The Works of John Dryden, now first collected in eighteen volumes. Volume 09

by John Dryden

RECOMMENDATORY VERSES.

The following Recommendatory Verses, Dryden thought worthy of being prefixed to the later editions of his "Absalom and Achitophel," for which reason they are here retained. It will be observed, that they all mention the author as unknown. This, however, we are not to understand literally; since it is obvious, from the contemporary libels, that Dryden was well known for the author. But, till he placed his name in the title page, his friends were not to affect to know more than that told them; as it is impolite to recognize a person who affects a disguise.

TO
THE UNKNOWN AUTHOR
OF THIS EXCELLENT POEM.

Take it as earnest of a faith renewed,

Your theme is vast, your verse divinely good:

}

{ Where, though the Nine their beauteous stroaks repeat,

{ And the turned lines on golden anvils beat,

{ It looks as if they strook them at a heat.

}

{ So all serenely great, so just refined,

{ Like angels love to humane seed enclined,

{ It starts a giant, and exalts the kind.

'Tis spirit seen, whose fiery atoms roul,

So brightly fierce, each syllable's a soul.

'Tis miniature of man, but he's all heart;

'Tis what the world would be, but wants the art;

To whom even the Phanatics altars raise,

Bow in their own despite, and grin your praise.

As if a Milton from the dead arose,

Filed off the rust, and the right party chose.

Nor, Sir, be shocked at what the gloomy say,

Turn not your feet too inward, nor too splay.

'Tis gracious all, and great; push on your theme,

Lean your grieved head on David's diadem.

David, that rebel Israel's envy moved,

David, by God and all good men beloved.

The beauties of your Absalom excell;

But more the charms of charming Annabel;

Of Annabel, than May's first morn more bright,

Chearfull as summer's noon, and chast as winter's night.

Of Annabel the muses dearest theme,

Of Annabel the angel of my dream.

Thus let a broken eloquence attend,

And to your master-piece these shadows send.

---

TO
THE UNKNOWN AUTHOR
OF THIS ADMIRABLE POEM.

I thought,—forgive my sin,—the boasted fire

Of poets' souls did long ago expire;

Of folly or of madness did accuse

The wretch that thought himself possest with muse;

Laughed at the God within, that did inspire

With more than human thoughts the tuneful quire;

But sure 'tis more than fancy, or the dream

Of rhimers slumbring by the muses stream.

Some livelier spark of heaven, and more refined

From earthly dross, fills the great poet's mind.

Witness these mighty and immortal lines,

Through each of which th' informing genius shines.

Scarce a diviner flame inspired the king,

Of whom thy muse does so sublimely sing.

Not David's self could in a nobler verse

His gloriously offending son rehearse,

Though in his breast the prophet's fury met

The father's fondness, and the poet's wit.

Here all consent in wonder and in praise,

And to the unknown poet altars raise.

Which thou must needs accept with equal joy,

As when Ænæas heard the wars of Troy,

Wrapt up himself in darkness and unseen,

Extolled with wonder by the Tyrian Queen.

Sure thou already art secure of fame,

Nor want'st new glories to exalt thy name;

What father else would have refused to own

So great a son as god-like Absalon? R. D.

---

TO
THE CONCEALED AUTHOR
OF THIS INCOMPARABLE POEM.

Hail heaven-born muse! hail every sacred page!

The glory of our isle and of our age.

}

{ The inspiring sun to Albion draws more nigh,

{ The north at length teems with a work to vie

{ With Homer's flame and Virgil's majesty.

}

{ While Pindus lofty heights our poet sought,

{ (His ravisht mind with vast ideas fraught,)

{ Our language failed beneath his rising thought;

}

{ This checks not his attempt, for Maro's mines,

{ He drains of all their gold t'adorn his lines;

{ Through each of which the Mantuan Genius shines.

The rock obeyed the powerful Hebrew guide,

Her flinty breast, dissolved into a tide;

Thus on our stubborn language he prevails,

And makes the Helicon in which he sails.

The dialect, as well as sense, invents,

And, with his poem, a new speech presents.

Hail then thou matchless bard, thou great unknown,

That give your country fame, yet shun your own!

In vain—for every where your praise you find,

And not to meet it, you must shun mankind.

}

{ Your loyal theme each loyal reader draws,

{ And even the factious give your verse applause,

{ Whose lightning strikes to ground their idol cause.

The cause for whose dear sake they drank a flood

Of civil gore, nor spared the royal-blood;

The cause whose growth to crush, our prelates wrote

In vain, almost in vain our Heroes fought.

Yet by one stab of your keen satyr dies;

Before your sacred lines their shattered Dagon lies.

Oh! If unworthy we appear to know

The sire, to whom this lovely birth we owe;

Denyed our ready homage to express,

And can at best but thankfull be by guess;

This hope remains,—May David's god-like mind,

(For him 'twas wrote) the unknown author find;

And, having found, shower equal favours down,

On wit so vast as could oblige a crown. N. T.

Some scribbler of the day also, thinking Dryden's meaning not sufficiently clear, wrote "Absalon's ix worthies, or a key to a late book, or poem, entitled AB, and AC," marked by Mr Luttrell, as bought, 10 March 1682-3. It concludes with the following address.

---

TO THE
AUTHOR OF THAT INCOMPARABLE POEM
ABOVE MENTIONED.

Homer, amazed, resigns the hill to you,

And stands i'the crowd, amidst the panting crew;

Virgil and Horace dare not shew their face,

And long admired Juv'nal quits his place;

For this one mighty poem hath done more

Than all those poets could have done before.

Satyr, or statesman, poet, or divine,

Thou any thing, thou every thing thats fine,

Thy lines will make young Absalon relent;

And, though 'tis hard, Achitophel repent;

And stop—as thou has done——

Thus once thy rival muse, on Cooper's hill,

With the true story would not Fatme[220] kill.

No politics exclude repentance quite;

Despair makes rebels obstinately fight;

'Tis well when errors do for mercy call;

Unbloody conquests are the best of all.

Methinks I see a numerous mixed croud

Of seduced patriots crying out aloud

For grace, to royal David. He, with tears,

Holds forth his sceptre, to prevent their fears,

And bids them welcome to his tender breast:

Thus may the people, thus the king be blest.

Then tunes his harp, thy praises to rehearse,

Who owes his son and subjects to thy verse.

---

ABSALOM
AND
ACHITOPHEL.

---

In pious times, ere priestcraft did begin,

Before polygamy was made a sin;

When man on many multiplied his kind,

Ere one to one was cursedly confined;

When nature prompted, and no law denied,

Promiscuous use of concubine and bride;

Then Israel's monarch[221] after heaven's own heart,

His vigorous warmth did variously impart

To wives and slaves; and, wide as his command,

Scattered his Maker's image through the land.

Michal, of royal blood, the crown did wear,[222]

A soil ungrateful to the tiller's care.

Not so the rest; for several mothers bore

To god-like David several sons before.

But since like slaves his bed they did ascend,

No true succession could their seed attend.

Of all the[223] numerous progeny was none

So beautiful, so brave, as Absalon;[224]

Whether inspired by[225] by some diviner lust,

His father got him with a greater gust;

Or that his conscious destiny made way,

By manly beauty, to imperial sway.

Early in foreign fields he won renown,

With kings and states, allied to Israel's crown;

In peace the thoughts of war he could remove,

And seemed as he were only born for love.

Whate'er he did, was done with so much ease,

In him alone twas natural to please;

His motions all accompanied with grace,

And paradise was opened in his face.

With secret joy indulgent David viewed

His youthful image in his son renewed;

To all his wishes nothing he denied,

And made the charming Annabel his bride.[226]

What faults he had,—for who from faults is free?

His father could not, or he would not see.

Some warm excesses, which the law forbore,

Were construed youth that purged by boiling o'er;

And Amnon's murder, by a specious name,

Was called a just revenge for injured fame.[227]

Thus praised and loved, the noble youth remained,

While David undisturbed in Sion reigned.

But life can never be sincerely blest;

Heaven punishes the bad, and proves the best.

The Jews, a headstrong, moody, murmuring race,

As ever tried the extent and stretch of grace;

God's pampered people, whom, debauched with ease,

No king could govern, nor no God could please;

Gods they had tried of every shape and size,

That godsmiths could produce, or priests devise;

These Adam-wits, too fortunately free,

Began to dream they wanted liberty;

And when no rule, no precedent was found,

Of men, by laws less circumscribed and bound;

They led their wild desires to woods and caves,

And thought that all but savages were slaves.

They who, when Saul[228] was dead, without a blow,

Made foolish Ishbosheth[229] the crown forego;

Who banished David[230] did from Hebron[231] bring,

And with a general shout proclaimed him king;

Those very Jews, who at their very best,

Their humour more than loyalty exprest,

Now wondered why so long they had obeyed

An idol monarch, which their hands had made;

Thought they might ruin him they could create,

Or melt him to that golden calf,—a state.

But these were random bolts; no formed design,

Nor interest made the factious crowd to join:

The sober part of Israel, free from stain,

Well knew the value of a peaceful reign;

And, looking backward with a wise affright,

Saw seams of wounds dishonest to the sight;

In contemplation of whose ugly scars,

They curst the memory of civil wars.

The moderate sort of men, thus qualified,

Inclined the balance to the better side;

And David's mildness managed it so well,

The bad found no occasion to rebel.

But when to sin our biassed nature leans,

The careful devil is still at hand with means,

And providently pimps for ill desires;

The good old cause, revived, a plot requires.

Plots, true or false, are necessary things,

To raise up commonwealths, and ruin kings.

The inhabitants of old Jerusalem[232]

Were Jebusites[233]; the town so called from them;

And theirs the native right.——

But when the chosen people grew more strong,

The rightful cause at length became the wrong;

And every loss the men of Jebus bore,

They still were thought God's enemies the more.

Thus worn or[234] weakened, well or ill content,

Submit they must to David's government;

Impoverished and deprived of all command,

Their taxes doubled as they lost their land;

And, what was harder yet to flesh and blood,

Their gods disgraced, and burnt like common wood.

This set the heathen priesthood in a flame;

For priests of all religions are the same.

Of whatsoe'er descent their godhead be,

Stock, stone, or other homely pedigree,

In his defence his servants are as bold,

As if he had been born of beaten gold.

The Jewish rabbins, though their enemies,

In this conclude them honest men and wise;

For 'twas their duty, all the learned think,

To espouse his cause, by whom they eat and drink.

From hence began that plot, the nation's curse,

Bad in itself, but represented worse;[235]

Raised in extremes, and in extremes decried;

With oaths affirmed, with dying vows denied;

Not weighed nor winnowed by the multitude,

But swallowed in the mass, unchewed and crude.

Some truth there was, but dashed and brewed with lies,

To please the fools, and puzzle all the wise.

Succeeding times did equal folly call,

Believing nothing, or believing all.

The Egyptian rites the Jebusites embraced,

Where gods were recommended by their taste.

Such savoury deities must needs be good,

As served at once for worship and for food.[236]

By force they could not introduce these gods,—

For ten to one in former days was odds,—

So fraud was used, the sacrificer's trade;

Fools are more hard to conquer than persuade.

Their busy teachers mingled with the Jews,

And raked for converts even the court and stews;

Which Hebrew priests the more unkindly took,

Because the fleece accompanies the flock.

Some thought they God's anointed meant to slay

By guns, invented since full many a day:

Our author swears it not; but who can know

How far the devil and Jebusites may go?[237]

This plot, which failed for want of common sense,

Had yet a deep and dangerous consequence;

For as, when raging fevers boil the blood,

The standing lake soon floats into a flood,

And every hostile humour, which before

Slept quiet in its channels, bubbles o'er;

So several factions, from this first ferment,

Work up to foam, and threat the government.

Some by their friends, more by themselves thought wise,

Opposed the power to which they could not rise;

Some had in courts been great, and, thrown from thence,

Like fiends, were hardened in impenitence;

Some, by their monarch's fatal mercy, grown

From pardoned rebels kinsmen to the throne,

Were raised in power and public office high;

Strong bands, if bands ungrateful men could tie.

Of these the false Achitophel[238] was first;

A name to all succeeding ages curst:

For close designs, and crooked counsels fit;

Sagacious, bold, and turbulent of wit;

Restless, unfixed in principles and place;

In power unpleased, impatient of disgrace;

}

{ A fiery soul, which, working out its way,

{ Fretted the pigmy-body to decay,

{ And o'er-informed the tenement of clay;

A daring pilot in extremity;

Pleased with the danger, when the waves went high

He sought the storms; but, for a calm unfit,

Would steer too nigh the sands, to boast his wit.

Great wits are sure to madness near allied,

And thin partitions do their bounds divide;

Else, why should he, with wealth and honour blest,

Refuse his age the needful hours of rest?

Punish a body which he could not please;

Bankrupt of life, yet prodigal of ease?

And all to leave what with his toil he won,

To that unfeathered two-legged thing, a son;[239]

Got, while his soul did huddled notions try;

And born a shapeless lump, like anarchy.

In friendship false, implacable in hate;

Resolved to ruin, or to rule the state.

}

{ To compass this the triple bond he broke;

{ The pillars of the public safety shook;

{ And fitted Israel for a foreign yoke;[240]

Then, seized with fear, yet still affecting fame,

Usurped a patriot's all-atoning name.[241]

So easy still it proves in factious times,

With public zeal to cancel private crimes.

How safe is treason, and how sacred ill,

Where none can sin against the people's will?

Where crowds can wink, and no offence be known,

Since in another's guilt they find their own?

Yet fame deserved no enemy can grudge;

The statesman we abhor, but praise the judge.

In Israel's courts ne'er sat an Abethdin[242]

With more discerning eyes, or hands more clean,

Unbribed, unsought, the wretched to redress;

Swift of dispatch, and easy of access.

Oh! had he been content to serve the crown,

With virtue only proper to the gown;

Or had the rankness of the soil been freed

From cockle, that oppressed the noble seed;

David for him his tuneful harp had strung,

And heaven had wanted one immortal song.

But wild ambition loves to slide, not stand,

And fortune's ice prefers to virtue's land.

Achitophel, grown weary to possess

A lawful fame, and lazy happiness,

Disdained the golden fruit to gather free,

And lent the crowd his arm to shake the tree.

Now, manifest of crimes contrived long since,

He stood at bold defiance with his prince;

Held up the buckler of the people's cause

Against the crown, and skulked behind the laws.[243]

The wished occasion of the plot he takes;

Some circumstances finds, but more he makes;

By buzzing emissaries, fills the ears

Of listening crowds with jealousies and fears,

Of arbitrary counsels brought to light,

And proves the king himself a Jebusite.

Weak arguments! which yet, he knew full well,

Were strong with people easy to rebel.

For, governed by the moon, the giddy Jews

Tread the same track when she the prime renews;

And once in twenty years their scribes record,

By natural instinct they change their lord.

Achitophel still wants a chief, and none

Was found so fit as warlike Absalon.

Not that he wished his greatness to create,

For politicians neither love nor hate;

But, for he knew his title not allowed,

Would keep him still depending on the crowd;

That kingly power, thus ebbing out, might be

Drawn to the dregs of a democracy.

Him he attempts with studied arts to please,

And sheds his venom in such words as these.

Auspicious prince, at whose nativity

Some royal planet ruled the southern sky;

Thy longing country's darling and desire;

Their cloudy pillar and their guardian fire;

Their second Moses, whose extended wand

Divides[244] the seas, and shews the promised land;

Whose dawning day, in every distant age,

Has exercised the sacred prophet's rage;

The people's prayer, the glad diviner's theme,

The young men's vision, and the old men's dream!

Thee, Saviour, thee the nation's vows confess,

And, never satisfied with seeing, bless;

Swift unbespoken pomps thy steps proclaim,

And stammering babes are taught to lisp thy name.

