BOOK II. For when Dr. Humphreys, who with a strong puritanical feeling had opposed the ecclesiastical habits, approached in his turn to kiss her hand, she said to him with a smile, Mr. Doctor! that loose gown becomes you mighty well; I wonder your notions should be so narrow. 149 6 9151 Hospitality, charity and splendor,' were the characteristics of her household, and upon the most liberal and comprehensive plan; embracing the inferior as well as the superior orders of society.150 In the latter part of her reign she was thought to be ' over-sparing of expense." The armaments she was obliged to prepare and send out, compelled her to require subsidies, and impose taxations on her people, which some complained of;152 but on one occasion she declined the money which the Commons had voted her, because she found that it was not wanted.153 She gratified her subjects by calling frequent parliaments; and had the pleasure of always witnessing their affectionate loyalty.155 Some thought that she too much courted popularity;' 154 156 149 Peck Decid. Curiosa, v. 2. p. 276. There is one instance, however, in which she let her resentment deviate into scurrility. In the MS. Titus, B. 2, there are two of her letters, in which she calls lord Mountjoy, Mistress Kitchenmaid.' p. 70. An expression half spleen and half jocoseness. 150 Upon the least acquaintance, all strangers, from the nobleman to the peasant, were invited to one table or other, of which she kept abundance, wherever she removed from one standing house to another.' Osborne, 69. 151 MS. Ellis, 191. 153 Castelnau, Mem. p. 62. 155The queen and her parliaments 152 MS. ib. 196. 154 Osborne, 91. had ever the good fortune to part in love, and on reciprocal terms.' Naunton, 184. 156 She 'rested for the security of her person on the love and fidelity of her people, which she politically affected, as it hath been thought, somewhat beneath the height of her spirit and natural magnanimity.' Naunt. 190. XXXVII. but it was one of her real enjoyments. It was her CHAP. feeling, to like to be loved by all, whether high or low; and she had so little of personal pride; and such a desire to promote the public good, that she would not refuse the informations of mean persons, if they were given with purposes of improve Of the four queens with whom she had been contemporary, her sister Mary, Jane Grey, the queen of Scots, and Catherine de Medicis, the fairlyearned pre-eminence can be refused to her by no one. She united all the real merits of each; and drew a just distinction between herself and the latter, when some one wished to express that in the management of affairs, and in the arts and power of governing, nothing less was to be expected from them than from the greatest men.' She could not endure to be compared to the ambiguous and objectionable French queen. I govern by very different measures, and upon principles very unlike her's,' was her correct observation.158 The legal severities which she sanctioned against the Jesuits and seminary priests were contrary to her disposition and principles, but were forced upon her adoption, by the inveterate hostilities and treasonable conduct of those deluding and deluded men; as harsh laws were also made against the Catholics, because they allowed the papal agents and instigators to stimulate them to disaffection, collusion and conspiracy. 157 Naunt. 190. 158 Lord Bacon, p. 194. 159 159 Lord Bacon, in his observations on Elizabeth, states their cause and necessity at some length, 187-192. He truly states, that 'It is most certain, (certissimum est) that the animi sensum, the opinion and principle of this sovereign was, that no force should be used to the II. BOOK It was thought an admirable specimen of her sagacious government, that, tho a woman, ruling a nation peculiarly turbulent and warlike, desirous of battle, and impatient of peace, she kept all in a state of internal tranquillity, due subordination, and contented loyalty. 160 'Her piety appeared in all her transactions and conduct. It governed the habits of her life, and her ordinary manners. She was seldom absent from the public prayers and divine services, either in her chapel or in her private chamber. She passed much time in reading the Scriptures, and the Fathers, especially St. Austin. She often composed prayers, when occasion required. She seldom mentioned the Deity, even in conversation, without adding to His name the epithet of The Creator:' and always, as she repeated it, shewed, by her eyes and face, a manifest humility and veneration. This,' adds lord Bacon, from whom this paragraph is taken, I have myself often remarked.' 