No More Learning

Note VII.

_Some thought they God's anointed meant to slay
By guns, invented since full many a day. _--P. 221.

The author alludes to the wonderful project to assassinate the king
by Pickering and Groves, to which Oates bore testimony. Pickering, a
man in easy circumstances, and whom religious zeal alone induced to
murder his sovereign, was to have 30,000 masses; and Groves, a more
mercenary ruffian, was to be recompensed with a sum, which, reckoning
at a shilling a mass, should be an equivalent in money. But this scheme
misgave, because, according to the evidence, the conscientious and
opulent Mr Pickering had furnished himself for the exploit with an old
pistol, the cock whereof was too loose to hold a flint. Another time
they were to come to Windsor, to execute their bloody purpose with
sword and dagger; but could find no better conveyance than miserable
hack horses, one of which became lame, and disconcerted the expedition.
Such at least was the apology made by Oates for their not appearing,
when a party were, upon his information, stationed to apprehend them.


Note VIII.

_Of these, the false Achitophel was first. _--P. 222.

Anthony, Earl of Shaftesbury, one of the principal heroes of this poem,
was in the Tower when it was published, and very soon after was served
with a bill of indictment for high treason; which was thrown out by
the grand jury, who returned a verdict of _Ignoramus_. This gave rise
to our author's next poem, "The Medal," and in the notes is contained
some account of his lordship's life, to which the reader is referred
for further information. We have already stated, that he was the
counsellor of Monmouth, and the very soul of his party. Nothing can be
more exquisitely satirical than the description which Dryden has here
given of this famous statesman.


Note IX.

_And all to leave what with his toil he won,
To that unfeathered, two-legged thing, a son;
Got while his soul did huddled notions try,
And born a shapeless lump, like anarchy. _--P. 222.

Anthony Ashley Cooper, second Earl of Shaftesbury, and son of the great
statesman, whom Dryden has dubbed his Achitophel. The contemptuous
language used towards him, is said not to have reference to his
outward appearance; for the portraits which remain represent him at
uncommonly handsome. Nay, so much was his personal beauty an object
of his attention, that he is said to have hastened his decease by his
solicitude to remove, by violent means, an excrescence which disfigured
his face. But the authority, from which these circumstances are quoted,
seems to admit, that he was of a very insignificant character, at least
not at all distinguished by mental abilities. _Biographia Britannica_,
Vol. IV. p. 266. His want of capacity was a standing joke among the
Tories. In an ironical pamphlet, called "A modest Vindication of the
Earl of Shaftesbury, in a letter to a friend concerning his being
elected King of Poland," we have, among the list of his officers of
the crown, "Prince Prettyman Perkinoski (_i. e. _ Monmouth), our adopted
heir, because a little wiser than our own son, and designed to be
offered to the diet as our successor. "

It often happens, that men are more jealous of their own, or their
ancestors' reputation for talents, than for virtue. The third Earl of
Shaftesbury, author of the "Characteristics," is said to have resented
more deeply this occasional attack on his father's understanding, than
the satire against his grandfather, in which Dryden has poured forth
his whole energy. This passage is alleged to have been the occasion of
his mentioning Dryden disrespectfully in several places of his works; a
revenge more dishonourable to his Lordship's taste than to the object
of his spleen. [309]


Note X.

_To compass this, the triple bond he broke,
The pillars of the public safety shook,
And fitted Israel for a foreign yoke. _--P. 222.

The Earl of Shaftesbury is allowed to have been a principal adviser of
the Dutch war in 1672; by which the triple alliance between England,
Sweden, and Holland, the _chef d'œuvre_ of Sir William Temple's
negociation, by which France and Spain were forced into the treaty
of Aix-la-Chapelle, was for ever broken. It was he who applied to
Holland the famous saying, _Delenda est Carthago_; and who, with all
his wit and eloquence, furthered a closer connection with France, to
the destruction of our natural ally. But when the success of the Dutch
war was inferior to the expectations of this ardent statesman, when he
found himself rivalled by Clifford and others in the favour of Charles,
and when he perceived that the king, to preserve his quiet, would not
hesitate to sacrifice an obnoxious minister, he chose to make what some
of his biographers have called _a short turn_; and, by going over to
the popular party, to escape the odium attached to the measures he had
himself recommended.


Note XI.

_In Israel's courts ne'er sat an Abethdin
With more discerning eyes, or hands more clean;
Unbribed, unsought, the wretched to redress,
Swift of dispatch, and easy of access. _--P. 223.

In 1672, the seals were given to the Earl of Shaftesbury, on the
resignation of the Lord Keeper, Sir Orlando Bridgeman; and he was
invested with the office of Lord High Chancellor. In the judicial part
of his duty, he appears to have merited the eulogium so elegantly
expressed in the text. One of his biographers uses the following
strong expressions: "With what prudence and candour, honour, and
integrity, he acquitted himself in that great and weighty employment,
the transactions of the Court of Chancery, during the time of his
chancellorship, will best testify. Justice, then, ran in an equal
channel; so that the cause of the rich was not suffered to swallow
up the rights of the poor, nor was the strong or cunning oppressor
permitted to devour the weak or unskilful opposer: but the abused found
relief suitable to their distress; and those by whom they were abused,
a severe reprehension, answerable to their crimes. The mischievous
consequences, which commonly arise from the delays and other practices
of that court, were, by his ingenious and judicious management, very
much abated, and every thing weighed and determined with such an
exact judgment and equity, that it almost exceeds all possibility of
belief. "[310] Yet even in this high situation, Shaftesbury could not
help displaying something of a temper more lively and freakish than was
consistent with the gravity of his place. His dress was an odd mixture
of the courtier and lawyer; being an ash-coloured gown, silver-laced,
with pantaloons garnished with ribbons; nothing being black about him,
save, peradventure, his hat, which North, though he saw him, cannot
positively affirm to have been so. [311] Besides, he occasioned much
dismay and discomfiture upon the first day of the term, which succeeded
his appointment, by obliging the judges, law officers, &c. who came,
as usual, to attend the great seal to Westminster-hall, to make this
solemn procession on horseback, according to ancient custom. As long as
the cavalcade was in the open street, this did well enough; but when
they came to strait passages and interruptions, "for want of gravity in
the beasts, and too much in the riders, there happened some curvetting,
which made no small disorder. Judge Twisden, to his great affright,
and the consternation of his grave brethren, was laid all along in the
dirt; but all at length arrived safe, without loss of life or limb in
the service. "[312] This whimsical fancy of setting grave judges on
managed horses, with hazard both of damage and ridicule, to say nothing
of bodily distress and terror, is a curious trait of the mercurial Earl
of Shaftesbury.