How long wilt thou the general joy detain,

Starve and defraud the people of thy reign;

Content ingloriously to pass thy days,

Like one of virtue's fools that feed on praise;

'Till thy fresh glories, which now shine so bright,

Grow stale, and tarnish with our daily sight?

Believe me, royal youth, thy fruit must be

Or gathered ripe, or rot upon the tree.

Heaven has to all allotted, soon or late,

Some lucky revolution of their fate;

Whose motions if we watch and guide with skill,

(For human good depends on human will,)

Our fortune rolls as from a smooth descent,

And from the first impression takes the bent;

But, if unseized, she glides away like wind,

And leaves repenting folly far behind.

Now, now she meets you with a glorious prize,

And spreads her locks before you as she flies.

Had thus old David, from whose loins you spring,

Not dared, when fortune called him, to be king,

At Gath[245] an exile he might still remain,

And heaven's anointing oil had been in vain.

Let his successful youth your hopes engage;

But shun the example of declining age:

Behold him setting in his western skies,

The shadows lengthening as the vapours rise.

}

{ He is not now, as when, on Jordan's[246] sand,

{ The joyful people thronged to see him land,

{ Covering the beach and blackening all the strand;

But, like the prince of angels, from his height

Comes tumbling downward with diminished light;

Betrayed by one poor plot to public scorn,

Our only blessing since his curst return;

Those heaps of people which one sheaf did bind,

Blown off and scattered by a puff of wind.

What strength can he to your designs oppose,

Naked of friends, and round beset with foes?

If Pharaoh's[247] doubtful succour he should use,

A foreign aid would more incense the Jews;

Proud Egypt[248] would dissembled friendship bring;

Foment the war, but not support the king:

Nor would the royal party e'er unite

With Pharaoh's arms, to assist the Jebusite;

Or, if they should, their interest soon would break,

And with such odious aid make David weak.

All sorts of men, by my successful arts

Abhorring kings, estrange their altered hearts

From David's rule; and 'tis their general cry,

Religion, commonwealth, and liberty.

If you, as champion of the public good,

Add to their arms a chief of royal blood,

What may not Israel hope, and what applause

Might such a general gain by such a cause?

Not barren praise alone, that gaudy flower

Fair only to the sight, but solid power;

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.[249]

What cannot praise effect in mighty minds,

When flattery sooths, and when ambition blinds?

Desire of power, on earth a vicious weed,

Yet, sprung from high, is of celestial seed;

In God 'tis glory; and when men aspire,

'Tis but a spark too much of heavenly fire.

The ambitious youth, too covetous of fame,

Too full of angel's metal in his frame,

Unwarily was led from virtue's ways,

Made drunk with honour, and debauched with praise.

Half loath, and half consenting to the ill,—

For royal blood within him struggled still,—

He thus replied.—And what pretence have I

To take up arms for public liberty?

My father governs with unquestioned right,

The faith's defender, and mankind's delight;

Good, gracious, just, observant of the laws;

And heaven by wonders has espoused his cause.

Whom has he wronged in all his peaceful reign?

Who sues for justice to his throne in vain?

What millions has he pardoned of his foes,

Whom just revenge did to his wrath expose?

Mild, easy, humble, studious of our good,

Inclined to mercy, and averse from blood.

If mildness ill with stubborn Israel suit,

His crime is God's beloved attribute.

What could he gain his people to betray,

Or change his right for arbitrary sway?

Let haughty Pharaoh curse with such a reign

His fruitful Nile, and yoke a servile train.

If David's rule Jerusalem displease,

The dog-star heats their brains to this disease.

Why then should I, encouraging the bad,

Turn rebel, and run popularly mad?

Were he a tyrant, who by lawless might

Oppressed the Jews, and raised the Jebusite,

Well might I mourn; but nature's holy bands

Would curb my spirits, and restrain my hands:

The people might assert their liberty;

But what was right in them were crime in me.

His favour leaves me nothing to require,

Prevents my wishes, and out-runs desire.

What more can I expect while David lives?

All but his kingly diadem he gives;

And that—But there he paused; then sighing, said—

Is justly destined for a worthier head;

For, when my father from his toils shall rest,

And late augment the number of the blest,

His lawful issue shall the throne ascend,

Or the collateral line, where that shall end.

His brother, though oppressed with vulgar spite,[250]

Yet dauntless, and secure of native right,

Of every royal virtue stands possest;

Still dear to all the bravest and the best.

His courage foes, his friends his truth proclaim;

His loyalty the king, the world his fame.

His mercy even the offending crowd will find;

For sure he comes of a forgiving kind.

Why should I then repine at heaven's decree,

Which gives me no pretence to royalty?

Yet oh that fate, propitiously inclined,

Had raised my birth, or had debased my mind;

To my large soul not all her treasure lent,

And then betrayed it to a mean descent!

I find, I find my mounting spirits bold,

And David's part disdains my mother's mould.

Why am I scanted by a niggard birth?

My soul disclaims the kindred of her earth;

And, made for empire, whispers me within,

Desire of greatness is a god-like sin.

Him staggering so, when hell's dire agent found,

While fainting virtue scarce maintained her ground,

He pours fresh forces in, and thus replies:

The eternal God, supremely good and wise,

Imparts not these prodigious gifts in vain.

What wonders are reserved to bless your reign!

Against your will your arguments have shown,

Such virtue's only given to guide a throne.

Not that your father's mildness I contemn;

But manly force becomes the diadem.

'Tis true, he grants the people all they crave;

And more, perhaps, than subjects ought to have;

For lavish grants suppose a monarch tame,

And more his goodness than his wit proclaim:

But when should people strive their bonds to break,

If not when kings are negligent, or weak?

Let him give on till he can give no more,

The thrifty sanhedrim shall keep him poor;

And every shekel, which he can receive,

Shall cost a limb of his prerogative.

To ply him with new plots shall be my care,

Or plunge him deep in some expensive war;

Which when his treasure can no more supply,

He must, with the remains of kingship, buy.

His faithful friends, our jealousies and fears

Call Jebusites, and Pharaoh's pensioners;

Whom when our fury from his aid has torn,

He shall be naked left to public scorn.

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.[251]

His right, for sums of necessary gold,

Shall first be pawned, and afterwards be sold;

'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.

All empire is no more than power in trust,

Which, when resumed, can be no longer just.

Succession, for the general good designed,

In its own wrong a nation cannot bind;

If altering that the people can relieve,

Better one suffer than a nation grieve.

The Jews well know their power; ere Saul[252] they chose,

God was their king, and God they durst depose.

Urge now your piety, your filial name,

A father's right, and fear of future fame;—

The public good, that universal call,

To which even heaven submitted, answers all.

Nor let his love enchant your generous mind;

'Tis nature's trick to propagate her kind.

Our fond begetters, who would never die,

Love but themselves in their posterity.

Or let his kindness by the effects be tried,

Or let him lay his vain pretence aside.

God said, he loved your father; could he bring

A better proof, than to anoint him king?

It surely shewed he loved the shepherd well,

Who gave so fair a flock as Israel.

Would David have you thought his darling son?

What means he then to alienate the crown?

The name of godly he may blush to bear;

Is't[253] after God's own heart to cheat his heir?

He to his brother gives supreme command,

To you a legacy of barren land;

Perhaps the old harp, on which he thrums his lays,

Or some dull Hebrew ballad in your praise.

Then the next heir, a prince severe and wise,

Already looks on you with jealous eyes;[254]

Sees through the thin disguises of your arts,

And marks your progress in the people's hearts;

Though now his mighty soul its grief contains,

He meditates revenge who least complains;

And like a lion, slumbering in the way,

Or sleep dissembling, while he waits his prey,

His fearless foes within his distance draws,

Constrains his roaring, and contracts his paws;

'Till, at the last, his time for fury found,

He shoots with sudden vengeance from the ground;

The prostrate vulgar passes o'er and spares,

But with a lordly rage his hunters tears.

Your case no tame expedients will afford;

Resolve on death, or conquest by the sword,

Which for no less a stake than life you draw;

And self defence is nature's eldest law.

Leave the warm people no considering time;

For then rebellion may be thought a crime.

Avail[255] yourself of what occasion gives,

But try your title while your father lives;

And that your arms may have a fair pretence,

Proclaim you take them in the kings defence;

Whose sacred life each minute would expose

To plots, from seeming friends, and secret foes.

And who can sound the depth of David's soul?[256]

Perhaps his fear his kindness may controul.

He fears his brother, though he loves his son,

For plighted vows too late to be undone.

If so, by force he wishes to be gained;

Like women's lechery to seem constrained.

Doubt not; but, when he most affects the frown,

Commit a pleasing rape upon the crown.

Secure his person to secure your cause;

They, who possess the prince, possess the laws.

He said, and this advice, above the rest,

With Absalom's mild nature suited best;

Unblamed of life, ambition set aside,

Not stained with cruelty, not puft with pride.

How happy had he been, if destiny

Had higher placed his birth, or not so high!

His kingly virtues might have claimed a throne,

And blest all other countries but his own;

But charming greatness since so few refuse,

'Tis juster to lament him than accuse.

Strong were his hopes a rival to remove,

With blandishments to gain the public love;

To head the faction while their zeal was hot,

And popularly prosecute the plot.

To further this, Achitophel unites

The malcontents of all the Israelites;

Whose differing parties he could wisely join,

For several ends, to serve the same design.

The best,—and of the princes some were such,

Who thought the power of monarchy too much;

Mistaken men, and patriots in their hearts;

Not wicked, but seduced by impious arts.

By these the springs of property were bent,

And wound so high, they cracked the government.

The next for interest sought to embroil the state,

To sell their duty at a dearer rate,

And make their Jewish markets of the throne;

Pretending public good, to serve their own.

Others thought kings an useless heavy load,

Who cost too much, and did too little good.

These were for laying honest David by,

On principles of pure good husbandry.[257]

With them joined all the haranguers of the throng;

That thought to get preferment by the tongue.

Who follow next a double danger bring,

Not only hating David, but the king;

The Solymæan rout; well versed, of old,

In godly faction, and in treason bold;

Cowring and quaking at a conqueror's sword,

But lofty to a lawful prince restored;

Saw with disdain an Ethnic plot begun,

And scorned by Jebusites to be outdone.

Hot Levites[258] headed these; who, pulled before

From the ark, which in the judges' days they bore,[259]

Resumed their cant, and, with a zealous cry,

Pursued their old beloved theocracy;

Where sanhedrim and priest enslaved the nation,

And justified their spoils by inspiration.

For who so fit to reign as Aaron's race,

If once dominion they could found in grace?

These led the pack; though not of surest scent,

Yet deepest mouthed against the government.

A numerous host of dreaming saints succeed,

Of the true old enthusiastic breed;

'Gainst form and order they their power employ,

Nothing to build, and all things to destroy.

But far more numerous was the herd of such,

Who think too little, and who talk too much.

These out of mere instinct, they knew not why,

Adored their fathers' God, and property;

And, by the same blind benefit of fate,

The devil and the Jebusite did hate;

Born to be saved, even in their own despite.

Because they could not help believing right.

Such were the tools; but a whole Hydra more

Remains of sprouting heads too long to score.

Some of their chiefs were princes of the land:

In the first rank of these did Zimri[260] stand;

A man so various, that he seemed to be

Not one, but all mankind's epitome;

Stiff in opinions, always in the wrong,

Was every thing by starts, and nothing long;

But, in the course of one revolving moon,

Was chemist, fidler, statesman, and buffoon;

Then all for women, painting, rhyming, drinking,

Besides ten thousand freaks that died in thinking.

Blest madman, who could every hour employ,

With something new to wish, or to enjoy!

Railing and praising were his usual themes;

And both, to shew his judgment, in extremes;

So over violent, or over civil,

That every man with him was God or devil.

In squandering wealth was his peculiar art;

Nothing went unrewarded but desert.

Beggared by fools, whom still he found too late;

He had his jest, and they had his estate.

He laughed himself from court; then sought relief

By forming parties, but could ne'er be chief;

For, spite of him, the weight of business fell

On Absalom, and wise Achitophel;

Thus, wicked but in will, of means bereft,

He left not faction, but of that was left.

Titles and names 'twere tedious to rehearse

Of lords, below the dignity of verse.

Wits, warriors, commonwealths-men, were the best;

Kind husbands, and mere nobles, all the rest.

And therefore, in the name of dulness, be

The well-hung Balaam and cold Caleb free;

And canting Nadab let oblivion damn,[261]

Who made new porridge for the paschal lamb.

Let friendship's holy band some names assure;

Some their own worth, and some let scorn secure.

Nor shall the rascal rabble here have place,

Whom kings no titles gave, and God no grace:

Not bull-faced Jonas,[262] who could statutes draw

To mean rebellion, and make treason law.

But he, though bad, is followed by a worse,

The wretch, who heaven's anointed dared to curse;

Shimei,[263]—whose youth did early promise bring

Of zeal to God, and hatred to his king,—

Did wisely from expensive sins refrain,

And never broke the sabbath but for gain:

Nor ever was he known an oath to vent,

Or curse, unless against a government.

Thus heaping wealth, by the most ready way

Among the jews, which was—to cheat and pray;

The city, to reward his pious hate

Against his master, chose him magistrate.

His hand a vase of justice did uphold;

His neck was loaded with a chain of gold.

During his office treason was no crime;

The sons of Belial had a glorious time:

For Shimei, though not prodigal of pelf,

Yet loved his wicked neighbour as himself.

}

{ When two or three were gathered to declaim

{ Against the monarch of Jerusalem,

{ Shimei was always in the midst of them:

And, if they cursed the king when he was by,

Would rather curse than break good company.

If any durst his factious friends accuse,

He packed a jury of dissenting jews;[264]

Whose fellow-feeling in the Godly cause

Would free the suffering saint from human laws:

For laws are only made to punish those

Who serve the king, and to protect his foes.

If any leisure time he had from power,—

Because 'tis sin to misemploy an hour,—

His business was, by writing, to persuade,

That kings were useless, and a clog to trade:[265]

And, that his noble style he might refine,

No Rechabite more shunned the fumes of wine.

Chaste were his cellars, and his shrieval board

The grossness of a city-feast abhorred.

His cooks, with long disuse, their trade forgot;

Cool was his kitchen, though his brains were hot.

Such frugal virtue malice may accuse;

But sure 'twas necessary to the Jews:

For towns, once burnt, such magistrates require,

As dare not tempt God's providence by fire.

With spiritual food he fed his servants well,

But free from flesh, that made the Jews rebel:

And Moses' laws he held in more account,

For forty days of fasting in the mount.

To speak the rest, (who better are forgot,)

Would tire a well-breathed witness of the plot.

Yet Corah,[266] 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!

What though his birth were base, yet comets rise

From earthy vapours, ere they shine in skies.

Prodigious actions may as well be done

By weaver's issue, as by prince's son.

This arch-attestor for the public good

By that one deed ennobles all his blood.

Who ever asked the witnesses high race,

Whose oath with martyrdom did Stephen grace?

Ours was a Levite, and, as times went then,

His tribe were God Almighty's gentlemen.

Sure signs he neither choleric was, nor proud:

His long chin proved his wit; his saint-like grace

A church vermillion, and a Moses' face.

His memory, miraculously great,

Could plots, exceeding man's belief, repeat;

Which therefore cannot be accounted lies,

For human wit could never such devise.

Some future truths are mingled in his book;

But where the witness failed the prophet spoke:

Some things like visionary flight appear;

The spirit caught him up,—the Lord knows where,

And gave him his rabinical degree,

Unknown to foreign university.[268]

His judgment yet his memory did excel;

Which pieced his wonderous evidence so well,

And suited to the temper of the times,

Then groaning under Jebusitic crimes.

