Harper's New Monthly Magazine. No. XVI.—September, 1851—Vol. III

"Would to God, son Roper, on condition three things were well established in Christendom, I were put into a sack, and cast presently into the Thames." Will sayth:

"What three soe great things can they be, father, as to move you to such a wish?"

"In faith, Will," answers he, "they be these: First, that whereas the most part of Christian princes be at war, they were at universal peace. Next, that whereas the Church of Christ is at present sore afflicted with divers errors and heresies, it were well settled in a godly uniformity. Last, that this matter of the king's marriage were, to the glory of God, and the quietness of alle parties, brought to a good conclusion."

Indeed, this last matter preys on my father's soul. He hath even knelt to the king to refrain from exacting compliance with his grace's will concerning it; movingly reminding him, even with tears, of his grace's own words to him on delivering the great seal, "First look unto God, and, after God, unto me." But the king is heady in this matter; stubborn as a mule or wild ass's colt, whose mouths must be held with bit and bridle if they be to be governed at alle; and the king hath taken ye bit between his teeth, and there is none dare ride him. All for love of a brown girl, with a wen on her throat, and an extra finger.

How short a time agone it seemeth, that in my prosperity I sayd, "We shall never be moved; Thou, Lord, of Thy goodness hast made our hill soe strong!" … Thou didst turn away Thy face, and I was troubled!

Thus sayth Plato: of Him whom he soughte, but hardly found: "Truth is his body, and Light his shadow." A marvelous saying for a heathen.

Hear also what St. John sayth: "God is Light; and in him is no darkness at all." "And the Light was the life of men: and the Light shineth in darkness, and the darkness comprehended it not."

Hear also what St. Augustine sayth: "They are the most uncharitable towards error who have never experienced how hard a matter it is to come at the Truth."

Hard, indeed. Here's father agaynst Will, and agaynst Erasmus, of whom he once cd not speak well enough; and now he says that if he upholds such and such opinions, his dear Erasmus may be the devil's Erasmus for what he cares. And here's father at issue with half ye learned heads in Christendom concerning ye king's marriage. And yet, for alle that, I think father is in the right.

He taketh matters soe to heart that e'en his appetite fails. Yesterday he put aside his old favorite dish of brewis, saying, "I know not how 'tis, good Alice; I've lost my stomach, I think, for my old relishes" … and this, e'en with a tear in his eye. But 'twas not the brewis, I know, that made it start.

He hath resigned the Great Seal! And none of us knew e'en of his meditating it, nor of his having done soe, till after morning prayers to-day, when, insteade of one of his gentlemen stepping up to my mother in her pew with the words, "Madam, my Lord is gone," he cometh up to her himself, with a smile on's face, and sayth, low bowing as he spoke, "Madam, my Lord is gone." She takes it for one of the manie jests whereof she misses the point; and 'tis not till we are out of church, in ye open air, that she fully comprehends my Lord Chancellor is indeed gone, and she hath onlie her Sir Thomas More.

A burst of tears was no more than was to be lookt for from poor mother; and, in sooth, we alle felt aggrieved and mortyfide enough; but 'twas a short sorrow; for father declared that he had cast Pelion and Ossa off his back into the bottomless pit; and fell into such funny antics that we were soon as merry as ever we were in our lives. Patteson, so soon as he hears it, comes leaping and skipping across the garden, crying, "A fatted calf! let a fatted calf be killed, masters and mistresses, for this my brother who was dead is alive again!" and falls a-kissing his hand. But poor Patteson's note will soon change; for father's diminished state will necessitate ye dismissal of all extra hands; and there is manie a servant under his roof whom he can worse spare than the poor fool.

In the evening he gathers us alle about him in the pavillion, where he throws himself into his old accustomed seat, casts his arm about mother, and cries, "How glad must Cincinnatus have been to spy out his cottage again, with Racilia standing at the gate!" Then, called for curds and cream; sayd how sweet ye soft May air was coming over the river, and bade Cecil sing "The king's hunt's up." After this, one ballad after another was called for, till alle had sung their lay, ill or well, he listing the while with closed eyes, and a composed smile about his mouth; the two furrows between his brows relaxing graduallie till at length they cd no more be seene. At last he says,

"Who was that old prophet that could not or would not prophesy for a King of Judah till a minstrel came and played unto him? Sure, he must have loved as I do, the very lovely song of one that playeth well upon an instrument, yclept the human heart; and have felt, as I do now, the spirit given him to speak of matters foreign to his mind. 'Tis of res angusta domæ, dear brats, I must speak; soe, the sooner begun, the sooner over. Here am I, with a dear wife and eight loved children … for my daughters' husbands and my son's wife are my children as much as any; and Mercy Giggs is a daughter too … nine children, then, and eleven grandchildren, and a swarm of servants to boot, all of whom have as yet eaten what it pleased them, and drunken what it suited them at my board, without its being any one's business to say them nay. 'Twas the dearest privilege of my Lord Chancellor; but now he's dead and gone, how shall we contract the charges of Sir Thomas More?"