161 conscience; but she would not permit the welfare of her kingdom to be brought into hazard under the pretext of conscience and religion.' ib. p. 187. After they had excommunicated her, and devoted her to perdition, he says, By their arts and poisons they depraved the very mass itself, which had been before so sweet and innoxious, (magis dulcem et innoxiam) and stained it, as it were, with a new leaven, and with a pernicious malignity.' ib. 190. Yet he says she was so desirous to be lenient, that she blunted the sword of the laws, in manifestation of her real nature, so that few priests, compared with their number, were capitally punished.' Bacon's Mem. Eliz. p. 191. 160 Bacon, p. 180. Natio ferocissima, et bellicosissima, belli cupida et pacem ægre tolerans.' ib. 161 Bacon, p. 186, 7. Quod et ipse sæpe notavi.' ib. 187. Every day she set apart some hours, either to read, or to hear her learned readers; one of whom, sir Henry Saville, professed, that her instructors, as oft as they came to her presence about such employments, received such admirable comments from her, that they seemed rather to learn of her, than to bring learning to her.' Speed, p. 907. Plato is mentioned as one of those which were thus read to her, and on whom she made her remarks. XXXVII. The intellectual endowments of Elizabeth were CHAP. superior not only to the usual level of kingly talent, but even to the attainments of many, who rank deservedly as respected scholars. The Latin, French, and Italian, she could speak elegantly; and she was able in these languages to answer ambassadors on the sudden.' 162 The studies and pro 6 ficiency of her youth have been the subject of a 162 MSS. Ellis, 193. 164 Camd. 500. 163 See before, vol. 3. p. 505, 6. 166 Camd. 422. She went twice to Oxford, and once to Cambridge, and delivered orations there; doubling, almost, the yearly revenues of all their noble foundations.' Speed, 907. 167 Camd. 500. De Thou mentions, that she read Ronsard's verses with pleasure, and conversed with him as he returned from Scotland to England, in his way to France. He wrote an interesting poem in her praise; but making a plaisanterie un peu trop libre on her marriage, she said, 'It did not become a man well born, like Ronsard, to collect the slanders which ran about the streets, to attack the reputation of a queen, his friend.' Ronsard, sorry to have vexed her, struck out the passage; which others, after his death, maliciously restored. v. 14 p. 145. II. BOOK especially when it aimed ambitiously at metaphors and similes, it became too elaborate. Its more prevailing character however is strength, dignity, and fulness of meaning.10 168 169 This industrious queen aspired also to be a poet. Her gentleman pensioner might amuse himself, and gratify her, by hailing her as an English Sappho." But flattery is neither criticism nor truth. There are very few remains of her Parnassian exercises, and she, like thousands who have touched the Heliconian lyre, has only shewn, that gifted hands can alone ' make it discourse eloquent music,' and that her admired fingers were not those of Apollo or of his sister Muses. She shone more in her vocal and instrumental melody, and in the gay and measured movements of Terpsichore, tho without being particularly distinguished in either.170 Her curiosity seems to have been universal; for we also find her listening 'Her 168 Its occasional defect is remarked in the Sloane MSS. manner of writing was somewhat obscure, and the style not vulgar: as being either learned by imitation of some author, whom she delighted to read, or else affected for difference sake, that she might not write such phrases as were commonly used.' Ellis, p. 193. 169 Puttenham dashes boldly into this high panegyric: And oft yourself, with lady Sappho's pen, In sweet measures of poetry t'indite, The rare affecter of your heavenly sprite. And his prose is still more extravagantly hyperbolical. See his 'Art of Poetry,' 50. His versified summary of her endowments, in his Partheniades, p. 37, is much nearer the truth. 170 In matters of recreation, as singing, dancing, and playing upon instruments, she was not ignorant, nor excellent; a measure, which in things indifferent best beseems a prince.' MSS. Ellis, 193. In her second year, one Treasorer had 'devised and given to the queen a new musical instrument, sending forth the sound of flutes and records.' For this she granted him a renewal for twelve years of her sister's patent. And what was this patent for? Liberty to buy 100,000 lasts of ashes, and 400,000 dozens of old worn-out shoes, and to export them to foreign parts!!! Ellis, Second, v. 3. p. 202. Risum teneatis! |