Let Israel's foes suspect his heavenly call,

And rashly judge his writ apocryphal;

Our laws for such affronts have forfeits made:

He takes his life, who takes away his trade.

Were I myself in witness Corah's place,

The wretch, who did me such a dire disgrace,

Should whet my memory, though once forgot,

To make him an appendix of my plot.

His zeal to heaven made him his prince despise,

And load his person with indignities.

But zeal peculiar privilege affords,

Indulging latitude to deeds and words:

And Corah might for Agag's[269] murder call,

In terms as coarse as Samuel used to Saul.

What others in his evidence did join,

The best that could be had for love or coin,

In Corah's own predicament will fall:

For witness is a common name to all.

Surrounded thus with friends of every sort,

Deluded Absalom forsakes the court;

Impatient of high hopes, urged with renown,

And fired with near possession of a crown.

The admiring crowd are dazzled with surprise,

And on his goodly person feed their eyes.

His joys concealed,[270] he sets himself to show;

On each side bowing popularly low:

His looks, his gestures, and his words he frames,

And with familiar ease repeats their names.

Thus formed by nature, furnished out with arts,

He glides unfelt into their secret hearts.

Then with a kind compassionating look,

And sighs, bespeaking pity ere he spoke,

Few words he said; but easy those and fit,

More slow than Hybla-drops, and far more sweet.

I mourn, my countrymen, your lost estate;

Though far unable to prevent your fate:

Behold a banished man, for your dear cause

Exposed a prey to arbitrary laws!

Yet oh! that I alone could be undone,

Cut off from empire, and no more a son!

}

{ Now all your liberties a spoil are made;

{ Egypt and Tyrus[271] intercept your trade,

{ And Jebusites your sacred rites invade.

My father,—whom with reverence yet I name—

Charmed into ease, is careless of his fame;

And, bribed with petty sums of foreign gold,

Is grown in Bathsheba's embraces old;[272]

Exalts his enemies, his friends destroys,

And all his power against himself employs.

He gives,—and let him give,—my right away:

But why should he his own and yours betray?

He, only he, can make the nation bleed,

And he alone from my revenge is freed.

Take then my tears,—with that he wiped his eyes,—

'Tis all the aid my present power supplies:

No court-informer can these arms accuse;

These arms may sons against their fathers use:

And 'tis my wish, the next successor's reign

May make no other Israelite complain.

Youth, beauty, graceful action seldom fail;

But common interest always will prevail;

And pity never ceases to be shown

To him who makes the people's wrongs his own.

The crowd, that still believe their kings oppress,

With lifted hands their young Messiah bless:

Who now begins his progress to ordain

With chariots, horsemen, and a numerous train:[273]

From east to west his glories he displays,

And, like the sun, the promised land surveys.

Fame runs before him as the morning-star,

And shouts of joy salute him from afar;

Each house receives him as a guardian god,

And consecrates the place of his abode.

But hospitable treats did most commend

Wise Issachar, his wealthy western friend.[274]

This moving court, that caught the people's eyes,

And seemed but pomp, did other ends disguise:

Achitophel had formed it, with intent

To sound the depths, and fathom, where it went,

The people's hearts, distinguish friends from foes,

And try their strength before they came to blows.

Yet all was coloured with a smooth pretence

Of specious love, and duty to their prince.

Religion, and redress of grievances,

(Two names that always cheat, and always please,)

Are often urged; and good king David's life,

Endangered by a brother and a wife.[275]

Thus in a pageant-shew a plot is made;

And peace itself is war in masquerade.

Oh foolish Israel! never warned by ill!

Still the same bait, and circumvented still!

Did ever men forsake their present ease,

In midst of health imagine a disease,

Take pains contingent mischiefs to foresee,

Make heirs for monarchs, and for God decree?

What shall we think? Can people give away,

Both for themselves and sons, their native sway?

Then they are left defenceless to the sword

Of each unbounded, arbitrary lord:

And laws are vain, by which we right enjoy,

If kings unquestioned can those laws destroy.

Yet if the crowd be judge of fit and just,

And kings are only officers in trust,

Then this resuming covenant was declared

When kings were made, or is for ever barred.

If those, who gave the sceptre, could not tie,

By their own deed, their own posterity,

How then could Adam bind his future race?

How could his forfeit on mankind take place?

Or how could heavenly justice damn us all,

Who ne'er consented to our father's fall?

Then kings are slaves to those whom they command,

And tenants to their people's pleasure stand.

Add, that the power, for property allowed,

Is mischievously seated in the crowd;

For who can be secure of private right,

If sovereign sway may be dissolved by might?

Nor is the people's judgment always true:

The most may err as grossly as the few;

And faultless kings run down by common cry,

For vice, oppression, and for tyranny.

What standard is there in a fickle rout,

Which, flowing to the mark, runs faster out?

Nor only crowds but Sanhedrims may be

Infected with this public lunacy,

And share the madness of rebellious times,

To murder monarchs for imagined crimes.

If they may give and take whene'er they please,

Not kings alone, the Godhead's images,

But government itself, at length must fall

To nature's state, where all have right to all.

Yet, grant our lords, the people, kings can make,

What prudent men a settled throne would shake?

For whatsoe'er their sufferings were before,

That change they covet makes them suffer more.

All other errors but disturb a state;

But innovation is the blow of fate.

If ancient fabrics nod, and threat to fall,

To patch their flaws, and buttress up the wall,

Thus far 'tis duty: but here fix the mark;

For all beyond it is to touch the ark.

To change foundations, cast the frame anew,

Is work for rebels, who base ends pursue;

At once divine and human laws controul,

And mend the parts by ruin of the whole.

The tampering world is subject to this curse,

To physic their disease into a worse.

Now what relief can righteous David bring?

How fatal 'tis to be too good a king!

Friends he has few, so high the madness grows;

Who dare be such must be the people's foes.

Yet some there were, even in the worst of days;

Some let me name, and naming is to praise.

In this short file Barzillai[276] first appears;

Barzillai, crowned with honour and with years.

Long since, the rising rebels he withstood

In regions waste beyond the Jordan's flood:[277]

Unfortunately brave to buoy the state;

But sinking underneath his master's fate:

In exile with his godlike prince he mourned;

For him he suffered, and with him returned.

The court he practised, not the courtier's art:

Large was his wealth, but larger was his heart,

Which well the noblest objects knew to choose,

The fighting warrior, and recording muse.

His bed could once a fruitful issue boast;

Now more than half a father's name is lost.

His eldest hope, with every grace adorned,

By me, so heaven will have it, always mourned,

And always honoured, snatched in manhood's prime

By unequal fates, and providence's crime:[278]

}

{ Yet not before the goal of honour won,

{ All parts fulfilled of subject and of son:

{ Swift was the race, but short the time to run.

Oh narrow circle, but of power divine,

Scanted in space, and perfect in thy line!

By sea, by land, thy matchless worth was known,

Arms thy delight, and war was all thy own:

Thy force infused the fainting Tyrians[279] prop'd,

And haughty Pharaoh found his fortune stop'd.

Oh ancient honour! Oh unconquered hand,

Whom foes unpunished never could withstand!

But Israel was unworthy of his name:[280]

Short is the date of all immoderate fame.[281]

It looks as heaven our ruin had designed,

And durst not trust thy fortune and thy mind.

Now, free from earth, thy disencumbered soul

Mounts up, and leaves behind the clouds and starry pole:

From thence thy kindred legions may'st thou bring,

To aid the guardian angel of thy king.

Here stop, my muse; here cease thy painful flight;

No pinions can pursue immortal height:

Tell good Barzillai thou canst sing no more,

And tell thy soul she should have fled before:

Or fled she with his life, and left this verse

To hang on her departed patron's hearse?

Now take thy steepy flight from heaven, and see

If thou canst find on earth another he:

Another he would be too hard to find;

See then whom thou canst see not far behind.

Zadoc the priest,[282] whom, shunning power and place,

His lowly mind advanced to David's grace.

With him the Sagan[283] of Jerusalem,

Of hospitable soul, and noble stem;

Him of the western dome,[284] whose weighty sense

Flows in fit words, and heavenly eloquence.

The prophet's sons, by such example led,

To learning and to loyalty were bred:

For colleges on bounteous kings depend,

And never rebel was to arts a friend.

To these succeed the pillars of the laws;

Who best can plead, and best can judge a cause.

Next them a train of loyal peers ascend;

Sharp-judging Adriel,[285] the muses friend,

Himself a muse: in Sanhedrim's debate,

True to his prince, but not a slave of state:

Whom David's love with honours did adorn,

That from his disobedient son were torn.

Jotham, of piercing wit, and pregnant thought,[286]

Endued by nature, and by learning taught,

To move assemblies, who but only tried

The worse a-while, then chose the better side:

Nor chose alone, but turned the balance too;

So much the weight of one brave man can do.

Hushai, the friend of David in distress;

In public storms, of manly stedfastness;[287]

By foreign treaties he informed his youth,

And joined experience to his native truth.

His frugal care supplied the wanting throne;

Frugal for that, but bounteous of his own:

'Tis easy conduct when exchequers flow,

But hard the task to manage well the low;

For sovereign power is too depressed or high,

When kings are forced to sell, or crowds to buy.

Indulge one labour more, my weary muse,

For Amiel; who can Amiel's praise refuse?[288]

Of ancient race by birth, but nobler yet

In his own worth, and without title great:

The Sanhedrim long time as chief he ruled,

Their reason guided, and their passion cooled:

So dexterous was he in the crown's defence,

So formed to speak a loyal nation's sense,

That, as their band was Israel's tribes in small,

So fit was he to represent them all.

Now rasher charioteers the seat ascend,

Whose loose careers his steady skill commend:

They, like the unequal ruler of the day,

Misguide the seasons, and mistake the way;

While he, withdrawn, at their mad labours smiles,

And safe enjoys the sabbath of his toils.

}

{ These were the chief; a small but faithful band

{ Of worthies, in the breach who dared to stand,

{ And tempt the united fury of the land.

With grief they viewed such powerful engines bent,

To batter down the lawful government.

A numerous faction, with pretended frights,

In Sanhedrims to plume the legal rights;

The true successor from the court removed;

The plot, by hireling witnesses, improved.

These ills they saw, and, as their duty bound,

They shewed the king the danger of the wound;

That no concessions from the throne would please,

But lenitives fomented the disease:

That Absalom, ambitious of the crown,

Was made the lure to draw the people down:

That false Achitophel's pernicious hate

Had turned the plot to ruin church and state:

The council violent, the rabble worse;

That Shimei taught Jerusalem to curse.

With all these loads of injuries opprest,

And long revolving in his careful breast

The event of things, at last, his patience tired,

Thus, from his royal throne, by heaven inspired,

The god-like David spoke; with awful fear

His train their Maker in their master hear.[289]

Thus long, have I by native mercy swayed,

My wrongs dissembled, my revenge delayed;

So willing to forgive the offending age;

So much the father did the king assuage.

But now so far my clemency they slight,

The offenders question my forgiving right.[290]

That one was made for many, they contend;

But 'tis to rule; for that's a monarch's end.

They call my tenderness of blood, my fear;

Though manly tempers can the longest bear.

Yet since they will divert my native course,

'Tis time to shew I am not good by force.

Those heaped affronts, that haughty subjects bring,

Are burdens for a camel, not a king.

Kings are the public pillars of the state,

Born to sustain and prop the nation's weight:

If my young Sampson will pretend a call

To shake the column, let him share the fall:[291]

But oh, that yet he would repent and live!

How easy 'tis for parents to forgive!

With how few tears a pardon might be won

From nature, pleading for a darling son!

Poor, pitied youth, by my paternal care

Raised up to all the height his frame could bear!

Had God ordained his fate for empire born,

He would have given his soul another turn:

Gulled with a patriot's name, whose modern sense

Is one that would by law supplant his prince;

The people's brave, the politician's tool;

Never was patriot yet, but was a fool.

Whence comes it, that religion and the laws

Should more be Absalom's than David's cause?

His old instructor, ere he lost his place,

Was never thought endued with so much grace.

Good heavens, how faction can a patriot paint!

My rebel ever proves my people's saint.

Would they impose an heir upon the throne?

Let Sanhedrims be taught to give their own.

A king's at least a part of government;

And mine as requisite as their consent:

Without my leave a future king to chuse,

Infers a right the present to depose.

True, they petition me to approve their choice;

But Esau's hands suit ill with Jacob's voice.

My pious subjects for my safety pray;

Which to secure, they take my power away.

From plots and treasons heaven preserve my years,

But save me most from my petitioners![292]

Unsatiate as the barren womb or grave;

God cannot grant so much as they can crave.

What then is left, but with a jealous eye

To guard the small remains of royalty?

The law shall still direct my peaceful sway,

And the same law teach rebels to obey:

Votes shall no more established power controul,—

Such votes, as make a part exceed the whole

No groundless clamours shall my friend remove,

Nor crowds have power to punish ere they prove;

For Gods and god-like kings their care express,

Still to defend their servants in distress

}

{ Oh, that my power to saving were confined!

{ Why am I forced, like heaven, against my mind,

{ To make examples of another kind?

Must I at length the sword of justice draw?

Oh curst effects of necessary law!

How ill my fear they by my mercy scan!

Beware the fury of a patient man.

Law they require, let law then shew her face;

They could not be content to look on grace,

Her hinder parts, but with a daring eye,

To tempt the terror of her front, and die.

By their own arts 'tis righteously decreed,

Those dire artificers of death shall bleed.

Against themselves their witnesses will swear,[293]

'Till, viper like, their mother-plot they tear;

And suck for nutriment that bloody gore,

Which was their principle of life before.

Their Belial with their Beelzebub will fight;

Thus on my foes, my foes shall do me right:

Nor doubt the event; for factious crowds engage,

In their first onset, all their brutal rage.

Then let them take an unresisted course;

Retire, and traverse, and delude their force:

But when they stand all breathless, urge the fight,

And rise upon them with redoubled might:

For lawful power is still superior found;

When long driven back, at length it stands the ground.

He said; the Almighty, nodding, gave consent,

And peals of thunder shook the firmament.

Henceforth a series of new time began,

The mighty years in long procession ran;

Once more the god-like David was restored,

And willing nations knew their lawful lord.

---

NOTES
ON
ABSALOM AND ACHITOPHEL.

[Note I.]

Michal, of royal blood, the crown did wear,

A soil ungrateful to the tiller's care.—P. [217.]

Queen Catherine of Portugal, the wife of Charles II., resembled the daughter of Saul in the circumstance mentioned in the text. She was plain in her person, and consequently possessed little influence over her gallant husband. She was, however, always treated by him with decent civility; and indeed, when persecuted by the popular party, experienced his warmest protection. Her greatest fault was her being educated a Catholic; her greatest misfortune, her bearing the king no children; and her greatest foible an excessive love of dancing. It might have occurred to the good people of these times, that loving a ball was not a capital sin, even in a person whose figure excluded her from the hopes of gracing it; that a princess of Portugal must be a Catholic, if she had any religion at all; and, finally, that to bear children, it is necessary some one should take the trouble of getting them. But these obvious considerations did not prevent her being grossly abused in the libels of the times,[294] and very nearly made a party in Dr Titus Oates' Appendix to his Original Plot.

[Note II.]

Not so the rest; for several mothers bore

To god-like David several sons before.—P. [217.]

Charles left a numerous family of illegitimate children by his various mistresses. Besides the Duke of Monmouth to be presently mentioned, he had a daughter by Lady Shannon, and the Earl of Plymouth by Mrs Catherine Pegge; by the Duchess of Cleveland he had the Dukes of Cleveland, Gratton, and Northumberland, and three daughters; by Mrs Eleanor Gwyn he had the Duke of St Alban's, and James Beauclerk; the Duchess of Portsmouth bore him the Duke of Richmond and Lennox: with a daughter by Mrs Mary Davies, the king's children amounted to the number of eight sons and five daughters.