Note XII.

_And proves the king himself a Jebusite. _--P. 223.

As it was pretty well understood that Charles was friendly to the
Catholic religion, which indeed he had secretly embraced, no pains
were spared to point out this tendency to the people, who connected
with the faith of Rome all the bugbear horrors of the plot, as well as
the real reasons which they had to dread its influence. Dryden probably
alludes to the language held by Colledge, which was that of his party.
Smith deposed against him, that, while he was carrying him to dine with
one Alderman Willcox, he told him, "He was a man as true as steel, and
a man that would endeavour to root out Popery. '--Says I, 'That may be
easily done, if you can but prevail with the king to pass the bill
against the duke of York. '--'No, no, (said he) now you are mistaken,
for Rowley is as great a papist as the duke of York is, (now he called
the king, Rowley,) and every way as dangerous to the Protestant
interest, as is too apparent by his arbitrary ruling. "--_State Trials_,
Vol. iii. p. 359.


Note XIII.

_And nobler is a limited command,
Given by the love of all your native land,
Than a successive title, long and dark,
Drawn from the mouldy rolls of Noah's ark. _--P. 226.

The legitimacy of the duke of Monmouth, though boldly and repeatedly
asserted by his immediate partizans, did not receive general credit
even in the popular faction. It was one of Shaftesbury's principal
advantages, to have chosen, for the ostensible head of his party, a
candidate, whose right, had he ever attained the crown, must have
fluctuated betwixt an elective and hereditary title. The consciousness
of how much he was to depend upon Shaftesbury's arts, for stating
and supporting so dubious a claim, obliged the duke to remain at the
devotion of that intriguing politician. It seems to have been shrewdly
suspected by some of Monmouth's friends, that Shaftesbury had no real
intention of serving his interest. A poem, written by one of Monmouth's
followers, called "Judah Betrayed, or the Egyptian Plot turned on
the Israelites," expresses their fears, and very plainly intimates
this suspicion: and the reader may bear with some bad poetry, to be
convinced how far this faction was from being firmly united together:

For depth in politics, and statesman's brain,
Draw Hushai[313] next, attended by a train
Of peevish votaries, heart-sick with pride,
Too numerous for an apostate guide;
The odious name of patriot he does own,
And prophecies the downfall of a throne:
Forms in his aged fancy, robbed of health,
The strange ideas of a Commonwealth,
Then gains the proselyte dissenting Jews,
And arguments from liberty does use:
So treason veiled for liberty may go,
And traitors' heads like royalists may show.
All Judah's people had united been,
Had not he interposed, and stept between;
David in's subjects love had held his reign,
Had not he cut the fastening bond in twain,
And fatal discord sown in sanhedrin,
The much lamented hasty Judah's sin.
When either faction does produce their right
To succession, they tacitly do slight
The present king, and silent reasons bring
That he is not, or should not be, a king. --
We need not care; for heaven ne'er will own
Egyptian heir on Israelitish throne;
Nor will it ere auspiciously defend
Hushai, that only strives for's private end.
He wheedles Absalon with hopes of king,
And glistering toys of crowns does 'fore him fling;
Thus does he sooth to overthrow a crown,
And Absalon's the tool to beat it down;
And easy Absalon, by gentleness drawn,
(Though he has courage paralleled by none,)
The loss of crowns to come he now does dread,
Can heaven place them on a nobler head?
So great a soul as his 'twill never own
Should rule on any thing beneath a throne;
Or ere see Judah plagued or robbed of health,
By that unbounded thing a Commonwealth.


Note XIV.

_The next successor, whom I fear and hate,
My arts have made obnoxious to the State;
Turned all his virtues to his overthrow,
And gained our elders to pronounce a foe. _--P. 229.

In 1679, when the antipathy to popery had taken the deepest root in
men's minds, the House of Commons passed a vote, "That the Duke of
York's being a papist, and the hopes of his coming to the crown,
had given the highest countenance to the present conspiracies and
designs of the papists, against the king and the protestant religion. "
Charles endeavoured to parry the obvious consequences of this vote,
by proposing to the council a set of limitations, which deprived
his successor, if a catholic, of the chief branches of royalty.
Shaftesbury, then president of the council, argued against this plan as
totally ineffectual; urging, that when the future king should find a
parliament to his mind, the limitations might be as effectually taken
off as they could be imposed. When the bill was brought in, for the
total exclusion of the Duke of York from the succession, Shaftesbury
favoured it with all his influence. It passed the Lower House by a very
large majority, but was rejected by the House of Lords, where Halifax
opposed it with very great ability. Shaftesbury, who had taken so
decided a part against the Duke of York in his dearest interests, was
now irreconcilable with him, and could only look for safety in his ruin.


Note XV.

_'Till time shall ever-wanting David draw,
To pass your doubtful title into law:
If not, the people have a right supreme
To make their kings; for kings are made for them. _--P. 229.

If we can believe the honourable Roger North, Lord Shaftesbury made
a fair experiment, for the purpose of ascertaining whether Charles's
love of ease and affection for Monmouth would induce him to consent to
an alteration of the succession in his favour, to the prejudice of the
Duke of York. He quotes a pamphlet, called, "The Earl of Shaftesbury's
expedient to settle the nation, discoursed with his Majesty at Oxford,
24 March, 1681," which gives the following account of the transaction;
and, as it was published at the time, and remained uncontradicted,
either by Shaftesbury, or the king, probably contains some essential
truth. The Earl of Shaftesbury having received, or pretended to
receive, an unsigned letter, in a disguised hand, bustled away to
court, "as hard," says the pamphleteer, "as legs, stick, and man could
carry him. " When he arrived there, the Lord Chamberlain conceiving
the Duke of Monmouth might be in the secret, applied to him to know
what the great concern was. His grace answered, with an appearance of
hesitation, that it was something relating to himself, in which, as
in other affairs of his, Lord Shaftesbury took a deeper concern than
he desired. Meanwhile. Shaftesbury was introduced to the audience
he solicited with the king, and produced the letter, containing, as
he said, a plan for settling the interests of religion and state,
which proved to be a proposal for calling the Duke of Monmouth to the
succession. The king answered, he was surprized such a plan should
be pressed upon him, after all the declarations he had made on the
subject, and that, far from being more timorous, he became more
resolute the nearer he approached his grave. Shaftesbury expressing
great horror at such an expression, the king assured him he was no less
anxious for his own preservation, than those who pretended to so much
concern for the security of his person; and yet, that he would rather
lay down his life than alter the true succession of the crown, against
both law and conscience. For that, said the earl, let us alone; we
will make a law for it. To which the king replied, that, if such was
his lordship's conscience, it was not his; and that he did not think
even his life of sufficient value to be preserved with the forfeiture
of his honour, and essential injury to the laws of the land. --_North's
Examen_, p. 100. 123.


