominum, motusq. notabis_
_Libertate sua proprios, positasque figuras_
_Ex sese faciles, ut inobservatus, habebis._ {470.}
_Mox quodcumque mari, terris, et in aëre pulchrum_
_Contigerit, chartis propera mandare paratis,_
_Dum præsens animo species tibi fervet hianti._
_Non epulis nimis indulget pictura, meroque_ {475.}
_Parcit: amicorum nisi cum sermone benigno_
_Exhaustam reparet mentem recreata; sed inde_
_Litibus, et curis, in cœlebe libera vita,_
_Secessus procul à turba, strepituque remotos,_
_Villarum, rurisque beata silentia quærit._ {480.}
_Namque recollecto, totâ incumbente Minervâ,_
_Ingenio, rerum species præsentior extat;_
_Commodiusque operis compagem amplectitur omnem._
_Infami tibi non potior sit avara peculî_
_Cura, aurique fames, modicâ quam sorte beato,_ {485.}
_Nominis æterni, et laudis pruritus habendæ,_
_Condignæ pulchrorum operum mercedis in ævum._
_Judicium, docile ingenium, cor nobile, sensus_
_Sublimes, firmum corpus, florensque juventa,_
_Commoda res, labor, artis amor, doctusque magister;_ {490.}
_Et quamcumque voles occasio porrigat ansam,_
_Ni genius quidam adfuerit, sydusque benignum,_
_Dotibus his tantis, nec adhuc ars tanta paratur._
_Distat ab ingenio longè manus. Optima doctis_
_Censentur, quæ parva minus; latet omnibus error;_ {495.}
_Vitaque tam longæ brevior non sufficit arti._
_Desinimus nam posse senes, cùm scire periti_
_Incipimus, doctamque manum gravat ægra senectus;_
_Nec gelidis fervet juvenilis in artubus ardor._
_Quare agite, O juvenes, placido quos sydere natos_ {500.}
_Pacifera studia allectant tranquilla Minervæ;_
_Quosque suo fovet igne, sibique optavit alumnos!_
_Eja agite, atque animis ingentem ingentibus artem_
_Exercete alacres, dum strenua corda juventus_
_Viribus extimulat vegetis, patiensque laborum est;_ {505.}
_Dum vacua errorum, nulloque imbuta sapore_
_Pura nitet mens, et rerum sitibunda novarum,_
_Præsentes haurit species, atque humida servat._
[Sidenote: LXX. Ordo studiorum.]
_In geometrali priùs arte parumpèr adulti,_
_Signa antiqua super Graiorum addiscite formam;_ {510.}
_Nec mora, nec requies, noctuque diuque labori,_
_Illorum menti atque modo, vos donec agendi_
_Praxis ab assiduo faciles assueverit usu._
_Mox, ubi judicium emensis adoleverit annis,_
_Singula quæ celebrant primæ exemplaria classis,_ {515.}
_Romani, Veneti, Parmenses, atque Bononi,_
_Partibus in cunctis pedetentìm, atque ordine recto,_
_Ut monitum suprà est, vos expendisse juvabit._
_Hos apud invenit Raphael miracula summo_
_Ducta modo, veneresque habuit, quas nemo deinceps._ {520.}
_Quidquid erat formæ scivit Bonarota potenter._
_Julius à puero musarum eductus in antris,_
_Aonias reseravit opes, graphicâque poesi_
_Quæ non visa prius, sed tantùm audita poetis,_
_Ante oculos spectanda dedit sacraria Phœbi:_ {525.}
_Quæque coronatis complevit bella triumphis_
_Heroum fortuna potens, casusque decoros,_
_Nobilius reipsâ antiqua pinxisse videtur._
_Clarior ante alios Corregius extitit, ampla_
_Luce superfusa, circum coëuntibus umbris,_ {530.}
_Pingendique modo grandi, et tractando colore_
_Corpora. Amicitiamque, gradusque, dolosque colorum,_
_Compagemque ita disposuit Titianus, ut inde_
_Divus appellatus, magnis sit honoribus auctus,_
_Fortunæque bonis: quos sedulus Hannibal omnes_ {535.}
_In propriam mentem, atque modum mirâ arte coëgit._
[Sidenote: LXXI. Natura et experientia artem perficiunt.]
_Plurimus inde labor ~Tabulas~ imitando juvabit_
_Egregias, operumque ~Typos~; sed plura docebit_
_~Natura~ ante oculos præsens; nam firmat et auget_
_Vim genii, ex illâque artem experientia complet._ {540.}
_Multa supercilio quæ ~Commentaria~ dicent._
_Hæc ego, dum memoror subitura volubilis ævi_
_Cuncta vices, variisque olim peritura ruinis,_
_Pauca sophismata sum graphica immortalibus ausus_ {545.}
_Credere pieriis, Romæ meditatus: ad Alpes,_
_Dum super insanas moles, inimicaque castra_
_Borbonidum decus et vindex Lodoicus avorum,_
_Fulminat ardenti dextrâ, patriæque resurgens_
_Gallicus Alcides premit Hispani ora Leonis._ {550.}
THE ART OF PAINTING.
The passages which you see marked with an asterism * are more
amply explained in the remarks.
Transcriber’s Note: This mark has been expanded to include the
dagger symbol and reference number to help the reader to locate
the relevant remark.
Painting and Poesy are two sisters, which are so like in all things,
that they mutually lend to each other, both their name and office. One
is called a dumb poesy, and the other a speaking picture. The poets have
never said any thing, but what they believed {5.} would please the ears.
And it has been the constant endeavour of the painters to give pleasure
to the eyes. In short, those things which the poets have thought unworthy
of their pens, the painters have judged to be unworthy of their pencils.
[*†1.] For both “those arts, that they might advance the sacred honours
of religion,” have raised themselves to heaven; and, having found a
free admission into {10.} the palace of Jove himself, have enjoyed the
sight and conversation of the gods; whose “awful majesty they observe,
and whose dictates they communicate to mankind;” whom at the same time
they inspire with those celestial flames, which shine so gloriously in
their works. From heaven they take their passage through the world; and
“with concurring studies” collect whatsoever they find worthy of them.
[*†9.] They dive (as I may say) into {15.} all past ages; and search
their histories, for subjects which are proper for their use: with care
avoiding to treat of any but those which, by their nobleness, or by
some remarkable accident, have deserved to be consecrated to eternity;
whether on the seas, or earth, or in the heavens. And by this their
care and study, it comes to pass, that the {20.} glory of heroes is not
extinguished with their lives; and that those admirable works, those
prodigies of skill, which even yet are the objects of our admiration,
are still preserved. [*†24.] So much these divine arts have been almost
honoured; and such authority they preserve amongst mankind. It will not
here {25.} be necessary to implore the succour of Apollo, and the muses,
for the gracefulness of the discourse, or for the cadence of the verses;
which, containing only precepts, have not so much need of ornament, as of
perspicuity.
I pretend not in this treatise to tie the hands of {30.} artists,
“whom practice only directs;” neither would I stifle the genius, by
a jumbled heap of rules; nor extinguish the fire of a vein which is
lively and abundant. But rather to make this my business, that art being
strengthened by the knowledge of things, may at length pass into nature
by slow degrees; and so in process of time, may be {35.} sublimed into a
pure genius, which is capable of choosing judiciously what is true; and
of distinguishing betwixt the beauties of nature, and that which is low
and mean in her; and that this original genius, by long exercise and
custom, may perfectly possess all the rules and secrets of that art.
[Sidenote: Precept I. Of what is beautiful.]
[*†37.] The principal and most important part of painting, is to find
out, and thoroughly to understand, what nature has made most beautiful,
and most proper to this art; [*†39.] and that a choice of it may be made
according to the taste and manner of the {40.} ancients; [*†40.] without
which, all is nothing but a blind and rash barbarity; which rejects what
is most beautiful, and seems, with an audacious insolence, to despise an
art, of which it is wholly ignorant; which has occasioned these words of
the ancients: “That no man is so bold, so rash, and so overweening of his
own works, as an ill painter, and a bad poet, who are not conscious to
themselves of their own ignorance.”
[*†45.] We love what we understand; we desire what {45.} we love; we
pursue the enjoyment of those things which we desire; and arrive at last
to the possession of what we have pursued, if we warmly persist in our
design. In the mean time, we ought not to expect, that blind fortune
should infallibly throw into our hands those beauties; for though we may
light by chance on some which are true and natural, yet they may prove
either not to be decent, or not to be ornamental. Because it is not
sufficient to imitate nature in every circumstance, {50.} dully, and as
it were literally, and minutely; but it becomes a painter to take what
is most beautiful, [*†50.] as being the sovereign judge of his own art;
“what is less beautiful, or is faulty, he shall freely correct by the
dint of his own genius,” [*†52.] and permit no transient beauties to
escape his observation.
[Sidenote: II. Of theory and practice.]
[*†54.] In the same manner, that bare practice, destitute of the
lights of art, is always subject to fall into a precipice, like a
blind traveller, without being {55.} able to produce any thing which
contributes to a solid reputation; so the speculative part of painting,
without the assistance of manual operation, can never attain to that
perfection which is its object, but slothfully languishes as in a
prison; for it was not with his tongue that Apelles performed his noble
works. Therefore, {60.} though there are many things in painting, of
which no precise rules are to be given, [*†61.] (because the greatest
beauties cannot always be expressed for want of terms,) yet I shall
not omit to give some precepts, which I have selected from among the
most considerable which we have received from nature, that exact
school-mistress, after having examined her most secret recesses, as
well as [*†63.] those master-pieces of antiquity, which were the chief
examples of this art; and it is by this means, that the mind and the
natural disposition {65.} are to be cultivated, and that science perfects
genius; [*†66.] and also moderates that fury of the fancy which cannot
contain itself within the bounds of reason; but often carries a man into
dangerous extremes. For there is a mean in all things; and certain limits
or bounds wherein the good and the beautiful consist, and out of which
they never can depart.
[Sidenote: III. Concerning the subject.]
This being premised, the next thing is to make choice of [*†69.] a
subject beautiful and noble; which being of itself capable of all the
charms and graces, {70.} that colours, and the elegance of design, can
possibly give, shall afterwards afford, to a perfect and consummate
art, an ample field of matter wherein to expatiate itself; to exert all
its power, and to produce somewhat to the sight, which is excellent,
judicious, [*†72.] and ingenious; and at the same time proper to
instruct, and to enlighten the understanding.
“At length I come to the work itself; and at {75.} first, find only
a bare strained canvas, on which the sketch is to be disposed by the
strength of a happy imagination;” [*†74.] which is what we properly call
invention. [*†75.]
[Sidenote: Invention the first part of painting.]
[*†76.] Invention is a kind of muse, which, being possessed of the other
advantages common to her sisters, and being warmed by the fire of Apollo,
is raised higher than the rest, and shines with a more glorious and
brighter flame.
[Sidenote: IV. The disposition, or œconomy of the whole work.]
[*†77.] It is the business of a painter, in his choice of attitudes,
to foresee the effect and harmony of the lights and shadows, with the
colours which are to enter into the whole; taking from each of them, that
which will most conduce to the production of {80.} a beautiful effect.
[Sidenote: V. The faithfulness of the subject.]
[*†81.] Let “there be a genuine and lively expression of the subject,”
conformable to the text of ancient authors, to customs, and to times.
[Sidenote: VI. Whatsoever palls the subject to be rejected.]
“Whatever is trivial, foreign, or improper, ought by no means to take up
the principal part of the picture.” [*†83.] But herein imitate the sister
of painting, Tragedy; which employs the whole forces of her art in the
main action. {85.}
[*†89.] This part of painting, so rarely met with, is neither to be
acquired by pains or study, nor by the precepts or dictates of any
master. For they alone who have been inspired at their birth with
{90.} some portion of that heavenly fire, [*†91.] which was stolen by
Prometheus, are capable of receiving so divine a present.
Painting in Egypt was at first rude and imperfect, till being brought
into Greece, [*†92.] and being cultivated by the study and sublime genius
of that {95.} nation, [*†95.] it arrived at length to that height of
perfection, that it seemed to surpass even original nature.
Amongst the academies, which were composed by the rare genius of those
great men, these four are reckoned as the principal: namely, the Athenian
school, that of Sicyon, that of Rhodes, and that of Corinth. These were
little different from each other, only in the manner of their work; as it
may {100.} be seen by the ancient statues, which are the rule of beauty
and gracefulness; and to which succeeding ages have produced nothing that
is equal; “or indeed that is not very much inferior, both in science, and
in the manner of its execution.”
[Sidenote: VII. Design, the second part of painting.]
[*†103.] An attitude therefore must be chosen, according to their taste:
[*†104.] the parts of it must be great and large, [*†105.] “contrasted by
contrary motions; the {105.} most noble parts foremost in sight, and each
figure carefully poised on its own centre.”
[*†107.] “The parts must be drawn with flowing, gliding outlines, large
and smooth, rising gradually, not swelling suddenly, but which may be
just felt in the statues, or cause a little relievo in painting. {110.}
Let the muscles have their origin and insertion, [*†112.] according to
the rules of anatomy; let them not be subdivided into small sections, but
kept as entire as possible, [*†113.] in imitation of the Greek forms,
and expressing only the principal muscles.” In fine, [*†114.] let there
be a perfect relation betwixt the parts and the whole, that they may be
entirely of a piece. {115.}
Let the part which produces another part, be more strong than that which
it produces; and let the whole be seen by one point of sight. [*†117.]
Though perspective cannot be called a perfect ruler “for designing,” yet
it is a great succour to art, and facilitates the “dispatch of the work:”
though frequently {120.} falling into error, it makes us behold things
under a false aspect; for bodies are not always represented according to
the geometrical plane, but such as they appear to the sight.
[Sidenote: VIII. Variety in the figures.]
Neither the shape of faces, nor the age, nor the colour, ought to be
alike in all figures, any more {125.} than the hair; because men are as
different from each other, as the regions in which they are born are
different.
[Sidenote: IX. The members and drapery of every figure to be suitable to
it.]
[Sidenote: X. The actions of mutes to be imitated.]
[*†126.] Let every member be made for its own head, and agree with it;
and let all together compose but one body, with the draperies which are
proper and suitable to it. And, above all, [*†128.] let the figures to
which art cannot give a voice, imitate the mutes in their actions.
[Sidenote: XI. Of the principal figure of the subject.]
[*†129.] Let the principal figure of the subject appear in the middle of
the piece, under the strongest light, {130.} that it may have somewhat
to make it more remarkable than the rest; and that the figures which
accompany it, may not steal it from our sight.
[Sidenote: XII. Groups of figures.]
[*†132.] Let the “parts be brought together, and the figures disposed
in groups:” and let those groups be separated by a void space, to avoid
a confused {135.} heap; which proceeding from parts that are dispersed
without any regularity, and entangled one within another, divides the
sight into many rays, and causes a disagreeable confusion.
[Sidenote: XIII. The diversity of attitudes in the groups.]
[*†137.] The figures in the groups ought not to “have the same
inflections of the body, nor the same motions; nor should they lean
all one way, but break {140.} the symmetry, by proper oppositions and
contrasts.
“To several figures seen in front oppose others with the back toward
the spectator; that is, the shoulders of some opposed to the breasts
of others, and right limbs to left, whether the piece consists of many
figures, or but of few.” {145.}
[Sidenote: XIV. Equality of the piece.]
[*†145.] One side of the picture must not be void, while the other is
filled to the borders; but let matters be so well disposed, that if “any
thing rises high on one side of the piece, you may raise {150.} something
to answer it on the other,” so that they shall appear in some sort equal.
[Sidenote: XV. Of the number of figures.]
[*†152.] As a play is seldom very good, in which there are too many
actors; so it is very seldom seen, and almost impossible to perform, that
a picture should be perfect, in which there are too great a {155.} number
of figures. How “should they excel in putting several figures together,
who can scarce excel in a single one?”
“Many dispersed objects breed confusion, and take away from the picture
that solemn majesty, and agreeable repose, which give beauty to the
piece, and satisfaction to the sight. But if you are {160.} constrained
by the subject to admit of many figures, you must then make the whole to
be seen together, and the effect of the work at one view; and not every
thing separately, and in particular.”
[Sidenote: XVI. Of the joints and feet.]
[*†162.] The extremities of the joints must be seldom hidden; and the
extremities or end of the feet never.
[Sidenote: XVII. The motions of the hands and head must agree.]
[*†164.] The figures which are behind others, have neither grace nor
vigour, unless the motions of the hands accompany those of the head.
{165.}
[Sidenote: XVIII. What must be avoided in the distribution of the
figures.]
Avoid “all odd aspects or positions, and all ungraceful or forced actions
and motions.” Show no parts which are unpleasing to the sight, as all
foreshortenings usually are.
[*†169.] Avoid all those lines and outlines which are equal; which make
parallels, or other sharp-pointed and geometrical figures; such as are
squares and {170.} triangles: all which by being too exact, give to the
eye a certain displeasing symmetry, which produces no good effect. But,
as I have already told you, the principal lines ought to contrast each
other: for which reason, in these outlines, you ought to have a special
regard to the whole together: for it {175.} is from thence that the
beauty and force of the parts proceed.
[Sidenote: XIX. That we must not tie ourselves to nature; but accommodate
her to our genius.]
[*†176.] Be not so strictly tied to nature, that you allow nothing to
study, and the bent of your own genius. But on the other side, believe
not that your genius alone, and the remembrance of those things which
you have seen, can afford you wherewithal to furnish out a beautiful
piece, without the succour of that incomparable school-mistress, Nature;
[*†178.] whom you must have always present as a witness to the truth.
“Errors are infinite,” and, amongst many ways which {180.} mislead a
traveller, there is but one true one, which conducts him surely to his
journey’s end; as also there are many several sorts of crooked lines; but
there is one only which is straight.
[Sidenote: XX. Ancient figures the rules of imitating nature.]
Our business is to imitate the beauties of nature, as the ancients have
done before us, and as the object and nature of the thing require from
us. And for {185.} this reason, we must be careful in the search of
ancient medals, statues, gems, vases, paintings, and basso relievos:
[*†183.] And of all other things which discover to us the thoughts and
inventions of the Grecians; because they furnish us with great ideas, and
make our productions wholly beautiful. And {190.} in truth, after having
well examined them, we shall therein find so many charms, that we shall
pity the destiny of our present age, without hope of ever arriving at so
high a point of perfection.
[Sidenote: XXI. A single figure how to be treated.]
[*†193.] If you have but one single figure to work upon, you ought to
make it perfectly finished, and diversified with many colours.
[Sidenote: XXII. Of the draperies.]
[*†195.] Let the draperies be nobly spread upon the body; let the folds
be large, [*†196.] and let them follow {195.} the order of the parts,
that they may be seen underneath, by means of the lights and shadows;
notwithstanding that the parts should be often traversed (or crossed) by
the flowing of the folds, which loosely encompass them, [*†200.] without
sitting too straight upon them; but let them mark the {200.} parts
which are under them, so as in some manner to distinguish them, by the
judicious ordering of the lights and shadows. [*†202.] And if the parts
be too much distant from each other, so that there be void spaces, which
are deeply shadowed, we are then to take occasion to place in those voids
some fold to make a joining of the parts. {205.} “[*†204.] And as those
limbs and members which are expressed by few and large muscles, excel
in majesty and beauty,” in the same manner the beauty of the draperies
consists not in the multitude of the folds, but in their natural order,
and plain simplicity. The quality of the persons is also to be considered
in the drapery. [*†210.] As supposing them to be magistrates, their
draperies ought to be large and ample; if country clowns, or slaves,
they ought to be coarse and short; [*†211.] if ladies, or damsels, light
and {210.} soft. It is sometimes requisite to draw out, as it were from
the hollows and deep shadows, some fold, and give it a swelling, that so
receiving the light, it may contribute to extend the clearness to those
places where the body requires it; and by this means we shall disburthen
the piece of those hard shadowings, which are always ungraceful.
[Sidenote: XXIII. What things contribute to adorn the picture.]
[*†215.] The marks or ensigns of virtues contribute not {215.} little, by
their nobleness, to the ornament of the figures. Such, for example, as
are the decorations belonging to the liberal arts, to war, or sacrifices.
[Sidenote: XXIV. Of precious stones and pearl for ornaments.]
[*†217.] But let not the work be too much enriched with gold or jewels;
“for the abundance of them makes them look cheap; their value arising
from the scarcity.”
[Sidenote: XXV. The model.]
[*†220.] It is very expedient to make a model of those things, which
we have not in our sight, and whose {220.} nature is difficult to be
retained in the memory.
[Sidenote: XXVI. The scene of the picture.]
[*†221.] We are to consider the places where we lay the scene of the
picture; the countries where they were born, whom we represent; the
manner of their actions, their laws, and customs, and all that is
properly belonging to them.
[Sidenote: XXVII. The graces and the nobleness.]
[*†222.] Let a nobleness and grace be remarkable through all your work.
But, to confess the truth, this is a most difficult undertaking; and a
very rare present, which the artist receives rather from the hand of
Heaven, than from his own industry and studies.
[Sidenote: XXVIII. Let every thing be set in its proper place.]
In all things you are to follow the order of nature; for which reason you
must beware of drawing or painting clouds, winds, and thunder, towards
the bottom of your piece, and hell, and waters, in the {225.} uppermost
parts of it; you are not to place a stone column on a foundation of
reeds, but let every thing be set in its proper place.
[Sidenote: XXIX. Of the passions.]
Besides all this, you are to express the motions {230.} of the spirits,
and the affections or passions, whose centre is the heart; in a word,
to make the soul visible, by the means of some few colours; [*†233.]
this is that in which the greatest difficulty consists. Few there are,
whom Jupiter regards with a favourable eye in this undertaking; so that
it appertains only to those few, who participate somewhat of divinity
itself, to work these mighty wonders. It is the business of rhetoricians,
{235.} to treat the characters of the passions; and I shall content
myself, with repeating what an excellent master has formerly said on this
subject, that a “true and lively expression of the passions, is rather
the work of genius, than of labour and study.”
[Sidenote: XXX. Gothic ornaments are to be avoided.]
[Sidenote: Colouring the third part of painting.]
We are to have no manner of relish for Gothic ornaments, {240.} as being
in effect so many monsters, which barbarous ages have produced; during
which, when discord and ambition, caused by the too large extent of the
Roman empire, had produced wars, plagues, and famine, through the world,
then I say, the stately buildings and colosses fell to ruin, and the
nobleness of all beautiful arts was totally extinguished. Then it was
that the admirable, and {245.} almost supernatural, works of painting
were made fuel for the fire; but that this wonderful art might not wholly
perish, [*†247.] some relicts of it took sanctuary under ground, “in
sepulchres and catacombs,” and thereby escaped the common destiny. And
in the same profane age, sculpture was for a long time buried under the
same ruins, with all its beautiful productions and admirable statues.
The empire, in the mean time, under the weight of its proper crimes,
and undeserving to enjoy the day, was enveloped {250.} with a hideous
night, which plunged it into an abyss of errors, and covered with a
thick darkness of ignorance those unhappy ages, in just revenge of their
impieties. From hence it comes to pass, that the works of those great
Grecians are wanting to us; nothing of their painting and colouring
now remains to assist our modern artists, either in the invention, or
the manner, of those ancients. Neither is there any man who is able to
restore [*†256.] the {255.} chromatic part, or colouring, or to renew it
to that point of excellency, to which it had been carried by Zeuxis; who
by this part, which is so charming, so magical, and which so admirably
deceives the sight, made himself equal to the great Apelles, that prince
of painters; and deserved that height {260.} of reputation, which he
still possesses in the world.
And as this part, which we may call the utmost perfection of painting,
is a deceiving beauty, but withal soothing and pleasing; so she has
been accused of procuring lovers for [*†263.] her sister, and artfully
engaging us to admire her. But so little have {265.} this prostitution,
these false colours, and this deceit, dishonoured painting, that, on the
contrary, they have only served to set forth her praise, and to make her
merit farther known; and therefore it will be profitable to us, to have a
more clear understanding of what we call colouring.
[*†267.] The light produces all kinds of colours, and the shadow gives us
none. The more a body is nearer to the eyes, and the more directly it is
opposed to them, the more it is enlightened. Because the light languishes
and lessens, the farther it removes from its proper source.
The nearer the object is to the eyes, and the more {270.} directly it is
opposed to them, the better it is seen; because the sight is weakened by
distance.
[Sidenote: XXXI. The conduct of the tints of light and shadows.]
It is therefore necessary, “that those parts of round bodies which are
seen directly opposite to the spectator, should have the light entire;”
and that the extremities turn, in losing themselves insensibly and
confusedly, without precipitating the light all on the sudden into the
shadow, or the shadow into {275.} the light. But the passage of one into
the other, must be common and imperceptible, that is, by degrees of
lights into shadows, and of shadows into lights. And it is in conformity
to these principles, that you ought to treat a whole group of figures,
though it be composed of several parts, in the same {280.} manner as you
would do a single head: “or if the wideness of the space, or largeness
of the composition, requires, that you should have two groups or three,
[*†280.] (which should be the most,) let the lights and shadows be so
discreetly managed, [*†283.] that light bodies may have a sufficient mass
or breadth of shadow to sustain them, and that dark bodies may {285.}
have a sudden light behind to detach them from the ground.
[*†286.] “As in a convex mirror, the collected rays strike stronger and
brighter in the middle than upon the natural object, and the vivacity of
the colours is increased in the parts full in your sight; [*†290.] while
the goings off are more and more broken and faint as they approach to
the extremities, in the same manner {290.} bodies are to be raised and
rounded.”
Thus the painter and the sculptor are to work with one and the same
intention, and with one and the same conduct. For what the sculptor
strikes off, and makes round with his tool; the painter performs with
his pencil, casting behind that which he makes less visible, by the
diminution and breaking {295.} of his colours: “That which is foremost
and nearest to the eye, must be so distinctly expressed, as to be sharp,
or almost cutting to the sight. Thus shall the colours be disposed upon a
plane, which from a proper place and distance will seem so natural {300.}
and round, as to make the figures appear so many statues.