[Note III.]

Of all the numerous progeny, was none

So beautiful, so brave, as Absalon.—P. [217.]

James Stuart, Duke of Monmouth and Buccleuch, was born at Rotterdam, 9th April, 1649, in the very heat of the civil wars. He was the son of Charles II. and Mrs Lucy Walters, or Waters, otherwise called Barlow, a beautiful young lady, of a good Welch family. He was educated privately in Holland, under the assumed name of James Crofts; and the respect with which his mother and he were treated by the cavalier, afforded a foundation for the argument of his adherents, who afterwards contended, that the king had been privately married to that lady. After the Restoration, the king sent for this young gentleman to court, where the royal favour and his own personal and acquired accomplishments soon made him very remarkable. Of his outward appearance, Count Hamilton, the gay recorder of the gaieties of the court of Charles, has given us a most interesting description, which is not belied by portraits which are still preserved. "Nature," says the count, "perhaps never formed any thing so perfect as the external graces of his person." His face was beautiful; but it was a masculine beauty, unmixed with any thing weak or effeminate: each feature had its own peculiar and interesting turn of expression. He had admirable address in all active exercises, an attractive manner, and an air of princely majesty. Yet his mental qualities did not altogether support this prepossessing exterior; or rather his fate plunged him into scenes where more was necessary than the mind and manners which, in more regular times, would have distinguished him as an accomplished cavalier in peace and war. He was married, by the king's interference, to Anne Scott, Countess of Buccleuch, sole surviving child of Francis, Earl of Buccleuch, and heiress of the extensive estate which the powerful family she represented had acquired on the frontiers of Scotland. The young prince had been previously created Duke of Orkney, a title now changed for that of Monmouth; and the king, upon his marriage, added to his honours the dukedom of Buccleuch. Thus favoured at home, he was also fortunate enough to have an opportunity of acquiring military fame, by serving two campaigns as a volunteer in Louis XIV.'s army against the Dutch. He particularly distinguished himself at the siege of Maestricht, where he led the storming party, took possession of the counterscarp, and made good his quarters against the repeated and desperate attempts of the besieged to dislodge him. Monmouth also served a campaign with the Dutch against the French, in 1678, and is on all hands allowed to have displayed great personal bravery; especially in the famous attack on the Duke of Luxemburgh's line before Mons, when the Prince of Orange, whose judgment can hardly be doubted, formed that good opinion of his military skill, which he stated when he offered to command the forces of his father-in-law against the Duke on his last unfortunate expedition. With that renown which is so willingly conferred upon the noble and the beautiful, the Duke returned to England, and met with a distinguished reception from Charles, by whom he was loaded with favours, as will appear from the following list of his titles and offices.

He was Duke of Monmouth and Buccleuch; Earl of Doncaster and Dalkeith; Lord Scott of Tinedale, Whichester, and Eskdale; Lord Great Chamberlain of Scotland, Lord-Lieutenant of the east Riding of Yorkshire; Governor of the town and citadel of Kingston upon Hull; Chief Justice in Eyre of all his Majesty's forests, chases, parks, and warrens on the south side of the Trent; Lord-General of all his Majesty's land forces; Captain of his Majesty's Life-guards of horse; Chancellor of the university of Cambridge; Master of horse to the King; one of the Lords of the Privy Council, and Knight of the order of the Garter.

Thus highly distinguished by rank, reputation, and royal favour, he appears for some time to have dedicated himself chiefly to the pleasures of the court, when an unfortunate quarrel with the Duke of York, in the rivalry of an intrigue,[295] laid the foundation for that difference, which was one great means of embroiling the latter years of Charles's reign, and finally cost Monmouth his head. When his quarrel with his uncle, whose unforgiving temper was well known, had become inveterate and irreconcileable, the Duke of Monmouth was led to head the faction most inimical to the interests of York, and speedily became distinguished by the name of the Protestant Duke, the dearest title that his party could bestow. The prospect which now opened itself before Monmouth was such as might have turned the head of a man of deeper political capacity. The heir apparent, his personal enemy, had become the object of popular hatred to such a degree, that the bill, excluding him from the succession, seemed to have every chance of being carried through the House of Lords, as it had already passed the Commons. The rights of the Queen were not likely to interest any one; and it seems generally to have been believed, however unjustly as it proved, that Charles was too fond of Monmouth, too jealous of his brother, and too little scrupulous of ways and means, to hesitate at declaring this favourite youth his legitimate successor.

Under such favourable circumstances, it is no wonder that Monmouth gave way to the dictates of ambition; and while he probably conceived that he was only giving his father an opportunity to manifest his secret partiality, he became more and more deeply involved in the plots of Shaftesbury, whose bustling and intriguing spirit saw at once the use to be made of Monmouth's favour with the king, and popularity with the public. From that time, their union became close and inseparable; even while Shaftesbury was yet a member of the king's administration. Their meetings were conducted with a secrecy and mystery which argued their importance. According to Carte, they were held at Lord Shaftesbury's and Charleton's houses, both parties coming in private, and in hackney coaches. Some of Monmouth's partizans had even the boldness to assert the legitimacy of their patron, to prepare for his supplanting the Duke of York. When the insurrection of the Covenanters broke out in Scotland, Monmouth was employed against them, a duty which he executed with fidelity and success. He completely defeated the insurgents in the battle of Bothwell Bridge, and returned to the court in all the freshness of his laurels. This was in the year 1679, and Monmouth's good fortune had then attained its summit. He was beloved by the people, general of all the forces both in England and Scotland; London was at the devotion of Shaftesbury, the Duke of York banished to Brussels, and universally detested on account of his religion. At this important moment Charles fell ill of a fever at Windsor. Had he died it is very probable that Monmouth would have found himself in a condition to agitate successfully a title to the crown. But either the king's attachment to the Catholic religion, in the profession of which he finally died, or his sense of justice and hereditary right occasioned an extraordinary alteration of measures at this momentous crisis. The Duke of York was summoned from abroad, arrived at Windsor, and by his presence and activity at once resumed that ascendance over Charles, which his more stern genius had always possessed, and animated the sunken spirit of his own partizans. By a most sudden and surprising revolution, York was restored to all his brother's favour. For although he was obliged to retire to Scotland to avoid the fury of the exclusionists, yet a sharper exile awaited his rival Monmouth, who, deprived of all his offices, was sent into the foreign banishment from which his uncle had just been recalled. Accordingly he retired to Holland, where he was courteously received by the States; and where Charles himself appears to have been desirous, that his darling son should find an honourable asylum. Meanwhile the factions waxed still more furious; and Shaftesbury, whose boast it was to "ride in the whirlwind and direct the storm," utterly embroiled the kingdom, by persuading Monmouth to return to England without licence from his father, and to furnish an ostensible head to that body of which the wily politician was himself the soul. This conduct deeply injured Monmouth in his father's favour, who refused to see him; and, by an enquiry and subsequent declaration made openly in council, and published in the Gazette, endeavoured to put an end to his hopes, by publicly declaring his illegitimacy. Wonderful as it may seem, this avowal was ascribed to the king's fear for his brother; and two daring pamphlets were actually published, to assert the legitimacy of Monmouth, against the express and solemn declaration of his father.[296] Monmouth himself, by various progresses through the kingdom, with an affectation of popularity which gained the vulgar but terrified the reflecting, above all, by a close alliance with the Machiavel, Shaftesbury, shewed his avowed determination to maintain his pretensions against those of the lawful successor. This was the state of parties in 1681, when "Absalom and Achitophel" first appeared.

The permission of so sharp a satire against the party of Monmouth, though much qualified as to his individual person, plainly shewed the king's intention to proceed with energy against the country party. Monmouth, in the midst of one of those splendid journies which he had made to display his strength, was arrested at Stafford, September 20, 1682, and obliged to enter bail for his peaceable deportment and appearance when called on, to answer any suit against him by the king. In the mean while, the dubious and mysterious cabal, called the Rye-house Plot, was concocted by two separate parties, moving in some degree towards the same point, but actuated by very different motives, adopting different modes of conduct, and in their mutual intrigues but slightly connected with each other. It appears certain, that Monmouth utterly abominated the proposal of Rumbold, and those who made the assassination of the King and Duke of York the groundwork of their proposed insurrection. It is equally certain, that, with Sidney and Russell, he engaged in plans of reformation, or revolution, of that dubious description, which might have turned out good or evil, according to their power of managing the machine they were about to set in motion; a power almost always over-rated till the awful moment of experiment. Upon the discovery of these proceedings, Monmouth absconded, but generously signified to Lord Russell his determination to surrender himself if it could serve his friend; an offer which Russell, with the same generosity, positively rejected.

Notwithstanding the discovery which involved perhaps a charge of high treason, the king was so much convinced of Monmouth's innocence, so far as the safety of his person was concerned, that the influence of Halifax, who always strove to balance the power of the Duke of York by that of his nephew, procured him an opportunity of being restored to the king's favour, for which the minister had little thanks from the heir of the crown.[297] But Monmouth, by an excess of imprudence, in which, however, he displayed a noble spirit, forfeited the advantages he might have obtained at this crisis. Although he signed an acknowledgment of his guilt, in listening to counsels which could not be carried into effect, without a restraint on the king's person; he would not, on reflection, authorize the publication of a declaration, which must have had a fatal influence on the impending trial of his friends. He demanded it back, and received it; but accompanied with an order to leave the kingdom. He obeyed, and remained in honourable banishment in Holland, till after the accession of James II. to the throne. There is room to believe, that Monmouth would never have disturbed his uncle, had James not evinced a desire to follow him with vengeance even into his retreat. Wellwood has published a letter from him, in which he says, ambition is mortified within him, and expresses himself determined to live in retirement. But when the King insisted on the Prince of Orange driving him out of Holland, and proceeded to take measures to exclude him from Brussels, he appears to have become desperate. Even yet he prepared to retire to Sweden, but he was surrounded by fugitives from England and Scotland, who, as is always the case, represented the nation as agitated by their passions, and feeling for their individual oppression: Argyle, in particular, and the Scottish exiles, fired by the aggressions on their liberty and religion, anticipated a more warm support than they afterwards experienced.

Monmouth, thus driven upon his fate, set sail with three ships; landed at Lyme with hardly an hundred followers; and, such was the magic of his popularity, soon found himself at the head of a considerable force. He baffled the Duke of Albemarle who attempted to coop him up at Lyme, and, advancing to Taunton took upon him fatally the title of King. At length, he surprised the Earl of Feversham, James's general, in his entrenchments near Bridgewater; and the native stubborn valour of his followers nearly proved too much for the discipline of the veterans, whom they attacked. The cowardice of Lord Grey,[298] who fled with the cavalry, led to a total defeat and much slaughter among Monmouth's forces. Still more fell a sacrifice to the bloody zeal of the brutal Jefferies. The Duke himself was taken in his flight; and, depressed by fatigue and disappointment, shewed some symptoms of weakness, inconsistent with his former character. He solicited his life by submissive letters to James, and, at length, obtained an interview with the king. But James forgot the noble, though homely popular saying,

A king's face

Should give grace.

With the natural sternness of his character, he only strove to extort from Monmouth a disavowal of his legitimacy, and a confession of his accomplices. To the former the Duke submitted; but, when urged to the latter, rose from the posture of supplication, and retorted with dignity the reproaches of James. When he returned to the Tower, he wrote a letter to the king, supposed to contain a secret, the revealing of which might have purchased his life. This letter he intrusted to Captain Scott of Dumbarton's regiment, a descendant of the family of Harden, and, consequently, related to the Duchess of Monmouth. The famous Blood is said to have compelled Scott to deliver up the letter, and carried it to Sunderland, who destroyed it.[299]

The Duke of Monmouth, finding all efforts to procure a pardon ineffectual, met death with great resolution. He smiled on the guards who surrounded the scaffold, and whom in his better days he had commanded; bowed to the populace, who expressed by sighs and tears their interest in his fate; and submitted to his doom. His death was cruelly prolonged by the hesitation of the executioner, who, after several ineffectual strokes of the axe, threw it down, and could scarcely be prevailed on to finish his bloody work. The execution took place on the 15th of July, 1685.

It would be difficult, were it here necessary, to draw a character of the unfortunate Duke of Monmouth. His qualities and accomplishments were fitted for times more gentle than those in which he lived, where he might be compared to a pleasure barge struggling against a hurricane. In gentler times, he had proved a successful leader in war; and in peace, what the reviver of tragedy has aptly stiled, "An honoured courtly gentleman." Count Basil. Act I. Scene II.

[Note IV.]

And made the charming Annabel his bride.—P. [218.]

Anne, Duchess of Buccleuch and Monmouth, a lady of high spirit, great beauty, and unimpeachable honour. We have had repeated occasion to mention her in the course of these notes. She was reckoned the richest heiress in Europe; as, upon the death of her elder sister, Anne Countess of Buccleuch, wife of Walter Earl of Tarras, she succeeded to the extensive land estate of that family. Charles made this advantageous match for his son, by the intervention of the young lady's mother, the Countess of Wemyss. The Duchess of Buccleuch was a distinguished protectress of poetical merit, and evinced her discriminating taste, by early selecting Dryden as the object of her patronage; she cultivated the friendship of the Duke of York, and established an intimacy between him and her husband, which paved the way for the advancement of the latter.[300] When by an occasional rivalry they quarrelled, and became irreconcileable enemies, she still opposed her prudence to the precipitate counsels of Monmouth's worse advisers. It is probable her influence saved his life, by determining him to make a timely confession, concerning all he knew of the Rye-house conspiracy, upon condition, it was not to be used against his friends. When he imprudently retracted that confession, her advice prevailed on him to offer a renewal of it.[301] Their last interview before the Duke's execution, is thus narrated in a MS. now before me.

"His behaviour all the time was brave and unmoved, and, even during the last conversation and farewell with his lady and children, which was the movingest scene in the world, and which no bye-standers could see without melting in tears, he did not shew the least concerndness. He declared before all the company, how averse the duchess had been to all his irregular courses, and that she had never been uneasy to him on any occasion whatsoever, but about women, and his failing of dutie to the late king. And that she knew nothing of his last designe, not having heard from himself a year before, which was his own fault, and noe unkindness in her, because she knew not how to direct her letters to him. In that, he gave her the kyndest character that could be, and begged her pardon of his many failings and offences to her, and prayed her to continue her kyndness and care to her poore children. At this expression she fell down on her knees, with her eyes full of teares, and begged him to pardon her if ever she had done any thing to offend and displease him; and embracing his knees, fell into a swoon, out of which they had much adoe to raise her up in a good while after. A little before, his children were brought to him, all crying about him; but he acquitted himself of these last adewes with much composure, shewing nothing of weakness and unmanliness." Account of the Actions and Behaviour of the Duke of Monmouth, from the time he was taken to his Execution, in a letter, dated July 16, 1685, MS., in the Duke of Buccleuch's library.

The Duchess of Monmouth's turn of mind, and her aversion to her husband's political intrigues, lead me to imagine, that Dryden sketched out her character under that of Marmoutiere in "the Duke of Guise;" whose expostulations with her lover apply exactly to the situation of this noble pair. If the Duke of Monmouth entertained a causeless jealousy of the intimacy of York with his lady, as the Duke of Buckingham seems to hint,[302] something like an allusion to this circumstance may be traced in the suspicions of Guise, and vindication of Marmoutiere.[303]

The Duchess of Buccleuch and Monmouth survived the catastrophe of her husband many years; during which she was resolute in asserting her right to be treated as a princess of the blood. She had two surviving sons by Monmouth; one of whom carried on the line of Buccleuch, and the other was created Earl of Deloraine. She was married a second time, in 1688, to Lord Cornwallis, by whom she had two surviving daughters. The Duchess died in 1732, in the eighty-first year of her life. King James made her Grace and her family a gift of all her original property, so far as forfeited by the Duke of Monmouth's condemnation.