Note XVI.

_Then the next heir, a prince severe and wise,
Already looks on you with jealous eyes. _--P. 230.

Before James went to Flanders, he had testified a jealousy of Monmouth.
"The Duke of York, before he went abroad," says Carte, "was concerned
to see that the king could observe his frequent whispers at court to
the Lord Shaftesbury, without being moved or expressing his dislike
of it, but was much more alarmed at hearing of their frequent and
clandestine meetings, without any apparent dissatisfaction expressed by
his Majesty. " p. 493. vol. II.


Note XVII.

_The Solymæan rout---- ----
Saw with disdain an Ethnic plot begun,
And scorned by Jebusites to be outdone. _--P. 232.

The royalists recriminated upon the popular party, the charge of plots
and machinations against the government. There is no doubt that every
engine was put in motion, to secure the mob of London, "the Solymean
rout" of Dryden, to Shaftesbury's party. Every one has heard of the
30,000 brisk boys, who were ready to follow the wagging of his finger.
The plots, and sham-plots, charged by the parties against each other,
form a dismal picture of the depravity of the times. Settle thus
ridicules the idea of the protestant, or fanatical plot for seizing the
king at Oxford.

This hellish Ethnick plot the court alarms;
The traytors, seventy thousand strong, in arms,
Near Endor town lay ready at a call,
And garrisoned in airy castles all:
These warriors, on a sort of coursers rid,
Ne'er lodged in stables, or by man bestrid.
What though the steel, with which the rebels fought,
No forge ere felt, or anvil ever wrought;
Yet this magnetick plot for black designs,
Can raise cold iron from the very mines;
To this, were twenty under plots contrived
By malice, and by ignorance believed;
Till shams met shams, and plots with plots so crost,
That the true plot amongst the false was lost.
_Absalom Senior. _


Note XVIII.

_In the first rank of these did Zimri stand;
A man so various, that he seemed to be
Not one, but all mankind's epitome. _--P. 233.

This inimitable description refers, as is well known, to the famous
George Villiers, Duke of Buckingham, son of the favourite of Charles
I. , who was murdered by Felton. The Restoration put into the hands
of the most lively, mercurial, ambitious, and licentious genius, who
ever lived, an estate of 20,000l a-year, to be squandered in every
wild scheme which the lust of power, of pleasure, of licence, or of
whim, could dictate to an unrestrained imagination. Being refused
the situation of President of the North, he was suspected of having
favoured the disaffected in that part of England, and was disgraced
accordingly. But, in 1666, he regained the favour of the king, and
became a member of the famous administration called the Cabal, which
first led Charles into unpopular and arbitrary measures, and laid the
foundation for the troubles of his future reign. Buckingham changed
sides about 1675, and, becoming attached to the country party, made a
most active figure in all proceedings which had relation to the Popish
plot; intrigued deeply with Shaftesbury, and distinguished himself as
a promoter of the bill of exclusion. Hence, he stood an eminent mark
for Dryden's satire; which, we may believe, was not the less poignant,
that the poet had sustained a personal affront, from being depicted
by his grace under the character of Bayes in the Rehearsal. As Dryden
owed the Duke no favour, he has shewn him none. Yet, even here, the
ridiculous, rather than the infamous part of his character, is touched
upon; and the unprincipled libertine, who slew the Earl of Shrewsbury
while his adulterous countess held his horse in the disguise of a page,
and who boasted of caressing her before he changed the bloody cloaths
in which he had murdered her husband,[314] is not exposed to hatred,
while the spendthrift and castle-builder are held up to contempt. So
just, however, is the picture drawn by Dryden, that it differs little
from the following sober historical character.

"The Duke of Buckingham was a man of great parts, and an infinite
deal of wit and humour; but wanted judgement, and had no virtue, or
principle of any kind. These essential defects made his whole life one
continued train of inconsistencies. He was ambitious beyond measure,
and implacable in his resentments; these qualities were the effects, or
different faces of his pride; which, whenever he pleased to lay aside,
no man living could be more entertaining in conversation. He had a
wonderful talent in turning all things into ridicule; but, by his own
conduct, made a more ridiculous figure in the world, than any other he
could, with all his vivacity of wit, and turn of imagination, draw of
others. Frolick and pleasure took up the greatest part of his life;
and in these he neither had any taste, nor set himself any bounds;
running into the wildest extravagancies, and pushing his debaucheries
to a height, which even a libertine age could not help censuring as
downright madness. He inherited the best estate which any subject
had at that time in England; yet, his profuseness made him always
necessitous; as that necessity made him grasp at every thing that would
help to support his expences. He was lavish without generosity, and
proud without magnanimity; and, though he did not want some bright
talents, yet, no good one ever made part of his composition; for there
was nothing so mean that he would not stoop to, nor any thing so
flagrantly impious, but he was capable of undertaking. "[315]

A patron like Buckingham, who piqued himself on his knowledge of
literature, and had the means, if not the inclination, to be liberal,
was not likely to want champions, such as they were, to repel the sharp
attack of Dryden. Elkanah Settle compliments him with the following
lines in his "Absalom Senior," some of which are really tolerable.

But who can Amiel's charming wit withstand,
The great state-pillar of the muses' land;
For lawless and ungoverned had the age
The nine wild sisters seen run mad with rage;
Debauched to savages, till his keen pen
Brought their long banished reason back again;
Driven by his satyrs into reason's fence,
And lashed the idle rovers into sense.