[Sidenote: XXXII. Of dark bodies on light grounds.]
“Solid bodies subject to the touch, are not to be {305.} painted
transparent; and even when such bodies are placed upon transparent
grounds, as upon clouds, waters, air, and the like vacuities, they must
be preserved opaque,[142] that their solidity be not destroyed among
those light, aërial, transparent species; and must therefore be expressed
sharper and rougher than what is next to them, more distinct by a firm
light and shadow, and with more solid and {310.} substantial colours;
that, on the contrary, the smoother and more transparent may be thrown
off to a farther distance.”
[Sidenote: XXXIII. That there must not be two equal lights in a picture.]
We are never to admit two equal lights in the same picture, but the
greater light must strike forcibly on the middle; and there extend its
greatest clearness on those places of the picture, where the principal
figures of it are, and where the {315.} strength of the action is
performed; diminishing by degrees as it comes nearer and nearer to the
borders; and after the same manner, that the light of the sun languishes
insensibly, in its spreading from the east, from whence it begins,
towards the west, where it decays and vanishes; so the light of the
picture being distributed over all the colours, will become less sensible
the farther it is removed {320.} from its original.
The experience of this is evident in those statues, which we see set up
in the midst of public places, whose upper parts are more enlightened
than the lower; and therefore you are to imitate them in the distribution
of your lights.
Avoid strong shadows on the middle of the limbs, lest the great quantity
of black which composes those shadows should seem to enter into them,
and to cut them: rather take care to place {325.} those shadowings round
about them, thereby to heighten the parts; and take such advantageous
lights, that after great lights great shadows may succeed. And
therefore Titian said, with reason, that he knew no better rule for the
distribution of the lights and shadows, than his observations drawn from
a [*†329.] bunch of grapes.
[Sidenote: XXXIV. Of white and black.]
[*†330.] Pure, or unmixed white, either draws an object {330.} nearer, or
carries it off to farther distance; it draws it nearer with black, and
throws it backward without it. [*†332.] But as for pure black, there is
nothing which brings the object nearer to the sight.
The light being altered by some colour, never fails to communicate
somewhat of that colour to the bodies on which it strikes; and the same
effect is performed by the medium of air, through which it passes.
[Sidenote: XXXV. The reflection of colours.]
The bodies which are close together, receive from {335.} each other that
colour which is opposite to them; and reflect on each other that, which
is naturally and properly their own.
[Sidenote: XXXVI. Union of colours.]
It is also consonant to reason, that the greatest part of those bodies
which are under a light, which is extended, and distributed equally
through all, should participate of each others colours. The Venetian
school having a great regard for that maxim, (which the ancients called
the breaking of colours,) in the quantity of figures, with which {340.}
they fill their pictures, have always endeavoured the union of colours;
for fear, that being too different, they should come to encumber the
sight: “therefore they painted each figure with one colour, {345.} or
with colours of near affinity, though the habit were of different kinds,
distinguishing the upper garment from the under, or from the loose and
flowing mantle, by the tints, or degrees, harmonizing and uniting the
colours, with whatever was next to them.”
[Sidenote: XXXVII. On the interposition of air.]
The less aërial space which there is betwixt us {350.} and the object,
and the more pure the air is, by so much the more the species are
preserved and distinguished; and, on the contrary, the more space of
air there is, and the less pure it is, so much the more the object is
confused and embroiled.
[Sidenote: XXXVIII. The relation of distances.]
Those objects which are placed foremost to the view, ought always to
be more finished, than those which are cast behind; and ought to have
dominion over those things which are confused and transient. [*†355.] But
let this be done relatively, viz. one {355.} thing greater and stronger,
casting the less behind, and rendering it less sensible by its opposition.
[Sidenote: XXXIX. Of bodies which are distanced.]
Those things which are removed to a distant view, though they are many,
yet ought to make but one mass; as for example, the leaves on the trees,
and the billows in the sea.
[Sidenote: XL. Of bodies which are contiguous, and of those which are
separated.]
Let not the objects which ought to be contiguous {360.} be separated; and
let those which ought to be separated, be apparently so to us; but let
this be done by a small and pleasing difference.
[Sidenote: XLI. Contrary extremities to be avoided.]
[*†361.] Let two contrary extremities never touch each other, either in
colour or in light; but let there always be a medium partaking both of
the one and of the other.
[Sidenote: XLII. Diversity of tints and colours.]
Let the bodies every where be of different tints and colours; that those
which are behind may be tied in friendship together; and that those which
are foremost may be strong and lively.
[Sidenote: XLIII. The choice of light.]
[*†365.] It is labour in vain to paint a high-noon, or {365.} mid-day
light, in your picture; because we have no colours which can sufficiently
express it; but it is better counsel, to choose a weaker light; such as
is that of the evening with which the fields are gilded by the sun; or a
morning light, whose whiteness is allayed; or that which appears after a
shower of rain, which the sun gives us through the breaking of a cloud;
or during thunder, when the clouds {370.} hide him from our view, and
make the light of a fiery colour.
[Sidenote: XLIV. Of certain things relating to the practical part.]
Smooth bodies, such as crystals, polished metals, wood, bones, and
stones; those which are covered with hair, as skins, the beard, or the
hair of the head; as also feathers, silks, and the eyes, which are of a
watery nature; and those which are liquid, as waters, and those corporeal
species, {375.} which we see reflected by them; and in fine, all that
which touches them, or is near them, ought to be “carefully painted
flat, in flowing colours; then touched up with sprightly lights, and the
true lines of the drawing restored, which were lost, or confused, in
working the colours together.”
[Sidenote: XLV. The field, or ground of the picture.]
[*†378.] Let the field, or ground of the picture, be pleasant, free,
transient, light, and well united with colours, which are of a friendly
nature to each other; and of such a mixture, as there may be {380.}
something in it of every colour that composes your work, as it were the
contents of your palette. “And let those bodies that are back in the
ground be painted with colours allied to those of the ground itself.”
[Sidenote: XLVI. Of the vivacity of colours.]
[*†382.] Let your colours be lively, and yet not look (according to the
painters’ proverb) as if they had been rubbed or sprinkled with meal;
that is to say, let them not be pale.
[*†383.] Let the parts which are nearest to us, and most raised, be
strongly coloured, and as it were sparkling; and let those parts which
are more remote from sight, and towards the borders, be more faintly
touched.
[Sidenote: XLVII. Of shadows.]
[*†385.] Let there be so much harmony, or consent, in {385.} the masses
of the picture, that all the shadowings may appear as if they were but
one.
[Sidenote: XLVIII. The picture to be of one piece.]
[*†386.] “Let the whole picture be of one piece, as if it were painted
from one palette.”
[Sidenote: XLIX. The looking-glass the painter’s best master.]
[*†387.] The looking-glass will instruct you in many beauties, which you
may observe from nature; so will also those objects which are seen in an
evening in a large prospect.
[Sidenote: L. An half figure, or a whole one, before others.]
If there be a half figure, or a whole one, to be set before the other
figures, and placed nearer to the view, and next the light; or if it is
to be painted in a great place, though at a distance from the eye; be
sure on these occasions not to be sparing of great {390.} lights, the
most lively colours, nor the strongest shadows.
[Sidenote: LI. A portrait.]
[*†393.] As for a portrait, or pictures by the life, you are to work
precisely after nature, and to express what she shows you, working at
the same time on those parts which are resembling to each {395.} other:
as for example, the eyes, the cheeks, the nostrils, and the lips: so
that you are to touch the one, as soon as you have given a stroke of the
pencil to the other, lest the interruption of time cause you to lose
the idea of one part, which nature has produced to resemble the other;
and thus imitating feature for feature, with a just and harmonious
composition of the lights and shadows, and of the colours; and giving to
the picture that liveliness, which the freedom and force of the pencil
make appear, it may seem, the living hand of nature.
[Sidenote: LII. The place of the picture.]
The works which are painted to be seen near, in little or narrow places,
must be very tender and well united with tints and colours; “let those
which are to be seen at a distance, be varied with fiercer colours and
stronger tints.
“Very large figures must have room enough, {400.} and strong, or rather
fierce colouring.”
[Sidenote: LIII. Large lights.]
[*†403.] You are to “take the utmost care, that broad lights may be
joined to a like breadth of shadows.”
[Sidenote: LIV. What lights are requisite.]
If the picture be set in a place which receives but little light, the
colours must be very clear; as, on the contrary, very brown, if the place
be {405.} strongly enlightened, or in the open air.
[Sidenote: LV. Things which are vicious in painting to be avoided.]
Remember to avoid objects which are full of hollows, broken in pieces,
little, and which are separated, or in parcels; shun also those things
which are barbarous, shocking to the eye, and party-coloured, and which
are all of an equal force of light and shadow; as also all things which
are obscene, {410.} impudent, filthy, unseemly, cruel, fantastical,
poor, and wretched; and those things which are sharp to the feeling;
in short, all things which corrupt their natural forms, by a confusion
of their parts which are entangled in each other: “For the eyes have a
horror for those things, which the hands will not condescend to touch.”
[Sidenote: LVI. The prudential part of a painter.]
But while you endeavour to avoid one vice, be cautious lest you fall into
another; for “extremes are always vicious.” {415.}
[Sidenote: LVII. The idea of a beautiful piece.]
[Sidenote: LVIII. Advice to a young painter.]
Those things which are beautiful in the utmost degree of perfection,
according to the axiom of ancient painters, [*†417.] ought to have
somewhat of greatness in them, and their outlines to be noble; they
must be disentangled, pure, and without alteration, clean, and knit
together; composed of great parts, yet those but few in number. In
fine, distinguished by bold colours; but of such as are related and
{420.} friendly to each other. And as it is a common saying, that “he
who has begun well, has already performed half his work;” [*†422.] so
there is nothing more pernicious to a youth who is yet in the elements
of painting, than to engage himself under the discipline of an ignorant
master; who depraves his taste, by an infinite number of mistakes, of
which his wretched works are full and thereby {425.} makes him drink the
poison, which infects him through all his future life.
Let him, who is yet but a beginner, not make so much haste to study after
nature, every thing which he intends to imitate, as not in the mean time
to learn proportions, the connection of the joints, and their outlines:
and let him first have {430.} well examined the excellent originals, and
have thoroughly studied all the pleasing deceptions of his art; which
he must be rather taught by a knowing master, than by practice; and by
seeing him perform, without being contented only to hear him speak.
[Sidenote: LIX. Art must be subservient to the painter.]
[*†433.] Search whatsoever is aiding to your art, and convenient; and
avoid those things which are repugnant to it.
[Sidenote: LX. Diversity and facility are pleasing.]
[*†434.] Bodies of divers natures, which are aggrouped (or combined)
together, are agreeable and pleasant to the sight; [*†435.] as also
those things which seem to be slightly touched, and performed with ease;
because {435.} they are ever full of spirit, and appear to be animated
with a kind of celestial fire. But we are not able to compass these
things with facility, till we have for a long time weighed them in our
judgment, and thoroughly considered them: by this means the painter shall
be enabled to conceal the pains and study which his art and work have
cost him, under a pleasing sort of deceit; for the greatest secret which
belongs to art, is to hide it from the discovery of spectators.
[Sidenote: LXI. The original must be in the head, and the copy on the
cloth.]
Never give the least touch with your pencil, till {440.} you have well
examined your design, and have settled your outlines; [*†442.] nor till
you have present in your mind a perfect idea of your work.
[Sidenote: LXII. The compass to be in the eyes.]
[*†443.] Let the eye be satisfied in the first place, even against and
above all other reasons, which beget difficulties in your art, which of
itself suffers none; and let the compass be rather in your eyes, than in
your hands.
[Sidenote: LXIII. Pride an enemy to good painting.]
[*†445.] Profit yourself by the counsels of the knowing; {445.} and do
not arrogantly disdain to learn the opinion of every man concerning
your work. All men are blind as to their own productions, and no man
is capable of judging in his own cause. [*†449.] But if you have no
knowing friend to assist you with his advice, yet {450.} length of time
will never fail; it is but letting some weeks pass over your head, or
at least some days, without looking on your work; and that intermission
will faithfully discover to you the faults and beauties. Yet suffer not
yourself to be carried away by the opinions of the vulgar, who often
speak without knowledge; neither give up yourself altogether to them, and
abandon wholly your own genius, so as lightly to change that which you
have made; for he who has a windy head, and flatters himself with the
empty hope of deserving the praise of the common people, (whose opinions
are inconsiderate and changeable,) does but injure himself, and pleases
no man.
[Sidenote: LXIV. Know yourself.]
Since every painter paints himself in his own {455.} works, (so much is
nature accustomed to produce her own likeness,) it is advantageous to
him to know himself; [*†458.] to the end that he may cultivate those
talents which make his genius, and not unprofitably lose his time, in
endeavouring to gain that, which she has refused {460.} him. As neither
fruits have the taste, nor flowers the beauty which is natural to them,
when they are transplanted into an unkindly or foreign soil, and are
forced to bear before their season, by an artificial heat; so it is in
vain for the painter to sweat over his works, in spite of nature and of
genius; for without them, it is impossible for him to succeed.
[Sidenote: LXV. Perpetually practise, and do easily what you have
conceived.]
[*†464.] While you meditate on these truths, and observe them diligently,
by making necessary reflections on them; let the labour of the hand
accompany the study of the brain; let the former second and support the
latter; yet without blunting the {465.} sharpness of your genius, and
abating of its vigour by too much assiduity.
[Sidenote: LXVI. The morning most proper for work.]
[*†466.] The morning is the best and most proper part of the day for your
business; employ it therefore in the study and exercise of those things
which require the greatest pains and application.
[Sidenote: LXVII. Every day do something.]
[*†468.] Let no day pass over you, without a line.
[Sidenote: LXVIII. The passions which are true and natural.]
Observe, as you walk the streets, the airs of heads; the natural postures
and expressions; which are always {470.} the most free, the less they
seem to be observed.
[Sidenote: LXIX. Of table-books.]
[*†473.] Be ready to put into your table-book (which you must always
carry about you) whatsoever you judge worthy of it: whether it be upon
the earth, or in the air, or upon the waters, while the species of them
is yet fresh in your imagination.
[*†475.] Wine and good cheer are no great friends to {475.} painting;
they serve only to recreate the mind, when it is opprest and spent with
labour; then indeed it is proper to renew your vigour by the conversation
of your friends. Neither is a true painter naturally pleased with the
fatigue of business, and particularly of the law, [*†478.] but delights
in the liberty which belongs to the bachelor’s estate. [*†480.] Painting
naturally withdraws from noise and tumult, and pleases itself in the
enjoyment of a country retirement; because silence and solitude set an
edge {480.} upon the genius, and cause a greater application to work and
study; and also serve to produce the ideas, which, so conceived, will be
always present in the mind, even to the finishing of the work; the whole
compass of which, the painter can at that time more commodiously form to
himself, than at any other.
[*†484.] Let not the covetous design of growing rich, {485.} induce you
to ruin your reputation, but rather satisfy yourself with a moderate
fortune; and let your thoughts be wholly taken up with acquiring to
yourself a glorious name, which can never perish, but with the world; and
make that the recompense of your worthy labours.
[*†487.] The qualities requisite to form an excellent painter, are, a
true discerning judgment, a mind which is docible, a noble heart, a
sublime sense of things, and fervour of soul; after which follow, health
of body, a convenient share of fortune, the {490.} flower of youth,
diligence, an affection for the art, and to be bred under the discipline
of a knowing master.
And remember, that whatsoever your subject be, whether of your own
choice, or what chance or good fortune shall put into your hand, if you
have not that genius, or natural inclination, which your art requires,
you shall never arrive to perfection in it, even with all those great
advantages which I have mentioned. For the wit and the manual operation
are things vastly distant from each other. It is the influence of your
stars, and the happiness of your genius, to which you must be obliged for
the greatest beauties of your art.
Nay, even your excellencies sometimes will not {495.} pass for such in
the opinion of the learned, but only as things which have less of error
in them; for no man sees his own failings; [*†496.] and life is so short,
that it is not sufficient for so long an art. Our strength fails us in
our old age, when we begin to know somewhat; age oppresses us by the same
degrees that it instructs us; and permits not, that our mortal members,
which are frozen with our years, should retain the vigour and spirits of
our youth.
[Sidenote: LXX. The method of studies for a young painter.]
[*†500.] Take courage therefore, O ye noble youths! {500.} you legitimate
offspring of Minerva, who are born under the influence of a happy planet,
and warmed with a celestial fire, which attracts you to the love of
science! exercise, while you are young, your whole forces, and employ
them with delight in an art, which requires a whole painter. Exercise
them, I say, while your boiling youth supplies {505.} you with strength,
and furnishes you with quickness, and with vigour; while your mind, yet
pure, and void of error, has not taken any ill habitude to vice; while
yet your spirits are inflamed with the thirst of novelties, and your
mind is filled with the first species of things which present themselves
to young imagination, which it gives in keeping to your memory; and
which your memory retains for length of time, by reason of the moisture
wherewith at that age the brain abounds. [*†503.] You will do well
[*†509.] to begin with geometry, and after having made some progress
in it, [*†510.] set yourself on designing after the ancient Greeks:
[*†511.] and cease {510.} not day or night from labour, till, by your
continual practice, you have gained an easy habitude of imitating them
in their invention, and in their manner. [*†514.] And when afterwards
your judgment shall grow stronger, and come to its maturity with years,
it will be very necessary to see and examine one after the other, and
part by part, those works which have given so great a reputation to the
masters of {515.} the first form in pursuit of that method, which we
have taught you here above, and according to the rules which we have
given you; such are the Romans, the Venetians, the Parmesans, and the
Bologneses. Amongst those excellent persons, Raphael {520.} had the
talent of invention for his share, by which he made as many miracles as
he made pictures. In which is observed [*†520.] a certain grace which was
wholly natural and peculiar to him, and which none since him have been
able to appropriate to themselves. Michael Angelo possessed powerfully
the part of design, above all others. [*†522.] Julio Romano (educated
from his childhood among the muses) has opened to us the treasures of
Parnassus: and in the poetry of painting has discovered to our eyes the
most sacred mysteries of Apollo, and all {525.} the rarest ornaments
which that god is capable of communicating to those works that he
inspires; which we knew not before, but only by the recital that the
poets made of them. He seems to have painted those famous wars “in which
fortune has crowned her triumphant heroes;” and those other glorious
events which she has caused in all ages, even with more magnificence and
nobleness, than when they were acted in the world.
“The shining eminence of Correggio consists in {530.} his laying on ample
broad lights encompassed with friendly shadows, and in a grand style
of painting, with a delicacy in the management of colours.” And Titian
understood so well the union of the masses, and the bodies of colours,
the harmony of the tints and the disposition of the whole together, that
he has deserved those honours and that wealth which were heaped upon him,
together with that attribute of being sirnamed the divine painter. The
laborious and diligent Annibal Caracci has taken from all those great
persons already mentioned {535.} whatsoever excellencies he found in
them, and, as it were, converted their nourishment into his own substance.
[Sidenote: LXXI. Nature and experience perfect art.]
It is a great means of profiting yourself, to copy diligently those
excellent pieces, and those beautiful designs; but Nature, which is
present before your eyes, is yet a better mistress; for she augments the
force and vigour of the genius, and she it is from whom art derives her
ultimate perfection, {540.} by the means of sure experience; [*†541.]
I pass in silence many things which will be more amply treated in the
ensuing commentary.
And now considering that all things are subject to the vicissitude of
time, and that they are liable to destruction by several ways, I thought
I might reasonably take the boldness [*†544.] to intrust to the muses
(those lovely and immortal sisters of painting) these few precepts, which
I have here made and collected of that art.
I employed my time in the study of this work at {545.} Rome, while
the glory of the Bourbon family, and the just avenger of his injured
ancestors, the victorious Louis XIII. was darting his thunder on the
Alps, and causing his enemies to feel the force of his unconquerable
arms; while he, like another Gallic Hercules, born for the benefit and
honour of his country, was griping the Spanish Geryon by the {550.}
throat, and at the point of strangling him.
OBSERVATIONS ON THE ART OF PAINTING OF CHARLES ALPHONSE DU FRESNOY.
The number at the head of every observation serves to find in
the text the particular passage on which the observation was
made.
Transcriber’s Note: This number has been expanded to include
the “asterism” marker to help the reader to locate the
relevant passage.
[*†1.]
Painting and Poesy are two sisters, &c. It is a received truth, that
the arts have a certain relation to each other. “There is no art, (said
Tertullian, in his Treatise of Idolatry,) which is not either the father,
or the near relation of another.” And Cicero, in his oration for Archias
the poet, says, “That the arts, which have respect to human life, have
a kind of alliance amongst themselves, and hold each other (as we may
say) by the hand.” But those arts, which are the nearest related, and
claim the most ancient kindred with each other, are painting and poetry;
and whosoever shall thoroughly examine them, will find them so much
resembling one another, that he cannot take them for less than sisters.
They both follow the same bent, and suffer themselves to be rather
carried away, than led by their secret inclinations, which are so many
seeds of the Divinity. “There is a god within us, (says Ovid, in the
beginning of his sixth book _De Fastis_, there speaking of the poets,)
who by his agitation warms us.” And Suidas says, “That the famous
sculptor Phidias, and Zeuxis that incomparable painter, were both of them
transported by the same enthusiasm which gave life to all their works.”
They both of them aim at the same end, which is imitation. Both of them
excite our passions, and we suffer ourselves willingly to be deceived,
both by the one and by the other; our eyes and souls are so fixed to
them, that we are ready to persuade ourselves, that the painted bodies
breathe, and that the fictions are truths. Both of them are set on fire
by the great actions of heroes; and both endeavour to eternize them. Both
of them, in short, are supported by the strength of their imagination,
and avail themselves of those licences, which Apollo has equally bestowed
on them, and with which their genius has inspired them:
_——“Pictoribus atque poetis_
_Quidlibet audendi, semper fuit æqua potestas.”_
“Painters and poets, free from servile awe,
May treat their subjects, and their objects draw.”
As Horace tells us, in his “Art of Poetry.”
The advantage which painting possesses above poesy is this; that, amongst
so great a diversity of languages, she makes herself understood by all
the nations of the world; and that she is necessary to all other arts,
because of the need which they have of demonstrative figures, which often
give more light to the understanding than the clearest discourses we can
make:
_“Segnius irritant animos demissa per aurem,_
_Quam quæ sunt oculis commissa fidelibus.”_
“Hearing excites the mind by slow degrees;
The man is warmed at once by what he sees.”
Horace in the same “Art of Poetry.”
[*†9.]
“For both those arts that they might advance,” &c. Poetry, by its hymns
and anthems; and Painting, by its statues, altar-pieces, and by all those
decorations which inspire respect and reverence for our sacred mysteries,
have been serviceable to religion. Gregory of Nice, after having made a
long and beautiful description of Abraham sacrificing his son Isaac, says
these words:—“I have often cast my eyes upon a picture, which represents
this moving object, and could never withdraw them without tears. So well
did the picture represent the thing itself, even as if the action were
then passing before my sight.”
[*†24.]
“So much these divine arts have been always honoured,” &c. “The greatest
lords, whole cities, and their magistrates of old, (says Pliny, lib.
xxxv.) took it for an honour to obtain a picture from the hands of
those great ancient painters.” But this honour is much fallen of late
amongst the French nobility: and if you will understand the cause of
it, Vitruvius will tell you, that it comes from their ignorance of the
charming arts, “_Propter ignorantiam artis, virtutes obscurantur_;” (in
the Preface to his Fifth Book.) Nay more, we should see this admirable
art fall into the last degree of contempt, if our mighty monarch, who
yields in nothing to the magnanimity of Alexander the Great, had not
shown as much love for painting as for valour in the wars; we daily
see him encouraging this noble art, by the considerable presents which
he makes to his chief painter.[143] And he has also founded an academy
for the progress and perfectionating of painting, which his first
minister[144] honours with his protection, his care, and frequent visits;
insomuch that we might shortly see the age of Apelles reviving in our
country, together with all the beauteous arts, if our generous nobility,
who follow our incomparable king with so much ardour and courage in those
dangers, to which he exposes his sacred person, for the greatness and
glory of his kingdom, would imitate him in that wonderful affection,
which he bears to all who are excellent in this kind. Those persons, who
were the most considerable in ancient Greece, either for birth or merit,
took a most particular care, for many ages, to be instructed in the art
of painting; following that laudable and profitable custom, begun and
established by the great Alexander, which was to learn how to design.
And Pliny, who gives testimony to this, in the tenth chapter of his
thirty-fifth book, tells us farther, (speaking of Pamphilius, the master
of Apelles,) “That it was by the authority of Alexander, that, first at
Sicyon, and afterwards through all Greece, the young gentlemen learned,
before all other things, to design upon tablets of boxen-wood; and that
the first place, among all the liberal arts, was given to painting.”