[Note V.]

And Amnon's murder, by a specious name,

Was called a just revenge for injured fame.—P. [218.]

There is a libel among the State Poems, relating to some obscure fray, in which the duke of Monmouth and some of his brothers appear to have been concerned. This was probably one of the youthful excesses alluded to.[304] But Amnon's murder seems to refer to the more noted assault upon sir John Coventry, which the reader may take in the words of Andrew Marvell.

"But an accident happened, which had like to have spoiled all. Sir John Coventry having moved (in the house of commons) for an imposition on the play houses, sir John Berkenhead, to excuse them, said they had been of great service to the king. Upon which, sir John Coventry desired that gentleman to explain "whether he meant the men or women players?"[305] Hereupon it is imagined, that the house adjourning from Tuesday, before, till Thursday after Christmas day, on the very Tuesday night of the adjournment, twenty-five of the duke of Monmouth's troop,[306] and some few foot, laid in wait from ten at night, till two in the morning, and as he returned from the Cock, where he supped, to his own house, they threw him down, and with a knife cut off almost all the end of his nose; but company coming, made them fearful to finish it; so they marched off. Sir Thomas Sands, lieutenant of the troop, commanded the party, and Obrian, the earl of Inchequin's son, was a principal actor. The court hereupon sometimes thought to carry it with a high hand, and question sir John for his words, and maintain the action; sometimes they flagged in their councils. However, the king commanded sir Thomas Clarges, and sir W. Pulteney, to release Wroth, and Lake, who were two of the actors, and taken. But the night before the house met, they surrendered (to) him again. The house being but sullen the next day, the court did not oppose adjourning for some days longer, till it was filled. Then the house went upon Coventry's business, and voted that they would go upon nothing else whatever, till they had passed a bill, as they did, for Sands, Obrian, Parry, and Reeves, to come in by the sixteenth of February, or else be condemned, and never to be pardoned, but by an express act of parliament, and their names therein inserted, for fear of being pardoned in some general act of grace. Farther, all such actions, for the future, on any man, felony without clergy; and who shall otherwise strike or wound any parliament man, during his attendance, or going or coming, imprisonment for a year, treble damages, and incapacity. The bill having in some few days been despatched to the lords, the house has since gone on in grand committee upon the first 800,000l. bill, but are not yet half way. But now the lords, instead of the sixteenth of February, put twenty-five days after the king's royal assent, and that registered in their journal; they disagree in several other things, but adhere in that first which is material. So that, in this week, the houses will be in danger of splitting, without much wisdom or force. For, considering that sir Thomas Sands was the very person sent to Clarges and Pulteney, that Obrian was concealed in the duke of Monmouth's lodgings, that Wroth and Lake were bailed at sessions, by order from Mr Attorney, and, that all persons and things are perfectly discovered, that act will not be passed without great consequence." Letter from Andrew Marvel, to William Romsden, in Marvel's Works, Vol. I. p. 413.

This aggression led to what, from the name of the sufferer, is called the Coventry act, making cutting, and maiming the person, with intent to disfigure it, felony without benefit of clergy. A satirical ballad on this subject, called the Haymarket Hectors, was written by Andrew Marvel, which may be found in his works, and, with some variations, in the third vol. of the State poems. It has very little wit, to atone for a great deal of grossness.

[Note VI.]

From hence began that plot, the nation's curse;

Bad in itself, but represented worse:

Raised in extremes, and in extremes decried;

With oaths affirmed, with dying vows denied.—P. [220.]

The Papist plot, like every criminal and mysterious transaction, where accomplices alone can give evidence, is involved in much mystery. It is well known, that the zeal for making proselytes, with all its good and all its evil consequences, is deeply engrafted upon the catholic faith. There can be no doubt, from Coleman's correspondence, that there was in agitation, among the Catholics, a grand scheme to bring about the conversion of the British kingdoms to the Romish religion. Much seemed to favour this in the reign of Charles II. The king, though a latitudinarian, was believed addicted to the religion of those countries which had afforded him refuge in his adversity, and the Duke of York was an open and zealous Papist. From the letters of his secretary Coleman, it is obvious, that hopes were entertained of eradicating the great northern heresy; and the real existence of intrigues carried on with this purpose, unfortunately gave a colour to the monstrous and absurd falsehoods which the witnesses of the plot contrived to heap together. It is probable, that Oates, by whom the affair was first started, knew nothing, but by vague report and surmise, of the real designs of the Roman catholic party; since he would otherwise have accommodated his story better to their obvious interests. The catholics might gain much by the life of Charles; but a plot to assassinate him, would have been far from placing them an inch nearer their point, even supposing them to escape the odium of so horrible a crime. The Duke, it was true, was nearest in blood; but his succession to the throne, had the king been taken off by those of his sect, would have been a very difficult matter, since the very suspicion of such a catastrophe had nearly caused his exclusion. But when the faction involved the king also in the plot, which Oates positively charges upon him in his last publication, and thereby renders him an accessory before the fact to an attempt on his own life, the absurdity is fully completed. Even according to the statement of those who suppose that Charles had irritated the Roman catholics, by preferring his ease and quiet to their interest and his own religious feelings, his situation appears ludicrously distressing. For, on the one hand, he incurred the hatred of those who called themselves the Protestant party, for his obstinacy in exposing himself to be murdered by the papists; and, on the other hand, he was to be assassinated by the catholics, for not doing what, according to this supposition, he himself most wished to do. It would be far beyond our bounds, to notice the numberless gross absurdities to which Oates and the other witnesses deposed upon oath. It may appear almost incredible, in the present day, how such extravagant fictions should be successfully palmed upon the deluded public; but at that time there was not the same ready communication by the press, which now allows opportunity to canvass an extraordinary charge as soon as it is brought forward. The public at large had no means of judging of state matters, but from the bribed libellers of faction, and the haranguers in coffee-houses, who gave what colour they pleased to the public news of the day.[307] Besides, the catholics had given an handle against themselves, by their own obscure intrigues; and it was impossible to forget the desperate scheme of the Gunpowder Plot, by which they had resolved to cut off the heresy in the time of King James. The crime of the fathers was, in this case, visited on the children; for no person probably would, or could, have believed in the catholic plot of 1678, had not the same religious sect meditated something equally desperate in 1606. It is true, the gunpowder conspiracy was proved by the most unexceptionable testimony; and the plot in Charles' time rested on the oaths of a few boldfaced villains, who contradicted both themselves and each other; but still popular credulity was prepared to believe any thing charged on a sect, who had shown themselves so devoted to their religious zeal, and so little scrupulous about means to gratify it. Another main prop of the Catholic plot was the mystery in which it was involved. If inconsistencies were pointed out, or improbabilities urged, the answer was, that the discovery had not yet reached the bottom of the plot. Thus the disposition of the vulgar to believe the atrocious and the marvellous, was heightened by the stimulus of ungratified curiosity, and still impending danger. "Every new witness," says North, "that came in, made us start—now we shall come to the bottom. And so it continued from one witness to another, year after year, till at length it had no bottom but in the bottomless pit."[308] Thus, betwixt villainy and credulity, the spirits of the people were exasperated and kept afloat, till the bloodhounds of the plot, like those formerly used in pursuit of marauders, had drenched their scent, and annihilated their powers of quest in the best blood in the kingdom.

The unfortunate victims, whose lives were sworn away by Oates and his accomplices, died averring their innocence; but the infuriated people for some time gave little credit to this solemn exculpation; believing that the religion of the criminals, or at least the injunctions of their priests, imposed on them the obligation of denying, with their last breath, whatever, if confessed, could have prejudiced the catholic cause. As all high wrought frenzies are incapable of duration, that of the Roman catholic plot decayed greatly after the execution of the venerable Stafford. The decent and manly sobriety of his demeanour on the scaffold, the recollection of how much blood had been spilled, and how much more might be poured out like water, excited the late and repentant commiseration of the multitude: His protestations of innocence were answered by broken exclamations of "God bless you, my lord! we believe you." And after this last victim, the Popish plot, like a serpent which had wasted its poison, though its wreaths entangled many, and its terrors held their sway over more, did little effectual mischief. Even when long lifeless, and extinguished, this chimera, far in the succeeding reigns, continued, like the dragon slain by the Red-cross Knight, to be the object of popular fear, and the theme of credulous terrorists:

Some feared, and fled; some feared, and well it fained.

One, that would wiser seem than all the rest,

Warned him not touch; for yet, perhaps, remained

Some lingering life within his hollow breast;

Or, in his womb might lurk some hidden nest

Of many dragonettes, his fruitful seed;

Another said, that in his eyes did rest

Yet sparkling fire, and bade thereof take heed;

Another said, he saw him move his eyes indeed.

[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]. This man was imprisoned in Newgate; and, after much communing with Shaftesbury and Buckingham, in which, it is said, neither threats, promises, nor actual tortures were spared, confessed himself an accomplice in the murder.[330] He retracted this confession before the privy-council; but being remanded to prison, new terrors, promises, and sufferings, induced him to retract that retractation. His story was a tissue of improbabilities; and he and Bedlow, when adduced as evidence on the trial of three poor men, whom they charged with strangling Godfrey, concealing the body in Somerset-House, and afterwards disposing of it on Primrose-hill, contradicted each other, and contradicted themselves. All was in vain: the three innocent victims of perjury were condemned and executed, and the witnesses promoted and rewarded, not with money only, but, strange to say, with universal respect and regard; although their merit, supposing it to be real, was that of murderers and incendiaries, who had turned evidence for the crown against their accomplices.

The outcry raised about Godfrey's murder at the time, and for long after, gave the plot its surest foundation and support. When his funeral rites were performed, the crowd was prodigious, and the papists were sufficiently cautious to keep within doors, or some might have been offered up as an oblation to the manes of Justice Godfrey. While the clergyman preached the funeral sermon of the protestant victim, two robust divines stood by him in the pulpit, lest, while rendering this last duty to the murdered magistrate, he should in facie ecclesiæ be murdered by the papists. At the formal pope-burnings of the party, Sir Edmondbury, supported on a steed by his murderers, was a principal figure in the procession, preceded by a harbinger, who rung a bell, and admonished the people to remember Justice Godfrey. In short, this unfortunate gentleman's death, however it came about, continued long to be the watch-word and war-cry of those, who called themselves the true protestant party.

[Note XXVIII.]

The crowd, that still believe their kings oppress,

With lifted hands their young Messiah bless;

Who now begins his progress to ordain,

With chariots, horsemen, and a numerous train.—P. [239.]

"In August, 1680, the Duke of Monmouth went into the country to divert himself, visiting several gentlemen in the west of England, by whom he was received and entertained with a gallantry suitable to the greatness of his birth, and the relation he stood in to his majesty; incredible numbers of people flocking from all the adjacent parts to see this great champion of the English nation, who had been so successful against both the Dutch, French, and Scots. He went first into Wiltshire, and was pleased to honour the worthy esquire Thynne with his company for some days. From thence he went to Mr Speak's, in Somersetshire, in which progress he was caressed with the joyful acclamations of the country people, who came from all parts; twenty miles about the lanes and hedges being every where lined with men, women, and children, who, with incessant shouts, cried, "God bless King Charles and the Protestant Duke!" In some towns and parishes which he passed through, they strewed the streets and highways where he was to pass with herbs and flowers, especially at Ilchester and Pithyton; others presenting him with bottles of wine. When he came within ten miles of Mr Speak's, he was met by two thousand persons on horseback, whose numbers still increased as they drew nearer to Mr Speak's, and when they arrived there, they were reputed to be twenty thousand; wherefore they were forced to break down several pearch of his park pales to enlarge their passage to the house, where his grace and all this numerous company were entertained and treated, in an extraordinary manner.

"On the 26th, he went to Brompton; being met on the road by a great company of gentry and country people, who conducted him to Sir J. Sydenham's, where he was entertained at a noble and splendid dinner. The next day he went to Barrington, where he was pleased to honour Mr William Stroud with his company at dinner; the entertainment being nothing inferior to what his Grace had met with in all other places. After dinner he went to Chard, where he arrived about five in the afternoon, attended with a train of five thousand horsemen; and there he was met and welcomed by a crowd of men, women, and children, who had not a mute among them, but were almost all of them made deaf by their own shouts and acclamations of joy. His Grace lay there that night, being treated at a very splendid supper; he lodged at the house of M. Prideaux.[331] The next day, having been entertained at a sumptuous dinner, he rid to Ilminster, and in the afternoon he went to Whitelackindon, where he lay that night; and the day following, which was Sunday, his grace observed the Sabbath with a religious care, and went to Ilminster church. On the 30th, he went to Calliton, where he was entertained by Sir Walter Young. The next day he went to Overton, where he was entertained, and lodged by Mr Dukes. From thence he went to Exeter, and was met by the citizens and the people of all the adjacent parts, to the number of twenty thousand persons; but that which was more remarkable, was the appearance of a brave company of brisk, stout young men, all clothed in linen waistcoats and drawers, white, and harmless, having not so much as a stick in their hands; they were in number about nine hundred or a thousand; they went three miles out of the city to meet his Grace, where they were drawn up all on a little hill, and divided into two parts, in which order they attended the Duke's coming, who rid up first between them, and then round each company; after which they united, and went hand in hand in order before, where he was no sooner arrived, but a universal shout from all parts echoed forth his welcome; the numerous concourse of people, the incredible and amazing acclamations, and the universal joy which then filled the whole city, far exceeding my pen to describe.[332]

"From thence he returned to Mr Speake's, where the whole country flocked again to see and admire him, not being enough satisfied with their former sight. From thence he went the next day to Mr Harvie's, near Yeovil, where he dined, and in the afternoon he rid to Esquire Thynne's; people flocking from all the towns and villages thereabout to Howden-hill, where they attended the Duke's coming; and after they had, by loud acclamations, proclaimed his welcome amongst them, and expressed their joy for his safe return, they took their leave of him, returning his Grace their humble and hearty thanks for that kind visit, and for his having condescended to accept of their plain, but true-hearted entertainment. From thence he returned to London, wonderfully pleased with the noble and generous entertainment he met with at the several places where he came; every place striving to out-vye each other."[333]

At Tunbridge Wells. "Abundance of country people rudely crowded, after their rustic manner, to see the eldest son of their king and sovereign, every one extolling him to the skies, crying to one another, 'O what a brave man he is!' Some admired the beauty and make of his person; some the majesty and port of his carriage; and others, who had seen the king, the exact resemblance he bare to his majesty; affirming, they never, in all their lives, saw a son resemble a father more than the duke did the king; but all admired his affable and courteous disposition."[334]

These assemblies were chiefly made under pretence of cock-matches, horse-races, and other popular amusements; pretexts the more dangerous, as they were the well-known signals of rendezvous at which the cavaliers were wont to concert their plots against Cromwell. See the tract called "Killing no Murder." Foot races, wrestling matches, and other country pastimes, were also resorted to as an ostensible cause of meeting. These gave Monmouth an opportunity to display his personal agility and liberality. He wrestled, he ran, and carried off the prize, in both exercises; he then ran in his boots against the peasants in their shoes, and still obtained the victory. The prizes which he gained were freely distributed among his competitors. All these arts of popularity became the derision of his enemies, when he was forced into exile; as, for example, in the following verses:

Monmouth, for wit, who was able

To make to a crown a pretence;

The head and the hope of the rabble,

A loyal and politic prince:

But now he's gone into Holland

To be a king of no land,

Or else must be monarch of Poland;

Was ever son so loyal as he?

Was ever son so loyal as he?