We looked from one to another, and were silent.

"I'll tell ye, dear ones," he went on, "I have been brought up at Oxford, at an inn of Chancery, at Lincoln's Inn, and at the King's Court; from the lowest degree, that is, to the highest; and yet have I in yearly revenues at this present, little above one hundred pounds a-year; but then, as Chilo sayth, 'honest loss is preferable to dishonest gain: by the first, a man suffers once; by the second, forever;' and I may take up my parable with Samuel, and say: 'Whose ox have I taken? whose ass have I taken? whom have I defrauded? whom have I oppressed? of whose hand have I received any bribe to blinde mine eyes therewith?' No, my worst enemies can not lay to my charge any of these things, and my trust in you is, that, rather than regret I should not have made a purse by any such base methods, you will all cheerfully contribute your proportions to the common fund, and share and share alike with me in this my diminished state."

We all gat about him, and by our words and kisses gave warrant that we would.

"Well, then," quoth he, "my mind is, that since we are all of a will to walk down-hill together, we will do soe at a breathing pace, and not drop down like a plummet. Let all things be done decently and in order: we won't descend to Oxford fare first, nor yet to the fare of New Inn. We'll begin with Lincoln's Inn diet, whereon many good and wise men thrive well; if we find this draw too heavily on the common purse, we will, next year, come down to Oxford fare, with which many great and learned doctors have been conversant; and, if our purse stretch not to cover e'en this, why, in heaven's name! we'll go begging together, with staff and wallet, and sing a Salve Regina at every good man's door, whereby we shall still keep company, and be merry together!"

Now that the first surprise and grief, and the first fervour of fidelity and self-devotion have passed off, we have subsided into how deep and holy a quiet!

We read of the desertion of the world as a matter of course; but, when our own turn comes, it does seem strange, to find ourselves let fall down the stream without a single hand outstretched to help us; forgotten, in a moment, as though we had never been, by those who lately ate and laughed at our table. And this, without any fault or offense of ours, but merely from our having lost the light of the king's countenance. I say, it does seem strange; but how fortunate, how blessed are those to whom such a course of events only seems strange, unaccompanied by self-reproach and bitterness! I could not help feeling this, in reading an affectionate letter deare father writ this forenoon to Erasmus, wherein he sayd, "I have now obtained what, from a child, I have continually wished! that, being entirely quit of businesse and all publick affairs, I might live for a time only to God and myself."

Having no hankering after the old round he soe long hath run, he now, in fact, looks younger every day; and yet, not with the same kind of youth he had before his back was bowed under the chancellorship. 'Tis a more composed, chastised sort of rejuvenescence: rather the soft warmth of autumn, which sometimes seems like May, than May itself: the enkindling, within this mortal tabernacle, of a heavenly light that never grows dim, because it is immortal; and burns the same yesterday, to-day, and forever: a youthfulness of soul and mind characterised by growth; something with which this world and its fleeting fancies has nothing to do; something that the king can neither impart nor take away.

We have had a tearfull morning … poor Patteson has gone. My father hath obtained good quarters for him with my Lord Mayor, with a stipulation that he shall retain his office with the Lord Mayor for the time being, as long as he can fill it at all. This suits Patteson, who says he will sooner shift masters year by year, than grow too fond of any man again, as he hath of father; but there has been sad blubbering and blowing of noses.

This afternoon, coming upon Mercy seated in ye alcove, like unto the image of some saint in a niche, her hands folded on her lap, and her eyes steadfastly agaze on the setting sun, I could not but mark how years were silentlie at work upon her, as doubtless upon us alle; the tender, fearfulle girl having thus graduallie changed into the sober, high-minded woman. She is so seldom seene in repose, so constantly astir and afoot in this or that kind office, mostly about the children, that I had never thought upon it before; but now I was alle at once avised to marvel that she who had so long seemed fitter for heaven than earth, shoulde never literallie have vowed herself ye spouse of Christ, more in especiall as all expectation of being ye spouse of anie else must long since have died within her.