And that which makes it evident, that they were very knowing in this
art, is the love and esteem which they had for painters. Demetrius gave
high testimonies of this, when he besieged the city of Rhodes; for he
was pleased to employ some part of that time, which he owed to the care
of his arms, in visiting Protogenes, who was then drawing the picture
of Ialysus. “This Ialysus (says Pliny,) hindered King Demetrius from
taking Rhodes, out of fear lest he should burn the pictures; and not
being able to fire the town on any other side, he was pleased rather
to spare the painting, than to take the victory, which was already in
his hands.” Protogenes, at that time, had his painting-room in a garden
out of the town, and very near the camp of the enemies, where he was
daily finishing those pieces which he had already begun, the noise of
soldiers not being capable of interrupting his studies. But Demetrius
causing him to be brought into his presence, and asking him, what made
him so bold as to work in the midst of enemies? he answered the king,
“That he understood the war which he made was against the Rhodians, and
not against the arts.” This obliged Demetrius to appoint him guards
for his security, being infinitely pleased that he could preserve that
hand, which by this means he saved from the barbarity and insolence of
soldiers. Alexander had no greater pleasure than when he was in the
painting-room of Apelles, where he commonly was found. And that painter
once received from him a sensible testimony of love and esteem which that
monarch had for him; for, having caused him to paint naked (by reason
of her admirable beauty,) one of his concubines, called Campaspe, who
had the greatest share in his affections, and perceiving that Apelles
was wounded with the same fatal dart of beauty, he made a present of her
to him. In that age, so great a deference was paid to painting, that
they, who had any mastery in that art, never painted on any thing but
what was portable from one place to another, and what could be secured
from burning. “They took a particular care (says Pliny, in the place
above cited,) not to paint any thing against a wall, which could only
belong to one master, and must always remain in the same place, and for
that reason could not be removed in case of an accidental fire. Men were
not suffered to keep a picture, as it were in prison, on the walls. It
dwelt in common in all cities, and the painter himself was respected as a
common good to all the world.” See this excellent author, and you shall
find, that the tenth chapter of his thirty-fifth book is filled with the
praises of this art, and with the honours which were ascribed to it. You
will there find, that it was not permitted to any but those of noble
blood to profess it. Francis the First (as Vasari tells us,) was in love
with painting to that degree, that he allured out of Italy all the best
masters, that this art might flourish in his own kingdom: and, amongst
others, Leonardo da Vinci, who, after having continued for some time in
France, died at Fontainbleau in the arms of that great king, who could
not behold his death without shedding tears over him. Charles the Fifth
has adorned Spain with the noblest pictures which are now remaining in
the world. Ridolphi, in his Life of Titian, says, “That emperor one day
took up a pencil which fell from the hand of that artist, who was then
drawing his picture; and upon the compliment which Titian made him on
this occasion, he said these words:—“Titian has deserved to be served by
Cæsar.” And in the same Life, it is remarkable, “That the emperor valued
himself not so much in subjecting kingdoms and provinces, as that he had
been thrice made immortal by the hand of Titian.” If you will but take
the pains to read this famous Life in Ridolphi, you will there see the
relation of all those honours which he received from Charles the Fifth.
It would take up too much time here to recount all the particulars; I
will only observe, that the greatest lords, who composed the court of
that emperor, not being able to refrain from some marks of jealousy,
upon the preference which he made of the person and conversation of
Titian, to that of all his other courtiers, he freely told them, “That
he could never want a court, or courtiers; but he could not have Titian
always with him.” Accordingly, he heaped riches on him; and whensoever
he sent him money, which, ordinarily speaking, was a great sum, he
always did it with this obliging testimony, “That his design was not to
pay him the value of his pictures, because they were above any price.”
After the example of the worthies of antiquity, who bought the rarest
pictures with bushels of gold, without counting the weight or the number
of the pieces. “_In nummo aureo, mensurâ accepit, non numero_,” says
Pliny, speaking of Apelles. Quinctilian infers from hence, “that there
is nothing more noble than the art of painting;” because other things,
for the most part, are merchandize, and bought at certain rates: “Most
things for this very reason (says he,) are vile, because they have a
price;” “_Pleraque hoc ipso possunt videri vilia, quod pretium habent._”
(See the 34th, 35th, and 36th Books of Pliny.) Many great persons have
loved it with an extreme passion, and have exercised themselves in
it with delight. Amongst others, Lælius Fabius, one of those famous
Romans, who, (as Cicero relates,) after he had tasted painting, and had
practised it, would be called Fabius Pictor; as also Turpilius, a Roman
knight; Labeo, prætor and consul; Quintus Pedius; the poets Ennius and
Pacuvius; Socrates, Plato, Metrodorus, Pyrrho, Commodus, Nero, Vespasian,
Alexander, Severus, Antoninus, and many other kings and emperors, who
thought it not below their majesty to employ some part of their time in
this honourable art.
[*†37.]
“The principal and most important part of painting, is to find out, and
thoroughly to understand, what nature hath made most beautiful, and most
proper to this art,” &c. Observe here the rock on which the greatest
part of the Flemish painters have split: most of that nation know how to
imitate nature, at least as well as the painters of other countries; but
they make a bad choice in nature itself; whether it be, that they have
not seen the ancient pieces, to find those beauties; or that a happy
genius, and the beautiful nature, is not of the growth of their country.
And to confess the truth, that which is naturally beautiful is so very
rare, that it is discovered by few persons; it is difficult to make a
choice of it, and to form to ourselves such an idea of it, as may serve
us for a model.
[*†39.]
“And that a choice of it may be made according to the gust and manner
of the ancients,” &c. That is to say, according to the statues, the
basso-relievos, and the other ancient pieces, as well of the Grecians as
of the Romans. Ancient (or antic) is that which has been made from the
time of Alexander the Great, till that of Phocas; during whose empire the
arts were ruined by war. These ancient works from their beginning have
been the rule of beauty: and in effect, the authors of them have been
so careful to give them that perfection, which is still to be observed
in them, that they made use not only of one single body, whereby they
formed them, but of many, from which they took the most regular parts
to compose from them a beautiful whole. “The sculptors,” says Maximus
Tyrius, in his 7th dissertation, “with admirable artifice, chose out of
many bodies those parts which appeared to them the most beautiful; and
out of that diversity made but one statue: but this mixture is made with
so much prudence and propriety, that they seem to have taken but one
only perfect beauty. And let us not imagine that we can ever find one
natural beauty, which can dispute with statues that art, which has always
somewhat more perfect than nature.” It is also to be presumed, that in
the choice which they made of those parts, they followed the opinion of
the physicians, who at that time were very capable of instructing them
in the rules of beauty; since beauty and health ordinarily follow each
other. “For beauty,” says Galen, “is nothing else but a just accord, and
mutual harmony of the members, animated by a healthful constitution. And
men,” says the same author, “commend a certain statue of Polycletus,
which they call the rule, and which deserves that name, for having so
perfect an agreement in all its parts, and a proportion so exact, that
it is not possible to find a fault in it.” From what I have quoted, we
may conclude, that the ancient pieces are truly beautiful, because they
resemble the beauties of nature; and that nature will ever be beautiful
which resembles those beauties of antiquity. It is now evident upon
what account none have presumed to contest the proportion of those
ancient pieces; and that, on the contrary, they have always been quoted
as models of the most perfect beauty. Ovid, in the twelfth book of his
“Metamorphoses,” where he describes Cyllarus, the most beautiful of all
the Centaurs, says, “That he had so great a vivacity in his countenance,
his neck, his shoulders, his hands, and stomach, were so fair, that it
is certain the manly part of him was as beautiful as the most celebrated
statues.” And Philostratus, in his “Heroics,” speaking of Protesilaus,
and praising the beauty of his face, says, “That the form of his nose was
square, as if it had been of a statue.” And in another place, speaking of
Euphorbus, he says, “That his beauty had gained the affections of all the
Greeks; and that it resembled so nearly the beauty of a statue, that one
might have taken him for Apollo.” Afterwards also, speaking of the beauty
of Neoptolemus, and of his likeness to his father Achilles, he says,
“That, in beauty, his father had the same advantage over him, as statues
have over the beauty of living men.”
This ought to be understood of the fairest statues; for amongst the
multitude of sculptors which were in Greece and Italy, it is impossible
but some of them must have been bad workmen, or rather less good; for
though their works were much inferior to the artists of the first
form, yet somewhat of greatness is to be seen in them, and somewhat of
harmonious in the distribution of their parts, which makes it evident,
that, at that time, they wrought on common principles; and that every one
of them availed himself of those principles, according to his capacity
and genius. Those statues were the greatest ornaments of Greece. We need
only open the book of Pausanias to find the prodigious quantity of them,
whether within or without their temples, or in the crossing of streets,
or in the squares and public places, or even the fields, or on the tombs.
Statues were erected to the muses, to the nymphs, to heroes, to great
captains, to magistrates, philosophers, and poets; in short, they were
set up to all those who had made themselves eminent, either in defence
of their country, or for any noble action which deserved a recompence;
for it was the most ordinary and most authentic way, both amongst the
Greeks and Romans, thus to testify their gratitude. The Romans, when
they had conquered Græcia, transported from thence not only their most
admirable statues, but also brought along with them the most excellent
of their sculptors, who instructed others in their art, and have left
to posterity the immortal examples of their knowledge, which we see
confirmed by those curious statues, those vases, those basso-relievos,
and those beautiful columns called by the names of Trajan and Antonine.
These are those beauties which our author proposes to us for our
models, and the true fountains of science, out of which both painters
and statuaries are bound to draw for their own use, without amusing
themselves with dipping in streams which are often muddy, at least
troubled; I mean the manner of their masters, after whom they creep, and
from whom they are unwilling to depart, either through negligence, or
through the meanness of their genius. “It belongs only to heavy minds,”
says Cicero, “to spend their time on streams, without searching for the
springs, from whence their materials flow in all manner of abundance.”
[*†40.]
“Without which, all is nothing but a blind and rash barbarity,” &c. All
that has nothing of the ancient gusto, is called a barbarous or Gothic
manner, which is not conducted by any rule, but only follows a wretched
fancy, which has nothing in it that is noble. We are here to observe,
that painters are not obliged to follow the antique as exactly as the
sculptors; for then the picture would savour too strongly of the statue,
and would seem to be without motion. Many painters, and some of the
ablest amongst them, believing they do well, and taking that precept in
too literal a sense, have fallen thereby into great inconveniencies. It
therefore becomes the painters to make use of those ancient patterns with
discretion, and to accommodate the nature to them in such a manner, that
their figures, which must seem to live, may rather appear to be models
for the antique, than the antique a model for their figures.
It appears, that Raphael made a perfect use of this conduct; and that
the Lombard school have not precisely searched into this precept any
farther, than to learn from thence how to make a good choice of the
nature, and to give a certain grace and nobleness to all their works, by
the general and confused idea which they had of what is beautiful. As
for the rest, they are sufficiently licentious, excepting only Titian,
who, of all the Lombards, has preserved the greatest purity in his works.
This barbarous manner, of which I spoke, has been in great vogue from the
year 611 to 1450. They who have restored painting in Germany (not having
seen any of those fair relics of antiquity,) have retained much of that
barbarous manner. Amongst others, Lucas van Leyden, a very laborious man,
who, with his scholars, has infected almost all Europe with his designs
for tapestry, which, by the ignorant, are called ancient hangings, (a
greater honour than they deserve;) these, I say, are esteemed beautiful
by the greatest part of the world. I must acknowledge, that I am amazed
at so gross a stupidity, and that we of the French nation should have
so barbarous a taste as to take for beautiful those flat, childish,
and insipid tapestries. Albert Durer, that famous German, who was
contemporary to that Lucas, has had the like misfortune to fall into that
absurd manner, because he had never seen any thing that was beautiful.
Observe what Vasari tells us, in the Life of Marc Antonio, (Raphael’s
graver,) having first commended Albert for his skill in graving, and his
other talents:—“And in truth,” says he, “if this so excellent, so exact,
and so universal a man, had been born in Tuscany, as he was in Germany,
and had formed his studies according to those beautiful pieces which are
seen at Rome, as the rest of us have done, he had proved the best painter
of all Italy, as he was the greatest genius, and the most accomplished
which Germany ever bore.”
[*†45.]
“We love what we understand,” &c. This period informs us, that though
our inventions are never so good, though we are furnished by nature with
a noble genius, and though we follow the impulse of it, yet this is not
enough, if we learn not to understand what is perfect and beautiful in
nature; to the end, that, having found it, we may be able to imitate it,
and by this instruction we may be capacitated to observe those errors
which she herself has made, and to avoid them, so as not to copy her
in all sorts of subjects, such as she appears to us, without choice or
distinction.
[*†50.]
“As being the sovereign judge of his own art,” &c. This word, sovereign
judge, or arbiter of his own art, presupposes a painter to be fully
instructed in all the parts of painting; so that being set as it were
above his art, he may be the master and sovereign of it, which is no easy
matter. Those of that profession are so seldom endowed with that supreme
capacity, that few of them arrive to be good judges of painting; and I
should many times make more account of their judgment, who are men of
sense, and yet have never touched a pencil, than of the opinion which is
given by the greatest part of painters. All painters, therefore, may be
called arbiters of their own art; but to be sovereign arbiters, belongs
only to knowing painters.
[*†52.]
“And permit no transient beauties to escape his observation,” &c. Those
fugitive or transient beauties, are no other than such as we observe in
nature, with a short and transient view, and which remain not long in
their subjects. Such are the passions of the soul. There are of this
sort of beauties which last but for a moment; as the different airs of
an assembly upon the sight of an unexpected and uncommon object, some
particularity of a violent passion, some graceful action, a smile, a
glance of an eye, a disdainful look, a look of gravity, and a thousand
other such-like things; we may also place in the catalogue of these
flying beauties, fine clouds, such as ordinarily follow thunder, or a
shower of rain.
[*†54.]
“In the same manner that bare practice, destitute of the lights of
art,” &c. We find in Quinctilian, that Pythagoras said, “The theory
is nothing without the practice.” “And what means,” says the younger
Pliny, “have we to retain what has been taught us, if we put it not in
practice?” We would not allow that man to be an orator, who had the
best thoughts imaginable, and who knew all the rules of rhetoric, if he
had not acquired, by exercise, the art of using them, and of composing
an excellent discourse. Painting is a long pilgrimage, what avails it
to make all the necessary preparatives for our voyage, or to inform
ourselves of all the difficulties in the road? If we do not actually
begin the journey, and travel at a round rate, we shall never arrive at
the end of it. And as it would be ridiculous to grow old in the study of
every necessary thing in an art, which comprehends so many several parts;
so, on the other hand, to begin the practice without knowing the rules,
or at least with a light tincture of them, is to expose ourselves to the
scorn of those who can judge of painting, and to make it apparent to
the world that we have no care of our reputation. Many are of opinion,
that we need only work, and mind the practical part, to become skilful
and able painters; and that the theory only encumbers the mind, and ties
the hand. Such men do just like the squirrel, who is perpetually turning
the wheel in her cage; she runs apace, and wearies herself with her
continual motion, and yet gets no ground. “It is not enough for doing
well to walk apace,” says Quinctilian, “but it is enough for walking
apace to do well.” It is a bad excuse to say, I was but a little while
about it. That graceful easiness, that celestial fire which animates
the work, proceeds not so much from having often done the like, as from
having well understood what we have done. See what I shall farther
say, on the 60th rule, which concerns easiness. Others there are, who
believe precepts and speculation to be of absolute necessity; but as
they were ill instructed, and what they knew, rather entangled, than
cleared their understanding, so they oftentimes turn short; and if they
perform a work, it is not without anxiety and pain. And in truth, they
are so much the more worthy of compassion, because their intentions are
right; and if they advance not in knowledge as far as others, and are
sometimes cast behind, yet they are grounded upon some sort of reason;
for it is belonging to good sense, not to go over fast, when we apprehend
ourselves to be out of the way, or even where we doubt which way we ought
to take. Others, on the contrary, being well instructed in good maxims,
and in the rules of art, after having done fine things, yet spoil them
all, by endeavouring to make them better, which is a kind of overdoing;
and they are so intoxicated with their work, and with an earnest desire
of being above all others, that they suffer themselves to be deceived
with the appearance of an imaginary good. “Apelles, one day admiring the
prodigious labour which he saw in a picture of Protogenes, and knowing
how much sweat it must have cost him, said, that Protogenes and himself
were of equal strength; nay, that he yielded to him, in some parts of
painting; but in this he surpassed him, that Protogenes never knew when
he had done well, and could never hold his hand. He also added, in the
nature of a precept, that he wished all painters would imprint this
lesson deeply in their memory, that with overstraining and earnestness of
finishing their pieces, they often did them more harm than good.”[145]
“There are some,” says Quinctilian, “who never satisfy themselves,
never are contented with their first notions and expressions, but are
continually changing all, till nothing remains of their first ideas.
Others there are,” continues he, “who dare never trust themselves, nor
resolve on any thing; and who being, as it were, entangled in their
own genius, imagine it to be a laudable correctness, when they form
difficulties to themselves in their own work. And, to speak the truth, it
is hard to discern, whether of the two is in the greatest error; he, who
is enamoured of all he does; or he, whom nothing of his own can please.
For it has happened to young men, and often even to those of the greatest
wit, to waste their spirits, and to consume themselves with anxiety and
pain of their own giving, so far as even to doze upon their work with too
much eagerness of doing well. I will now tell you, how a reasonable man
ought to carry himself on this occasion. It is certain, that we ought to
use our best endeavour to give the last perfection to our works; yet it
is always to be understood, that we attempt no more than what is in the
compass of our genius, and according to our vein. For, to make a true
progress, I grant that diligence and study are both requisite; but this
study ought to have no mixture, either of self-opinion, obstinacy, or
anxiety; for which reason, if it blows a happy gale, we must set up all
our sails, though in so doing it sometimes happens, that we follow those
motions where our natural heat is more powerful than our care and our
correctness, provided we abuse not this license, and suffer not ourselves
to be deceived by it; for all our productions cannot fail to please us at
the moment of their birth, as being new to us.”[146]
[*†61.]
“Because the greatest beauties cannot always be expressed for want of
terms,” &c. I have learned from the mouth of Monsieur du Fresnoy, that
he had oftentimes heard Guido say, “that no man could give a rule of the
greatest beauties; and that the knowledge of them was so abstruse, that
there was no manner of speaking which could express them.” This comes
just to what Quinctilian says,[147] “That things incredible wanted words
to express them; for some of them are too great, and too much elevated,
to be comprehended by human discourse.” From hence it proceeds, that the
best judges, when they admire a noble picture, seem to be fastened to it;
and when they come to themselves, you would say, they had lost the use of
speech.
“_Pausiacâ torpes, insane, tabellâ_,” says Horace;[148] and Symmachus
says,[149] “that the greatness of astonishment hinders men from giving a
just applause.” The Italians say, “_Opera da stupire_,” when a thing is
wonderfully good.
[*†63.]
“Those master-pieces of antiquity, which were the chief examples of this
art,” &c. He means the most knowing and best painters of antiquity; that
is to say, from the last two ages to our times.
[*†66.]
“And also moderates that fury of the fancy,” &c. There is in the Latin
text, “which produces only monsters,” that is to say, things out of
all probable resemblance. Such things as are often found in the works
of Pietro Testa. “It often happens,” says Dionysius Longinus, a grave
author, “that some men, imagining themselves to be possessed with a
divine fury, far from being carried into the rage of Bacchanalians, often
fall into toys and trifles, which are only puerilities.”
[*†69.]
“A subject beautiful and noble,” &c. Painting is not only pleasing
and divertising, but is also a kind of memorial of those things which
antiquity has had the most beautiful and noble in their kinds, replacing
the history before our eyes; as if the thing were at this very time
effectually in action; even so far, that, beholding the pictures wherein
those noble deeds are represented, we find ourselves stung with a desire
of endeavouring somewhat, which is like that action, there expressed, as
if we were reading it in the history. The beauty of the subject inspires
us with love and admiration for the pictures, as the fair mixture causes
us to enter into the subject which it imitates, and imprints it the more
deeply into our imagination, and our memory. These are two chains which
are interlinked, which contain, and are at the same time contained, and
whose matter is equally precious and estimable.
[*†72.]
“And ingenious,” &c. _Aliquid salis_, somewhat that is well seasoned,
fine, and picquant, extraordinary, of a high relish, proper to instruct,
and to clear the understanding. “The painters ought to do like the
orators,” says Cicero;[150] “let them instruct, let them divertise, and
let them move us;” this is what is properly meant by the word _salt_.
[*†74.]
“On which the sketch, as it may be called, of the picture is to be
disposed,” &c. It is not without reason, nor by chance, that our author
uses the word _machina_. A machine is a just assembling or combination
of many pieces, to produce one and the same effect. And the disposition
in a picture is nothing else but an assembling of many parts, of which
we are to foresee the agreement with each other, and the justness to
produce a beautiful effect, as you shall see in the 4th precept, which is
concerning the economy. This is also called the composition, by which is
meant the distribution and orderly placing of things, both in general,
and in particular.
[*†75.]
“Which is what we properly call invention,” &c. Our author establishes
three parts of painting; the _invention_; the _design_, or _drawing_;
and the _colouring_, which in some places he also calls the _cromatic_.
Many authors who have written of painting, multiply the parts according
to their pleasure; and without giving you, or myself, the trouble of
discussing this matter, I will only tell you, that all the parts of
painting which others have named, are reducible into these three which
are mentioned by our author.
For which reason, I esteem this division to be the justest: and as these
three parts are essential to painting, so no man can be truly called a
painter, who does not possess them all together: in the same manner that
we cannot give the name of man to any creature which is not composed of
body, soul, and reason, which are the three parts necessarily constituent
of a man. How therefore can they pretend to the quality of painters, who
can only copy and purloin the works of others, who therein employ their
whole industry, and with that only talent would pass for able painters?
And, do not tell me, that many great artists have done this; for I can
easily answer you, that it had been their better course to have abstained
from so doing; that they have not thereby done themselves much honour,
and that copying was not the best part of their reputation. Let us then
conclude, that all painters ought to acquire this part of excellence;
not to do it, is to want courage, and not dare to shew themselves. It is
to creep and grovel on the ground; it is to deserve this just reproach,
_O imitatores, servum pecus!_ It is with painters, in reference to their
productions, as it is with orators: a good beginning is always costly
to both; much sweat and labour is required, but it is better to expose
our works, and leave them liable to censure for fifteen years, than to
blush for them at the end of fifty. On this account, it is necessary
for a painter to begin early to do somewhat of his own, and to accustom
himself to it by continual exercise; for so long as, endeavouring to
raise himself, he fears falling, he shall be always on the ground. See
the following observation.
[*†76.]
“Invention is a kind of Muse, which being possessed of the other
advantages common to her sisters,” &c. The attributes of the Muses are
often taken for the Muses themselves; and it is in this sense, that
Invention is here called a Muse. Authors ascribe to each of them in
particular, the sciences which they have, say they, invented; and in
general the Belles Lettres, because they contain almost all the others.
These sciences are those advantages of which our author speaks, and with
which he would have a painter furnish himself sufficiently: and in truth,
there is no man, though his understanding be very mean, who knows not,
and who finds not of himself, how much learning is necessary to animate
his genius, and to complete it. And the reason of this is, that they who
have studied, have not only seen and learned many excellent things, in
their course of studies; but also they have acquired, by that exercise,
a great facility of profiting themselves, by reading good authors. They
who will make profession of painting, must heap up treasures out of
their reading: and there they will find many wonderful means of raising
themselves above others, who can only creep upon the ground; or if they
elevate themselves, it is only to fall from a higher place, because
they serve themselves of other men’s wings, neither understanding their
use, nor their virtue. It is true, that it is not the present mode for
a painter to be so knowing: and if any of them, in these times, be
found to have either a great wit, or much learning, the multitude would
not fail to say, that it was great pity; and that the youth might have
come to somewhat in the practical part of the law, or it may be in the
treasury, or in the families of some noblemen. So wretched is the destiny
of painting in these latter ages. By learning, it is not so much the
knowledge of the Greek and Latin tongue, which is here to be understood;
as the reading of good authors, and understanding those things of which
they treat: for translations being made of the best authors, there is
not any painter who is not capable, in some sort, of understanding those
books of humanity, which are comprehended under the name of the Belles
Lettres. In my opinion, the books which are of the most advantage to
those of the profession, are these which follow:
The Bible.
The History of Josephus.
The Roman History of Coeffeteau, for those who understand the French; and
that of Titus Livius, in Latin.
Homer, whom Pliny calls the fountain-head of invention and noble thoughts.
Virgil, and in him particularly his Æneis.
The Ecclesiastical History of Godeau, or the Abridgment of Baronius.
Ovid’s Metamorphoses.
The Pictures of Philostratus.[151]
Plutarch’s Lives.
Pausanias, who is wonderful for giving of great ideas; and chiefly for
such as are to be placed at a distance, or cast behind, and for the
combining of figures. This author, in conjunction with Homer, makes a
good mingle of what is pleasing, and what is perfect.
The Religion of the Ancient Romans, by Du Choul; and in English, Godwin’s
Roman Antiquities.
Trajan’s Pillar, with the discourse which explains the figures on it, and
instructs a painter in those things with which he is indispensably to be
acquainted. This is one of the most principal and most learned books,
which we have for the modes, the customs, the arms, and the religion of
the Romans. Julio Romano made his chief studies on the marble itself.
The books of medals.
The Bass-Reliefs of Perrier, and others, with their explanations at the
bottom of the pages, which give a perfect understanding of them.
Horace’s Art of Poetry, because of the relation which there is betwixt
the rules of poetry, and those of painting.
And other books of the like nature, the reading of which are profitable
to warm the imagination; such as in English, are Spenser’s Fairy Queen;
the Paradise Lost of Milton; Tasso, translated by Fairfax; and the
History of Polybius, by Sir Henry Shere.
Some romances also are very capable of entertaining the genius, and of
strengthening it, by the noble ideas which they give of things: but there
is this danger in them, that they almost always corrupt the truth of
history.
There are also other books which a painter may use upon some particular
occasions, and only when he wants them: Such are, The Mythology of the
Gods; The Images of the Gods; The Iconology; The Tables of Hyginus; The
Practical Perspective; and some others not here mentioned.
Thus it is necessary, that they who are desirous of a name in painting,
should read at leisure times these books with diligence; and make their
observations of such things as they find for their purpose in them,
and of which they believe they may some time or other have occasion.