Lord Gray, and Armstrong the bully,

That prudent and politic knight,

Who made of his grace such a cully,

Together have taken their flight,

Is this your races, horse-matches,

His grace's swift dispatches,

From shire to shire,

Under the hatches?

Now above deck you dare not appear.

The Conspiracy, or the Discovery of the Fanatic Plot.

These ostentatious progresses were devised by Shaftesbury, as a mode of manifesting the strength of Monmouth's party, and increasing his partizans and popularity. Among the higher ranks, they carried an air of defiance which rather hurt his cause; for reflecting and cautious men were slow to join in what seemed to be a preliminary for civil war. It was different with the lower orders, who, always biassed by what is more immediately addressed to their eye-sight, were led by these showy processions, and by the courtesy, activity, and fine presence of Monmouth, to doat on him to an incredible degree. Not only did the western peasantry, on his landing in 1685, crowd to join him in multitudes beyond what he could arm, but their attachment survived even his defeat and death; and they long believed, with fond credulity, that another person had been executed in his stead, and that their beloved protestant prince was still alive.

The arts of Absalom, in stealing the hearts of Israel from his father, form an exact parallel to the language which Dryden puts in the mouth of Monmouth.

"And it came to pass after this, that Absalom prepared him chariots and horses, and fifty men to run before him. And Absalom rose up early, and stood beside the way of the gate: and it was so, that when any man that had a controversy came to the king for judgment, then Absalom called unto him, and said, Of what city art thou? And he said, Thy servant is one of the tribes of Israel. And Absalom said unto him, See, thy matters are good and right; but there is no man deputed of the king to hear thee. Absalom said moreover, Oh that I were made judge in the land, that every man, which hath any suit or cause, might come unto me, and I would do him justice! And it was so, that when any man came nigh unto him to do him obeisance, he put forth his hand, and took him, and kissed him. And on this manner did Absalom to all Israel, that came to the king for judgment. So Absalom stole the hearts of the men of Israel." 2d Sam. chap. xv. v. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6.

[Note XXX.]

But hospitable treats did most commend

Wise Issachar, his western wealthy friend.—P. [239.]

Thomas Thynne, esquire, of Longleat-hall, called, from his great wealth, Tom of Ten Thousand. He had been formerly a friend of the Duke of York, but, upon some quarrel between them, he attached himself warmly to Monmouth. Mr Thynne was one of those gentlemen, who petitioned for the speedy meeting of parliament, after it was prorogued in 1679, on account of the heat with which the house pursued the Exclusion Bill. The king received the intimation very ill; told Mr Thynne, he was surprised at persons of property countenancing such proceedings, and that he wished they would mind their own affairs, and leave him to attend to his. When Monmouth made his progress through the west of England, as mentioned in the last note, Mr Thynne received him at his country-seat with all the splendour and liberality of ancient English hospitality. This gentleman's tragical fate is well known. He was married to the Lady Ogle, sole heiress of the Northumberland estate; but, his bride going abroad, the marriage was never consummated. Count Konigsmark met the lady, fell in love with her person, or with her fortune, and could see no better road to both than by assassinating her husband. Accordingly, three foreigners, hired by the count, or dependents upon him, waylaid Mr Thynne's carriage, as it passed through Pall-Mall, and shot him with a blunderbuss, in the manner represented on his tombstone in Westminster Abbey.[335] The Duke of Monmouth had left the carriage about an hour before the murder; and sir John Reresby received the thanks of the king for his activity in apprehending the assassins, without which, suspicions might have arisen that the attempt was intended against Monmouth by the court party.[336] Monmouth himself remained all night with his dying friend, and distinguished himself by his zeal and assiduity in furthering the search after the murderers. At length, Count Konigsmark was taken by Gibbons, one of Monmouth's attendants, who seized him, as he was going on ship-board. When apprehended, Gibbons charged him with the fact, and added, that he had like to have killed his master, the Duke of Monmouth; to which the Count answered, "they would not have killed him." The three actual assassins were condemned to death; but, by some foul play,[337] Konigsmark, who had employed them, and who came over to England expressly to see that they executed their bloody commission, was acquitted. Monmouth went to see these subaltern villains executed. Stern, at the gallows, complained that he died for a man's fortune whom he never spoke to, for a woman whom he never saw, for a dead man whom he never had a view of. True Narrative of the Horrid Plot, &c. fol. 1679. p. 64. State Trials, Vol. II. p. 503.

[Note XXXI.]

———Good King David's life,

Endangered by a brother and a wife.—P. [239.]

The accusations against York and the Queen were no part of Oate's original plot. On the contrary, in the summary of his "True Narrative," he informs us, that the "Royal family of the Stuarts are condemned to be cut off, root and branch, and namely, the King, Duke of York, and Prince of Orange, because that family have not answered their expectation, nor have they any hopes that any of them will comply fully with this their bloody design, when fully discovered to them." And on the next page, it is again affirmed, that notwithstanding the Duke of York's zeal for the Catholic religion, "they design to dispose of him as is aforesaid." But when the public belief in the plot had taken root, and Shaftesbury had grafted upon it his doctrine of exclusion, Oates, by degrees, charged the Duke, first with being the innocent and blind tool of the Catholics whom they intended to succeed his brother, though he knew nothing of their designs; and finally, with being at the very depth of all the villainy, and the immediate author of the Fire of London. As for the queen, her barrenness was a reason, for all the exclusionists desiring she should be removed, that the king might have a chance of legitimate issue, to the exclusion of the Duke of York. Animated by a belief, that this would be agreeable to the king, Oates had the boldness, at the bar of the House of Commons, to utter these words, in his affected phraseology, "Aye, Taitus Oates, accause Catherine, Quean of England, of haigh traison!" The grounds of his accusation are stated in the trial of Wakeman, the queen's physician, who, he alleged, was bribed with 15,000l to poison the king, in case he should escape the poniard of a Jesuit, named Coniers, and the pistols of Pickering and Groves. Oates then swore, that three Jesuits carried him with them to Somerset-house, where they were summoned to attend the Queen; that he remained in an anti-chamber when they were ushered into her presence; that he heard a female voice say, she would assist Sir George Wakeman in his project, and would no longer bear these repeated violations of her bed. When the fathers came out, he desired to see the queen, and when admitted into the anti-chamber, whence the female voice had proceeded, he saw the queen, who smiled graciously on him, and there was no other woman present. These impudent stories, with some blunders into which the best-breathed witness may fall, saved Wakeman's life.

The King immediately saw the tendency of this charge, and observed, "They think I have a mind for a new wife; but for all that, I will not see an innocent woman abused;" and certainly, had he given way to it, the Queen would have been in great danger.

[Note XXXII.]

In this short file Barzillai first appears,

Barzillai, crowned with honour and with years;

Long since the rising rebels he withstood,

In regions waste, beyond the Jordan's flood, &c.

P. [241.]

James Butler, Duke, Marquis, and Earl of Ormond, Earl of Ossory and Brecknock, &c. &c. was as illustrious for his talents, as for his rank, and distinguished by virtues superior to both. In the difficult and dangerous situation of Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland, he had to maintain the cause of Charles I. in that kingdom, with very slender means, at once against the confederated Irish Catholics, and the parliamentary forces, the more formidable, though less numerous, enemies of the royal cause. In 1649, he was able, through consummate skill, both as a politician and general, to boast that he had reduced almost all Ireland under the royal authority, excepting the cities of Dublin and Londonderry. But Cromwell's arrival, with 8000 disciplined and veteran forces, effectually changed the scene. His first exploit was the storm of Tredagh, or Drogheda, where the besiegers put the whole garrison to the sword, and committed the most dreadful excesses of barbarity. After this terrible example of severity, hardly any of the royal garrisons could be prevailed on to make such a defence, as might expose them to the same extremity. Wexford, and New Ross, both very strong places, surrendered without a blow; all the forces under Lord Inchiquin revolted to the side of the parliament; and, at length, in 1650, Ormond saw himself under the necessity of abandoning the kingdom, which he had so long and valiantly defended. From Ireland he retreated to France, and accompanied King Charles during his exile. He was much trusted by that prince; and was charged with the task of withdrawing the Duke of Gloucester from the family of the queen mother, Henrietta, who was making every possible attempt to induce him to change his religion. This delicate commission he executed with dexterity and success. He had afterwards the satisfaction to forward a reconciliation between the king and his mother, who had been on bad terms on account of the queen's imprudent interference with her son's religious tenets. At the Restoration, the Marquis of Ormond, for such was then his title, was liberally rewarded, in lands and honours, for his steady attachment to the royal party. He was created Duke of Ormond in Ireland, and appointed steward of the household, groom of the stole, and privy counsellor for the three kingdoms. In 1661, he was made Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland. As the duke was a steady friend of the great Clarendon, his services, and faithful zeal for the king's real interests, did not prevent his sharing in the disgrace of the chancellor. He had quarrelled with Lady Castlemaine, then the favourite mistress, who gave vent to her rage in the most abusive reproaches, and finally told the duke, she hoped to see him hanged; to which he made the memorable reply, that, far from wishing her ladyship's days shortened in return, his greatest desire was to see her grow old. When Clarendon was banished, the prevailing party, and especially the Duke of Buckingham, entertained a design of impeaching the Duke of Ormond, and succeeded so far as to deprive him of the lieutenancy of Ireland. The profligate Buckingham agitated a still darker project, and is supposed to have hired the famous Blood to attempt the assassination of his rival, in which the ruffian had nearly succeeded. When Blood was afterwards taken in his attempt to steal the regalia, the king being desirous to spare his life, sent to Ormond to intimate his wish, that his grace would consent to the proposed pardon. Ormond nobly answered, if his majesty could forgive him the stealing of his crown, he might easily pardon the assault on his life. The gallant Earl of Ossery,[338] who guessed whence the attempt originally proceeded, seeing the Duke of Buckingham shortly afterwards in the presence, charged him with being the author of the intended assassination; and added, "if his father came to a violent end, he should be at no loss to know the author, should consider Buckingham as the murderer, and pistol him, if he stood behind the king's chair: this" he boldly added, "I tell you in the king's presence, that you may be sure I shall keep my word." It does not appear that this spirited speech met either a retort from Buckingham, or a check from the king. Although the Duke of Ormond escaped the more open, as well as the more secret practices of his enemies, he experienced much coldness from the king, partly on account of his disliking the French intrigues, and partly because he disdained to pay court to the royal mistresses. Yet he would not throw up the staff, which he held as lord-steward of the household, but continued his attendance on court with as much punctuality as if in the highest favour. This mode of conduct greatly embarrassed the good-natured, though unprincipled Charles, to whom Ormond's silent and unreproachful attentions were the most cutting memento of his own ingratitude. On one occasion, the king appeared so much confused, that the Duke of Buckingham asked him, whether he had lost the Duke of Ormond's favour, or Ormond had lost his, since, of the two, his majesty seemed most out of countenance?—In this neglected situation, the duke used good-humouredly to compare himself to an old neglected rusty clock; "yet, even that," said he, "points right once in the twelve hours, and so perhaps may I." On another occasion, when Colonel Cary Dillon pressed him for his interest with the king, and said, he had no friend at court, save God and his grace,—"Alas! poor Cary," said the duke, "thou couldst not have two friends who have so little influence there, and are so much neglected." During all the king's coldness, the duke never altered his political principles, although Charles carried his estrangement to the pitch of not even speaking to him. His opinion of Shaftesbury, and his party, may be learned from an incident which happened during his disgrace at court. "The day that the Earl of Shatesbury was declared lord-chancellor, the king broke through his ordinary rule (of not addressing the duke) and either in doubt about the wisdom of the step he had taken, or out of curiosity to know the Duke of Ormond's sentiments of it, went up to him, and, taking him aside to a window, asked what he thought of his giving the seals to Lord Shaftesbury, whether he had done prudently or not? His grace replied, you have doubtless acted very prudently in so doing, if you know how to get them from him again." Carte, Vol. II. p. 462. At length, after the duke had attended court for a year without receiving a civil word from his sovereign, he suddenly received a message, that the king meant to sup with him. At the entertainment, no word of explanation took place, although the ancient cordiality between the king and his subject seemed to be fully restored. The next day, when the duke came to the court, as usual, the king observed, "Yonder comes Ormond; I have done all I can to disoblige him, and render him as discontented as others; but he will be loyal in spite of my teeth: I must even take him in again, as the fittest man to govern Ireland." Accordingly, the duke was restored to his office of lord-lieutenant in 1677.

He held this high situation during the ferment occasioned by the Popish plot; and although, according to Oates and Bedloe's information, one branch of that conspiracy was the murder of the duke, yet he did not escape suspicion of being accessary to it any more than the king, who was in the same predicament. Lord Shaftesbury, in the parliament of 1679, insinuated an accusation against the duke, on account of the alleged favour he shewed to Papists. From this charge he was vindicated by the Earl of Ossory, with an uncommon degree of spirited eloquence. Alter pleading his father's services against the Roman Catholic rebels, the danger of assassination from them which he had repeatedly escaped, and the active share he had in preventing the perversion of the Duke of Gloucester from the Protestant faith, he thus retorted upon Shaftesbury; "Having spoke of what he has done, I presume with the same truth to tell your lordship what he has not done. He never advised the breaking the triple league; he never advised the shutting up of the exchequer; he never advised the declaration for a toleration; he never advised the falling out with the Dutch, and the joining with France; he was not the author of that most excellent position, Delenda est Carthago; that Holland, a Protestant country, should, contrary to the true interest of England, be totally destroyed. I beg your lordship will be so just, as to judge of my father, and of all men, according to their actions and counsels."[339] Shaftesbury, abashed at this summary of his former political conduct, so different from that he was now pursuing, retracted his accusation with some symptoms of confusion. It remained, however, a capital object with the Whigs, to remove, if possible, the Duke of Ormond from the management of Ireland, at least to put in such a council as should trammel his measures. The King's firmness disconcerted both these plans. At the momentous period when Shaftesbury was committed to the Tower, the Duke of Ormond was sent for to England, that his presence might add respectability and weight to the king's councils. He entered the city with great pomp; and was every where received with the veneration due to his rank, his age, and his services. He had never linked himself to any political faction; contented to serve the crown upon the old cavalier principles, which he always asserted. He was thought, however, to go too great lengths in advising the king to maintain his authority by harsh measures; nor were his experience and authority sufficient to prevent much confused jarring in the king's councils, betwixt Halifax, who was for holding the scales even between the factions, and the high-flying Tories, who were posting towards arbitrary power. Yet, as a steady supporter of the interests of the crown, particularly in the course of the city elections, he deserved the honour which Dryden has assigned him, of standing the first in the file of the king's friends.

The King was pleased to reward the services of Ormond by giving him the rank of an English Duke, in 1682. After having been so long threatened with removal, as a favourer of the Papists, he was actually deprived of the lieutenancy of Ireland, in 1684, for not being disposed to second James II. in the countenance which he meant to afford that sect. The great Duke of Ormond, to which epithet he has a just title, died on the 21 July, 1688, without witnessing the second banishment of the house of Stewart.

This great statesman was a particular patron of Dryden, as is evident from the dedication of "Plutarch's Lives;" where our author again expresses his respect for the father, and his regret for the son. After the death of both, our poet continued to enjoy the countenance of their successor, James, second Duke of Ormond, son of the gallant Ossory, to whom he has dedicated the Fables.

[Note XXXIII.]

His bed could once a fruitful issue boast;

Now more than half a father's name is lost.

His eldest hope, with every grace adorned,

By me, so heaven will have it, always mourned,

And always honoured, snatched, in manhood's prime,

By unequal fates, and providence's crime.—P. [242.]