I sayd, "Mercy, thou lookst like a nun: how is't thou hast ne'er become one in earnest?"

She started; then sayd, "Could I be more usefull? more harmless? less exposed to temptation? or half so happy as I am now? In sooth, Meg, the time has been when methought, how sweet ye living death of the cloister! How good that must needs be which had the suffrages of Chrysostom the golden-mouthed, and holy Ambrose, and our own Anselm! How peacefull, to take wing like ye dove, and fly away from a naughty world, and be at rest! How brave, to live alone, like St. Antony, in the desert! only, I would have had some books with me in my cave, and 'tis uncertayn whether St. Antony had knowledge of letters, beyond ye heaven-taught lesson, 'God is love' … for methought so much reflection and no action would be too much for a woman's mind to bear – I might goe mad: and I remembered me how the dove that gladly flew away from the ark, gladly flew back, and abode in ye ark till such time as a new home was ready for her. And methought, cannot I live apart from sin here, and now; and as to sorrow, where can we live apart from that? Sure, we may live on ye skirts of the world in a spiritt as truly unwordlie as though we were altogether out of it: and here I may come and go, and range in the fresh air, and love other folks' children, and read my Psalter, and pore over the sayings of the wise men of old, and look on the faces I love, and sit at the feet of Sir Thomas More. Soe, there, Meg, are my poor reasons for not caring to be a nun. Our deare Lord is in himself all that our highest, holiest affections can seek or comprehend; for he made these our hearts; he gave us these our affections; and through them the Spirit speaks. Aspiring to their source, they rise up like the white smoke and bright flame; while, on earth, if left unmastered, they burn, suffocate, and destroy. Yet they have their naturall and innocent outlets even here; and a woman may warm herself by them without scorching, and yet be neither a wife nor a nun."

Ever since father's speech to us in ye pavillion, we have beene of one heart and one soul; neither have any of us said that aught of the things we possessed were our own, but we have had all things in common. And we have eaten our meat with gladness and singleness of heart.

This afternoon, expressing to father my gratefull sense of our present happiness… "Yes, Meg," returns he, "I, too, am deeply thankful for this breathing space."

"Do you look on it as no more, then?" I sayd.

"As no more, Meg: we shall have a thunder-clap by-and-by. Look out on the Thames. See how unwontedlie clear it is, and how low the swallows fly… How distinctlie we see the green sedges on Battersea bank, and their reflected images in the water. We can almost discern the features of those poor knaves digging in the cabbage gardens, and hear 'em talk, so still is ye air. Have you ne'er before noted these signs?"

"A storm is brewing," I sayd.

"Aye, we shall have a lightning-flash anon. So still, Meg, is also our moral atmosphere just now. God is giving us a breathing space, as he did to the Egyptians before the plague of hail, that they might gather their live stock within doors. Let us take for example them that believed and obeyed him; and improve this holy pause."

Just at this moment, a few heavie drops fell agaynst the window pane, and were seene by both. Our eyes met; and I felt a silent pang.

"Five days before the Passover," resumed father, "all seemed as still and quiet as we are now; but Jesus knew his hour was at hand. E'en while he yet spake familiarly among the people, there came a sound from heaven, and they that stood by said it thundered; but he knew it for the voice of his dear Father. Let us, in like manner, when the clap cometh, recognise in it the voice of God, and not be afraid with any amazement."

Gammer Gurney is dead, and I must say I am glad of it. The change, to her, must be blessed, and there seemed some danger lest, after having escaped being ducked for a witch, she shoulde have been burnt for a heretic. Father looked on her as an obstinate old woman; Will counted her little short of a saint and prophetess, and kept her well supplied with alle she could need. Latterly she was stone deaf; so 'tis a happy release.

The settled purpose of father's soul, just now, is to make up a marriage between Mercy and Dr. Clement. 'Tis high advancement for her, and there seems to have been some old liking between 'em we never knew of.

Though some months have passed since my father uttered his warning voice, and all continues to go quiet, I cannot forbear, now and then, to call his monition to mind, and look about for the cloud that is to bring the thunder-clap; but the expectation sobers rather than saddens me.

This morning, leaning over the river wall, I was startled by the cold, damp hand of some one from behind being laid on mine. At the same time a familiar voice exclaimed, "Canst tell us, mistress, why fools have hot heads and hands icy cold?"