Let the imagination be employed in this reading, and let them make
sketches, and light touches of those ideas which that reading forms in
their imagination. Quinctilian, Tacitus, or whoever was the author of
that dialogue, which is called in Latin _De Causis corruptæ Eloquentiæ_,
says, “That painting resembles fire, which is fed by the fuel, inflamed
by motion, and gathers strength by burning; for the power of the genius
is only augmented by the abundance of matter to supply it; and it is
impossible to make a great and magnificent work, if that matter be
wanting, or not disposed rightly.” And therefore a painter, who has a
genius, gets nothing, by long thinking, and taking all imaginable care
to make a noble composition, if he be not assisted by those studies
which I have mentioned. All that he can gain by it is only to weary his
imagination, and to travel over many vast countries, without dwelling on
any one thing, which can give him satisfaction.
All the books which I have named may be serviceable to all sorts of
persons, as well as to painters. As for those books which were of
particular use to them, they were unfortunately lost in those ages
which were before the invention of printing. The copiers neglecting
(probably out of ignorance) to transcribe them, as not finding themselves
capable of making the demonstrative figures.[152] In the mean times,
it is evidently known, by the relation of authors, that we have lost
fifty volumes of them at the least. See Pliny in his 35th book; and
Franc Junius, in his 3d chapter of the 2d book of the “Painting of the
Ancients.” Many moderns have written of it with small success, taking a
large compass, without coming directly to the point; and talking much,
without saying any thing; yet some of them have acquitted themselves
successfully enough. Amongst others, Leonardo da Vinci (though without
method); Paulo Lomazzo, whose book is good for the greatest part,
but whose discourse is too diffusive and very tiresome; John Baptist
Armenini, Franciscus Junius, and Monsieur de Cambray, to whose preface I
rather invite you, than to his book. We are not to forget what Monsieur
Felebien has written of the historical piece of Alexander, by the hand
of Monsieur Le Brun: besides that the work itself is very eloquent,
the foundations which he establishes for the making of a good picture
are wonderfully solid. Thus I have given you very near the library of
a painter, and a catalogue of such books as he ought either to read
himself, or have read to him; at least if he will not satisfy himself
with possessing painting as the most sordid of all trades, and not as the
noblest of all arts.
[*†77.]
“It is the business of a painter, in his choice of attitudes,” &c. See
here the most important precept of all those which relate to painting. It
belongs properly to a painter alone, and all the rest are borrowed either
from learning, or from physic, or from the mathematics, or, in short,
from other arts; for it is sufficient to have a natural wit and learning
to make that which we call in painting, a good invention: for the design,
we must have some insight into anatomy: to make buildings, and other
things in perspective, we must have knowledge in the mathematics: and
other arts will bring in their quotas, to furnish out the matter of a
good picture. But for the economy, or ordering of the whole together,
none but only the painter can understand it; because the end of the
artist is pleasingly to deceive the eyes, which he can never accomplish
if this part be wanting to him. A picture may have an ill effect, though
the invention of it be truly understood, the design of it correct, and
the colours of it the most beautiful and fine that can be employed in
it. And, on the contrary, we may behold other pictures ill invented, ill
designed, and painted with the most common colours, which shall have
a very good effect, and which shall more pleasingly deceive. “Nothing
pleases a man so much as order,” says Xenophon;[153] and Horace, in his
“Art of Poetry,” lays it down as a rule,
_Singula quæque locum teneant sortita decenter._
Set all things in their own peculiar place;
And know, that order is the greatest grace.
This precept is properly the use and application of all the rest; for
which reason it requires much judgment. You are therefore in such manner
to foresee things, that your picture may be painted in your head, before
it comes upon the canvas. “When Menander,” says a celebrated author,[154]
“had ordered the scenes of his comedy, he held it to be, in a manner,
already made; though he had not begun the first verse of it.” It is an
undoubted truth, that they who are endued with this foresight, work
with incredible pleasure and facility; others, on the contrary, are
perpetually changing, and rechanging their work, which, when it is ended,
leaves them but anxiety for all their pains. It seems to me, that these
sorts of pictures remind us of those old Gothic castles, made at several
times; and which hold together only as it were by rags and patches.
It may be inferred from that which I have said, that the invention and
the disposition are two several and distinct parts. In effect, though
the last of them depends upon the first, and is commonly comprehended
under it; yet we are to take great care, that we do not confound them.
The invention simply finds out the subjects, and makes a choice of them
suitable to the history which we treat; and the disposition distributes
those things which are thus found, each to its proper place, and
accommodates the figures and the groupes in particular, and the _tout
ensemble_ (or whole together) of the picture in general; so that this
economy produces the same effect in relation to the eyes, as a concert of
music to the ears.
There is one thing of great consequence to be observed in the economy
of the whole work, which is, that at the first sight we may be given to
understand the quality of the subject; and that the picture, at the first
glance of the eye, may inspire us with the principal passion of it: for
example, if the subject which you have undertaken to treat be of joy,
it is necessary that every thing which enters into your picture should
contribute to that passion, so that the beholders shall immediately be
moved with it. If the subject be mournful, let every thing in it have
a stroke of sadness; and so of the other passions and qualities of the
subjects.
[*†81.]
“Let there be a genuine and lively expression of the subject, conformable
to the text of ancient authors,” &c. Take care that the licences of
painters be rather to adorn the history, than to corrupt it. And though
Horace gives permission to painters and poets[155] to dare every thing,
yet he encourages neither of them to make things out of nature or
verisimility; for he adds immediately after,
But let the bounds of licences be fixed;
Not things of disagreeing natures mixed:
Not sweet with sour, nor birds with serpents joined;
Nor the fierce lion with the fearful hind.
The thoughts of a man endued with good sense, are not of kin to
visionary madness; men in fevers are only capable of such dreams. Treat
then the subjects of your pictures with all possible faithfulness, and
use your licences with a becoming boldness; provided they be ingenious,
and not immoderate and extravagant.
[*†83.]
“Take care that whatsoever makes nothing to your subject,” &c. Nothing
deadens so much the composition of a picture, as figures which are not
appertaining to the subject: we may call them pleasantly enough, _figures
to be let_.
[*†89.]
“This part of painting so rarely met with,” &c. That is to say,
_invention_.
[*†91.]
“Which was stolen by Prometheus,” &c. The poets feign, that Prometheus
formed out of clay so fair a statue, that Minerva one day, having long
admired it, said to the workman, that if he thought there was any thing
in heaven which could add to its perfection, he might ask it of her;
but he being ignorant of what might be most beautiful in the habitation
of the gods, desired leave that he might be carried thither, and being
there, to make his choice. The goddess bore him thither upon her shield,
and so soon as he had perceived, that all celestial things were animated
with fire, he stole a parcel of it, which he carried down to earth, and
applying it to the stomach of his statue, enlivened the whole body.
[*†92.]
“That it happens not to every one to see Corinth,” &c. This is an ancient
proverb, which signifies, that every man has not the genius, nor the
disposition, that is necessary for the sciences; neither yet a capacity
fit for the undertaking of things which are great and difficult. Corinth
was heretofore the centre of all arts, and the place whither they sent
all those whom they would render capable of any thing. Cicero calls it
the light of all Græcia.[156]
[*†95.]
“It arrived at length to that height of perfection,” &c. This was in
the time of Alexander the Great, and lasted even to Augustus, under
whose reign painting fell to great decay. But under the emperors,
Domitian, Nerva, and Trajan, it appeared in its primitive lustre; which
lasted to the time of Phocas the emperor, when vices prevailing over
the arts, and war being kindled through all Europe, and especially
in Lombardy, (occasioned by the irruption of the Huns,) painting was
totally extinguished. And if some few, in the succeeding ages, strained
themselves to revive it, it was rather in finding out the most glaring,
gaudy, and costly colours, than in imitating the harmonious simplicity
of those illustrious painters who preceded them. At length, in the
fourteenth century, some there were, who began to set it again on foot.
And it may truly be said, that about the end of the fifteenth age, and
the beginning of our sixteenth, it appeared in much splendour, by means
of many knowing men in all parts of Italy, who were in perfect possession
of it. Since those happy times, which were so fruitful of the noble arts,
we have also had some knowing painters, but very few in number, because
of the little inclination which sovereign princes have had for painting:
but thanks to the zeal of our great monarch, and to the care of his first
minister, Monsieur Colbert, we may shortly behold it more flourishing
than ever.
[*†103.]
“An attitude therefore must be chosen, according to their taste,” &c.
This is the second part of painting, which is called design, or drawing.
As the ancients have sought as much as possible whatsoever contributes
to the making of a perfect body; so they have diligently examined in what
consists the beauty of good attitudes, as their works sufficiently inform
us.
[*†104.]
“The parts of it must be great,” &c. Yet not so great as to exceed a just
proportion. But he means, that in a noble attitude, the greatest parts
of the body ought to appear foremost, rather than the less, for which
reason, in another passage, he vehemently forbids the foreshortenings,
because they make the parts appear little, though of themselves they are
great. “And large,” &c. To avoid the dry manner, such as is most commonly
the nature which Lucas van Leyden and Albert Durer have imitated.
[*†105.]
“Contrasted by contrary motions, the most noble parts foremost in sight,
and each figure carefully poised on its own centre,” &c. The motions are
never natural, when the members are not equally balanced on their centre;
and these members cannot be balanced on their centre in an equality
of weight, but they must contrast each other. A man who dances on the
rope, makes a manifest demonstration of this truth. The body is a weight
balanced on its feet, as upon two pivots. And though one of the feet
most commonly bears the weight, yet we see that the whole weight rests
centrally upon it. Insomuch, that if, for example, one arm is stretched
out, it must of necessity be either, that the other arm, or the leg, be
cast backward, or the body somewhat bowed on the opposite side, so as to
make an equilibrium, and be in a situation which is unforced. It may be,
though seldom, if it be not in old men, that the feet bear equally; and
for that time half the weight is equally distributed on each foot. You
ought to make use of the same prudence, if one foot bears three parts in
four of the burthen, and that the other foot bears the remaining part.
This, in general, is what may be said of the balance, and the libration
of the body. In particular, there may many things be said which are very
useful and curious, of which you may satisfy yourselves in Leonardo da
Vinci. He has done wonderfully well on that subject; and one may truly
say, that the ponderation is the best and soundest part of all his book
of painting. It begins at the 181st chapter, and concludes at the 273d.
I would also advise you to read Paulo Lomazzo, in his 6th book, chapter
4th, _Del moto del corpo humano_, that is, the motion of a human body.
You will there find many things of great profit. For what concerns the
contrast, I will only say, in general, that nothing gives so much grace
and life to figures. See the 13th precept, and what I say upon it in the
remarks.
[*†107.]
“The parts must be drawn with flowing, glideing outlines,” &c. The reason
of this proceeds from the action of the muscles, which are so many
well-buckets: when one of them acts and draws, it is necessary that the
other must obey; so that the muscles which act, drawing always towards
their principal, and those which obey stretching in length, and on the
side of their insertion; it must needs follow, that the parts must be
designed in waves; but beware, lest in giving this form to the parts, you
do not break the bones which sustain them, and which always must make
them appear firm.
This maxim is not altogether so general, but that actions may be found,
where the masses of the muscles are situate one over against another;
but that is not very common. The outlines, which are in waves, give not
only a grace to the parts, but also to the whole body, when it is only
supported on one leg. As we see in the figures of Antinous, Meleager, the
Venus of Medicis, that of the Vatican, the two others of Borghese, and
that of Flora, of the goddess Vesta, the two Bacchus’s of Borghese, and
that of Ludovisio, and in fine, of the greatest number of the ancient
figures, which are standing, and which always rest more upon one foot
than the other. Besides, that the figures and their parts ought almost
always to have a serpentine and flaming form naturally; these sorts of
outlines have, I know not what of life and seeming motion in them, which
very much resembles the activity of the flame, and of the serpent.
[*†112.]
“According to the rules of anatomy,” &c. This part is nothing known at
present amongst our modern painters. I have shewn the profit, and even
the necessity of it, in the preface of a little epitome which I have
made, and which Monsieur Torrebat has published. I know, there are some,
who think this science a kind of monster, and believe it to be of no
advantage, either because they are mean spirited, or that they have not
considered the want which they have of it; nor reflected, as they ought,
on its importance; contenting themselves with a certain tract, to which
they have been used. But certain it is, that whoever is capable of such a
thought, will never be capable of becoming a great designer.
[*†113.]
“In imitation of the Greek forms,” &c. That is to say, according to the
ancient statues, which for the most part come from Greece.
[*†114.]
“Let there be a perfect relation betwixt the parts and the whole,” &c.,
or let them agree well together, which is the same thing. His meaning
in this place is, to speak of the justness of proportions, and of the
harmony which they make with one another. Many famous authors have
thoroughly treated this matter. Amongst others, Paulo Lomazzo, whose
first book speaks of nothing else; but there are so many sub-divisions,
that a reader must have a good brain not to be turned with them. See
those which our author has remarked in general, on the most beautiful
statues of the ancients. I believe them to be so much the better, as
they are more conformable to those which Vitruvius gives us in the first
chapter of his third book; and which he tells us, that he learned from
the artists themselves; because in the preface to his seventh book, he
makes his boast to have had them from others, and particularly from
architects and painters.
_The Measures of a Human Body._
The ancients have commonly allowed eight heads to their figures, though
some of them have but seven. But we ordinarily divide the figures into
ten faces;[157] that is to say, from the crown of the head to the sole of
the foot; in the following manner:
From the crown of the head to the forehead, is the third part of a face.
The face begins at the root of the lowest hairs, which are upon the
forehead, and ends at the bottom of the chin.
The face is divided into three proportionable parts; the first contains
the forehead, the second the nose, and the third the mouth and the chin.
From the chin to the pit betwixt the collar-bones, are two lengths of a
nose.
From the pit betwixt the collar-bones to the bottom of the breast, one
face.
[158] From the bottom of the breasts to the navel, one face.
[159] From the navel to the genitories, one face.
From the genitories to the upper part of the knee, two faces.
The knee contains half a face.
From the lower part of the knee to the ankle, two faces.
From the ankle to the sole of the foot, half a face.
A man, when his arms are stretched out, is, from the longest finger of
his right hand, to the longest of his left as broad as he is long.
From one side of the breasts to the other, two faces.
The bone of the arm, called humerus, is the length of two faces from the
shoulder to the elbow.
From the end of the elbow to the root of the little finger, the bone
called cubitus, with part of the hand, contains two faces.
From the box of the shoulder-blade to the pit betwixt the collar-bones,
one face.
If you would be satisfied in the measures of breadth, from the extremity
of one finger to the other, so that this breadth should be equal to
the length of the body, you must observe, that the boxes of the elbows
with the humerus, and of the humerus with the shoulder-blade, bear the
proportion of half a face, when the arms are stretched out.
The sole of the foot is the sixth part of the figure.
The hand is the length of a face.
The thumb contains a nose.
The inside of the arm, from the place where the muscle disappears, which
makes the breast, (called the pectoral muscle,) to the middle of the arm,
four noses.
From the middle of the arm to the beginning of the hand, five noses.
The longest toe is a nose long.
The two utmost parts of the teats, and the pit betwixt the collar bones
of a woman, make an equilateral triangle.
For the breadth of the limbs, no precise measures can be given; because
the measures themselves are changeable, according to the quality of the
persons, and according to the movement of the muscles.
If you would know the proportions more particularly, you may see them
in Paulo Lomazzo; it is good to read them, once at least, and to make
remarks on them; every man according to his own judgment, and according
to the occasion which he has for them.
[*†117.]
“Though perspective cannot be called a perfect rule,” &c. That is to
say, purely of itself, without prudence and discretion. The greatest
part of those who understand it, desiring to practise it too regularly,
often make such things as shock the sight, though they are within the
rules. If all those great painters, who have left us such fair platforms,
had rigorously observed it in their figures, they had not wholly found
their account in it. They had indeed made things more regularly
true, but withal very unpleasing. There is great appearance, that the
architects and statuaries of former times have not found it to their
purpose always; nor have followed the geometrical part so exactly as
perspective ordains. For he who would imitate the frontispiece of the
Rotunda according to perspective, would be grossly deceived; since the
columns which are at the extremities have more diameter than those which
are in the middle. The cornish of the Palazzo Farnese, which makes so
beautiful an effect below, when viewed more nearly, will be found not to
have its just measures. In the pillar of Trajan, we see that the highest
figures are greater than those below; and make an effect quite contrary
to perspective, increasing according to the measure of their distance. I
know there is a rule which teaches a way of making them in that manner;
and which, though it is to be found in some books of perspective, yet
notwithstanding is no rule of perspective; because it is never made use
of, but only when we find it for our purpose: for if, for example, the
figures which are at the top of Trajan’s pillar were but as great as
those which are at the bottom, they would not be for all that against
perspective: and thus we may say, with more reason, that it is a rule of
decorum in perspective, to ease the sight, and to render objects more
agreeable. It is on this general observation, that we may establish in
perspective, the rules of decorum, or convenience, whensoever occasion
shall offer. We may also see another example in the base of the Farnesian
Hercules; which is not upon the level, but on an easy declivity on the
advanced part, that the feet of the figure may not be hidden from the
sight, to the end that it may appear more pleasing; which the noble
authors of these things have done, not in contempt of geometry and
perspective, but for the satisfaction of the eyes, which was the end they
proposed to themselves in all their works.
We must therefore understand perspective as a science which is absolutely
necessary, and which a painter must not want; yet without subjecting
ourselves so wholly to it, as to become slaves of it. We are to follow
it, when it leads us in a pleasing way, and shews us pleasing things;
but for some time to forsake it, if it leads us through mire, or to
a precipice. Endeavour after that which is aiding to your art, and
convenient, but avoid whatsoever is repugnant to it; as the 59th rule
teaches.
[*†126.]
“Let every member be made for its own head,” &c. That is to say, you
ought not to set the head of a young man on the body of an old one;
nor make a white hand for a withered body. Not to habit a Hercules in
taffata, nor an Apollo in coarse stuff. Queens, and persons of the
first quality, whom you would make appear majestical, are not to be too
negligently dressed, or _en dishabillee_, no more than old men; the
nymphs are not to be overcharged with drapery. In fine, let all that
which accompanies your figures, make them known for what effectively they
are.
[*†128.]
“Let the figures to which art cannot give a voice, imitate the mutes in
their actions,” &c. Mutes having no other way of speaking, or expressing
their thoughts, but only by their gestures, and their actions, it is
certain, that they do it in a manner more expressive, than those who have
the use of speech: for which reason, the picture which is mute, ought to
imitate them, so as to make itself understood.
[*†129.]
“Let the principal figure of the subject,” &c. It is one of the greatest
blemishes of a picture, not to give knowledge, at the first sight, of
the subject which it represents. And truly nothing is more perplexing,
than to extinguish, as it were, the principal figure, by the opposition
of some others, which present themselves to us at the first view, and
which carry a greater lustre. An orator, who had undertaken to make a
panegyric on Alexander the Great, and who had employed the strongest
figures of his rhetoric in the praise of Bucephalus, would do quite
the contrary to that which was expected from him; because it would be
believed, that he rather took the horse for his subject, than the master.
A painter is like an orator in this. He must dispose his matter in such
sort, that all things may give place to his principal subject. And if
the other figures, which accompany it, and are only as accessories
there, take up the chief place, and make themselves most remarkable,
either by the beauty of their colours, or by the splendour of the light,
which strikes upon them, they will catch the sight, they will stop it
short, and not suffer it to go farther than themselves, till after some
considerable space of time, to find out that which was not discerned
at first. The principal figure in a picture, is like a king among his
courtiers, whom we ought to know at the first glance, and who ought
to dim the lustre of all his attendants. Those painters who proceed
otherwise, do just like those, who, in the relation of a story, engage
themselves so foolishly in long digressions, that they are forced to
conclude quite another way than they began.
[*†132.]
“Let the parts be brought together, and the figures disposed in groupes,”
&c. I cannot better compare a groupe of figures, than to a concert of
voices, which, supporting themselves altogether by their different parts,
make a harmony, which pleasingly fills the ears, and flatters them; but
if you come to separate them, and that all the parts are equally heard
as loud as one another, they will stun you to that degree, that you would
fancy your ears were torn in pieces. It is the same of figures; if you
so assemble them, that some of them sustain the others, and make them
appear, and that altogether they make but one entire whole, then your
eyes will be fully satisfied; but if, on the contrary, you divide them,
your eyes will suffer by seeing them altogether dispersed, or each of
them in particular. Altogether, because the visual rays are multiplied
by the multiplicity of objects. Each of them in particular; because, if
you fix your sight on one, those which are about it will strike you, and
attract your eyes to them, which extremely pains them in this sort of
separation and diversity of objects. The eye, for example, is satisfied
with the sight of one single grape; and is distracted, if it carries
itself at one view to look upon many several grapes, which lie scattered
on a table. We must have the same regard for the members; they aggroupe,
and contrast each other in the same manner as the figures do. Few
painters have observed this precept as they ought, which is a most solid
foundation for the harmony of a picture.
[*†137.]
“The figures in the groupes ought not to have the same inflections of the
body,” &c. Take heed in this contrast, to do nothing that is extravagant;
and let your postures be always natural. The draperies, and all things
that accompany the figures, may enter into the contrast with the members,
and with the figures themselves; and this is what our poet means in these
words of his verses, _cætera frangant_.
[*†145.]
“One side of the picture must not be void, while the other is filled,”
&c. This sort of symmetry, when it appears not affected, fills the
picture pleasingly, keeps it in a kind of balance, and infinitely
delights the eyes, which thereby contemplate the work with more repose.
[*†152.]
“As a play is seldom good, in which there are too many actors,” &c.
Annibal Caracci did not believe that a picture could be good, in which
there were above twelve figures. It was Albano who told our author this,
and from his mouth I had it. The reasons which he gave were, first, that
he believed there ought not to be above three great groupes of figures
in any picture; and secondly, that silence and majesty were of necessity
to be there, to render it beautiful; and neither the one nor the other
could possibly be in a multitude and crowd of figures. But nevertheless,
if you are constrained by the subject, (as for example, if you painted
the day of judgment, the massacre of the innocents, a battle, &c.) on
such occasions, you are to dispose things by great masses of lights and
shadows, and union of colours, without troubling yourself to finish every
thing in particular, independently one of the other, as is usual with
painters of a little genius, and whose souls are incapable of embracing a
great design, or a great composition.
_Æmilium circa ludum, faber imus et ungues_
_Exprimet, et molles imitabitur ære capillos;_
_Infelix operis summâ: quia ponere totum_
_Nesciet._
The meanest sculptor in the Æmilian square,
Can imitate in brass the nails and hair;
Expert in trifles, and a cunning fool,
Able to express the parts, but not dispose the whole.
Says Horace in his “Art of Poetry.”
[*†162.]
“The extremities of the joints must be seldom hidden, and the extremities
or end of the feet never,” &c. These extremities of the joints are as it
were the hafts, or handles of the members. For example, the shoulders,
the elbows, the thighs, and the knees. And if a drapery should be
found on these ends of the joints, it is the duty of science, and of
decorum, to mark them by folds, but with great discretion; for what
concerns the feet, though they should be hidden by some part of the
drapery, nevertheless, if they are marked by folds, and their shape be
distinguished, they are supposed to be seen. The word _never_, is not
here to be taken in the strictest sense; he means but this,—so rarely,
that it may seem we should avoid all occasions of dispensing with the
rule.
[*†164.]
“The figures which are behind others, have neither grace nor vigour,” &c.
Raphael and Julio Romano have perfectly observed this maxim; and Raphael
especially in his last works.
[*†169.]
“Avoid also those lines and outlines which are equal, which make
parallels,” &c. He means principally to speak of the postures so ordered,
that they make together those geometrical figures which he condemns.
[*†176.]
“Be not so strictly tied to nature,” &c. This precept is against two
sorts of painters; first, against those who are so scrupulously tied
to nature, that they can do nothing without her; who copy her, just as
they believe they see her, without adding, or retrenching any thing,
though never so little, either for the nudities, or for the draperies.
And secondly, against those who paint every thing by practice, without
being able to subject themselves to retouch any thing, or to examine
by the nature. These last, properly speaking, are the libertines of
painting; as there are libertines of religion, who have no other law
but the vehemence of their inclinations, which they are resolved not
to overcome: and in the same manner the libertines of painting have
no other model but a rhodomontado genius, and very irregular, which
violently hurries them away. Though these two sorts of painters are both
of them in vicious extremes, yet nevertheless the former sort seems to
be the more supportable; because though they do not imitate nature, as
she is accompanied by all her beauties, and her graces; yet at least they
imitate that nature, which we know, and daily see. Instead of which, the
others shew us a wild or savage nature, which is not of our acquaintance,
and which seems to be of a quite new creation.
[*†178.]
“Whom you must have always present, as a witness to the truth,” &c.
This passage seems to be wonderfully well said. The nearer a picture
approaches to the truth, the better it is; and though the painter, who
is its author, be the first judge of the beauties which are in it, he is
nevertheless obliged not to pronounce it, till he has first consulted
Nature, who is an irreproachable evidence, and who will frankly, but
withal truly, tell you its defects and beauties, if you compare it with
her work.
[*†183.]
“And of all other things which discover to us the thoughts and inventions
of the Grecians,” &c. As good books, such as are Homer and Pausanias. The
prints which we see of the antiquities, may also extremely contribute to
form our genius, and to give us great ideas; in the same manner as the
writings of good authors are capable of forming a good style, in those
who are desirous of writing well.
[*†193.]
“If you have but one single figure to work upon,” &c. The reason of this
is, that there being nothing to attract the sight but this only figure,
the visual rays will not be too much divided by the diversity of colours
and draperies; but only take heed to put in nothing, which shall appear
too sharp, or too hard; and be mindful of the 41st precept, which says,
that two extremities are never to touch each other, either in colour, or
in light; but that there must be a mean, partaking of the one and of the
other.