* * * * *

Amiel, whose generous gallantry, while fame
Shall have a tongue, shall never want a name;
Who, whilst his pomp his lavish gold consumes,
Moulted his wings to lend a throne his plumes;
Whilst an ungrateful court he did attend,
Too poor to pay, what it had pride to spend.

Another poet, at a period when interest could little sway his
panegyrick, has apologized for the versatility and extravagance of the
then deceased Duke of Buckingham:

What though black envy, with her ran'crous tongue,
And angry poets in embittered song,
While to new tracks thy boundless soul aspires,
Charge thee with roving change, and wandring fires?
Envy more base did never virtue wrong:
Thy wit, a torrent for the bank too strong,
In twenty smaller rills o'erflowed the dam,
Though the main channel still was Buckingham. [316]

Buckingham himself, smarting under the severity of Dryden's satire,
strove to answer it in kind. He engaged in this work with more zeal
and anger, than wit or prudence. It is one thing to write a farce, and
another to support such a controversy with such an author. The Duke's
pamphlet, however, sold at a high price, and had a celebrity, which
is certainly rather to be imputed to the rank and reputation of the
author, than to the merit of the performance. As it is the work of such
an applauded wit, is exceedingly scarce, and relates entirely to the
poem which I am illustrating, I shall here insert the introduction, and
some extracts from the piece itself.

It is entitled "Poetic Reflections on a late Poem, entituled, Absalom
and Achitophel, by a Person of Honour. London, printed for Richard
Janeway, 1682. (14 December. )"

To the Reader. --"To epitomize which scandalous pamphlet, unworthy the
denomination of poesy, no eye can inspect it without a prodigious
amazement, the abuses being so gross and deliberate, that it seems
rather a capital or national libel, than personal exposures, in order
to an infamous detraction. For how does he character the King, but
as a broad figure of scandalous inclinations, or contrived into such
irregularities, as renders him rather the property of parasites and
vice, than suitable to the accomplishment of so excellent a prince.
Nay, he forces on king David such a royal resemblance, that he darkens
his sanctity, in spite of illuminations from holy writ.

"Next, to take as near our king as he could, he calumniates the Duke
of Monmouth, with that height of impudence, that his sense is far
blacker than his ink, exposing him to all the censures that a murderer,
a traitor, or what a subject of most ambitious evil can possibly
comprehend.

"As to my Lord Shaftesbury, in his collusive Achitophel, what does he
other than exceed malice itself, or that the more prudent deserts of
that Peer were to be so impeached before hand by his impious poem, as
that he might be granted more emphatically condign of the hangman's
axe, and which his muse does in effect take upon her to hasten.

"And if the season be well observed when this adulterate poem was
spread, it will be found purposely divulged near the time when this
lord, with his other noble partner, were to be brought to their trial;
and, I suppose this poet thought himself enough assured of their
condemnation, at least that his genius had not otherwise ventured to
have trampled on persons of such eminent abilities and interest in
the nation; a consideration, I confess, incited my pen, its preceding
respect being paid to the duke of Monmouth, to vindicate their
reputations where I thought it due.

When late Protector-ship was cannon proof,
And, cap-a-pe, had seized on Whitehall roof;
And next on Israelites durst look so big,
That, Tory-like, it loved not much the Whig;
A poet there starts up of wondrous fame,
Whether Scribe, or Pharisee, his race doth name,
Or more to intrigue the metaphor of man,
Got on a muse by father Publican;[317]
For 'tis not harder much if we tax nature,
That lines should give a poet such a feature,
Than that his verse a hero should us show,[318]
Produced by such a feat, as famous too;
His mingle such, what man presumes to think,
But he can figures daub with pen and ink.
A grace our mighty Nimrod late beheld,
When he within the royal palace dwelled;
And saw 'twas of import, if lines could bring
His greatness from usurper to be king;[319]
Or varnish so his praise, that little odds
Should seem 'twixt him and such called earthly gods;
And though no wit can royal blood infuse,
No more than melt a mother to a muse,
Yet much a certain poet undertook,
That men and manners deals in without book,
And might not more to gospel truth belong,
Than he if christened does by name of John.

* * * * *

Fame's impious hireling, and mean reward,
The knave that in his lines turns up his card;
Who, though no Raby thought in Hebrew writ,
He forced allusions that can closely fit;
To Jews, or English, much unknown before,
He made a talmud on his muses score;
Though hoped few critics will its genius carp,
So purely metaphors king David's harp;
And, by a soft encomium, near at hand,
Shews Bathsheba embraced throughout the land.

After much unintelligible panegyric on Shaftesbury, his Grace comes to
Seymour:[320]

For Amiel, Amiel, who cannot endite,
Of his then value wont disdain to write;
The very _him_, with gown and mace did rule
The Sanhedrim, when guided by a fool;
The _him_ that did both sense and reason shift.
That he to gainful place himself might lift;
The very _him_, that did adjust the seed
Of such as did their votes for money breed;
The mighty _him_, that frothy notions vents,
In hope to turn them into presidents;
The _him_ of _hims_, although in judgment small,
That fain would be the biggest at Whitehall;
The _he_, that does for justice coin postpone,
As on account may be hereafter shown.

The noble author, with what cause the reader is now enabled to
determine, piqued himself especially upon the satirical vigour of
these last verses. "As to the character of Amiel, I confess my lines
are something pointed: the one reason being, that it alludes much to a
manner of expression of this writer's, as may be seen by the marginal
notes; and a second will soon be allowed. The figure of Amiel has been
so squeezed into paint, that his soul is seen in spite of the varnish. "
As these verses were written on an occasion, when personal indignation
must have fired his Grace's wit, they incline us to believe, with Mr
Malone, that his friends, Clifford and Sprat, had the greatest share in
the lively farce of "The Rehearsal. "

Buckingham's death was as awful a beacon as his life. He had dissipated
a princely fortune, and lost both the means of procuring, and the power
of enjoying, the pleasures to which he was devoted. He had fallen from
the highest pinnacle of ambition, into the last degree of contempt and
disregard. His dying scene, in a paltry inn in Yorkshire, has been
immortalized by Pope's beautiful lines:

In the worst inn's worst room, with mat half hung,
The floors of plaister, and the walls of dung;
On once a flock-bed, but repaired with straw,
With tape-tied curtains, never meant to draw,
The George and Garter dangling from that bed,
Where tawdry yellow strove with dirty red,
Great Villiers lies! alas, how changed from him!
That life of pleasure, and that soul of whim;
Gallant and gay, in Cliefden's proud alcove,
The bower of wanton Shrewsbury and love;
Or just as gay at council, in a ring
Of mimicked statesmen, and a merry king;
No wit to flatter left of all his store,
No fool to laugh at, which he valued more;
There, victor of his health, of fortune, friends,
And fame, this lord of useless thousands ends!