The Duke of Ormond had eight sons, and two daughters. Six of those sons were dead in 1681, when this poem was published. He, over whom Dryden pours forth this lamentation, was the gallant Thomas, Earl of Ossory, whom, in the last note, we have exhibited as the guardian of his father's life and reputation. At the age of twenty-one, his external appearance and accomplishments are thus described by one who knew him well:[340] "He is a young man, with a very handsome face, a good head of hair, a pretty big voice, well set, and a good round leg. He pleaseth me exceedingly; being very good-natured, asking many questions, and humouring the answers. He rides the great horse very well, is a good tennis player, fencer, and dancer. He understands music, and plays on the guittar and lute; speaks French eloquently, reads Italian fluently; is a good historian, and so well versed in romances, that, if a gallery be full of pictures, or hangings, he will tell the story of all that are there described. He shuts up his door at eight o'clock in the evening, and studies till midnight. He is temperate, courteous, and excellent in all his behaviour." When the Duke of Ormond went into exile, his son was imprisoned by Cromwell, but, being afterwards released, he went abroad. In 1659, he married the daughter of Beverwaert, governor of Sluys, a leading man in the States-General. Upon the Restoration, he was promoted in the army, which did not prevent his exerting his gallantry on another element; for, during the desperate action of four days in 1666, upon hearing the sound of the cannon, he contrived to get off from Harwich, and to get on board the Duke of Albemarle, to whom he brought the first news, that Prince Rupert was recalled to support him. He distinguished himself by his bravery during the battle in Southwold Bay, and by his liberality to the wounded seamen after the action. In 1673 he was made rear-admiral of the blue squadron; and, in the great battle in which Sir Edward Spragge was killed, he lay by to defend and bring off that admiral's disabled vessel. He is said to have formed a plan for revenging the surprise at Chatham, by a descent at Helvoetsluys; when he averred he would burn the Royal Charles, which the Dutch preserved as a trophy, and the whole Dutch fleet, with a half-penny candle, or consent, in case of failure, that his head should be placed beside Cromwell's on Westminster-Hall. But the scheme was not attempted; being prevented, it is said, by the envious interposition of Buckingham. In November 1674, the Earl of Ossory had the honour to be intrusted with the charge of arranging the match between the Prince of Orange and the Lady Mary. He served under the prince against the French with great credit, particularly in the famous battle of Mons, fought 1678, where, with the British regiments under his command, he executed with glory the desperate service of beating the French out of their entrenchments. In April 1680, he was designed Governor of Tangiers, an appointment with which he was highly pleased; for his courage, being of a romantic and wild nature, delighted in the prospect of being opposed to such uncommon adversaries as the Moors. But, while he was busily preparing for his departure, he was seized with a malignant fever, during the delirium of which his mind was observed constantly to be occupied with his intended exploits against the besiegers of Tangiers.[341] He died on the 30th July, 1680, aged forty-six years. The lamentation for his loss was general and excessive; the noble reply of his venerable father, to those who offered him consolation, is well known: "Since he had borne the death of his king, he could support," he said, "that of his child; and would rather have his dead son, than any living son in Christendom."

The Earl of Ossory was a patron of learning; and was mourned, both in verse and prose, by many other writers, as well as Dryden. Settle, who then seems to have been in the Tory interest, published a heroic poem on his death. Flatman wrote a pindaric ode on the same occasion; for which he received, from the Duke of Ormond, a diamond ring of 100 guineas value.—See WOOD'S Athenæ Oxon. There is another ode written by K. C., perhaps Katherine Cockburn; finally, one bard, resolving to amuse the nation's mourning by his own, dedicates to Ossory's memory some exquisite stanzas, beginning thus: "Upon the Earl of Ossory, who died of a fever, 30th July, 1680."

The best sized pillar of the fairest pile,

That has of late been built on Ireland's isle,

Is fallen; some were too short, others too long,

Some are too old, and others much too young.

— — — — — — —

Who knew him well, could not believe that ever

He meant to die thus tamely of a fever.

After lamenting, in similar strains, that the subject of his muse had not

————fallen down a scaling ladder;

First by grenadoes rent, or, what is sadder,

Some royal ship his coffin should have been;

he complains, "weeps, and frets," that

————the king, the nation,

Ireland, his house, and the whole confederation

Of worthy men, his children, and his wife,

Were all trepanned and cozen'd of his life;

For he (who fire and hail was proof) with ice

Was burned, and with a peach shot in a trice.

It is curious, and not quite useless, to see how admirably such a poet can succeed in turning into farce the most lofty subject.

[Note XXXIV.]

Zadoc the priest, whom, shunning power and place,

His lowly mind advanced to David's grace.—P. [243.]

Sancroft, Archbishop of Canterbury, was, in principle and practice, a rigid high-church man. He even harboured notions favourable to the celibacy of the clergy, and other ascetic doctrines of the church of Rome. Burnet says, "that he was a man of solemn deportment, sullen gravity, and some learning." He made profession of the old cavalier faith and principles of loyalty, which rendered him acceptable to the court and the high-church party in general, although his temper was austere and reserved, and his manners dry and distant. Yet the Archbishop, though so harshly described by his brother of Sarum, displayed, on one urgent occasion, a becoming readiness to assert the doctrine of the church of England against those of Rome; and on another, the steadiness of his own political principles, although his adherence, in both instances, exposed him to persecution from those in power. While the head of the high-church party, this primate was the first to encourage the bishops and clergy to a refusal to read the king's declaration of indulgence; he concerted also, and signed the memorable petition, for which, with six other prelates, he suffered imprisonment and trial, by one of the most imprudent exertions of power which an infatuated monarch ever attempted. On the 16th of July, 1688, this primate recommended a set of articles to the bishops within his metropolitan jurisdiction, inculcating residence and attention to parochial duties; but especially, that the clergy should take heed of Romish emissaries, who, like the old serpent, insidiantur calcaneo, and besiege the beds of dying persons, to unsettle their faith. He also recommends a tender regard to their "brethren, the protestant dissenters," and an union with them against the church of Rome. At the Revolution, the Archbishop was one of those privy counsellors who invited the Prince of Orange to take charge of the government; but as his principles did not permit him to accede to any step for removing King James from the throne, he declined sitting in the Convention of the estates. In conformity to the same principles, he refused to take the oaths of allegiance to the Revolution government; and was, in consequence, first suspended, and finally deprived of his dignity, in which he was succeeded by the famous Tillotson. He was regarded by the high-church party as a confessor, if not a martyr, for the doctrine of passive obedience. Sancroft died in 1693.

[Note XXXV.]

With him the Sagan of Jerusalem,

Of hospitable soul, and noble stem.—P. [243.]

Compton, Bishop of London, was youngest son of the late, and brother to the then Earl of Northampton. He had been a soldier until he was thirty and upwards, when he exchanged the sword for the gown. He is said by Burnet to have been a great hater of Popery, and exact in performing the duties of his diocese; but unlearned, weak, and wilful. He was a high-church man, and held some reputation in the party, from his personal rank, and the dignity of his situation. In other respects, the bishop seems to have been good-tempered and hospitable, but much at the devotion of the Earl of Danby, who had early assisted him with his patronage. Although the Duke of York hated Compton, yet the charge of the education of the Princesses Mary and Anne devolved upon him. In the reign of James II., he distinguished himself in the House of Peers, by a severe rebuff to the insolence of Jefferies, the Chancellor. Soon after, the Bishop was cited before the illegal court, called the Ecclesiastical Commission, to answer for having refused to obey the king's command, by suspending Sharpe, a clergyman, who had preached a sermon against Popery. He requested a copy of their commission; but Jefferies, with his usual violence, told him, he might have it for a penny in any coffeehouse, and he might believe, in the mean while, that they were not such fools as to sit there without an effectual one. After some delay, he was suspended from his function, until the news of the Prince of Orange's intended expedition, when his suspension was removed. The credit which the bishop acquired by this persecution, amounted to what Mulgrave called a "reverential popularity, which," his lordship adds, "he of all the bishops would have found it most difficult to have acquired otherwise." This led to the Bishop of London playing what, considering his age and situation, was rather a remarkable part in the Revolution; when Prince George of Denmark went over to the Prince of Orange, and the princess, his wife, afterwards Queen Anne, either fearing the resentment of her father, or determined by the councils of Lady Churchill, (afterwards the famous Duchess of Marlborough,) resolved to leave Whitehall, and abandon her father's party. The Bishop acted as her escort on this occasion; and, the time and circumstances reviving his military habits, he rode before her coach to Northampton, with pistols at his saddle, and a drawn sword in his hand. It may easily be believed, that Dryden did not greatly approve of this last exploit of his hospitable and noble Sagan; and he has left a pretty strong testimony of his latter opinion, if the verses called "Suum Cuique" are really written by him:

I should admit the booted prelate now,

But he is even for lampoon too low;

The scum and outcast of a royal race,

The nation's grievance, and the gown's disgrace.

None so unlearned did e'er at London sit;

This driveller does the holy chair b——.

I need not brand the spiritual parricide,

Nor draw the weapon dangling by his side;

The astonished world remembers that offence,

And knows he stole the daughter of his prince.

'Tis time enough, in some succeeding age,

To bring this mitred captain on the stage.

[Note XXXVI.]

Him of the western dome, whose weighty sense

Flows in fit words, and heavenly eloquence.—P. [243.]

Dolben, Bishop of Rochester, and Dean of Westminster, had borne arms in his youth for Charles I., who made him a major. He was, according to Burnet, an excellent preacher, but a man of more spirit than discretion, and imprudent in his behaviour. He is unanimously allowed to have been a good-natured easy man, of most amiable manners. In 1683, he was promoted to the see of York, and made a very good archbishop. Dolben died in 1686.

Settle attempts to droll upon the praises bestowed by Dryden on these three bishops, and assures us,

Not David's lyre could more his touch obey;

As their princes breathe and strike, they play.

}

{ 'Gainst royal will they never can dispute;

{ But, by a strange tarantula struck mute,

{ Dance to no other tune but absolute:

Besides, they've sense of honour and who knows

How far the gratitude of priestcraft goes?

— — — — — — —

And what if now, like old Elisha fed,

To praise the sooty bird that brought them bread,

In pure acknowledgment, though in despite

Of their own sense, they paint the raven white?

Absalom Senior.

[Note XXXVII.]

Sharp-judging Adriel, the muses friend,

Himself a muse.—P. [243.]

Adriel is the Earl of Mulgrave, afterwards Marquis of Normanby and Duke of Buckingham. He was one of Dryden's most early and effectual patrons. The "Essay upon Satire" was their joint composition, and Dryden inscribed to him his play of "Aureng-Zebe." The praise bestowed by Dryden is, as usual, discriminating and appropriate. Mulgrave exhibits his "sharp judgement" in his "Essay on Poetry," which contains some good critical remarks; but of his lordship's poetical talents we have spoken sufficiently elsewhere.[342] His political principles were those of a staunch Tory, which he maintained through his whole life; and was zealous for the royal prerogative, although he had no small reason to complain of Charles II., who, to avenge himself of Mulgrave, for a supposed attachment to the Princess Anne, sent him to Tangiers, at the head of some troops, in a leaky vessel, which it was supposed must have perished in the voyage. Though Mulgrave was apprized of the danger, he scorned to shun it; and the Earl of Plymouth, a favourite son of the king, generously insisted upon sharing it along with him. This ungenerous attempt to destroy him, in the very act of performing his duty, with the refusal of a regiment, made a temporary change in Mulgrave's conduct. He connected himself for a time with the country party;[343] but he soon returned to his original principles, and continued steadily to support the court during the progress of the Exclusion Bill, and in all the stormy debates of the troubled period to which Dryden's poem refers. Yet he evinced, that he was not a "slave of state;" for, although James II. made him Lord High Chamberlain, he withstood all the measures which that ill-advised prince adopted in behalf of the Catholic religion. He silenced a priest, who was labouring for his conversion, and had begun with the doctrine of transubstantiation, by the famous repartee, that "though he believed God made man, he could not believe that man was quits by making God in return." But he stood gallantly by King James to the very last, and had the courage to insist upon the council taking measures for the safety of that unfortunate monarch's person, when, after his first flight, he was seized by the sailors at Feversham.

Dryden says, Adriel was adorned with the "honours torn from his disobedient son;" because, when Monmouth was deprived of the government of Hull and lieutenancy of Yorkshire, the king conferred them upon the Earl of Mulgrave.

[Note XXXVIII.]

Jotham, of piercing wit, and pregnant thought,

Endued by nature, and by learning taught,

To move assemblies, who but only tried

The worse awhile, then chose the better side:

Nor chose alone, but turned the balance too;

So much the weight of one brave man, can do.—P. [243.]

Sir George Saville, Viscount, Earl, and at length Marquis of Halifax, was the prime minister of Charles during the last years of his reign. He was a man of fine genius and lively imagination; but, as a politician, was guided rather by a desire to display the full extent of artful and nice management of parties, than by any steady or consistent principle of his own. He was at the head of the small party called Trimmers, who affected a sort of neutrality between the Whig and Tory factions, and were, of course, suspected and hated by both. He originally made a figure in opposition to the court, particularly upon the great debates concerning the test, which he keenly opposed. He voted at first for the bill of Exclusion; and used the jocular argument against hereditary government, that no man would chuse a man to drive his carriage, merely because his father had been a good coachman. But when that great question came finally to be debated in the House of Lords, on the 15th November, 1680, Halifax had changed his opinion; and he even conducted the opposition to the bill, and displayed an extent of capacity and eloquence, equally astonishing to friends and foes, and which, perhaps, never was surpassed in that assembly. Even Shaftesbury sank before this versatile orator; and there seems little doubt, that his eloquence had a great effect in deciding the issue of that day's famous debate, by which the Exclusion Bill was thrown out for ever. The House of Commons was so much incensed against Halifax, that they voted an address for his removal from the king's councils. The king, however, found his own advantage in the fine and balancing policy of Halifax; and, far from consenting to his disgrace, promoted him to the rank of Marquis, and office of Privy Seal, which was hardly more displeasing to the Whigs than to the Duke of York. To the over-bearing measures of this prince, Halifax was secretly a determined opponent; it was his uniform object to detach Monmouth so far from the violent councils and party of Shaftesbury, that the interest which he still retained in the king's affections might be employed as a counterbalance to that of his brother. He prevailed upon the king to see Monmouth, after the discovery of the Rye-house Plot; and, had the duke then proved more practicable, it is possible, that, backed with the interest of Halifax, he might have regained his place in the king's favour. Upon this occasion, the Duke of York was not consulted, and made open show of his displeasure. Indeed Halifax told Sir John Reresby, that the Duke would never forgive him.[344] It is even said, that, immediately before the death of Charles, there was a scheme in agitation, under the management of Halifax, for recalling Monmouth, sending York to Scotland, calling a parliament, and totally changing the violent measures of the last two years.[345] If so, it was prevented by the king's sudden death, and left Halifax exposed to the resentment of his successor. For some time, James, in consideration of his great services during the dependence of the Bill of Exclusion, treated him with seeming confidence; but finding him unwilling to go the lengths he proposed in religious matters, and particularly in the proposed repeal of the test acts, he was totally disgraced. Alter this period, the Marquis of Halifax engaged with those lords who invited over the Prince of Orange; and joined so cordially in the Revolution, that he was made Keeper of the Seals by King William. He died in April 1695.

Amidst the various political changes of this thorough-paced statesman, it ought not to be forgotten, that, though he sided with the court during the last years of King Charles, his councils were a salutary check on the arbitrary measures urged by the Duke of York; and that he probably merited the praise, which Dryden elsewhere bestows on him, "of preventing a civil war, and extinguishing a growing fire, which was just ready to have broken forth."[346]

[Note XXXIX.]

Hushai, the friend of David in distress;

In public storms, of manly stedfastness;

By foreign treaties he informed his youth,

And joined experience to his native truth.—P. [244.]