[*†195.]
“Let the draperies be nobly spread upon the body; let the folds be
large,” &c. As Raphael practised, after he had forsaken the manner of
Pietro Perugino, and principally in his latter works.
[*†196.]
“And let them follow the order of the parts,” &c. As the fairest
pieces of antiquity will shew us. And take heed, that the folds do not
only follow the order of the parts, but that they also mark the most
considerable muscles; because that those figures, where the drapery and
the naked part are seen both together, are much more graceful than the
other.
[*†200.]
“Without sitting too straight upon them,” &c. Painters ought not to
imitate the ancients in this circumstance. The ancient statuaries made
their draperies of wet linen, on purpose to make them sit close and
straight to the parts of their figures; for doing which they had great
reason, and in following which the painters would be much in the wrong;
and you shall see upon what grounds. Those great geniuses of antiquity,
finding that it was impossible to imitate with marble the fineness of
stuffs or garments which is not to be discerned but by the colours, the
reflexes and more especially by the lights and shadows; finding it, I
say, out of their power to dispose of those things, thought they could
not do better, nor more prudentially, than to make use of such draperies,
as hindered not from seeing, through their folds, the delicacy of the
flesh, and the purity of the outlines; things which, truly speaking, they
possessed in the last perfection, and which in all appearance were the
subject of their chief study. But painters, on the contrary, who are to
deceive the sight, quite otherwise than statuaries, are bound to imitate
the different sorts of garments, such as they naturally seem; and such as
colours, reflexes, lights, and shadows, (of all which they are masters,)
can make them appear. Thus we see, that those who have made the nearest
imitations of nature, have made use of such stuffs or garments which are
familiar to our sight; and these they have imitated with so much art,
that in beholding them we are pleased that they deceive us: such were
Titian, Paul Veronese, Tintoret, Rubens, Van Dyck, and the rest of the
good colourists, who have come nearest to the truth of nature. Instead
of which, others, who have scrupulously tied themselves to the practice
of the ancients, in their draperies, have made their works crude and
dry; and by this means have found out the lamentable secret, how to make
their figures harder than even the marble itself; as Andrea Mantegna,
and Pietro Perugino have done; and Raphael also had much of that way in
his first works, in which we behold many small foldings often repleated,
which look like so many whipcords. It is true these repetitions are seen
in the ancient statues, and they are very proper there: because they who
made use of wet linen, and close draperies, to make their figures look
more tender, reasonably foresaw, that the members would be too naked,
if they left not more than two or three folds, such as those sorts of
draperies afford them, and therefore have used those repetitions of
many folds; yet in such a manner, that the figures are always soft and
tender, and thereby seem opposite to the hardness of marble. Add to
this, that in sculpture, it is almost impossible, that a figure, clothed
with coarse draperies, can make a good effect on all the sides; and that
in painting, the draperies, of what kind soever they be, are of great
advantage, either to unite the colours and the groupes, or to give such a
ground, as one would wish to unite, or to separate; or farther to produce
such reflections as set off; or for filling void spaces; or, in short,
for many other advantages, which help to deceive the sight, and which are
no ways necessary to sculptors, since their work is always of relievo.
Three things may be inferred from what I have said, concerning the rule
of draperies. First, that the ancient sculptors had reason to clothe
their figures as we see them. Secondly, that painters ought to imitate
them in the order of their folds, but not in their quality, nor in their
number. Thirdly, that sculptors are obliged to follow them as much as
they can, without desiring to imitate unprofitably, or improperly,
the manner of the painters, by making many ample folds, which are
insufferable hardnesses, and look more like a rock, than a natural
garment.—See the 211th remark, about the middle of it.
[*†202.]
“And if the parts be too much distant from each other,” &c. It is with
intent to hinder (as we have said in the rule of groupes) the visual
rays from being too much divided; and that the eyes may not suffer, by
looking on so many objects, which are separated. Guido was very exact in
this observation. See in the text the end of the rule, which relates to
draperies.
[*†204.]
“And as those limbs and members which are expressed by few and large
muscles,” &c. Raphael, in the beginning of his painting, has somewhat
too much multiplied the folds; because, being with reason charmed with
the graces of the ancients, he imitated their beauties somewhat too
regularly; but having afterwards found, that this quantity of folds
glittered too much upon the limbs, and took off that repose and silence,
which in painting are so friendly to the eyes, he made use of a contrary
conduct, in the works which he painted afterwards; which was at that
time when he began to understand the effect of lights, of groupes, and
the oppositions of the lights and shadows; so that he wholly changed
his manner, (this was about eight years before his death,) and though
he always gave a grace to whatsoever he painted, yet he made appear in
his latter works, a greatness, a majesty, and a harmony, quite other
than what we see in his first manner: and this he did by lessening the
number of his folds, making them more large, and more opposing them,
and by making the masses of the lights and shadows greater, and more
disentangled. Take the pains to examine these his different manners in
the prints which we see of that great man.
[*†210.]
“As, supposing them to be magistrates, their draperies ought to be
large,” &c. Yet make not your draperies so large, that they may be big
enough to clothe four or five figures, as some there are who follow that
method. And take heed, that the foldings be natural, and so disposed,
that the eye may be directed to discover the folds, from the beginning of
them to the end. By magistrates he means all great and grave persons, and
such as are advanced in age.
[*†211.]
“If ladies or damsels, light and soft,” &c. By this name of ladies,
maids, or damsels, he means all young persons, slender, finely shaped,
airy, and delicate. Such as are Nymphs and Naiades, and Fountains.
Angels are also comprehended under this head, whose drapery should be of
pleasing colours, and resembling those which are seen in the heavens, and
chiefly when they are suspended in the air. They are only such sorts of
light habits as are subject to be ruffled by the winds, which can bear
many folds; yet so, that they may be freed from any hardnesses. It is
easy for every one to judge, that betwixt the draperies of magistrates,
and those of young maids, there must be some mediocrity of folds, such
as are most commonly seen and observed; as in the draperies of a Christ,
of a Madonna, of a King, a Queen, or a Duchess, and of other persons
of consideration and majesty; and those also who are of a middle age;
with this distinction, that the habits must be made more or less rich,
according to the dignity of the persons; and that cloth garments may
be distinguished from those of silk, sattin from velvets, brocard from
embroidery, and that, in one word, the eye may be deceived by the truth,
and the difference of the stuffs. Take notice, if you please, that the
light and tender draperies having been only given to the female sex,
the ancient sculptors have avoided, as much as they could, to clothe
the figures of men, because they thought (as we have formerly said)
that, in sculpture garments could not be well imitated, and that great
folds made a very bad effect. There are almost as many examples of this
truth, as amongst the ancients there are statues of naked men. I will
name only that of Laocoon, which, according to all probability, ought
to have been clothed. And in effect, what likelihood can there be, that
the son of a king, and the priest of Apollo, should appear naked in the
actual ceremony of sacrifice? for the serpents passed from the Isle of
Tenedos to the Trojan shore, and surprised Laocoon, and his sons, while
they were sacrificing to Neptune on the sea-shore, as Virgil witnesses
in the second of his Æneids. Notwithstanding which, the sculptors,[160]
who were authors of this noble work, had well considered, that they could
not give vestments suitable to the quality of the persons represented,
without making as it were a heap of stones, whose mass would rather be
like a rock, than those three admirable figures, which will ever be the
admiration of all ages. And for this reason of two inconveniences, they
judged that of draperies to be greater than that which was against the
truth itself.
This observation well confirms what I have said in the 200th remark. It
seems to me, that it deserves you should make some reflection on it; and
to establish it the better in your mind, I will tell you, that Michael
Angelo, following this maxim, has given the prophets which he painted
in the chapel of the pope, such draperies, whose folds are large, and
whose garments are coarse; instead of which, the Moses, which he has
made in sculpture, is habited with a drapery much more close to the
parts, and holding more of the ancients. Nevertheless, he is a prophet,
as well as those in the chapel, a man of the same quality, and to whom
Michael Angelo ought to have given the same draperies, if he had not been
hindered by those very reasons, which have been given you.
[*†215.]
“The marks or ensigns of virtues,” &c. That is to say, of the sciences
and arts. The Italians call a man a _virtuoso_, who loves the noble
arts, and is a critic in them. And amongst our French painters, the word
_vertueux_ is understood in the same signification.
[*†217.]
“But let not the work be too much enriched with gold or jewels,” &c.
Clemens Alexandrinus relates,[161] “That Apelles having seen a Helena,
which a young scholar of his had made, and adorned with a great quantity
of golden ornaments and jewels, said to him, My good friend, though
thou couldst not make her beautiful, at least thou hast made her rich.”
Besides, that these glittering things in painting, as precious stones
prodigally strewed over the habits, are destructive to each other,
because they draw the sight to several places at the same time, and
hinder round bodies from turning, and making their due effect; it is
the very quantity which often makes us judge that they are false. And
besides, it is to be presumed, that precious things are always rare.
Corinna, that learned Theban lady, reproached Pindar, whom she had five
times overcome in poetry, that he scattered through all his works the
flowers of Parnassus too prodigally; saying to him, “That men sowed with
the hand, and not with the sack;”[162] for which reason, a painter ought
to adorn his vestments with great discretion. And precious stones look
exceedingly well, when they are set in those places which we would make
to come out of the picture; as for example, on a shoulder, or an arm,
to tie some drapery, which of itself is of no strong colouring. They do
also perfectly well with white, and other light colours, which are used
in bringing the parts or bodies forward; because jewels make a show, and
glitter through the opposition of the great lights in the deep brown,
which meet together.
[*†220.]
“It is very expedient to make a model of those things which we have
not in our sight, and whose nature is difficult to be retained in the
memory,” &c. As, for example, the groupes of many figures, the postures
difficult to be long kept, the figures in the air, in cielings, or much
raised above the sight; and even of animals, which are not easily to be
disposed.
By this rule we plainly see, how necessary it is for a painter to know
how to model, and to have many models of soft wax. Paul Veronese had so
good store of them, with so great a quantity of different sorts, that he
would paint a whole historical composition on a perspective plan, how
great and how diversified soever it were. Tintoret practised the same;
and Michael Angelo (as Giovan. Bapt. Armenini relates) made use of it,
for all the figures of his Day of Judgment. It is not that I would advise
any one, who would make any very considerable work, to finish after these
sorts of models; but they will be of vast use and advantage to see the
masses of great lights, and great shadows, and the effect of the whole
together. For what remains, you are to have a layman[163] almost as big
as the life, for every figure in particular, besides the natural figure
before you, on which you must also look, and call it for a witness, which
must first confirm the thing to you, and afterwards to the spectators as
it is in reality.
You may make use of these models with delight, if you set them on a
perspective plan, which will be in the manner of a table made on purpose.
You may either raise, or let it down, according to your convenience; and
if you look on your figures, through a hole, so contrived, that it may be
moved up and down, it will serve you for a point of sight, and a point of
distance, when you have once fixed it.
The same hole will farther serve you, to set your figures in the cieling,
and disposed upon a grate of iron-wire, or supported in the air by little
strings raised at discretion, or by both ways together.
You may join to your figures what you see fitting, provided, that the
whole be proportioned to them; and, in short, what you yourself may judge
to be of no greater bigness than theirs. Thus, in whatsoever you do,
there will be more of truth seen, your work itself will give you infinite
delight, and you will avoid many doubts and difficulties, which often
hinder you; and chiefly for what relates to lineal perspective, which you
will there infallibly find, provided that you remember to proportion all
things to the greatness of your figures, and especially the points of
sight and of distance; but for what belongs to aërial perspective, that
not being found, the judgment must supply it. Tintoret (as Ridolphi tells
us in his Life) had made chambers of board and pasteboard, proportioned
to his models, with doors and windows, through which he distributed on
his figures artificial lights, as much as he thought reasonable, and
often passed some part of the night, to consider and observe the effect
of his compositions. His models were two feet high.
[*†221.]
“We are to consider the places where we lay the scene of the picture,”
&c. This is what Monsieur de Chambray calls, to do things according to
_decorum_. See what he says of it, in the interpretation of that word,
in his book of the Perfection of Painting. It is not sufficient, that in
the picture there be nothing found which is contrary to the place, where
the action which is represented, passes; but we ought, besides, to mark
out the place, and make it known to the spectator by some particular
address, that his mind may not be put to the pains of discovering it;
as whether it be Italy, or Spain, or Greece, or France; whether it be
near the sea-shore, or the banks of some river; whether it be the Rhine,
or the Loire; the Po, or the Tyber; and so of other things, if they
are essential to the history. “Nealces, a man of wit, and an ingenious
painter,” as Pliny tells us,[164] “being to paint a naval fight betwixt
the Egyptians and the Persians, and being willing to make it known that
the battle was given upon the Nile, whose waters are of the same colour
with the sea, drew an ass drinking on the banks of the river, and a
crocodile endeavouring to surprise him.”
[*†222.]
“Let a nobleness and grace,” &c. It is difficult enough to say what this
grace of painting is; it is to be conceived and understood much more
easily than to be explained by words. It proceeds from the illuminations
of an excellent mind, (not to be acquired,) by which we give a certain
turn to things, which makes them pleasing. A figure may be designed
with all its proportions, and have all its parts regular; which,
notwithstanding all this, shall not be pleasing, if all those parts are
not put together in a certain manner, which attracts the eye to them,
and holds it fixed upon them; for which reason, there is a difference to
be made betwixt grace and beauty. And it seems that Ovid had a mind to
distinguish them, when he said, speaking of Venus,
_Multaque cum formâ gratia mixta fuit._
A matchless grace was with her beauty mixed.
And Suetonius, speaking of Nero, says, he was rather beautiful than
graceful: _Vultu pulchro, magis quam venusto_. How many fair women do we
see, who please us much less than others, who have not such beautiful
features? It is by this grace, that Raphael has made himself the most
renowned of all the Italians, as Apelles by the same means carried it
above all the Greeks.
[*†233.]
“This is that in which the greatest difficulty consists,” &c. For
two reasons; first, because great study is to be made, as well upon
the ancient beauties, and noble pictures, as upon nature itself; and
secondly, because that part depends entirely on the genius, and seems to
be purely the gift of heaven, which we have received at our birth: upon
which account our author adds, “Undoubtedly we see but few, whom in this
particular Jupiter has regarded with a gracious eye; so that it belongs
only to those elevated souls, who partake somewhat of divinity, to work
such mighty wonders.” Though they, who have not altogether received
from heaven this precious gift, cannot acquire it without great labour;
nevertheless, it is needful, in my opinion, that both the one and the
other should perfectly learn the character of every passion.
All the actions of the sensitive appetite are in painting called
passions, because the soul is agitated by them, and because the body
suffers through them, and is sensibly altered. They are those divers
agitations and different motions of the body in general, and of every
one of its parts in particular, that our excellent painter ought to
understand; on which he ought to make his study, and to form to himself
a perfect idea of them. But it will be proper for us to know, in the
first place, that the philosophers admit eleven, love, hatred, desire,
shunning, joy, sadness, hope, despair, boldness, fear, and anger. The
painters have multiplied them not only by their different degrees, but
also by their different species; for they will make, for example, six
persons in the same degree of fear, who shall express that passion all of
them differently. And it is that diversity of species which distinguishes
those painters who are able artists, from those whom we may call
mannerists, and who repeat five or six times over in the same picture the
same airs of a head. There are a vast number of other passions, which
are as the branches of those which we have named; we might, for example,
under the notion of love, comprehend grace, gentleness, civility,
caresses, embraces, kisses, tranquillity, sweetness, &c.; and without
examining whether all these things which painters comprize under the
name of passions, can be reduced to those of the philosophers, I am of
opinion, that every one may use them at his pleasure, and that he may
study them after his own manner; the name makes nothing. One may even
make passions of majesty, fierceness, dissatisfaction, care, avarice,
slothfulness, envy, and many other things like these. These passions (as
I have said) ought to be learnt from the life itself, or to be studied
on the ancient statues, and excellent pictures; we ought to see, for
example, all things which belong to sadness, or serve to express it; to
design them carefully, and to imprint them in our memories, after such
a manner, as we may distinctly understand seven or eight kinds of them
more or less, and immediately after, draw them upon paper, without any
other original than the image which we have conceived of them. We must be
perfect masters of them, but above all, we must make sure of possessing
them throughly. We are to know, that it is such or such a stroke, or
such a shadow, stronger or weaker, which makes such or such a passion,
in this or that degree. And thus if any one should ask you, what makes,
in painting, the majesty of a king, the gravity of a hero, the love of a
Christ, the grief of a Madonna, the hope of the good thief, the despair
of the bad one, the grace and beauty of a Venus, and, in fine, the
character of any passion whatsoever; you may answer positively, on the
spot, and with assurance, that it is such a posture, or such lines in
the parts of the face, formed of such or such a passion, or even the one
and the other both together; for the parts of the body, separately, make
known the passions of the soul, or else conjointly one with the other.
But of all the parts, the head is that which gives the most of life, and
the most of grace to the passion, and which alone contributes more to it
than all the rest together. The others separately can only express some
certain passions, but the head expresses all of them. Nevertheless, there
are some which are more particular to it; as, for example, humility,
which it expresses by the stooping or bending of the head; arrogance,
when it is lifted, or, as we say, tossed up; languishment, when we
hang it on one side, or lean it upon one shoulder; obstinacy, (or, as
the French call it, _opiniâtretè_,) with a certain stubborn, unruly,
barbarous humour, when it is held upright, stiff, and poised betwixt the
shoulders. And of the rest, there are many marks, more easily conceived
than they can be expressed; as bashfulness, admiration, indignation,
and doubt. It is by the head that we make known more visibly our
supplications, our threatenings, our mildness, our haughtiness, our love,
our hatred, our joy, our sadness, our humility; in fine, it is enough to
see the face, and to understand the mind at half a word. Blushing and
paleness speak to us, as also the mixture of them both.
The parts of the face do all of them contribute to expose the thoughts
of our hearts; but above the rest, the eyes, which are as it were the two
windows through which the soul looks out and shows itself. The passions
which they more particularly express, are pleasure, languishment,
disdain, severity, sweetness, admiration, and anger. Joy and sadness
may bear their parts, if they did not more especially proceed from
the eyebrows and the mouth. And the two parts last named agree more
particularly in the expression of those two passions; nevertheless, if
you join the eyes as a third, you will have the product of a wonderful
harmony for all the passions of the soul.
The nose has no passion which is particular to it; it only lends its
assistance to the other before-named, by the stretching of the nostrils,
which is as much marked in joy, as it is in sadness. And yet it seems,
that scorn makes us wrinkle up the nose, and stretch the nostrils also,
at the same time drawing up the upper lip to the place which is near the
corners of the mouth. The ancients made the nose the seat of derision;
_eum subdolæ irrisioni dicaverunt_, says Pliny; that is, they dedicated
the nose to a cunning sort of mockery. We read in the 3d satire of
Persius,
_Disce, sed ira cadat naso, rugosaque sanna._
Learn, but let your anger fall from your nose, and the sneering wrinkles
be dismounted. And Philostratus in the picture of Pan, whom the Nymphs
had bound, and scornfully insulted over, says of that god, “That, before
this, he was accustomed to sleep with a peaceable nose, softening in his
slumbers the wrinkles of it, and the anger which commonly mounted to that
part; but now his nostrils were widened to the last degree of fury.” For
my own part, I should rather believe, that the nose was the seat of
wrath in beasts than in mankind; and that it was unbecoming of any god
but only Pan, who had very much of the beast in him, to wrinkle up his
nose in anger, like other animals. The moving of the lips ought to be but
moderate, if it be in conversation, because we speak much more by the
tongue than by the lips: and if you make the mouth very open, it is only
when you are to express the violence of passion, and more properly of
anger.
For what concerns the hands, they are the servants of the head, they
are his weapons and his auxiliaries; without them the action is weak,
languishing, and half dead. Their motions, which are almost infinite,
make innumerable expressions. Is it not by them, that we desire, that
we hope, that we promise, that we call towards us, and that we reject?
Besides, they are the instruments of our threats, of our petitions, of
the horror which we show for things, and of the praises which we give
them. By them we fear, we ask questions, we approve, and we refuse,
we show our joy and our sadness, our doubts and our lamentations, our
concernments of pity, and our admirations. In short, it may be said, that
they are the language of the dumb, that they contribute not a little to
the speaking of the universal tongue common to all the world, which is
that of painting.
Now, to tell you how these parts are to be disposed, so as to express
the different passions, is impossible; no precise rules can be given of
it, both because the task itself is infinite, and also because every
one is left to the conduct of his own genius, and to the fruit of his
former studies; only remember to be careful, that all the actions of your
figures must be natural. “It seems to me,” says Quinctilian, speaking of
the passions, “that this part, which is so noble, and so great, is not
altogether inaccessible, and that an easy way may be found to it; it is
to consider nature, and to copy her; for the spectators are satisfied,
when in artificial things they can discern that nature, which they are
accustomed to behold.” This passage of Quinctilian is perfectly explained
by the words of an excellent master, which our author proposes to us
for a rule. They are these which follow: “That the studied motions of
the soul are never so natural, as those which we see in the transport
of a true passion.” These motions will better be expressed, and be
much more natural, if we enter into the same thoughts, become of the
same piece, and imagine ourselves to be in the same circumstances with
those whom we would represent. “For nature,” says Horace, in his Art
of Poetry, “disposes the inside of mankind to all sorts of fortunes;
sometimes she makes us contented, sometimes she drives us into choler,
and sometimes she so oppresses us with grief, that she seems to tread us
down, and plunge us into mortal anxieties; and on all these occasions,
she drives outwards the motions of the heart by the tongue, which is
her interpreter.” Now, instead of the tongue, let the painter say by
the actions, which are her interpreters. “What means have we,” says
Quinctilian, “to give a colour to a thing, if we have not the same
colour? It is necessary that we ourselves should first be touched with a
passion before we endeavour to move others with it. And how,” continues
he, “can we be touched, since the passions are not in our power? This is
the way, in my opinion; we must form to ourselves the visions and images
of absent things, as if they were in reality before our eyes; and he
who conceives these images with the greatest strength of imagination,
shall possess that part of the passions with the most advantage, and the
greatest ease.” But we must take care, (as I have already said,) that in
these visions the motions may be natural; for there are some who imagine
they have given abundance of light to their figures, when they have made
them do violent and extravagant actions; which we may more reasonably
call the convulsions, or contortions of the body, than the passions of
the mind; and by this means they often put themselves to much pains, to
find a strong passion, where no passion is required. Add to all that I
have said concerning the passions, that we are to have a very serious
regard to the quality of the persons who are to be expressed in passions.
The joy of a king ought not to resemble that of a serving-man; and the
fierceness of a private soldier must not be like that of an officer. In
these differences consists all the fineness and delicacy of the passions.
Paulo Lomazzo has written at large on every passion in particular, in his
second book; but beware you dwell not too long upon it, and endeavour not
to force your genius.
[*†247.]
“Some relicts of it took sanctuary under ground,” &c. All the ancient
painting that was in Italy perished in the invasion of the Huns and
Goths, excepting those works which were hidden under ground, or there
painted; which, by reason they had not been much exposed to view, were
preserved from the insolence of those barbarians.
[*†256.]
“The cromatic part, or colouring,” &c. The third and last part of
painting, is called the cromatic, or colouring. Its object is colour; for
which reason, lights and shadows are therein also comprehended, which
are nothing else but white and brown, (or dark,) and by consequence
have their place among the colours. Philostratus says, in his life of
Apollonius, “That that may be truly called painting, which is made only
with two colours, provided the lights and shadows be observed in it;
for there we behold the true resemblance of things with their beauties;
we also see the passions, though without other colours; so much of life
may be also expressed in it, that we may perceive even the very blood;
the colour of the hair, and of the beard, are likewise to be discerned;
and we can distinguish, without confusion, the fair from the black, and
the young from the old, the differences betwixt the white and the flaxen
hair; we distinguish with ease betwixt the Moors and the Indians, not
only by the Camus noses of the blacks, their woolly hair, and their high
jaws, but also by that black colour which is natural to them.” We may add
to what Philostratus has said, that with two colours only, (the light
and the dark,) there is no sort of stuff, or habit, but may be imitated.
We say then, that the colouring makes its observations on the masses or
bodies of the colours, accompanied with lights and shadows, more or less
evident by degrees of diminution, according to the accidents. First, of
a luminous body; as, for example, the sun, or a torch. Secondly, of a
diaphanous or transparent body, which is betwixt us and the object, as
the air, either pure or thick, or a red glass, &c. Thirdly, of a solid
body illuminated, as a statue of white marble, a green tree, a black
horse, &c. Fourthly, from his part, who regards the body illuminated, as
beholding it either near, or at a distance, directly in a right angle, or
aside in an obtuse angle, from the top to the bottom, or from the bottom
to the top. This part, in the knowledge which it has of the virtue of
colours, and the friendship which they have with each other, and also
their antipathies, comprehends the strength, the relievo, the briskness,
and the delicacy which are observed in good pictures. The management of
colours, and the labour, depend also on this last part.
[*†263.]
“Her sister,” &c. That is to say, the design or drawing, which is
the second part of painting; which, consisting only of lines, stands
altogether in need of the colouring to appear. It is for this reason,
that our author calls this part her sister’s procurer, that is, the
colouring shows us the design, and makes us fall in love with it.
[*†267.]
“The light produces all kinds of colours,” &c. Here are three theorems
successively following, which our author proposes to us, that from thence
we may draw some conclusions. You may likewise find others, which are in
the nature of so many propositions, to which we ought to agree, that from
thence we may draw the precepts contained in the following part of this
treatise: they are all founded on the sense of seeing.
[*†280.]
“Which should be the most,” &c. See the remark of number 152.
[*†283.]