Note XIX.

_------Balaam. _--P. 234.

The Earl of Huntington. A coarse reason is given by Luttrel in his MS.
notes, for the epithet by which he is distinguished in the text.
[321]
He was one of the seventeen peers who signed a petition, beseeching
Charles to have recourse to the advice of his parliament; and he
himself presented it at Whitehall, on the 7th of December, 1679, in
the name of the other lords subscribing. This advice was received
very coldly by the king, who answered, "That he would consider of
what they had offered, and could heartily wish, that all other people
were as solicitous for the peace and good of the nation, as he would
ever be. " The Earl of Huntington also subscribed the petition and
advice, presented by fifteen peers to the king, against removing the
parliament to Oxford; where they stated, "Neither Lords nor Commons can
be in safety, but will be daily exposed to the swords of the Papists,
and their adherents, of whom too many are crept into your majesty's
guards. " Yet Lord Huntington did not go all the lengths of the Whig
party. He became a privy councillor, was admitted to the honour of
kissing the king's hand, and was stated in the Public Intelligencer, of
the 25th of October, 1681, to have then confessed, that he had found by
experience, "That they who promoted the bill of exclusion, were for the
subversion of monarchy itself. " Monmouth, Grey, and Herbert, state, in
a paper published on this occasion, that Lord Huntington had denied the
utterance of the said words; but, from the stile of their manifesto,
it is obvious, they no longer regarded him as attached to their party.
_Ralph's History_. Vol. I. p. 657. 709. Note.


Note XX.

_------Cold Caleb. _--P. 234.

Ford, Lord Grey of Wark, described among Absalom's IX worthies as

Chaste Caleb next, whose chill embraces charm
Women to ice, was yet in treason warm;
Of the ancient race of Jewish nobles come,
Whose title never lay in Christendom.

He appears to have been a man of very great indifference to his
domestic concerns; as the Duke of Monmouth, under whose banners he
enlisted himself, was generally believed to have an intrigue with
Lady Grey. In an account of a mock apparition, which that lady is
supposed to witness, she is made to state, "That on Saturday, the 29th
of January, 1680, being alone in her closet about nine o'clock at
night, she heard a voice behind her, which mildly said, _sweetheart_.
At which she was at first not at all frightened, supposing it to be
an apparition, which she says has often of late appeared to her _in
the absence of her lord_, in the shape of a _bright star and blue
garter_, but without hurting, or so much as frightening her. " Lord
Grey, ignorant or indifferent about these scandalous reports, went
step for step with Monmouth in all his projects. He was a man of a
restless temper, and lively talents, which he exercised in the service
of the popular party. He was deep in the Rye-house Plot, and probably
engaged in the very worst part of it; at least, Lord Howard deposed,
that Grey was full of expectation of some great thing to be attempted
on the day of the king's coming from Newmarket, which was that fixed
by the inferior conspirators for his assassination. Upon the trial of
Lord Russel, Howard was yet more particular, and said, that upon a dark
intimation of an attempt on the king's person, the Duke of Monmouth,
"with great emotion, struck his breast, and cried out, 'God so! kill
the king! I will never suffer them. ' That Lord Grey, with an oath,
also observed upon it, that if they made such an attempt, they could
not fail. " Ramsey charged Lord Grey with arguing with Ferguson, on the
project of the rising at Taunton. Grey, on the first discovery of this
conspiracy, was arrested, but, filling the officers drunk, he escaped
in a boat, and fled into Holland. He was afterwards very active in
pushing on Monmouth to his desperate expedition in 1685. He landed with
the duke at Lyme, and held the rank of general of horse in his army.
Like many other politicians, his lordship proved totally devoid of
that courage in executing bold plans, which he displayed in forming or
abetting them. At the first skirmish at Bridport he ran away, although
the troops he commanded did not follow his example, but actually
gained a victory, while he returned on the gallop to announce a total
defeat. Monmouth, much shocked, asked Colonel Mathews what he should do
with him? who answered, he believed there was not another general in
Europe would have asked such a question. Lord Grey, however, fatally
for Monmouth, continued in his trust, and commanded the horse at the
battle of Sedgemore. There he behaved like a poltroon as formerly, fled
with the whole cavalry, and left the foot, who behaved most gallantly,
to be cut to pieces by the horse of King James, who, without amusing
themselves with pursuit, wheeled, and fell upon the rear of the hardy
western peasants. So infamous was Grey's conduct, that many writers at
the time, thinking mere cowardice insufficient to account for it, have
surmised, some, that he was employed by the king to decoy Monmouth to
his destruction; and others, that jealousy of the domestic injury he
had received from the duke, induced him to betray the army. [322] This
caitiff peer was taken in the disguise of a shepherd, near Holt Lodge,
in Dorsetshire; and confessed, that "since his landing in England, he
had never enjoyed a quiet meal, or a night's repose. " He was conveyed
to London, and would probably have been executed, had it not been
discovered, that his estate, which had been given to Lord Rochester,
was so strictly entailed, that nothing could be got by his death. He,
therefore, by the liberal distribution, it is said, of large sums of
money, received a pardon from the king, and appeared as a witness on
the trial of Lord Delamere; and was ready to do so on that of Hampden;
yet he is supposed to have kept some secrets with respect to the
politics of the Prince of Orange, in reward of which, he was raised to
the rank of an Earl after the Revolution. --_Dalrymple's Memoirs_, Vol.
I. p. 185.

Notwithstanding the attribute which Dryden has ascribed to Lord Grey in
this poem, he afterwards proved a man of unprincipled gallantry; and
23d of November, 1682, was tried in the King's Bench for debauching
lady Henrietta Berkeley, daughter of the Earl of Berkeley, to whose
sister, lady Mary, he was himself married. See _State Trials_, Vol.
III. p. 519.