I made answer, "Canst tell me, Patteson, why fools should stray out of bounds?"

"Why, that's what fools do every day," he readily replied; "but this is All Fools' Day, mine own special holiday; and I told my Lord Mayor overnight, that if he lookt for a fool this morning, he must look in the glass. In sooth, mistress Meg, I should by rights wear the gold chain and he the motley; for a proper fool he is, and I shall be glad when his year's service to me is out. The worst o' these Lord Mayors is, that we can't part with 'em till their time's up. Why now, this present one hath not so much under standing as would foot an old stocking; 'twas but yesterday when, in quality of my taster, he civilly enough makes over to me a half-eaten plate of gurnet, which I wave aside, thus, saying, I eat no fish of which I cannot affirm 'rari sunt boni,' few are the bones … and I protest to you he knew it not for fool's latin. Thus I'm driven, from mere discouragement, to leave prating for listening, which thou knowest, mistress, is no fool's office; and among ye sundrie matters I hear at my lord's table … for he minds not what he says before his servants, thereby giving new proof 'tis he shoulde wear the motley … I note his saying that ye king's private marriage will assuredlie be made publick this coming Easter, and my Lady Anne will be crowned … more by token, he knows ye merchant that will supply the Genoa velvet and cloth of gold, and the masquers that are to enact the pageant. For the love o' safety, then, mistress Meg, bid thy good father e'en take a fool's advice, and eat humble pie betimes, for, doubt not this proud madam to be as vindictive as Herodias, and one that, unless he appease her full early, will have his head set before her in a charger. I've said my say."

Three bishops have been here this forenoon, to bid father to ye coronation, and offer him twenty pounds to provide his dress; but father hath, with courtesie, declined to be present. After much friendly pressing, they parted, seemingly on good terms; but I have misgivings of ye issue.

A ridiculous charge hath been got up 'gainst dear father; no less than of bribery and corruption. One Parnell complaineth of a decree given agaynst him in favour of one Vaughan, whose wife, he deponeth, gave father a gilt flaggon. To ye noe small surprise of the Council, father admitted that she had done soe: "But, my lords," proceeded he, when they had uttered a few sentences of reprehension somewhat too exultantlie, "will ye list the conclusion of the tale? I bade my butler fill the cup with wine, and having drunk her health, I made her pledge me, and then restored her the gift, and would not take it again."

As innocent a matter, touching the offering him a pair of gloves containing forty pounds, and his taking the first and returning the last, saying he preferred his gloves without lining, hath been made publick with like triumph to his own good fame; but alack! these feathers show which way sets the wind.

WORDSWORTH, BYRON, SCOTT, AND SHELLEY

William Wordsworth is generally allowed to have exercised a deeper and more permanent influence upon the literature and modes of thinking of our age, than any of the great poets who lived and wrote during the first quarter of the present century. In proportion as his fame was of slower growth, and his poems were longer in making their way to the understanding and affections of his countrymen, so their roots seem to have struck deeper down, and the crown of glory that encircles his memory is of gold, that has been purified and brightened by the fiery ordeal through which it has passed. Tennyson says of the laureate wreath which he so deservedly wears, that it is

Greener from the browsOf him who uttered nothing base.

And this, which seems at first sight negative praise, is, in reality, a proof of exquisite discernment; for it is just that which constitutes the marked distinction between Wordsworth and the other really original poets who are likely to share with him the honor of representing poetically to posterity the early part of the nineteenth century. In their crowns there is alloy, both moral and intellectual. His may not be of so imperial a fashion; the gems that stud it may be less dazzling, but the gold is of ethereal temper, and there is no taint upon his robe. Weakness, incompleteness, imperfection he had, for he was a mortal man of limited faculties, but spotless purity is not to be denied him – he uttered nothing base. Our readers will anticipate us in ranking with him, as the representative poets of their age, Byron, Scott, and Shelley. Of each of these we shall say a few words, especially in this representative character.