“That light bodies may have a sufficient mass, or breadth of shadow, to
sustain them,” &c. That is properly to say, that after the great lights,
there must be great shadows, which we call reposes; because, in reality,
the sight would be tired, if it were attracted by a continuity of
glittering objects. The lights may serve for a repose to the darks, and
the darks to the lights. I have said in another place, that a groupe of
figures ought to be considered as a choir of music, in which the basses
support the trebles, and make them to be heard with greater pleasure.
These reposes are made two several ways, one of which is natural, the
other artificial. The natural is made by an extent of lights or of
shadows, which naturally and necessarily follow solid bodies; or the
masses of solid bodies aggrouped, when the light strikes upon them. And
the artificial consists in the bodies of colours, which the painter
gives to certain things, such as pleases him; and composes them in such
a manner, that they do no injury to the objects which are near them.
A drapery, for example, which is made yellow, or red, on some certain
place, in another place may be brown and will be more suitable to it, to
produce the effect required. We are to take occasion, as much as possibly
we can, to make use of the first manner, and to find the repose of which
we speak, by the light and by the shadow, which naturally accompany solid
bodies. But since the subjects on which we work are not always favourable
to dispose the bodies as we desire, a painter in such a case may take his
advantage by the bodies of colours, and put into such places as ought
to be darkened, draperies, or other things, which we may suppose to be
naturally brown and sullied, which will produce the same effect, and give
him the same reposes as the shadows would do, which could not be caused
by the disposition of the objects.
Thus an understanding painter will make his advantages both of the one
manner and the other. And if he makes a design to be graved, he is to
remember, that the gravers dispose not their colours as the painters do;
and that by consequence he must take occasion to find the reason of his
design, in the natural shadows of the figures, which he has disposed
to cause the effect. Rubens has given us a full information of this in
those prints of his, which he caused to be engraved; and I believe that
nothing was ever seen more beautiful in that kind; the whole knowledge
of groupes, of the lights and shadows, and of those masses, which Titian
calls a bunch of grapes, is there exposed so clearly to the sight, that
the view of those prints, and the careful observation of them, might very
much contribute to the forming of an able painter. The best and fairest
of them are graven by Vosterman, Pontius, and Bolsvert, all of them
admirable gravers, whose works Rubens himself took care to oversee; and
which, without doubt, you will find to be excellent, if you examine them.
But expect not there the elegance of design, nor the correctness of the
outlines.
It is not but the gravers can, and ought to imitate the bodies of the
colours by the degrees of the lights and shadows, as much as they shall
judge that this imitation may produce a good effect. On the contrary,
it is impossible, in my opinion, to give much strength to what they
grave, after the works of the school of Venice, and of all those who
have had the knowledge of colours, and of the contrast of the lights
and shadows, without imitating in some sort the colour of the objects,
according to the relation which they have to the degrees of white and
black. We see certain prints of good gravers different in their kinds,
where these things are observed, and which have a wonderful strength. And
there appears in public, of late years, a gallery of archduke Leopold,
which, though very ill graven, yet shows some part of the beauty of its
originals, because the gravers who have executed it, though otherwise
they were sufficiently ignorant, have observed, in almost the greatest
parts of their prints, the bodies of colours, in the relation which they
have to the degrees of the lights and shadows. I could wish the gravers
would make some reflection upon this whole remark: it is of wonderful
consequence to them; for when they have attained to the knowledge of
these reposes, they will easily resolve those difficulties which many
times perplex them; and then chiefly, when they are to engrave after a
picture, where neither the lights and shadows, nor the bodies of the
colours, are skilfully observed, though in its other parts the picture
may be well performed.
[*†286.]
“As in a convex mirror the collected rays strike stronger,” &c. A convex
mirror alters the objects which are in the middle, so that it seems to
make them come out from the superfices. The painter must do in the same
manner, in respect of the lights and shadows of his figures, to give them
more relievo, and more strength.
[*†290.]
“While the goings off are more and more broken and faint, as they
approach to the extremities,” &c. It is the duty of a painter, even in
this also, to imitate the convex mirror, and to place nothing which
glares either in colour or in light, at the borders of his picture: for
which there are two reasons; the first is, that the eye at the first view
directs itself to the midst of the object, which is presented to it, and
by consequence must there necessarily find the principal object, in order
to its satisfaction; and the other reason is, that the sides or borders
being overcharged with a strong and glittering work, attract the eyes
thither, which are in a kind of pain, not to behold a continuity of that
work, which is on the sudden interrupted by the borders of the picture;
instead of which, the borders being lightened, and eased of so much work,
the eye continues fixed on the centre of the picture, and beholds it with
greater pleasure. It is for the same reason, that, in a great composition
of figures, those which, coming most forward, are cut off by the bottom
of the picture, will always make an ill effect.
[*†329.]
“A bunch of grapes,” &c. It is sufficiently manifest, that Titian, by
this judicious and familiar comparison, means, that a painter ought to
collect the objects, and to dispose them in such a manner, as to compose
one whole; the several contiguous parts of which may be enlightened,
many shadowed, and others of broken colours to be in the turnings; as on
a bunch of grapes, many grapes, which are the parts of it, are in the
light, many in the shadow, and the rest faintly coloured to make them go
farther back. Titian once told Tintoret, that in his greatest works, a
bunch of grapes had been his principal rule, and his surest guide.
[*†330.]
“Pure, or unmixed white, either draws an object nearer, or carries it
off to farther distance. It draws it nearer with black, and throws
it backward without it,” &c. All agree, that white can subsist on
the fore-ground of the picture, and there be used without mixture;
the question therefore is to know, if it can equally subsist, and be
placed in the same manner, upon that which is backward, the light being
universal, and the figures supposed in a champaigne and open field.
Our author concludes affirmatively; and the reason on which he
establishes his rule is this; that there being nothing which partakes
more of the light than whiteness, and the light being capable of
subsisting well in remoteness, or at a long distance, as we daily see in
the rising and setting of the sun, it follows, that white may subsist
in the same manner. In painting, the light and a white colour are but
one and the same thing. Add to this, that we have no colour which more
resembles the air than white, and by consequence no colour which is
lighter; from whence it comes, that we commonly say, the air is heavy,
when we see the heavens covered with black clouds, or when a thick fog
takes from us that clearness, which makes the lightness or serenity
of the air. Titian, Tintoret, Paul Veronese, and all those who best
understood lights, have observed it in this manner, and no man can go
against this precept, at least without renouncing any skill in landscape,
which is an undoubted confirmation of this truth. And we see, that all
the great masters of landscape have followed Titian in this, who has
always employed brown and earthy colours upon the fore-part, and has
reserved his greatest lights for remotenesses, and the back parts of his
landscapes.
It may be objected against this opinion, that white cannot maintain
itself in remotenesses, because it is ordinarily used to bring the
objects nearer on the advanced part. It is true that so it is used, and
that to very good purpose, to render the objects more sensible, by the
opposition of the dark, which must accompany it, and which retains it, as
it were, by force, whether the dark serves it for a ground, or whether it
be combined to it. For example, if you would make a white horse on the
fore-ground of your picture, it is of absolute necessity, that the ground
must be of a mixed brown, and large enough, or that the furniture must be
of very sensible colours; or lastly, that some figure must be set upon
it, whose shadows and the colour may bring it forward.
But it seems, say you, that blue is the most flying or transient colour,
because the heavens and mountains, which are at the greatest distance,
are of that colour. It is very true that blue is one of the lightest and
sweetest colours; but it is also true, that it possesses these qualities
so much the more, because the white is mingled in it, as the example of
the distances demonstrate to us. But if the light of your picture be not
universal, and that you suppose your figures in a chamber, then recal to
your memory that theorem which tells you, that the nearer a body is to
the light, and the more directly it is opposed to us, so much the more
it is enlightened, because the light grows languishing the farther it
removes from its original.
You may also extinguish your white, if you suppose the air to be somewhat
thicker, and if you foresee that this supposition will make a good effect
in the economy of the whole work; but let not this proceed so far, as to
make your figures so brown, that they may seem as it were in a filthy
fog, or that they may appear to be part of the ground. See the following
remark.
[*†332.]
“But as for pure black, there is nothing that brings the object nearer
to the sight,” &c. Because black is the heaviest of all colours, the
most earthy, and the most sensible. This is clearly understood by the
qualities of white, which is opposed to it, and which is, as we have
said, the lightest of all colours. There are few who are not of this
opinion; and yet I have known some, who have told me, that the black
being on the advanced part, makes nothing but holes. To this there is
little else to be answered, but that black always makes a good effect,
being set forward, provided it be placed there with prudence. You are
therefore so to dispose the bodies of your pictures which you intend to
be on the fore-ground, that those sorts of holes may not be perceived,
and that the blacks may be there by masses, and insensibly confused. See
the 47th rule.
That which gives the relievo to a bowl, (may some say to me,) is the
quick light, or the white, which appears to be on the side which is
nearest to us, and the black, by consequence, distances the object. We
are here to beware, not to confound the turnings with the distances:
the question is only in respect of bodies, which are separated by some
distance of a backward position; and not of round bodies, which are of
the same continuity: the brown, which is mingled in the turnings of the
bowl, makes them go off rather in confounding them (as we may say) than
in blackening them. And do you not see, that the reflects are an artifice
of the painter, to make the turnings seem more light, and that by this
means the greatest blackness remains towards the middle of the bowl, to
sustain the white, and make it deceive us with more pleasure?
This rule of white and black is of so great consequence, that unless it
be exactly practised, it is impossible for a picture to make any great
effect, that the masses can be disentangled, and the different distances
may be observed at the first glance of the eye, without trouble.
It may be inferred from this precept, that the masses of other colours
will be so much the more sensible, and approach so much the nearer to the
sight, the more brown they bear; provided this be amongst other colours
which are of the same species. For example, a yellow brown shall draw
nearer to the sight than another which is less yellow. I said, provided
it be amongst other colours, which are of the same species; because there
are simple colours, which naturally are strong and sensible, though they
are clear, as vermilion; there are others also, which, notwithstanding
that they are brown, yet cease not to be soft and faint, as the blue of
ultramarine. The effect of a picture comes not only therefore from the
lights and shadows, but also from the nature of the colours. I thought it
was not from the purpose in this place to give you the qualities of those
colours which are most in use, and which are called capital, because they
serve to make the composition of all the rest, whose number is almost
infinite.
Red ochre is one of the most heavy colours.
Yellow ochre is not so heavy, because it is clearer.
And the masticot is very light, because it is a very clear yellow, and
very near to white.
Ultramarine, or azure, is very light, and a very sweet colour.
Vermilion is wholly opposite to ultramarine.
Lake is a middle colour betwixt ultramarine and vermilion, yet it is
rather more sweet than harsh.
Brown-red is one of the most earthy and most sensible colours.
Pink is in its nature an indifferent colour, that is very susceptible of
the other colours by the mixture: if you mix brown-red with it, you will
make it a very earthy colour; but, on the contrary, if you join it with
white or blue, you shall have one of the most faint and tender colours.
Terra verte (or green earth) is light; it is a mean betwixt yellow ochre
and ultramarine.
Umbre is very sensible and earthy; there is nothing but pure black which
can dispute with it.
Of all blacks, that is the most earthy, which is most remote from blue.
According to the principle which we have established of white and black,
you will make every one of these colours before-named more earthy and
more heavy, the more black you mingle with them; and they will be
lighter, the more white you join with them.
For what concerns broken or compound colours, we are to make a judgment
of their strength by the force of those colours which compose them.
All who have thoroughly understood the agreement of colours, have not
employed them wholly pure and simple in their draperies, unless in some
figure upon the fore-ground of the picture; but they have used broken
and compound colours, of which they made a harmony for the eyes, by
mixing those which have some kind of sympathy with each other, to make a
whole, which has an union with the colours which are neighbouring to it.
The painter who perfectly understands the force and power of his colours,
will use them most suitably to his present purpose, and according to his
own discretion.
[*†355.]
“But let this be done relatively,” &c. One body must make another body
fly off in such a manner, that itself may be chased by those bodies which
are advanced before it. “We are to take care, and use great attention,”
says Quinctilian, “not only of one separate thing, but of many which
follow each other, and by a certain relation which they have with each
other, are as it were continued.” In the same manner, as if in a straight
street, we cast our eyes from one end of it to the other, we discover at
once those different things which are presented to the sight, so that we
not only see the last, but whatsoever is relating to the last.
[*†361.]
“Let two contrary extremities never touch each other,” &c. The sense of
seeing has this in common with all the rest of the senses, that it abhors
the contrary extremities. And in the same manner as our hands, when they
are very cold, feel a grievous pain when on the sudden we hold them near
the fire; so the eyes, which find an extreme white next to an extreme
black, or a fair cool azure next to a hot vermilion, cannot behold these
extremities without pain, though they are always attracted by the glaring
of two contraries.
This rule obliges us to know those colours which have a friendship
with each other, and those which are incompatible; which we may easily
discover in mixing together those colours of which we would make trial.
And if by this mixture they make a gracious and sweet colour, which is
pleasing to the sight, it is a sign that there is an union and a sympathy
betwixt them; but if, on the contrary, that colour which is produced
by the mixture of the two be harsh to the sight, we are to conclude,
that there is a contrariety and antipathy betwixt these two colours.
Green, for example, is a pleasing colour, which may come from a blue and
a yellow mixed together; and, by consequence, blue and yellow are two
colours which sympathise: and, on the contrary, the mixture of blue with
vermilion, produces a sharp, harsh, and unpleasant colour; conclude then,
that blue and vermilion are of a contrary nature. And the same may be
said of other colours, of which you may make the experiment, and clear
that matter once for all. (See the conclusion of the 332d remark, where
I have taken occasion to speak of the force and quality of every capital
colour.) Yet you may neglect this precept, when your piece consists but
of one or two figures, and when amongst a great number you would make
some one figure more remarkable than the rest; one, I say, which is one
of the most considerable of the subject, and which otherwise you cannot
distinguish from the rest. Titian, in his Triumph of Bacchus, having
placed Ariadne on one of the borders of the picture, and not being able
(for that reason) to make her remarkable by the brightness of light,
which he was to keep in the middle of his picture, gave her a scarf of
a vermilion colour, upon a blue drapery, as well to loosen her from his
ground, which was a blue sea, as because she is one of the principal
figures of his subject, upon which he desired to attract the eye. Paul
Veronese, in his Marriage of Cana, because Christ, who is the principal
figure of the subject, is carried somewhat into the depth of the picture,
and that he could not make him distinguishable by the strength of the
lights and shadows, has clothed him with vermilion and blue, thereby to
conduct the sight to that figure.
The hostile colours may be so much the more allied to each other, the
more you mix them with other colours which mutually sympathise, and which
agree with those colours which you desire to reconcile.
[*†365.]
“It is labour in vain to paint a high-noon,” &c. He said in another
place, “endeavour after that which aids your art, and is suitable to it,
and shun whatsoever is repugnant:” it is the 59th precept. If the painter
would arrive to the end he has proposed, which is to deceive the sight,
he must make choice of such a nature as agrees with the weakness of his
colours; because his colours cannot accommodate themselves to every sort
of nature. This rule is particularly to be observed, and well considered
by those who paint landscapes.
[*†378.]
“Let the field or ground of the picture,” &c. The reason of it is, that
we are to avoid the meeting of those colours which have an antipathy to
each other, because they offend the sight; so that this rule is proved
sufficiently by the 41st, which tells us, that two contrary extremities
are never to touch each other, whether it be in colour, or in light; but
that there ought to be a mean betwixt them, which partakes of both.
[*†382.]
“Let your colours be lively, and yet not look (according to the painters’
proverb) as if they had been rubbed, or sprinkled with meal,” &c. _Donner
dans la farine_, is a phrase amongst painters, which perfectly expresses
what it means; which is to paint with clear or bright colours, and dull
colours together; for being so mingled, they give no more life to the
figures, than if they had been rubbed with meal. They who make their
flesh-colours very white, and their shadows grey, or inclining to green,
fall into this inconvenience. Red colours in the shadows of the most
delicate or finest flesh, contribute wonderfully to make them lively,
shining, and natural; but they are to be used with the same discretion,
that Titian, Paul Veronese, Rubens, and Van Dyck have taught us, by their
example.
To preserve the colours fresh, we must paint by putting in more colours,
and not by rubbing them in after they are once laid; and (if it could be
done) they should be laid just in their proper places, and not be any
more touched, when they are once so placed; because the freshness of the
colours is tarnished and lost, by vexing them with the continual drudgery
of daubing.
All they who have coloured well have had yet another maxim to maintain
their colours fresh and flourishing, which was to make use of white
grounds, upon which they painted, and oftentimes at the first stroke,
without retouching any thing, and without employing new colours. Rubens
always used this way; and I have seen pictures from the hand of that
great person, painted up at once, which were of a wonderful vivacity.
The reason why they made use of those kinds of grounds is, because white
as well preserves a brightness under the transparency of colours, which
hinders the air from altering the whiteness of the ground, as that it
likewise repairs the injuries which they receive from the air, so that
the ground and the colours assist and preserve each other. It is for this
reason, that glazed colours have a vivacity which can never be imitated
by the most lively and most brilliant colours; because, according to the
common way, the different tints are simply laid on, each in its place,
one after another. So true it is, that white with other strong colours
with which we paint at once that which we intend to glaze, are, as it
were, the life, the spirit, and the lustre of it. The ancients most
certainly have found, that white grounds were much the best, because,
notwithstanding that inconvenience, which their eyes received from that
colour, yet they did not forbear the use of it; as Galen testifies, in
his Tenth Book of the Use of the Parts. “Painters,” says he, “when they
work upon their white grounds, place before them dark colours, and others
mixed with blue and green, to recreate their eyes; because white is a
glaring colour, which wearies and pains the sight more than any other.”
I know not the reason why the use of it is left off at present, if it
be not that in our days there are few painters who are curious in their
colouring, or that the first strokes which are begun upon white are not
seen soon enough, and that a more than French patience is required to
wait till it be accomplished; and the ground, which by its whiteness
tarnishes the lustre of the other colours, must be entirely covered, to
make the whole work appear pleasingly.
[*†383.]
“Let the parts which are nearest to us, and most raised,” &c. The reason
of this is, that upon a flat superficies, and as much united as a cloth
can be, when it is strained, the least body is very appearing, and gives
a heightening to the place which it possesses: do not therefore load
those places with colours, which you would make to turn; but let those be
well loaded, which you would have come out of the canvas.
[*†385.]
“Let there be so much harmony, or consent in the masses of the picture,
that all the shadowings may appear as if they were but one,” &c. He
has said in another place, that after great lights, great shadows are
necessary, which he calls reposes. What he means by the present rule is
this, that whatsoever is found in those great shadows, should partake of
the colours of one another; so that the different colours which are well
distinguished in the lights, seem to be but one in the shadows, by their
great union.
[*†386.]
“Let the whole picture be of one piece,” &c. That is to say, of one and
the same continuity of work, and as if the picture had been painted up
all at once: the Latin says, all of one pallet.
[*†387.]
“The looking-glass will instruct you,” &c. The painter must have a
principal respect to the masses, and to the effect of the whole together.
The looking-glass distances the objects, and, by consequence, gives us
only to see the masses, in which all the little parts are confounded.
The evening, when the night approaches, will make you better understand
this observation, but not so commodiously; for the proper time to make it
lasts but a quarter of an hour, and the looking-glass may be useful all
the day.
Since the mirror is the rule and master of all painters, as showing them
their faults by distancing the objects, we may conclude, that the picture
which makes not a good effect at a distance, cannot be well done; and a
painter must never finish his picture, before he has examined it at some
reasonable distance, or with a looking-glass, whether the masses of the
lights and shadows, and the bodies of the colours, be well distributed.
Giorgione and Correggio have made use of this method.
[*†393.]
“As for a portrait, or picture by the life,” &c. The end of portraits is
not so precisely, as some have imagined, to give a smiling and pleasing
air, together with the resemblance; this is indeed somewhat, but not
enough. It consists in expressing the true temper of those persons which
it represents, and to make known their physiognomy. If the person whom
you draw, for example, be naturally sad, you are to beware of giving
him any gaiety, which would always be a thing which is foreign to his
countenance. If he or she be merry, you are to make that good humour
appear, by the expressing of those parts where it acts, and where it
shows itself. If the person be grave and majestical, the smiles, or
laughing, which is too sensible, will take off from that majesty, and
make it look childish and indecent. In short, the painter, who has a
good genius, must make a true discernment of all these things; and if he
understands physiognomy, it will be more easy to him, and he will succeed
better than another. Pliny tells us, “That Apelles made his pictures so
very like, that a certain physiognomist and fortune-teller (as it is
related by Appion the grammarian) foretold, by looking on them, the very
time of their deaths, whom those pictures represented; or at what time
their death happened, if such persons were already dead.”
[*†403.]
“You are to take the utmost care, that broad lights may be joined,” &c.
This must be done tenderly, yet not so as to make your colours die, by
force of tormenting them; but that you should mix them as hastily as you
can, and not retouch the same place, if conveniently you can avoid it.
“Broad lights,” &c. It is in vain to take pains if you cannot preserve
large lights; because without them your work will never make a good
effect at a distance, and also because little lights are confused and
effaced proportionably as you are at a distance from the picture. This
was the perpetual maxim of Correggio.
[*†417.]
“Ought to have somewhat of greatness in them, and their outlines to be
noble,” &c. As the pieces of antiquity will evidently show us.
[*†422.]
“There is nothing more pernicious to a youth,” &c. It is common to place
ourselves under the discipline of a master, of whom we have a good
opinion, and whose manner we are apt to embrace with ease; which takes
root more deeply in us, and augments, the more we see him work, and the
more we copy after him. This happens oftentimes to that degree, and makes
so great an impression in the mind of the scholar, that he cannot give
his approbation to any other manner whatsoever, and believes there is no
man under the cope of heaven, who is so knowing as his master.
But what is most remarkable in this point, is, that nature appears to us
always like that manner which we love, and in which we have been taught;
which is just like a glass through which we behold objects, and which
communicates its colour to them, without our perceiving it. After I
have said this, you may see of what consequence is the choice of a good
master, and of following in our beginning the manner of those who have
come nearest to nature. And how much injury do you think have the ill
manners which have been in France done to the painters of that nation,
and what hindrance have they been to the knowledge of what is well done,
or of arriving to what is so, when once we know it? The Italians say to
those whom they see infected with an ill manner, which they are not able
to forsake, “If you knew just nothing, you would soon learn something.”
[*†433.]
“Search whatsoever is aiding to your art, and convenient; and avoid those
things which are repugnant to it,” &c. This is an admirable rule; a
painter ought to have it perpetually present in his mind and memory. It
resolves those difficulties which the rules beget; it loosens his hands,
and assists his understanding; in short, this is the rule which sets the
painter at liberty; because it teaches him, that he ought not to subject
himself servilely, and be bound, like an apprentice, to the rules of his
art; but that the rules of his art ought to be subject to him, and not
hinder him from following the dictates of his genius, which is superior
to them.
[*†434.]
“Bodies of diverse natures, which are aggrouped, or combined together,
are agreeable and pleasant to the sight,” &c. As flowers, fruits,
animals, skins, sattins, velvets, beautiful flesh, works of silver,
armours, instruments of music, ornaments of ancient sacrifices, and
many other pleasing diversities which may present themselves to the
painter’s imagination. It is most certain, that the diversity of objects
recreates the sight, when they are without confusion, and when they
diminish nothing of the subject on which we work. Experience teaches us,
that the eye grows weary with poring perpetually on the same thing; not
only on pictures, but even on nature itself: for who is he, who would
not be tired in the walks of a long forest, or with beholding a large
plain which is naked of trees, or in the sight of a ridge of mountains,
which, instead of pleasure, give us only the view of heights and bottoms?
Thus to content and fill the eye of the understanding, the best authors
have had the address to sprinkle their works with pleasing digressions,
with which they recreate the minds of readers. Discretion in this, as
in all other things, is the surest guide; and as tedious digressions,
which wander from their subject, are impertinent; so the painter, who,
under pretence of diverting the eyes, would fill his picture with such
varieties as alter the truth of the history, would make a ridiculous
piece of painting, and a mere gallimaufry of his work.
[*†435.]
“As also those things which seem to be slightly touched, and performed
with ease,” &c. This ease attracts our eyes and spirits so much the more,
because it is to be presumed, that a noble work, which appears so easy
to us, is the product of a skilful hand, which is master of its art. It
was in this part, that Apelles found himself superior to Protogenes,
when he blamed him for not knowing when to lay down his pencil, and,
as I may almost say, to make an end of finishing his piece. And it was
on this account he plainly said, “That nothing was more prejudicial to
painters, than too much exactness; and that the greatest part of them
knew not when they had done enough:” as we have likewise a proverb, which
says, “An Englishman never knows when he is well.” It is true, that the
word _enough_ is very difficult to understand. What you have to do, is
to consider your subject thoroughly, and in what manner you intend to
treat it, according to your rules, and the force of your genius; after
this, you are to work with all the ease, and all the speed you can,
without breaking your head so very much, and being so very industrious in
starting scruples to yourself, and creating difficulties in your work.
But it is impossible to have this facility without possessing perfectly
all the precepts of the art, and to have made it habitual to you: for
ease consists in making precisely that work which you ought to make,
and to set every thing in its proper place with speed and readiness,
which cannot be done without the rules; for they are the assured means
of conducting you, to the end that you design, with pleasure. It is then
most certain, (though against the opinion of many,) that the rules give
facility, quiet of mind, and readiness of hand to the slowest genius;
and that the same rules increase and guide that ease in those who have
already received it at their birth, from the happy influence of their
stars.