Note XXI

_And canting Nadab let oblivion damn,
Who made new porridge for the paschal lamb. _--P. 234.

Lord Howard of Escricke, although an abandoned debauchee, made
occasional pretensions to piety. He was an intimate of Shaftesbury and
of Monmouth, but detested by Russel on account of the infamy of his
character. Plots, counter-plots, and sham-plots, were at this time
wrought like mine and countermine by each party, under the other's
vantage-ground. One Fitzharris had written a virulent libel against
the court party, which he probably intended to father upon the whigs;
but being seized by Sir William Waller, he changed his note, and
averred, that he had been employed by the court to write this libel,
and to fix it upon the exclusionists; and to this probable story
he added, _ex mera gratia_, a new account of the old Popish Plot.
The court resolved to make an example of Fitzharris; they tried and
convicted him of treason, for the libel fell nothing short of it. When
condemned, finding his sole resource in the mercy of the crown, he
retracted his evidence against the court, and affirmed, that Treby,
the recorder, and Bethel and Cornish, the two sheriffs, had induced
him to forge that accusation; and that Lord Howard was the person who
drew up instructions, pointing out to him what he was to swear, and
urging him so to manage his evidence, as to criminate the Queen and
the Duke of York. The confession of Fitzharris did not save his life,
although he adhered to it upon the scaffold. Lord Howard, as involved
in this criminal intrigue, was sent to the Tower, where he uttered and
published a canting declaration, asserting his innocence, upon the
truth of which he received the sacrament. He is said, however, to have
taken the communion in _lamb's wool_, (_i. e. _ ale poured on roasted
apples and sugar,) to which profanation Dryden alludes, with too much
levity, in the second line above quoted. The circumstance is also
mentioned in "Absalom's IX Worthies:"

Then prophane Nadab, that hates all sacred things,
And on that score abominateth kings;
With Mahomet wine he damneth, with intent
To erect his Paschal-lamb's-wool-sacrament.

Lord Howard was at length set at liberty from the Tower, upon finding
bail, when he engaged under Shaftesbury, and ran into all the excesses
of the party. Being deeply involved in the Rye-house Plot, he fled upon
the discovery of that affair, and was detected in his shirt, covered
with soot, in a chimney; a sordid place of concealment, which well
suited the spirit of the man. A tory ballad-maker has the following
strain of prophetic exultation on Howard's commitment:

Next valiant and noble Lord Howard,
That formerly dealt in lambs-wool;
Who knowing what it is to be towered,
By impeaching may fill the jails full.
_The Conspiracy, or the Discovery of the Fanatic Plot. _

Accustomed to tamper with evidence, Howard did not hesitate to
contaminate the noblest name in England, by practising the meannesses
and villainies he had taught to others. For the sake of his shameful
life, he bore witness against Russel and Sidney to all he knew, and
probably to a great deal more. The former had always hated and despised
Howard, and had only been induced to tolerate his company by the
persuasions of Essex: The recollection, that, by introducing his best
friend to the contagion of such company, he had, in fact, prepared
his ruin, was one of the reasons assigned for that unfortunate peer's
remorse and suicide.


Note XXII.

_Not bull-faced Jonas, who could statutes draw
To mean rebellion, and make treason law. _--P. 234.

Sir William Jones was an excellent lawyer, and, in his private
character, an upright, worthy, and virtuous man; in his religion he
had some tendency to nonconformity, and his political principles were
of the popular cast. He was the king's attorney-general, and as such
conducted all the prosecutions against those concerned in the Popish
plot. He was, or affected to be, so deeply infected by the epidemic
terror excited by this supposed conspiracy, that he had all his billets
removed from his cellar, lest the Papists should throw in fire-balls,
and set his house on fire. He closed, nevertheless, with the court,
in an attempt to prohibit coffee-houses, on account of the facility
which they afforded in propagating faction and scandal; for this, he
was threatened by the country party with an impeachment in parliament.
Sir William Jones shortly after resigned his office under government,
and went into open opposition. He distinguished himself particularly,
by supporting the bill of exclusion, and by a violent speech in the
Oxford parliament, on the subject of the clerk's mislaying the Bill
for repealing the 35th of Elizabeth, an act against dissenters. He was
on his legs, as the phrase is, in the same house, arguing vehemently
on the subject of Fitzharris, when the Black Rod knocked at the door,
to announce the sudden and unexpected dissolution of the parliament.
A well written pamphlet, entitled, "Advice to Grand Juries," which
appeared on the eve of the presentment against Shaftesbury, is said to
have had some effect in producing the ignoramus verdict, on that bill.

Sir William Jones is said to have regretted the share he took in the
prosecutions on account of the plot; which is extremely probable, as
his excellent talents, and sound legal principles, could not fail, when
clamour and alarm were over, to teach him how far he had been misled.
His anxiety for the situation of the country is supposed to have
accelerated his death, which took place in 1682, at Mr Hampden's house,
in Buckingham-shire.


Note XXIII.

_Shimei, whose youth did early promise bring
Of zeal to God, and hatred to his king. _--P. 235.

Slingsby Bethel was son of Sir Walter Bethel, knight, by Mary, daughter
of Sir Henry Slingsby of Scriven, in Yorkshire, and sister to Sir
Henry Slingsby, a steady loyalist, who was condemned by Cromwell's
high court of justice, and beheaded on Towerhill in 1655. Bethel
was early attached to the fanatical interest, both by religious and
political tenets; he was even a member of the Committee of Safety. But
he was a staunch republican, and no friend to the Protector; being,
it is believed, the author of that famous treatise, entitled "The
World's Mistake in Oliver Cromwell. " He was elected sheriff, with
Cornish, on Midsummer-day 1680, and the choice was, in many respects,
disadvantageous to the popular party. In the first place, they were
both Independents; and, before taking upon them their offices, they
conformed, and took the sacrament according to the church of England's
ritual. It was believed, that nothing but the necessity of qualifying
themselves to serve their party in this office, could have prevailed
on them to have done so, and this gave advantages against their whole
party. Besides, Cornish was a downright, plain-spoken republican,
and Bethel had expressed himself very bluntly in justification of
the execution of Charles I. ; and was, therefore, obnoxious to every
slur which the royalists could bring against him, as ill-disposed to
monarchy. Further still, Bethel's extreme and sordid meanness gave
great disgust to the citizens, who were accustomed to consider the
exercise of a splendid and ostentatious hospitality as the principal
part of a sheriff's duty. He kept no table, lived in a chop-house, and,
long afterwards, whoever neglected to entertain during his shrievalty,
was said to "_Bethel_ the city. " Bethel is mentioned among the subjects
of deprecation in "The Loyal Litany:"

From serving great Charles, as his father before;
And disinheriting York, without why or wherefore;
And from such as Absalom has been, or more;
Libera nos, &c.