Lord Byron's poems are the actual life-experience of a man whose birth and fortune enabled him to mix with the highest society, and whose character led him to select for his choice that portion of it which pursued pleasure as the main if not the sole object of existence. Under a thin disguise of name, country, and outward incident, they present us with the desires which actuated, the passions which agitated, and the characters which were the ideals of the fashionable men and women of the earlier part of this century. Limited and monotonous as they are in their essential nature, ringing perpetual changes upon one passion and one phase of passion, the brilliance of their diction, the voluptuous melody of their verse, the picturesque beauty of their scenery, well enough represent that life of the richer classes, which chases with outstretched arms all the Protean forms of pleasure, only to find the subtle essence escape as soon as grasped, leaving behind in its place weariness, disappointment, and joyless stagnation. The loftiest joys they paint are the thrillings of the sense, the raptures of a fine nervous organization; their pathos is the regret, and their wisdom the languor and the satiety of the jaded voluptuary. These form the staple, the woof of Lord Byron's poetry, and with it is enwoven all that which gives outward variety and incessant stimulating novelty to the pursuits of an Englishman of fashion. These pursuits are as numerous, as absorbing, and demand as much activity of a kind as those of the student or the man of business. Among them will be found those upon which the student and the man of business are employed, though in a different spirit, and with a different aim. Thus we frequently see among the votaries of pleasure men who are fond of literature, of art, of politics, of foreign travel, of all manly and active enterprise but all these will be pursued, not as duties to be done, in an earnest, hopeful, self-sacrificing spirit, "that scorns delights and lives laborious days," but for amusement, for immediate pleasure to be reaped, as a resource against ennui and vacuity, to which none but the weakest and most effeminate nature will succumb. This difference of object and of motive necessitates a difference in the value of the results. The soil, which is plowed superficially, and for a quick return, will bear but frail and fading flowers; the planter of oaks must toil in faith and patience, and sublime confidence in the future. And so, into whatever field the wide and restless energies of men like Lord Byron carry them, they bring home no treasures that will endure – no marble of which world-lasting statue or palace may be hewn or built – no iron, of which world-subduing machines may be wrought. Poems, pictures, history, science, the magnificence and loveliness of Nature, cities of old renown, adventures of desperate excitement, new manners, languages, and characters, supply them with an ever fresh flow of sensation and emotion, keep the senses and the faculties cognate with sense in a pleasant activity, but no well-based generalization is gained for the understanding; facts are not even carefully observed and honestly studied; pleasant sensation was the object, and that once obtained, there is no more worth in that which produced it, though in it may lie a law of God's manifestation, one of those spiritual facts, to know and obey which would seem the chief purpose of man's existence, to discover and make them known, the noblest glory and highest function of genius. It is in this spirit that Lord Byron has questioned Life: "Oh! where can pleasure be found?" and Life, echo-like, would only answer, "Where!" It is because he put that question more earnestly, lived up to its spirit more fearlessly, and more faithfully and experimentally reported the answer, that he is so eminently a representative poet – representative of what a large and important class in every country actually is, of what a far larger class aspires to be. It is in his fearless attempt at solving the problem of life in his own way, his complete discomfiture, and his unshrinking exhibition of that discomfiture, that the absolute and permanent value of his social teaching consists. For he was endowed with such gifts of nature and of fortune, so highly placed, so made to attract and fascinate, adorned with such beauty and grace, with such splendor of talents, with such quick susceptibility to impressions, with such healthy activity of mind, with such rich flow of speech, with such vast capacity of enjoyment, that no one is likely to make the experiment he made from a higher vantage-ground, with more chances of success. And the result of his experience he has given to the world, and has thrown over the whole the charm of a clear, vigorous, animated style, at once masculine, and easy, and polished, sparkling with beauty, instinct with life, movement, and variety; by turns calm, voluptuous, impassioned, enthusiastic, terse, and witty, and always most prominent that unstudied grace, that Rubens-like facility of touch, which irresistibly impresses the reader with a sense of power, of strength not put fully forth, of resources carelessly flowing out with exhaustless prodigality, not husbanded with timid anxiety, and exhibited with pompous ostentation. It is the combination of these qualities of the artist, with his peculiar fearlessness and honesty of avowal – his plain, unvarnished expression of what he found pleasant, and chose for his good, that will ever give him a high, if not almost the highest place among the poets of the nineteenth century, even with those readers who perceive and lament the worthlessness of his matter, the superficiality and scantiness of his knowledge, the want of purity and elevation in his life and character. Those will best appreciate his wonderful talents who are acquainted with the works of his countless imitators, who have admirably succeeded in re-producing his bad morality, his superficial thoughts, and his characterless portraits, without the fervor of his feeling, the keenness of his sensations, the ease and vigor of his language, the flash of his wit, or the knowledge of the world, and the manly common-sense which redeemed and gave value to what else had been entirely worthless.