From whence it follows, that we may consider facility two several ways;
either simply, as diligence, and a readiness of mind, and of the hand;
or, as a disposition in the mind to remove readily all those difficulties
which can arise in the work. The first proceeds from an active temper
full of fire; and the second from a true knowledge and full possession
of infallible rules: the first is pleasing, but it is not always without
anxiety, because it often leads us astray; and, on the contrary, the last
makes us act with a repose of mind and wonderful tranquillity, because
it ascertains us of the goodness of our work: it is a great advantage to
possess the first; but it is the height of perfection to have both in
that manner which Rubens and Van Dyck possessed them, excepting the part
of design, or drawing, which both of them too much neglected.
Those who say, that the rules are so far from giving us this facility,
that, on the contrary, they puzzle and perplex the mind, and tie the
hand, are generally such people who have passed half their lives in an
ill practice of painting, the habit of which is grown so inveterate in
them, that to change it by the rules, is to take, as it were, their
pencils out of their hands, and to put them out of condition of doing any
thing; in the same manner as we make a countryman dumb, whom we will not
allow to speak, but by the rules of grammar.
Observe, if you please, that the facility and diligence, of which I
spoke, consists not in that which we call bold strokes, and a free
handling of the pencil, if it makes not a great effect at a distance:
that sort of freedom belongs rather to a writing-master than a painter.
I say yet farther, that it is almost impossible, that things, which are
painted, should appear true and natural, where we observe these sorts of
bold strokes. And all those, who have come nearest to nature, have never
used that manner of painting. Those tender hairs, and those hatching
strokes of the pencil, which make a kind of minced meat in painting, are
very fine, I must confess, but they are never able to deceive the sight.
[*†442.]
“Nor till you have present in your mind a perfect idea of your work,”
&c. If you will have pleasure in painting, you ought to have so well
considered the economy of your work, that it may be entirely made and
disposed in your head, before it be begun upon the cloth. You must, I
say, foresee the effect of the groupes, the ground, and the lights and
shadows of every thing, the harmony of the colours, and the intelligence
of all the subject, in such a manner, that whatsoever you shall put upon
the cloth, may be only a copy of what is in your mind. If you make use of
this conduct, you will not be put to the trouble of so often changing and
rechanging.
[*†443.]
“Let the eye be satisfied, in the first place, even against and above
all other reasons,” &c. This passage has a respect to some particular
licences which a painter ought to take; and, as I despair not to treat
this matter more at large, I adjourn the reader to the first opportunity
which I can get for his farther satisfaction on this point, to the
best of my ability. But in general, he may hold for certain, that
those licences are good which contribute to deceive the sight, without
corrupting the truth of the subject on which the painter is to work.
[*†445.]
“Profit yourself by the counsels of the knowing,” &c. Parrhasius and
Cliton thought themselves much obliged to Socrates for the knowledge
which he gave them of the passions. (See their dialogue in Xenophon,
towards the end of the third book of Memoirs.) “They, who the most
willingly bear reproof,” says Pliny[165] the Younger, “are the very
men, in whom we find more to commend than in other people.” Lysippus
was extremely pleased, when Apelles told him his opinion; and Apelles
as much, when Lysippus told him his. That which Praxiteles said of
Nicias, in Pliny,[166] shews the soul of an accomplished and an humble
man. “Praxiteles being asked, which of all his works he valued most?”
“Those,” says he, “which Nicias has retouched.” So much account he made
of his criticisms and his opinions. You know the common practice of
Apelles; when he had finished any work, he exposed it to the sight of
all passengers, and concealed himself to hear the censure of his faults,
with the prospect of making his advantage of the informations which
unknowingly they gave him; being sensible, that the people would examine
his works more rigorously than himself, and would not forgive the least
mistake.
The opinions and counsels of many together are always preferable to the
advice of one single person. And Cicero wonders, that any are besotted
on their own productions, and say to one another, “Very good, if your
works please you, mine are not unpleasing to me.”[167] In effect, there
are many who, through presumption, or out of shame to be reprehended,
never let their works be seen. But there is nothing can be of worse
consequence; “for the disease is nourished and increases,” says
Virgil,[168] “while it is concealed.” “There are none but fools,” says
Horace, “who, out of shamefacedness, hide their ulcers, which, if shewn,
might easily be healed:
“_Stultorum incurata malus pudor ulcera celat._”[169]
There are others, who have not altogether so much of this foolish
bashfulness, and who ask every one’s opinion with prayers and
earnestness; but if you freely and ingenuously give them notice of their
faults, they never fail to make some pitiful excuse for them; or, which
is worse, they take in ill part the service which you thought you did
them, which they but seemingly desired of you, and out of an established
custom amongst the greatest part of painters. If you desire to get
yourself any honour, and acquire a reputation by your works, there is
no surer way than to shew them to persons of good sense, and chiefly to
those who are critics in the art; and to take their counsel with the same
mildness, and the same sincerity, as you desired them to give it you. You
must also be industrious to discover the opinion of your enemies, which
is commonly the truest; for you may be assured, that they will give you
no quarter, and allow nothing to complaisance.
[*†449.]
“But if you have no knowing friend,” &c. Quinctilian gives the reason
of this, when he says, “that the best means to correct our faults, is
doubtless this, to remove our designs out of sight, for some space of
time, and not to look upon our pictures: to the end, that after this
interval we may look on them as it were with other eyes, and as a new
work, which was of another hand, and not our own”. Our own productions
do but too much flatter us; they are always too pleasing, and it is
impossible not to be fond of them at the moment of their conception. They
are children of a tender age, which are not capable of drawing our hatred
on them. It is said, that apes, as soon as they have brought their young
into the world, keep their eyes continually fastened on them, and are
never weary of admiring their beauty; so amorous is nature of whatsoever
she produces.
[*†458.]
“To the end that he may cultivate those talents which make his genius,”
&c.
_Qui sua metitur pondera, ferre potest._
“That we may undertake nothing beyond our forces, we must endeavour to
know them.” On this prudence our reputation depends. Cicero calls it
“a good grace,” because it makes a man seen in his greatest lustre.
“It is,” says he,[170] “a becoming grace, which we shall easily make
appear, if we are careful to cultivate that which nature has given us in
propriety, and made our own; provided it be no vice, or imperfection. We
ought to undertake nothing which is repugnant to nature in general; and
when we have paid her this duty, we are bound so religiously to follow
our own nature, that though many things which are more serious and more
important, present themselves to us, yet we are always to conform our
studies and our exercises to our natural inclinations. It avails nothing
to dispute against nature, and think to obtain what she refuses; for
then we eternally follow what we can never reach; for, as the proverb
says, there is nothing can please, nothing can be graceful, which we
enterprise in spite of Minerva; that is to say, in spite of nature.
When we have considered all these things attentively, it will then be
necessary that every man should regard that in particular which nature
has made his portion, and that he should cultivate it with care. It is
not his business to give himself the trouble of trying whether it will
become him to put on the nature of another man, or, as one would say,
to act the person of another; there is nothing which can more become
us, than what is properly the gift of nature. Let every one therefore
endeavour to understand his own talent, and, without flattering himself,
let him make a true judgment of his own virtues, and his own defects and
vices, that he may not appear to have less judgment than the comedians,
who do not always chuse the best plays, but those which are best for
them; that is, those which are most in the compass of their acting.
Thus we are to fix on those things for which we have the strongest
inclination. And if it sometimes happens, that we are forced, by
necessity, to apply ourselves to such other things, to which we are no
ways inclined, we must bring it so about, by our care and industry, that
if we perform them not very well, at least we may not do them so very
ill, as to be shamed by them: we are not so much to strain ourselves, to
make those virtues appear in us, which really we have not, as to avoid
those imperfections which may dishonour us.” These are the thoughts and
the words of Cicero, which I have translated, retrenching only such
things as were of no concernment to my subject: I was not of opinion to
add any thing, and the reader, I doubt not, will find his satisfaction in
them.
[*†464.]
“While you meditate on these truths, and observe them diligently,” &c.
There is a great connection betwixt this precept and that other, which
tells you, “That you are to pass no day without a line.” It is impossible
to become an able artist, without making your art habitual to you; and it
is impossible to gain an exact habitude, without an infinite number of
acts, and without perpetual practice. In all arts the rules of them are
learned in little time; but the perfection is not acquired without a long
practice, and a severe diligence. “We never saw, that laziness produced
any thing which was excellent,” says Maximus Tyrius;[171] and Quinctilian
tells us, “That the arts draw their beginning from nature;” the want we
often have of them causes us to search the means of becoming able in
them, and exercise makes us entirely masters of them.
[*†466.]
“The morning is the best and most proper part of the day,” &c. Because
then the imagination is not clouded with the vapours of meat, nor
distracted by visits, which are not usually made in the morning. And the
mind, by the sleep of the foregoing night, is refreshed and recreated
from the toils of former studies. Malherbe says well to this purpose,
_Le plus beau de nos jours, est dans leur matinee._
The sprightly morn is the best part of day.
[*†468.]
“Let no day pass over you, without a line,” &c. That is to say, without
working, without giving some strokes of the pencil or the crayon. This
was the precept of Apelles; and it is of so much the more necessity,
because painting is an art of much length and time, and is not to be
learned without great practice. Michael Angelo, at the age of fourscore
years, said, “That he learned something every day.”
[*†473.]
“Be ready to put into your table-book,” &c. As it was the custom of
Titian and the Carraches. There are yet remaining in the hands of some
who are curious in painting, many thoughts and observations, which those
great men have made on paper, and in their table-books, which they
carried continually about them.
[*†475.]
“Wine and good cheer are no great friends to painting; they serve only
to recreate the mind, when it is opprest and spent with labour,” &c.
“During the time,” says Pliny,[172] “that Protogenes was drawing the
picture of Jalysus, which was the best of all his works, he took no other
nourishment than lupines, mixed with a little water, which served him
both for meat and drink, for fear of clogging his imagination, by the
luxury of his food;” Michael Angelo, while he was drawing his Day of
Judgment, fed only on bread and wine at dinner; and Vasari observes in
his life, that he was so sober, that he slept but little, and that he
often rose in the night to work, as being not disturbed by the vapours of
his thin repasts.
[*†478.]
“But delights in the liberty which belongs to the bachelors estate,”
&c. We never see large, beautiful, and well-tasted fruits, proceeding
from a tree which is encompassed round, and choked with thorns and
briars. Marriage draws a world of business on our hands, subjects us
to law-suits, and loads us with multitudes of domestic cares, which
are as so many thorns that encompass a painter, and hinder him from
producing his works in that perfection of which otherwise he is capable.
Raphael, Michael Angelo, and Hannibal Carrache, were never married: and
amongst the ancient painters we find none recorded for being married,
but only Apelles, to whom Alexander the Great made a present of his own
mistress Campaspe; which yet I would have understood, without offence
to the institution of marriage; for that calls down many blessings
upon families, by the carefulness of a virtuous wife. If marriage be
in general a remedy against concupiscence, it is doubly so in respect
of painters, who are more frequently under the occasions of sin, than
other men, because they are under a frequent necessity of seeing nature
bare-faced. Let every one examine his own strength upon this point: but
let him prefer the interest of his soul, to that of his art, and of his
fortune.
[*†480.]
“Painting naturally withdraws from noise and tumult,” &c. I have said at
the end of the first remark, that both poetry and painting were upheld
by the strength of imagination. Now there is nothing which warms it more
than repose and solitude; because, in that estate, the mind being freed
from all sorts of business, and in a kind of sanctuary, undisturbed by
vexatious visits, is more capable of forming noble thoughts, and of
application to its studies:
_Carmina secessum scribentis, et otia quærunt._
Good verse recess and solitude requires:
And ease from cares, and undisturbed desires.
We may properly say the same of painting, by reason of its conformity
with poetry, as I have shewn in the first remark.
[*†484.]
“Let not the covetous design of growing rich,” &c. We read in Pliny,
that Nicias refused sixty talents from king Attalus, and rather chose to
make a free gift of his picture to his country. “I enquired of a prudent
man,” says a grave author,[173] “in what times those noble pictures were
made, which now we see; and desired him to explain to me some of their
subjects, which I did not well understand. I asked him likewise the
reason of that great negligence, which is now visible amongst painters;
and from whence it proceeded, that the most beautiful arts were now
buried in oblivion; and principally painting, a faint shadow of which is
at present remaining to us? To which he thus replied, that the immoderate
desire of riches had produced this change: for of old, when naked virtue
had her charms, the noble arts then flourished in their vigour; and if
there was any contest amongst men, it was only who should be the first
discoverer of what might be of advantage to posterity. Lysippus and
Myron, those renowned sculptors, who could give a soul to brass, left
no heirs, no inheritance, behind them; because they were more careful
of acquiring fame than riches. But as for us of this present age, it
seems, by the manner of our conduct, that we upbraid antiquity for being
as covetous of virtue as we are of vice; wonder not so much, therefore,
if painting has lost its strength and vigour, because many are now of
opinion, that a heap of gold is much more beautiful than all the pictures
and statues of Apelles and Phidias, and all the noble performances of
Greece.”
I would not exact so great an act of abstinence from our modern painters;
for I am not ignorant, that the hope of gain is a wonderful sharp spur
in arts, and that it gives industry to the artist; from whence it was,
that Juvenal said, even of the Greeks themselves, who were the inventors
of painting, and who first understood all the graces of it, and its whole
perfection,
_Græculus esuriens, in Cœlum, jusseris, ibit._
A hungry Greek, if bidden, scales the skies.
But I could heartily wish, that the same hope which flatters them, did
not also corrupt them; and did not snatch out of their hands a lame
imperfect piece, rudely daubed over with too little reflection, and too
much haste.
[*†487.]
“The qualities requisite to form an excellent painter,” &c. It is to
be confessed, that very few painters have those qualities which are
required by our author, because there are very few who are able painters.
There was a time, when only they who were of noble blood were permitted
to exercise this art; because it is to be presumed, that all these
ingredients of a good painter are not ordinarily found in men of vulgar
birth. And, in all appearance, we may hope, that though there be no
edict in France, which takes away the liberty of painting, from those
to whom nature has refused the honour of being born gentlemen, yet at
least that the Royal Academy will admit henceforward only such, who being
endued with all the good qualities, and the talents which are required
for painting, those endowments may be to them instead of an honourable
birth. It is certain, that which debases painting, and makes it descend
to the vilest and most despicable kind of trade, is the great multitude
of painters, who have neither noble souls, nor any talent for the art,
nor even so much as common sense. The origin of this great evil is, that
there have always been admitted into the schools of painting, all sorts
of children promiscuously, without examination of them, and without
observing (for some convenient space of time) if they were conducted to
this art by their inward disposition, and all necessary talents, rather
than by a foolish inclination of their own, or by the avarice of their
relations, who put them to painting, as a trade which they believe to be
somewhat more gainful than another. The qualities properly required are
these following:—
A good judgment, that they may do nothing against reason and verisimility.
A docile mind, that they may profit by instructions, and receive, without
arrogance, the opinion of every one, and principally of knowing men.
A noble heart, that they may propose glory to themselves, and reputation
rather than riches.
A sublimity and reach of thought, to conceive readily, to produce
beautiful ideas, and to work on their subjects nobly, and after a lofty
manner, wherein we may observe somewhat that is delicate, ingenious, and
uncommon.
A warm and vigorous fancy, to arrive at least to some degree of
perfection, without being tired with the pains and study which are
required in painting.
Health, to resist the dissipation of spirits, which are apt to be
consumed by pains-taking.
Youth, because painting requires a great experience, and a long practice.
Beauty, or handsomeness, because a painter paints himself in all his
pictures; and nature loves to produce her own likeness.
A convenient fortune, that he may give his whole time to study, and
may work cheerfully, without being haunted with the dreadful image of
poverty, ever present to his mind.
Labour, because the speculation is nothing without the practice.
A love for his art, we suffer nothing in the labour which is pleasing to
us; or if it happen that we suffer, we are pleased with the pain.
And to be under the discipline of a knowing master, &c. Because all
depends on the beginnings; and because commonly they take the manner
of their master, and are formed according to his gusto. See verse 422,
and the remark upon it. All these good qualities are insignificant, and
unprofitable to the painter, if some outward dispositions are wanting to
him. By which I mean favourable times, such as are times of peace, which
is the nurse of all noble arts: there must also some fair occasion offer
to make their skill manifest, by the performance of some considerable
work within their power; and a protector, who must be a person of
authority, one who takes upon himself the care of their fortune, at least
in some measure, and knows how to speak well of them in time and place
convenient. “It is of much importance,” says the younger Pliny, “in what
times virtue appears. And there is no wit, howsoever excellent it may
be, which can make itself immediately known; time and opportunity are
necessary to it, and a person who can assist us with his favour, and be a
Mæcenas to us.”
[*†496.]
“And life is so short, that it is not sufficient for so long an art,” &c.
Not only painting but all other arts, considered in themselves, require
almost an infinite time to possess them perfectly. It is in this sense,
that Hippocrates begins his Aphorisms with this saying, “That art is
long, and life is short.” But if we consider arts as they are in us, and
according to a certain degree of perfection, sufficient enough to make it
known, that we possess them above the common sort, and are comparatively
better than most others, we shall not find that life is too short on that
account, provided our time be well employed. It is true, that painting
is an art which is difficult, and a great undertaking; but they who are
endued with the qualities that are necessary to it, have no reason to
be discouraged by that apprehension. “Labour always appears difficult
before it is tried.”[174] The passages by sea, and the knowledge of
the stars, have been thought impossible, which notwithstanding have
been found and compassed, and that with ease, by those who endeavoured
after them. “It is a shameful thing,” says Cicero,[175] “to be weary of
enquiry, when what we search is excellent.” That which causes us to lose
most of our time, is the repugnance which we naturally have to labour,
and the ignorance, the malice, and the negligence of our masters: we
waste much of our time in walking, and talking to no manner of purpose,
in making and receiving idle visits; in play, and other pleasures which
we indulge; without reckoning those hours which we lose in the too great
care of our bodies; and in sleep, which we often lengthen out till the
day is far advanced; and thus we pass that life which we reckon to be
short, because we count by the years which we have lived rather than by
those which we have employed in study. It is evident, that they who lived
before us, have passed through all those difficulties, to arrive at that
perfection which we discover in their works; though they wanted some of
the advantages which we possess, and none had laboured for them as they
have done for us. For it is certain, that those ancient masters, and
those of the last preceding ages, have left such beautiful patterns to
us, that a better and more happy age can never be than ours; and chiefly
under the reign of our present king, who encourages all the noble arts,
and spares nothing, to give them the share of that felicity, of which he
is so bountiful to his kingdom; and to conduct them with all manner of
advantages to that supreme degree of excellence, which may be worthy of
such a master, and of that sovereign love which he has for them. Let us
therefore put our hands to the work, without being discouraged by the
length of time, which is requisite for our studies; but let us seriously
contrive how to proceed with the best order, and to follow a ready,
diligent, and well understood method.
[*†500.]
“Take courage, therefore, O ye noble youths! ye legitimate offspring of
Minerva, who are born under the influence of a happy planet,” &c. Our
author intends not here to sow in a barren, ungrateful ground, where
his precepts can bear no fruit: he speaks to young painters, but to
such only who are born under the influence of a happy star; that is to
say, those who have received from nature the necessary dispositions of
becoming great in the art of painting; and not to those who follow that
study through caprice, or by a sottish inclination; or for lucre, who are
either incapable of receiving the precepts, or will make a bad use of
them when received.
[*†503.]
“You will do well,” &c. Our author speaks not here of the first rudiments
of design; as, for example, the management of the pencil, the just
relation which the copy ought to have to the original, &c. He supposes,
that before he begins his studies, one ought to have a facility of hand,
to imitate the best designs, and the noblest pictures and statues; that,
in few words, he should have made himself a key, wherewith to open the
closet of Minerva, and to enter into that sacred place, where those fair
treasures are to be found in all abundance, and even offer themselves to
us, to make our advantage of them, by our care and genius.
[*†509.]
“To begin with geometry,” &c. Because that is the ground of perspective,
without which nothing is to be done in painting. Besides, geometry is of
great use in architecture, and in all things which are of its dependence;
it is particularly necessary for sculptors.
[*†510.]
“Set yourself on designing after the antient Greeks,” &c. Because they
are the rule of beauty, and give us a good gusto; for which reason it is
very proper to tie ourselves to them, I mean generally speaking; but the
particular fruit which we gather from them, is what follows: To learn by
heart four several airs of heads; of a man, a woman, a child, and an old
man. I mean those which have the most general approbation; for example,
those of the Apollo, of the Venus de Medecis, of the little Nero, (that
is, when he was a child,) and of the god Tiber. It would be a good means
of learning them, if when you have designed one after the statue itself,
you design it immediately after from your own imagination, without seeing
it; and afterwards examine, if your own work be conformable to the first
design; thus exercising yourself on the same head, and turning it on ten
or twelve sides. You must do the same to the feet, to the hands, to the
whole figure. But to understand the beauty of these figures, and the
justness of their outlines, it will be necessary to learn anatomy. When I
speak of four heads, and four figures, I pretend not to hinder any one
from designing many others, after this first study; but my meaning is,
only to show by this, that a great variety of things undertaken at the
same time, dissipates the imagination, and hinders all the profit; in
the same manner, as too many sorts of meat are not easily digested, but
corrupt in the stomach, instead of nourishing the parts.
[*†511.]
“And cease not day or night from labour, till by your continual
practice,” &c. In the first principles, the students have not so much
need of precepts as of practice; and the antique statues being the
rule of beauty, you may exercise yourselves in imitating them, without
apprehending any consequence of ill habits and bad ideas, which can be
formed in the soul of a young beginner. It is not as in the school of a
master, whose manner and whose gusto are ill, and under whose discipline
the scholar spoils himself the more he exercises.
[*†514.]
“And when afterwards your judgment shall grow stronger,” &c. It is
necessary to have the soul well formed, and to have a right judgment to
make the application of his rules upon good pictures, and to take nothing
but the good. For there are some who imagine, that whatsoever they find
in the picture of a master who has acquired reputation, must of necessity
be excellent: and these kind of people never fail, when they copy, to
follow the bad, as well as the good things, and to observe them so much
the more, because they seem to be extraordinary, and out of the common
road of others, so that at last they come to make a law and precept of
them. You ought not also to imitate what is truly good in a crude and
gross manner, so that it may be found out in your works, that whatsoever
beauties there are in them, come from such or such a master. But, in
this, imitate the bees, who pick from every flower that which they find
most proper in it to make honey. In the same manner, a young painter
should collect from many pictures what he finds to be the most beautiful;
and from his several collections form that manner which thereby he makes
his own.
[*†520.]
“A certain grace, which was wholly natural and peculiar to him,” &c.
Raphael in this may be compared to Apelles, who, in praising the works of
other painters, said, “That gracefulness was wanting to them;” and that,
without vanity, he might say, it was his own peculiar portion. See the
Remark on the 218th verse.
[*†522.]
“Julio Romano, educated from his childhood in the country of the Muses,”
&c. He means in the studies of the _belle lettre_, and above all in
poesy, which he infinitely loved. It appears, that he formed his ideas,
and made his gusto, from reading Homer; and in that imitated Zeuxis and
Polygnotus, who, as Maximus Tyrius relates, treated their subjects in
their pictures as Homer did in his poetry.
To these remarks I have annexed the opinions of our author, upon the best
and chiefest painters of the two foregoing ages. He tells you candidly,
and briefly, what were their excellencies, and what their failings.
[*†541.]
“I pass in silence many things which will be more amply treated in the
ensuing Commentary.” It is evident by this, how much we lose, and what
damage we have sustained by our author’s death, since those commentaries
had undoubtedly contained things of high value and of great instruction.
[*†544.]
“To intrust with the Muses,” &c. That is to say, to write in verse;
poetry being under their protection, and consecrated to them.
THE JUDGMENT OF CHARLES ALPHONSE DU FRESNOY, ON THE WORKS OF THE
PRINCIPAL AND BEST PAINTERS OF THE TWO LAST AGES.
Painting was in its perfection amongst the Greeks. The principal schools
were at Sycion, afterwards at Rhodes, at Athens, and at Corinth, and at
last in Rome. Wars and luxury having overthrown the Roman empire, it was
totally extinguished, together with all the noble arts, the studies of
humanity, and the other sciences.
It began to appear again, in the year 1450, amongst some painters of
Florence, of which Domenico Chirlandaio was one, who was master to
Michael Angelo, and had some kind of reputation, though his manner was
Gothic, and very dry.
Michael Angelo, his disciple, flourished in the times of Julius the
Second, Leo the Tenth, and of seven successive popes. He was a painter,
a sculptor, and an architect, both civil and military. The choice which
he made of his attitudes was not always beautiful or pleasing; his gusto
of design was not the finest, nor his outlines the most elegant; the
folds of his draperies, and the ornaments of his habits, were neither
noble nor graceful. He was not a little fantastical and extravagant in
his compositions; he was bold, even to rashness, in taking liberties
against the rules of perspective. His colouring is not over true, or
very pleasant. He knew not the artifice of the lights and shadows; but
he designed more learnedly, and better understood all the knittings of
the bones, with the office and situation of the muscles, than any of the
modern painters. There appears a certain air of greatness and severity
in his figures; in both which he has oftentimes succeeded. But above
the rest of his excellencies, was his wonderful skill in architecture,
wherein he has not only surpassed all the moderns, but even the ancients
also. The St Peters of Rome, the St Johns of Florence, the Capitol, the
Palazzo Farnese, and his own house, are sufficient testimonies of it. His
disciples were Marcello Venusti, Il Rosso, Georgio Vasari, Fra. Bastiano,
who commonly painted for him, and many other Florentines.