From Vulcan's treasons, late forged by the fan;
From starving of mice to be parliament-man;
From his copper face, that out-face all things can;
Libera nos, &c.

These two sheriffs first set the example of packing juries, when
persons were to be tried for party offences; for they took the task
of settling the pannels for juries out of the Compters into their
own hands, and left the secondaries of the Compters, who had usually
discharged that duty, only to return the lists, thus previously
made up. In Middlesex, they had the assistance of Goodenough, the
under-sheriff, a bustling and active partizan, who very narrowly
escaped being hanged for the Rye-house Plot. By this selection of
jurymen, the sheriffs insured a certainty of casting such bills as
might be presented to the Grand Jury against any of their partizans.
This practice was so openly avowed, that Settle has ventured to make it
a subject of eulogy:

Next Hethriel write Baal's watchful foe, and late
Jerusalem's protecting magistrate;
Who, when false jurors were to frenzy charmed,
And, against innocence, even tribunals armed,
Saw depraved justice ope her ravenous maw,
And timely broke her canine teeth of law.

The Earl of Shaftesbury himself reaped the advantage of this
manœuvre; which, from the technical word employed in the return of
these bills, was called _Ignoramus_. Stephen Colledge, the Protestant
joiner, also experienced the benefit of a packed jury, though concerned
in all the seditious practices of the time. He was afterwards tried,
condemned, and executed at Oxford, where he was out of the magic
circle of the sheriff's protection; and, though I believe the man
deserved to die, he certainly at last met with hard measure. His
death was supposed to have broke the talisman of Ignoramus, and was
considered as a triumph by the Tories, who, for a long time, had
been unable to persuade a jury to find for the king. [323] When Lord
Stafford was most unjustly condemned, Bethel and his brother sheriff
affected a barbarous scruple, whether the king was entitled to commute
the statutory punishment of high treason into simple decapitation.
The House of Commons ordered that the king's writ be obeyed. This
hard-hearted conduct was an indulgence of their republican humour.
Shortly after, Mr Bethel was found guilty of a riot and assault upon
one of the king's watermen at the election of members of parliament for
Southwark, 5th October, 1681. This person being active in the poll,
Mr Bethel caned him, and told him he would have his coat (the king's
livery) stripped over his ears. For this he was fined five merks.
Bethel, notwithstanding his violence, was so fortunate as to escape
the business of the Rye-house Plot. His brother sheriff, Cornish, was
not so fortunate: He was a plain republican, and highly esteemed by
Lord Russell, for having treated with indifference the apprehension of
the Tower firing on the city, saying, they could only demolish a few
chimneys. He was executed as an accomplice in the Rye-house conspiracy,
upon the evidence of that very Goodenough, who had been his tool in
packing the illegal juries; so that his death seemed a retribution
for dishonouring and perverting the course of justice. James II. was
afterwards satisfied that Cornish had been unjustly executed, and
restored his estate to his family.


Note XXIV.

_Yet Corah, thou shalt from oblivion pass;
Erect thyself, thou monumental brass,
High as the serpent of thy metal made,
While nations stand secure beneath thy shade! _--P. 236.

Titus Oates, once called and believed the Saviour of his country, was
one of the most infamous villains whom history is obliged to record. He
was the son of an anabaptist ribbon-weaver, received a tolerably good
education, and, having taken orders, was preferred to a small vicarage
in Kent. Here the future protestant witness was guilty of various
irregularities, for which he was at length silenced by the bishop, and
by the Duke of Norfolk deprived of his qualification as chaplain. At
this pinching emergency he became a papist, either for bread, or, as
he afterwards boasted, for the purpose of insinuating himself into the
secrets of the Jesuits, and betraying them. [324]

The Jesuits setting little store by their proselyte, whose talents
lay only in cunning and impudence, he skulked about St Omers and
other foreign seminaries in a miserable condition. Undoubtedly he had
then the opportunity of acquiring that list of names of the order of
Jesus with which he graced his plot, and might perhaps hear something
generally of the plans, which these intriguing churchmen hoped to
carry through in England by means of the Duke of York. Of these,
however, he must have had a very imperfect suspicion; for the scheme
which is displayed in the letters of Coleman, the duke's secretary,
does not at all quadrate with the doctor's pretended discovery. When
confronted with Coleman, he did not even know him personally. When the
king asked him about the personal appearance of Don John of Austria,
he described him, at a venture, as a tall thin black man, being the
usual Spanish figure and complexion; but, unfortunately, he was little,
fair, and fat. In a word, it was impossible such a villain could have
obtained a moment's credit, but for the discovery of Coleman's actual
intrigues, the furious temper of the times, and the mysterious death
of Sir Edmondbury Godfrey. On that last occasion he displayed much
dexterity. There was some difficulty in managing the evidence, whether
to bring the assassination to the conspiracy, or the conspiracy to the
assassination; but Oates contrived the matter with such ingenuity,
that the murder became a proof, and the plot became a proof of the
murder, to the universal conviction of the public. As to Oates' other
qualities, he was, like every renegade, a licentious scoffer at
religion, and, in his manners, addicted, it is said, to the most foul
and unnatural debaucheries. When we consider his acts and monuments, it
is almost impossible to believe, how so base a tool should have ever
obtained credit and opportunity to do such mighty mischief. [325]

As for his family, to which Dryden alludes a little below, "he would
needs," says North, "be descended of some ancient and worshipful stock;
but there were not so many noble families strove for him, as there were
cities strove for the _parentele_ of Homer. However, the heralds were
sent for, to make out his pedigree, and give him a blazon. They were
posed at the first of these, but they made good the blazon for him
in a trice, and delivered it _authenticamente_, and it was engraved
on his table and other plate; for he was rich, set up for a solemn
housekeeper, and lived up to his quality. "[326]

Dryden compares Oates to the brazen serpent raised up in the
wilderness, by looking on which, the Israelites were cured of the bites
of the fiery snakes. Sprat had applied the same simile, in a favourable
sense, to Oliver Cromwell:

Thou, as once the healing serpent rose,
Was lifted up, not for thyself, but us.


Note XXV.

_Sunk were his eyes, his voice was harsh and loud;
Sure signs he neither choleric was, nor proud:
His long chin proved his wit; his saint-like grace
A church vermilion, and a Moses' face. _--P. 236.

North has left us some specimens of Oates' peculiar mode of
pronounciation. Bedloe, his brother-witness in the plot, had been
taken ill at Bristol, and, on his death-bed, held some conference with
the Lord Chief-Justice North, then upon a circuit, who took down his
examination, concerning which numerous reports went forth. It proved,
however, to be the same story he had formerly told. Even Dr Oates
himself was disappointed; and was heard to say aloud, as the Lord
Chief-Justice passed through the court on a council-day, at all which
times he was a diligent attendant, "Maay Laird Chaife-Jaistaice, whay
this baisness of Baidlaw caims to naithaing. " But his Lordship walked
on without attending to his discourse. [327]

In personal appearance North informs us, that "he was a low man, of
an ill-cut very short neck; and his visage and features were most
particular. His mouth was the centre of his face, and a compass there
would sweep his nose, forehead, and chin, within the perimeter. _Cave
quos Deus ipse notavit. _"[328] An engraving of the doctor, now before
me, bears witness to this last peculiarity, and does justice to the
cherubic plenitude of countenance and chin mentioned in the text. It
is drawn and engraved by Richard White, and bears to be "the true
originall, taken from the life, done for Henry Brome and Richard
Chiswel; all others are counterfeit. "

As the doctor's portrait is not now quite so common as when the
lady, mentioned in the Spectator, wore it upon her fan, gloves, and
handkerchief, the curious reader may be pleased to be informed, that
this "true original" is prefixed to "The Witch of Endor, or the
Witchcrafts of the Roman Jezebel, by Titus Oates, D. D. folio 1679. "
It is dedicated to the Earl of Shaftesbury, &c. ; "the Publisher's
affectionate good friend, and singular good Lord. "


Note XXVI.

_And gave him his rabinical degree,
Unknown to foreign university. _--P. 237.

Oates pretended to have taken his doctor's degree at Salamanca, where
it is shrewdly suspected he never was; at least where he certainly
never took orders. The Tory libels of the time contain innumerable
girds concerning this degree. There is, in the Luttrel Collection,
"An Address from Salamanca to her (unknown) offspring, Dr T. O. "
Dryden often alludes to the circumstance; thus, in the epilogue to
"Mithridates," acted 1681-2,

Shall we take orders? that will parts require;
Our colleges give no degrees for hire. --
Would Salamanca were a little nigher!


Note XXVII.

_And Corah might for Agag's murder call,
In terms as coarse as Samuel used to Saul. _--P. 237.

In the first book of Samuel, chap. xv. , the reader will find the
reproaches with which that prophet loaded Saul, for sparing, contrary
to God's commandment, Agag, king of the Amalekites; concluding with the
awful denunciation, that for his disobedience the Lord had rejected him
from being king over Israel.

Agag's murder is to be understood of the mysterious death of Sir
Edmondbury Godfrey. This gentleman was an active justice of peace, and
had been knighted by Charles II. , on account of his exertions during
the fire of London. In other respects, he was low-spirited, and rather
a timorous man, and, in the exercise of his office, favourable to
the Catholics. Oates, finding the information he had lodged with the
ministers concerning the Popish plot rather less ardently listened
to than he expected, chose to utter before this magistrate a full
declaration on the subject upon oath. His intention was probably
to make the matter as public as possible. Godfrey expressed much
unwillingness to have any thing to do with the matter at all; and
when he had heard the story out, expressed to his friends his fear
that he should have no thanks for his pains, but would probably be
the first martyr. This strange, and one would think absurd, boding
proved too true; after having been missing for several days, this
unfortunate man was found lying in a ditch, near Primrose-hill. There
were marks of strangling round his neck; and although his own sword
was thrust through his body, yet it turned out to have been done after
death. His money and rings were safe; robbery was therefore out of the
question. This murder ever will remain among the riddles of history.
Three opinions have been entertained: 1st, North does not hesitate to
affirm, that the contrivers and abettors of the plot murdered this poor
man, to give some colour to the story of the bloody machinations of
the Papists: But this seems too strange and desperate a course to be
imputed to the opposition party at large without some positive proof;
and as for Oates and his brother witnesses, (whom we will not injure
by suspecting them capable of remorseful, or compunctious visitings,)
their steps were, at this time, too much the object of observation to
admit of their executing so bloody a plan with the necessary degree of
secrecy. 2d, It has been thought that Godfrey, a man of a melancholy
temperament, whose dark and cloudy spirit had been just agitated by a
strange tale of blood and mystery, may have been wrought up to take
that time to commit suicide. It is even positively asserted, that he
hanged himself at home, and that his brothers conveyed the body to the
place where it was found, to avoid the shame and other consequences
of his fate becoming public. There is something plausible in this
account; but it is entirely unsupported by proof of any kind. 3d, The
grand solution, and indeed the only one which would go down at the
time, was, that Godfrey had fallen by the papists. There were probably
enough of fanatics in that sect to have executed such a deed, had
it been of consequence to the progress of their religion: But there
appears no adequate motive for taking off Godfrey, who had merely taken
down a deposition which he could not refuse to receive, and who had
besides endeavoured to serve the accused parties, by transmitting to
Coleman an account of the affidavit; while Oates and his companions,
the depositaries of the supposed secret, and whose death would stifle
the plot for ever, were suffered to walk about, even unattempted.
Positive evidence was however obtained, to silence all hypothetical
reasoning on the subject. One Bedlow, a very infamous character, amid
a thousand dreadful stories of fires raised by the Jesuits from 1666
downwards, charged the Catholics, and particularly Miles Prance, a
silver-smith, with the death of Godfrey[329].