Pietro Perugino designed with sufficient knowledge of nature; but he is
dry, and his manner little. His disciple was,
Raphael Santio, who was born on Good Friday, in the year 1483, and died
on Good Friday, in the year 1520, so that he lived only thirty-seven
years complete. He surpassed all modern painters, because he possessed
more of the excellent parts of painting than any other: and it is
believed that he equalled the ancients, excepting only that he designed
not naked bodies with so much learning as Michael Angelo; but his gusto
of design is purer, and much better. He painted not with so good, so
full, and so graceful a manner as Correggio; nor has he any thing of the
contrast of the lights and shadows, or so strong and free a colouring
as Titian; but he had a better disposition in his pieces, without
comparison, than either Titian, Correggio, Michael Angelo, or all the
rest of the succeeding painters to our days. His choice of attitudes,
of heads, of ornaments; the suitableness of his drapery, his manner of
designing, his varieties, his contrasts, his expressions, were beautiful
in perfection; but above all, he possessed the graces in so advantageous
a manner, that he has never since been equalled by any other. There are
portraits, or single figures, of his, which are finished pieces. He was
an admirable architect. He was handsome, well made, and tall of stature,
civil and well-natured, never refusing to teach another what he knew
himself. He had many scholars, amongst others, Julio Romano, Polydore,
Gaudenzio, Giovanni d’Udine, and Michael Coxis. His graver was Marc
Antonio, whose prints are admirable for the correctness of their outlines.
Julio Romano was the most excellent of all Raphael’s disciples. He had
conceptions which were more extraordinary, more profound, and more
elevated, than even his master himself. He was also a great architect;
his gusto was pure and exquisite. He was a great imitator of the
ancients; giving a clear testimony in all his productions, that he was
desirous to restore to practice the same forms and fabrics which were
ancient. He had the good fortune to find great persons, who committed
to him the care of edifices, vestibules, and porticos, all tetrastyles,
xistes, theatres, and such other places as are not now in use. He was
wonderful in his choice of attitudes. His manner was drier and harder
than any of Raphael’s school. He did not exactly understand the lights
and shadows, or the colours. He is frequently harsh and ungraceful. The
folds of his draperies are neither beautiful nor great, easy nor natural;
but all extravagant, and too like the habits of fantastical comedians.
He was very knowing in human learning. His disciples were Pirro Ligorio,
(who was admirable for ancient buildings, as for towns, temples, tombs,
and trophies, and the situation of ancient edifices,) Æneas Vico,
Bonasone, Georgio Mantuano, and others.
Polydore, a disciple of Raphael, designed admirably well, as to the
practical part, having a particular genius for freezes, as we may see
by those of white and black which he has painted at Rome. He imitated
the ancients; but his manner was greater than that of Julio Romano;
nevertheless, Julio seems to be the truer. Some admirable groupes are
seen in his works, and such as are not elsewhere to be found. He coloured
very seldom, and made landscapes of a reasonable good gusto.
Gio. Bellino, one of the first who was of any consideration at Venice,
painted very drily, according to the manner of his time. He was very
knowing, both in architecture and perspective. He was Titian’s first
master, which may easily be observed in the first painting of that noble
disciple; in which we may remark, that propriety of colours which his
master has observed.
About this time, Georgione, the contemporary of Titian, came to excel in
portraits, or face-painting, and also in great works. He first began to
make choice of glowing and agreeable colours, the perfection and entire
harmony of which were afterwards to be found in Titian’s pictures. He
dressed his figures wonderfully well; and it may be truly said, that, but
for him, Titian had never arrived to that height of perfection, which
proceeded from the rivalship and jealousy of honour betwixt those two.
Titian was one of the greatest colourists who was ever known. He designed
with much more ease and practice than Georgione. There are to be seen
women and children of his hand, which are admirable, both for the design
and colouring. The gusto of them is delicate, charming, and noble, with
a certain pleasing negligence of the head dresses, the draperies, and
ornaments of habits, which are wholly peculiar to him. As for the figures
of men, he has designed them but moderately well. There are even some of
his draperies which are mean, and savour of a little gusto. His painting
is wonderfully glowing, sweet, and delicate. He made portraits, which
were extremely noble; the attitudes of them being very graceful, grave,
diversified, and adorned after a very becoming fashion. No man ever
painted landscape with so great a manner, so good a colouring, and with
such a resemblance of nature. For eight or ten years space, he copied
with great labour and exactness whatsoever he undertook; thereby to make
himself an easy way, and to establish some general maxims for his future
conduct. Besides the excellent gusto which he had of colours, in which
he excelled all mortal men, he perfectly understood how to give every
thing the touches which were most suitable and proper to them; such as
distinguished them from each other, and which gave the greatest spirit,
and the most of truth. The pictures, which he made in his beginning and
in the declension of his age, are of a dry and mean manner. He lived
ninety-nine years. His disciples were Paulo Veronese, Giacomo Tintoret,
Giacomo da Ponte Bassano, and his sons.
Paulo Veronese was wonderfully graceful in his airs of women, with
great variety of shining draperies, and incredible vivacity and ease.
Nevertheless, his composition is sometimes improper, and his design is
incorrect; but his colouring, and whatsoever depends on it, is so very
charming in his pictures, that it surprises at the first sight, and makes
us totally forget those other qualities which are wanting in him.
Tintoret was the disciple of Titian, great in the practical part of
design, but sometimes also sufficiently extravagant. He had an admirable
genius for painting, if he had had as great an affection to his art, and
as much patience in undergoing the difficulties of it, as he had fire and
vivacity of nature. He has made pictures not inferior in beauty to those
of Titian. His composition, and his dresses, are, for the most part,
improper, and his outlines are not correct; but his colouring, and the
dependencies of it, like that of his master, are most admirable.
The Bassans had a more mean and poor gusto in painting than Tintoret,
and their designs were also less correct than his: they had, indeed, an
excellent gusto of colours, and have touched all kinds of animals with an
admirable manner, but were notoriously imperfect in the composition and
design.
Correggio painted at Parma two large cupolas in fresco, and some
altar-pieces. This artist found out certain natural and unaffected
graces, for his Madonnas, his Saints, and Little Children, which were
peculiar to him. His manner is exceeding great, both for the design and
for the work, but withal is very incorrect. His pencil was both easy and
delightful; and, it is to be acknowledged, that he painted with great
strength, great heightning, great sweetness, and liveliness of colours,
in which none surpassed him.
He understood how to distribute his lights in such a manner as was wholly
peculiar to himself; which gave a great force and great roundness to
his figures. This manner consists in extending a large light, and then
making it lose itself insensibly in the dark shadowings which he placed
out of the masses; and those give them this great roundness, without
our being able to perceive from whence proceeds so much of force, and
so vast a pleasure to the sight. It is probable, that, in this part,
the rest of the Lombard school copied him. He had no great choice of
graceful attitudes, nor of distribution for beautiful groupes; his design
oftentimes appears lame, and the positions are not much observed in them.
The aspects of his figures are many times unpleasing; but his manner of
designing heads, hands, feet, and other parts, is very great, and well
deserves our imitation. In the conduct and finishing of a picture, he has
done wonders; for he painted with so much union, that his greatest works
seemed to have been finished in the compass of one day, and appear as if
we saw them from a looking-glass. His landscape is equally beautiful with
his figures.
At the same time with Correggio, lived and flourished Parmegiano; who,
besides his great manner of well colouring, excelled also both in
invention and design, with a genius full of gentleness and of spirit,
having nothing that was ungraceful in his choice of attitudes, and in
the dresses of his figures, which we cannot say of Correggio. There are
pieces of his to be seen, which are both beautiful and correct.
These two painters last mentioned had very good disciples, but they
are known only to those of their own province; and besides, there is
little to be credited of what his countrymen say; for painting is wholly
extinguished amongst them.
I say nothing of Leonardo da Vinci, because I have seen but little of
his, though he restored the arts at Milan, and had many disciples there.
Ludovico Carrache, cousin of Hannibal and Augustine, studied at Parma
after Correggio; and excelled in design and colouring with such a
gracefulness, and so much candour, that Guido, the scholar of Hannibal,
did afterwards imitate him with great success. There are some of his
pictures to be seen, which are very beautiful and well understood. He
made his ordinary residence at Bologna; and it was he who put the pencil
into the hands of Hannibal his cousin.
Hannibal, in a little time, excelled his master in all parts of painting.
He imitated Correggio, Titian, and Raphael, in their different manners
as he pleased; excepting only, that you see not in his pictures the
nobleness, the graces, and the charms of Raphael; and his outlines
are neither so pure nor so elegant as his. In all other things he is
wonderfully accomplished, and of an universal genius.
Augustine, brother to Hannibal, was also a very good painter, and an
admirable graver. He had a natural son, called Antonio, who died at the
age of thirty-five, and who (according to the general opinion) would have
surpassed his uncle Hannibal; for by what he left behind him, it appears
that he was of a more lofty genius.
Guido chiefly imitated Ludovico Carrache, yet retained always somewhat
of the manner which his master, Denis Calvert, the Fleming, taught him.
This Calvert lived at Bologna, and was competitor and rival to Ludovico
Carrache. Guido made the same use of Albert Durer as Virgil did of old
Ennius; borrowed what pleased him, and made it afterwards his own; that
is, he accommodated what was good in Albert to his own manner; which he
executed with so much gracefulness and beauty, that he alone got more
money and more reputation in his time than his own masters and all the
scholars of the Carraches, though they were of greater capacity than
himself. His heads yield no manner of precedence to those of Raphael.
Sisto Badolocchi designed the best of all his disciples, but he died
young.
Domenichino was a very knowing painter, and very laborious, but otherwise
of no great natural endowments. It is true, he was profoundly skilled in
all the parts of painting, but wanting genius, (as I said,) he had less
of nobleness in his works than all the rest who studied in the school of
the Carraches.
Albani was excellent in all that belonged to painting, and adorned with
variety of learning.
Lanfranc, a man of a great and sprightly wit, supported his reputation
for a long time with an extraordinary gusto of design and colouring. But
his foundation being only on the practical part, he at length lost ground
in point of correctness; so that many of his pieces appear extravagant
and fantastical. And after his decease the school of the Carraches went
daily to decay in all the parts of painting.
Gio. Viola was very old before he learned landscape; the knowledge of
which was imparted to him by Hannibal Carrache, who took pleasure to
instruct him, so that he painted many of that kind, which are wonderfully
fine, and well coloured.
If we cast our eyes towards Germany and the Low Countries, we may there
behold Albert Durer, Lucas Van Leyden, Holbein, Aldegrave, &c. who were
all contemporaries. Amongst these, Albert Durer and Holbein were both
of them wonderfully knowing, and had certainly been of the first form
of painters, had they travelled into Italy; for nothing can be laid to
their charge, but only that they had a Gothic gusto. As for Holbein, he
performed yet better than Raphael; and I have seen a portrait of his
painting, with which one of Titian’s could not come in competition.
Amongst the Flemings, we had Rubens, who derived from his birth, a
lively, free, noble, and universal genius: a genius which was capable
not only of raising him to the rank of the ancient painters, but also
to the highest employment in the service of his country; so that he was
chosen for one of the most important embassies of our age. His gusto of
design savours somewhat more of the Fleming than of the beauty of the
antique, because he staid not long at Rome. And though we cannot but
observe in all his paintings somewhat of great and noble, yet, it must
be confessed, that, generally speaking, he designed not correctly; but,
for all the other parts of painting, he was as absolute a master of them,
and possessed them all as thoroughly as any of his predecessors in that
noble art. His principal studies were made in Lombardy, after the works
of Titian, Paul Veronese, and Tintoret; whose cream he has skimmed, (if
you will allow the phrase,) and extracted from their several beauties
many general maxims and infallible rules, which he always followed, and
by which he has acquired in his works a greater facility than that of
Titian; more of purity, truth, and science, than Paul Veronese; and more
of majesty, repose, and moderation, than Tintoret. To conclude: his
manner is so solid, so knowing, and so ready, that it may seem this rare
accomplished genius was sent from heaven to instruct mankind in the art
of painting.
His school was full of admirable disciples, amongst whom, Van Dyck was he
who best comprehended all the rules and general maxims of his master; and
who has even excelled him in the delicacy of his colouring, and in his
cabinet-pieces; but his gusto, in the designing part, was nothing better
than that of Rubens.
FOOTNOTES:
[112] Fresnoy employed above twenty years in finishing this poem.
[113] Our author began his translation of Virgil in the preceding year,
1694.—MALONE.
[114] In May 1664, Gio. Pietro Bellori read a discourse in the Academy of
St Luke at Rome, (Carlo Maratti being then president,) entitled—_L’Idea
del Pittore, dello Scultore, e dell’ Architetto, scelta dalle bellezze
naturali superiore alla Natura_. This discourse, from which the following
extract is taken, was afterwards prefixed to _Le Vite de Pittore_, &c. by
the same author, printed at Rome in 4to, 1672.—MALONE.
[115] The ΕΙΚΟΝΕΣ of Flavius Philostratus, who flourished in the
beginning of the third century, was first printed by Aldus in
1502.—MALONE.
[116] _i.e._ Merchant vessels. The passage seems to be so worded, as
to contain a sneer at the negligence of King William’s government in
protecting the trade. Perhaps Dryden alluded to the misfortune of
Sir Francis Wheeler, in 1693, who, being sent with a convoy into the
Mediterranean, was wrecked in the bay of Gibraltar.
[117] The principal female character in “Tyrannic Love, or The Royal
Martyr.” See Vol. III. page 343.
[118] In the epistle in which he describes our Saviour’s person and
manners.
[119] In his treatise on Epic Poetry.
[120] This line is a little misquoted. The couplets run,
Reject that vulgar error, which appears
So fair, of making perfect characters;
There’s no such thing in nature, and you’ll draw
A faultless monster, which the world _ne’er saw_.
_Essay on Poetry._
[121] Our author had previously quoted the lines here alluded to, in
defence of the indecencies of one of his comedies. Vol. VI. p. 10.
——_castum esse decet pium poetam_
_Ipsum. Versiculos nihil necesse est:_
_Qui tum denique habent salem ac leporem_
_Si sint molliculi et parum pudici._
[122] The celebrity of that action, which is generally called the
continence of Scipio, gives us a woeful idea of the gross barbarity of
the age in which he lived. What would now be said of a general, who did
not act as Scipio is said to have done? Assuredly, his refusing the
ransom would be thought more wonderful, than his dismissing, uninjured,
the betrothed princess.
[123] There is a fallacy in this, which a moment’s consideration may
detect. Painting does not present in one moment what tragedy shews in
many hours, and cannot, on the contrary, shew more than one scene, at one
minute and point of time. Doubtless, by presenting to us one striking
situation, the painting recals, if we know the story, all that has
preceded and is to follow; but this arises from association, and happens
equally if we come suddenly into a theatre where a well-known tragedy is
performing.
[124] A Dutch fair. Dryden probably recollected the pieces of Teniers.
[125] The passage alluded to is in Aristotle’s “Treatise on Poetry,”
in which he accounts for the pleasure afforded by the imitative arts,
by observing, that “to _learn_ is a natural pleasure.” “To the same
purpose (says Mr Twining,) in his ‘Rhetorick,’ lib. i. cap. xi. p. 537.
edit. Duval. Επει δε το μανθανειν, κ. τ. λ. ‘And as it is by nature
delightful to _learn_, to _admire_, and the like, hence we necessarily
receive pleasure from imitative arts, as PAINTING, SCULPTURE, and POETRY,
and from whatever is well imitated, even though the original may be
disagreeable; but our pleasure does not arise from the beauty of the
thing itself, but from the _inference_, the _discovery_ that THIS IS
THAT, &c. so that we seem to learn something.’
“Μανθανειν—to _learn_, to _know_, i.e. merely to _recognize_, _discover_,
&c.,” See Harris, On Music, Painting, &c. ch. iv. note (_b_). The meaning
is sufficiently explained by what follows.
“Dryden, who scarce ever mentions Aristotle without discovering that he
had looked only at the wrong side of the tapestry, (a translation,) says,
‘Aristotle tells us, that imitation pleases, because it affords matter
for a reasoner to inquire into the truth or falsehood of imitation,’
&c. But Aristotle is not here speaking of _reasoners_, or _inquiry_,
but, on the contrary, of the vulgar, the generality of mankind, whom he
expressly opposes to philosophers, or reasoners: and his συλλογιζεσθαι
is no more than that rapid, habitual, and imperceptible act of the
mind, that ‘_raisonnement aussi prompt que le coup d’œil_,’ (as it is
well paraphrased by M. Batteux,) by which we _collect_ or infer, from a
comparison of the picture with the image of the original in our minds,
that it was intended to represent that original.
“The fullest illustration of this passage is to be found in another work
of Aristotle, his ‘Rhetoric,’ lib. iii. cap. x. where he applies the same
principle to metaphorical language, and resolves the pleasure we receive
from such language, into that which arises from the μαθησις ΤΑΧΕΙΑ, the
exercise of our understandings in _discovering_ the meaning by a _quick_
and _easy_ perception of some quality, or qualities, common to the thing
expressed, and the thing intended; to a mirror, for example, and to the
theatre, when the latter is called metaphorically, _the mirror of human
life_.
“Dryden (Mr Twining further observes) seems to have taken his idea from
Dacier’s note on this place, (in the ‘Treatise on Poetry,’) which is
extremely confused, and so expressed, as to leave it doubtful whether
he misunderstood the original, or only explained himself awkwardly. The
use that Dryden made of French critics and translators is well known.”
_Aristotle’s Treatise on Poetry, translated, with Notes. &c. by THOMAS
TWINING, A. M._ 4to, 1789, p. 186.—MALONE.
[126] This is hardly accurate. Lopez de Vega did indeed despise the rules
laid down by others, but he made no new regulations.
[127]
O Powers divine,
Take my last thanks! no longer I repine.
I might have lived my own mishaps to mourn,
While some would pity me, but more would scorn;
For pity only on fresh objects stays,
But with the tedious sight of woes decays.
Still less and less my boiling spirits flow,
And I grow stiff, as cooling metals do.—
Farewell, Almeria.—Vol. II. p. 371.
[128] Nothing can be more hazardous for a dramatist than the introduction
of many inferior characters. In proportion to the numbers of the
_Dramatis Personæ_, the difficulty of _getting up_ a piece is increased
in a tremendous ratio; since even the awkwardness of a domestic, or the
ridiculous gait of a guard, may throw the audience into a tone of feeling
very inconsistent with tragic effect. Undoubtedly, could the expence
be supported, something might be gained by drilling underlings to such
inferior characters, and teaching even the mutes to look, as it they took
some interest in what is going forward; but, at present, the entrance and
exit of a hero, _cum suis_, has something in it irresistibly ludicrous.
Here the painter has a decisive advantage over the dramatist, since
it costs him nothing to finish his inferior personages in a style as
correspondent to truth as the principal.
[129] I retain Mr Malone’s excellent note. “This description seems at
the first view to be intended for Congreve, to whom it is certainly
sufficiently applicable, and who had produced his ‘Double Dealer’ in
the preceding year, and his ‘Love for Love’ in 1695. But beside that
Dryden’s high admiration of Congreve, which he had so strongly manifested
in the admirable verses addressed to that poet on the former play, will
not admit of such an application, the words—‘I _knew_,’ clearly denote
a _dead_ poet, and consequently will exclude Wycherley also. The person
meant therefore, I think, was Sir George Etherege, who died a few years
before. In Dryden’s Epilogue to that author’s ‘Man of Mode,’ he says,
“Sir Fopling is a _fool_ so nicely writ,
Most ladies would mistake him for a _wit_.”
[130] Nat. Lee.
[131] Dryden probably recollected, particularly, Lee’s famous rant at the
conclusion of the fourth act of Œdipus:
Fall darkness then, and everlasting night
Shadow the globe; may the sun never dawn,
The silver moon be blotted from her orb!
And for an universal rout of nature,
Through all the inmost chambers of the sky
May there not be a glimpse, one starry spark,
But gods meet gods, and jostle in the dark;
That jars may rise, and wrath divine be hurled,
Which may to atoms shake the solid world!
Vol. VI. p. 206.
[132] “Pericles, Prince of Tyre,” which has been generally imputed
to Shakespeare, though the internal evidence is not in favour of the
supposition. Dryden believed it to be one of his earliest pieces:
Shakespeare’s own muse his Pericles first bore,
The Prince of Tyre was elder than the Moor.
This order was probably assigned from the confessed inferiority of
Pericles to Shakespeare’s later plays. But that apology cannot be
received; for if Shakespeare had any hand in Pericles at all, it was at a
late period of his dramatic career.—See Vol. X. p. 335, and the remarks
on Pericles in Malone’s Shakespeare.
[133] Morecraft is an usurer in Beaumont and Fletcher’s comedy of the
“Scornful Lady,” who, having been cheated and discomfited, as usurers
commonly are in the drama, (I suppose to compensate their success in real
life,) at the end of the play suddenly changes his character for that of
an extravagant gallant, and assumes the denomination of _cutting_, or as
we would now say _dashing_, Morecraft.—See Vol. IV. p. 241.
[134] Mr Malone thinks this alludes to the translation of Virgil, in
which Dryden was now engaged. But I conceive it has a general reference
to his situation as a suspected and discountenanced person; restrained
from free exertion of his genius, by the necessity of considering that he
was exposed to misconstruction. He must have recollected the suppression
of “Cleomenes,” and the offence taken by government at the prologue to
the “Prophetess.” In truth, the very expression in the text is elsewhere
hitched into rhyme:
The labouring bee, when his sharp sting is gone,
Forgets his golden work, and turns a drone;
Such is a satire when you take away
That rage in which his noble vigour lay.
...
How can he show his manhood if you bind him,
To box like boys with one hand tied behind him?
_Prologue to Amphitryon_, Vol. VIII. p. 12.
[135] A comedy written by Sir Robert Stapylton, and acted by the Duke
of York’s servants, at their theatre in Lincoln’s-Inn-Fields, in 1663.
Dryden has elsewhere undervalued this play, Vol. X. p. 336:
Your Ben and Fletcher, in their first young flight,
Did no Volpone, nor no Arbaces write;
But hopped about, and short excursions made }
From bough to bough, as if they were afraid; }
And each was guilty of some “Slighted Maid.” }
Sir Robert Stapylton, the author of the “Slighted Maid,” translated
Juvenal and Musæus, and wrote other two plays, called “The Step-mother,”
and “Hero and Leander.”
[136] “Otway,” says Pope, “has written but two tragedies, out of six,
that are pathetic. I believe he did it without much design, as Lillo
has done in his ‘Barnwell.’ It is a talent of nature, rather than an
effect of judgment, to write so movingly.”—SPENCE’S _Anecdotes_, quoted
by Malone. Dryden, at an early period, is said to have set no high value
upon Otway in other respects, while he allowed he excelled him in the art
of affecting the passions.
[137] “Aristotle, in the place referred to, (περι ποιητ. κ. μς.) does not
mention any third dramatic poet by name. He does indeed put the case of a
third poet, who might pursue a method different from the practice either
of Sophocles or Euripides, and represent things _as they are said, and
believed, to be_. In the same passage, (which is manifestly corrupt,) he
mentions an observation of Xenophanes, who, I believe, was the person
here in our author’s thoughts.”—MALONE.
[138] The first and third Acts.
[139] Our author has already compared the first of the lines alluded to—
_Quæ superimposito moles geminata Colosso—_
with the first line of Virgil’s Eclogues.
[140] Theb. vi. 400, 401.
Our author’s confession of the difficulty of translating these lines,
probably induced Pope to transplant them into his “Windsor Forest,” where
they are thus beautifully paraphrased:
The impatient courser pants in every vein,
And pawing seems to beat the distant plain;
Hills, vales, and floods, appear already crost,
And, ere he starts, a thousand steps are lost.
Our author trusted, as usual, to memory; for the first of the lines,
quoted from Statius, runs differently:
_Stare adeò_ miserum est——
but he was thinking on a passage in the Third Georgic:
_——tum, si qua sonum procul arma dedere,_
_Stare loco ~nescit~: micat auribus, et tremit artus;_
_Conlectumque premens volvit sub naribus ignem._—MALONE.
[141] See Volume XIII. p. 320. There are good grounds for disbelieving
this beautiful anecdote. See Malone’s note on this passage.
[142] The French translator here, as well as Mr Dryden, is
unintelligible; which happened by their mistaking the meaning of the word
_opaca_, which is not put for _dark_; but _opaque_, in opposition to
_transparent_: for a white garment may be _opaque_, &c.
[143] M. Le Brun.
[144] M. Colbert.
[145] Pliny, xxxv. 10.
[146] Quinc. x. 3.
[147] Declam. xix.
[148] Lib. ii. Sat. 7.
[149] Lib. x. Ep. xxii.
[150] _De Opt. Gen. Orat._
[151] Tableaux.
[152] That is to the eye, by diagrams and sketches, &c.
[153] In _Œconomico._
[154] _Comm. Vetus._
[155] Art of Poetry.
[156] _Pro lege Man._
[157] This depends on the age and quality of the persons. The Apollo and
Venus of Medicis have more than ten faces.
[158] The Apollo has a nose more.
[159] The Apollo has half a nose more; and the upper half of the Venus de
Medicis is to the lower part of the belly, and not to the privy parts.
[160] Polydorus, Athenodorus, and Agesander, all Rhodians.
[161] Lib. ii. Pædag. cap. 12.
[162] Plutarch
[163] A figure made of wood, or cork, turning upon joints.
[164] Lib. xxv. 12.
[165] Lib. viii. 20.
[166] Lib. v. 8.
[167] Tuscul. lib. v.
[168] Georg. iii. l. 5.
[169] Ep. xvi.
[170] 1 Off.
[171] Diss. 34.
[172] Lib. xxxv. 10.
[173] Petron. Arbiter.
[174] Veget. de Re Milit. lib. 2.
[175] Lib. 1. de fin.
END OF THE SEVENTEENTH VOLUME.
EDINBURGH:
Printed by James Ballantyne & Co.Project Gutenberg
The works of John Dryden, now first collected in eighteen volumes. Volume 17
Dryden, John
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