Laurence Hyde, second son to the great Earl of Clarendon, created Earl of Rochester by Charles II. Even after his father's fall, he contrived to retain the confidence of Charles, and in 1676 was employed on an embassy to Poland. He was also one of the plenipotentiaries at the treaty of Nimeguen, and for some time ambassador in Holland; to which diplomatic situations Dryden alludes in the text. He was named one of the commissioners of the treasury in 1679, and had very considerable influence, by which the poet reaped some advantage; for, notwithstanding the exhausted state of the exchequer, he acknowledges, that, contrary to the famous comparison of Cowley, Gideon's fleece had been moistened, when all the ground around was parched. Rochester was a steady opposer of the Bill of Exclusion, for which, in 1681, he was voted a public enemy by the House of Commons. Indeed, that measure must have materially affected the interests of the Duke of York's daughters, to whom Rochester stood in the relation of maternal uncle. For the same reason, as well as from political principle, he as keenly withstood the Duke of Monmouth s pretensions; for which he is stigmatised by Settle, in lines of which the following is a specimen:

Of these, than subtile Caleb none more great;

Caleb, who shines where his lost father set.

— — — — — — —

Caleb, who does that hardy pilot make,

Steering in that hereditary track,

Blind to the sea-mark of a father's wrack.

Notwithstanding the compliments bestowed by Dryden on Rochester for his management of the exchequer, he was, when in the high situation of Lord Treasurer, 1682, accused of peculation by his rival Halifax, who so far prevailed, that Rochester was removed to the more honourable but less important office, of President of the Council; on which occasion his witty adversary first applied the since well-known phrase, of "his lordship's being kicked up stairs." After the accession of King James, Rochester was again made Lord Treasurer, but soon lost the staff for his repugnance to enter into the violent measures of that monarch. He had consented to be present at a conference between some Catholic and Protestant divines, but treated the arguments of the former with a contempt which James could not forgive. At the Revolution he observed a sullen neutrality; and, though uncle to Queen Mary, never heartily acquiesced in her title to the crown, or reaped any benefit from its being occupied by so near a relation. King William never could forgive his once having passed through the Low Countries without waiting upon him.

He was a particular patron of Dryden, who inscribed to him the "Duke of Guise" and "Cleomenes," with expressions of great gratitude and respect. See Vol. VII. p. 13. Vol. VIII. p. 191.

[Note XL.]

Indulge one labour more, my weary muse,

For Amiel; who can Amiel's praise refuse?

Of ancient race by birth, but nobler yet

In his own worth, and without title great:

The Sanhedrim long time as chief he ruled,

Their reason guided, and their passion cooled.—P. [244.]

Edward Seymour, afterward Sir Edward Seymour, Bart., was descended of the elder branch of the illustrious family of that name, and was ancestor of the present Duke of Somerset. He is said to have attached great importance to his high birth, and to have been esteemed the proudest commoner in England. He was speaker of the House of Commons under the Earl of Danby's administration; a post which he filled with a mixture of dexterity and dignity. Burnet says, he knew the House and every man of it so well, that at one glance he could tell the fate of every motion. This he used as a means of serving the court; contriving usually to protract the debate when their party were not assembled in strength. It was alleged by his enemies, that he was the channel through which gratuities were distributed to the court members; which charge is grossly urged in Settle's poem called "Absalom Senior."[347] These charges seem to be exaggerated; at least it is certain, that Seymour's conduct as speaker was not uniformly, or servilely, guided by devotion to the court; and that he was acceptable to the Commons, for the Parliament, in 1679, chose him speaker anew, in opposition to Mr Meres, who was proposed by the court party. But when Seymour was next day presented as speaker to the king, he refused to receive him as such, and said, he had indispensable occasion for his services in another capacity. At this time the crown claimed a voice in the nomination of the speaker, and the dispute became very warm, till it was terminated by the king conceding, that the right of election was in the House, upon their passing from the election of Mr Seymour, and chusing Mr Sergeant Gregory. He was afterwards made Treasurer of the Navy, and was in that office in 1680, when an impeachment was moved against him for corruption and mal-administration. But the House of Lords repelled the impeachment; which seems only to have been founded in party clamour. In the following year he was voted a public enemy, for opposing the Bill of Exclusion. In the slavish parliament of 1685, Seymour had the boldness to deliver a speech on the irregularity of the elections, which had been much biassed by the crown. He told the House, that many doubted whether they were the true representatives of the people; and that little justice was expected on petitions, where too many were guilty to judge justly and impartially. He said, it concerned the House to look to this; for, if the nation saw no equity was to be expected from them, they might take means to make the members suffer that justice which they would not grant. No one among the astonished members had been aware of Seymour's intentions, so none were prepared either to second or answer this bold harangue. This statesman was a friend to the Revolution; he joined the Prince of Orange at Exeter, and was the first to propose that an association should be signed, without which, he observed, the insurgents were as a rope of sand. On this occasion, the Prince, meaning a compliment, asked Seymour if he was not of the Duke of Somerset's family? "No, please your royal highness," was the reply; "the Duke is of mine." This gave the Prince the first idea of the conscious dignity of an English commoner. William placed Devonshire under his government. In the parliament of 1700-1, Sir Edward Seymour was active in detecting the corrupt practices of elections, and received the thanks of the House for having protected its constitution.

[Note XLI.]

Thus, from his royal throne, by heaven inspired,

The godlike David spoke, &c.—P. [245.]

Spence, on the authority of a priest whom he often met at Mr Pope's, has stated, that the king obliged Dryden to put his speech to the Oxford Parliament into verse, and insert it at the close of "Absalom and Achitophel." Mr Malone has extracted the following parallel passages, which give some countenance to the tradition; although Dryden is just as likely to have versified them of his own accord as by the royal command; for this speech was the talisman by which he was to extricate David from all his difficulties.[348]

"The unwarrantable proceedings of the last House of Commons were the occasion of my parting with the last parliament; for I, who will never use arbitrary government myself, am resolved not to suffer it in others. —— I am unwilling to mention particulars, because I am desirous to forget faults; but whoever shall calmly consider what offers I have formerly made, and what assurances I made to the last Parliament,——and then shall reflect upon the strange unsuitable returns made to such propositions by men who were called together to consult, perhaps may wonder more that I had patience so long, than that at last I grew weary of their proceedings. —— I conclude with this one advice to you, that the rules and measures of all your votes may be the known and established laws of the land, which neither can nor ought to be departed from, nor changed, but by act of Parliament; and I may the more reasonably require, that you make the laws of the land your rule, because I am resolved they shall be mine."

[Note XLII.]

The offenders question my forgiving right.—P. [245.]

In the case of the Earl of Danby, the King's power of granting him a pardon was warmly disputed; it being supposed, that the crown had no power to remit the penalty of high treason. So far was this notion stretched, that, as we have already seen, the sheriffs, Bethel and Cornish, contested, in the case of Lord Stafford, the king's right to exchange the statutory punishment of hanging, drawing, and quartering, for that of beheading. They applied by petition to the House of Commons to have their scruples removed, and, proh pudor! received the countenance of Lord Russell in this brutal scruple. The king did not forget this circumstance when the writ was issued for Russell's execution: "He shall find," said Charles, in appointing the commutation of punishment, "that I have the privilege which he was pleased to deny in the case of Lord Stafford."

The petitioners, mentioned immediately afterwards, are those who called upon the king by petition to summon the parliament. These applications were highly displeasing to Charles, whose followers, to balance them, made equally violent addresses, expressing their abhorrence of tumultuary petitions. Almost every county and town was thus divided into petitioners, and addressers, or abhorrers, as they were sometimes called. The former experienced, on occasion of presenting their petitions, the royal frowns; while the latter were in a very summary manner committed, by the House of Commons, to the custody of their serjeant. This arbitrary course was ended by the refusal of one Stowel to submit to the arrest, which contempt the House were fain to pass over, by voting that he was indisposed.

[Note XLIV.]

By their own arts 'tis righteously decreed,

Those dire atificers of death shall bleed.

Against themselves their witnesses will swear,

Till, viper-like, their mother-plot they tear.—P. [247.]

This is rather an imprudent avowal of what was actually the policy of the court faction at this time. They contrived to turn against Shaftesbury and his party, many of those very witnesses by whom so many Catholics had been brought to execution. Dugdale, Turberville, Haynes, and Smith, all of whom had been witnesses of the plot, now came as readily forward to convict Colledge, Howard, and Shaftesbury himself, of high treason. Such infamous traffic ought to have deprived them of credit on all sides; but it was the misfortune of the time, that, swear what they would one day, and the exact contrary the next, they, on each occasion, found a party to countenance, believe, and reward them.

---

ABSALOM
AND
ACHITOPHEL.
PART II.

---

Si quis tamen hæc quoque, si quis
Captus amore leget.——

---

ABSALOM AND ACHITOPHEL.
PART SECOND.

The sensation produced in London, and indeed throughout the nation, by the first part of "Absalom and Achitophel," was so deep and extended, as never had been before occasioned by a similar performance. Neither was Dryden backward in pursuing the literary victory which he had obtained over the Whigs. He published "The Medal" upon the acquittal of the Earl of Shaftesbury, and the rejoicings with which his party had celebrated that memorable event. He even stooped to inferior game, and avenged himself of Shadwell's repeated attacks upon his literary reputation, his political principles, and his moral character, by the publication of "Mac Flecnoe," one of the most severe satires in the English language. Yet, according to the opinion of the royal party, more still remained to be done. The heads of Shaftesbury's faction had been held up to hatred, or ridicule, in "Absalom and Achitophel;" his own life had been more closely scrutinized, and his failings and crimes exposed more specifically in "The Medal;" but something, they conceived, was wanting, to silence and crush the underling writers and agitators of the party, and Dryden's assistance was again invoked for this purpose, as well as to celebrate some of the king's supporters and favourites, who were necessarily omitted in the original poem. But Dryden, being unwilling again to undertake a task upon which he had repeatedly laboured, deputed Nahum Tate to be his assistant in a second part of "Absalom and Achitophel;" reserving for himself only the execution of certain particular characters, and the general plan and revisal of the poem.

Of Tate, honoured with so high a trust by our great poet, biographers have preserved but a very imperfect memorial. He was the son of Dr Faithful Tate or Teat, was born in Ireland, and educated at Trinity College, Dublin. He wrote, or rather new modelled and translated, nine plays, of which, his alteration of King Lear still keeps the stage, in defiance of its gross departure from Shakespeare's plot and moral. During the reign of Charles and his successor, Tate was a keen Tory, as may be easily guessed from Dryden's employing him in the honourable task of writing a second part to his admirable satire; yet, upon Shadwell's death, he was made poet laureat to King William, and retained that office till his own decease. His talent for poetry amounted to cold mediocrity; had he been a man of fortune, it would have raised him to the rank of an easy sonnet writer, or a person of wit and honour about town. As he was very poor, it is no disgrace to his muse, that she left him in that indigence from which far more distinguished poetical merit has been unable to raise those who possessed it. Tate died in the Mint, where he had taken refuge from his creditors, on the 12th of August, 1715. He had long been in extreme want, having owed almost his sole subsistence to the patronage or charity of the Earl of Dorset. His poetry is multifarious; but consists chiefly of pieces upon occasional subjects, written to supply the immediate wants of the author. The Psalms, of which he executed a translation, in conjunction with Dr Brady, are still used in the church of England, although, in the opinion of many persons, they are inferior to the old version.[349]

The following continuation of "Absalom and Achitophel," owes all its spirit to the touches and additions of the author of the first part. Those lines, to the number of two hundred, beginning,

Next these a troop of busy spirits press;

and concluding,

To talk like Doeg, and to write like thee,

are entirely composed by Dryden, and contain some of the most masterly strokes of his pen. The portraits of Doeg and Og, under which names he stigmatized his personal antagonists, Settle and Shadwell, are executed with a strength of satirical colouring, unmatched in the English language. When we consider that Dryden had already, and very lately, made Shadwell the subject of an entire independent satire, it seems wonderful, with what ease he has executed a separate, and even more striking, caricature of his adversary, without repeating an idea or expression which he had used in "Mac Flecnoe." This is, indeed, partly owing to the dexterous division of his subject, as well as to the rich fertility of his vein of satire. For, after apparently exhausting upon his enemy all the opprobrium and contempt with which a literary character could be loaded, he seized this second occasion to brand and blacken his political and moral principles, and to exaggerate his former charge of dulness, by combining it with those of sedition, profaneness, and immorality. The characters of Ben Jochanan, Judas, Phaleg, &c. are all drawn with the same spirit and vivacity; and, on the whole, these lines are equal to any of the kind which our author ever wrote.

Had Dryden limited his assistance to furnishing this fragment, he would rather have injured than served his coadjutor, since it would have shone like a lamp in a dungeon, only to show the dreary waste in which it was inclosed. To prevent Tate from suffering too much by comparison, Dryden has obviously contributed much to the poem at large. Still, though Tate's lines have doubtless been weeded of much that would at once have ascertained their origin, our author's own couplet might have been addressed to Nahum on the assistance lent him. Dryden's spirit is

————so transfused, as oil and waters flow;

His always floats above, thine sinks below.

Much of the character of Corah, for example, is unquestionably Dryden's; so probably is that of Arod, and the verses generally descriptive of the Green-ribbon Club, which precede it. Such pungent satire is easily distinguished from the smooth insipid flow of other parts in which Dryden's corrections probably left nothing for censure, and which fate was unable to qualify with any thing entitled to praise. The character of Michal, of Dryden as Asaph, and some of the encomiastic passages, seem to show the extent of Tate's powers, when unsupported by the vivifying assistance of his powerful auxiliary. They are just decently versified, but flat, common-place, and uninteresting.

The second part of "Absalom and Achitophel" shared the fate of most continuations, and did not attain the popularity of the original. This was not entirely owing to the general inferiority of the poetry; for there was enough of personal satire, and that immediately flowing from the keen pen of Dryden, to secure the attention both of friends and foes; but the parallel between the heroes of Scripture and the characters of the day, however striking at first, did not bear to be too long protracted. When the original comparison was made, its aptness at once pleased the imagination, and arrested the attention; but when prolonged in a second part, readers began to see there was little wit in continuing to draw out the allusion, till it consisted in nothing more than the invention of a Jewish name for a British author or statesman; the attempt at finding prototypes in Scripture for every modern character being necessarily abandoned. Besides, those who took it upon them to answer Dryden, had in general made use of the vehicle of satire which he had invented; and as, in the eyes of the public, the theme became stale and tarnished by repetition, his antagonists did him that injury by their stupidity, which their wit was unequal to accomplish. Add to all this, that whole lines, and even longer passages, not to mention images and sentiments, are by Tate, in his poverty of ideas, transferred from the first part of the satire to the second;[350] and we must allow, that the latter is deficient in the captivating grace of novelty.

The second part of "Absalom and Achitophel" appeared about November 10th, 1682, in folio. Tonson is the publisher.

---

ABSALOM
AND
ACHITOPHEL.
PART SECOND.

---

Since men, like beasts, each other's prey were made,

Since trade began, and priesthood grew a trade,

Since realms were formed, none, sure, so curst as those,

That madly their own happiness oppose;

There heaven itself, and god-like kings, in vain

Shower down the manna of a gentle reign;

While pampered crowds to mad sedition run,

And monarchs by indulgence are undone.

Thus David's clemency was[351] fatal grown,

While wealthy faction awed the wanting throne:

For now their sovereign's orders to contemn,

Was held the charter of Jerusalem;

His rights to invade, his tributes to refuse,

A privilege peculiar to the Jews;

As if from heavenly call this licence fell,

And Jacob's seed were chosen to rebel!

Achitophel, with triumph, sees his crimes

Thus suited to the madness of the times;

And Absalom, to make his hopes succeed,

Of flattering[352] charms no longer stands in need;

While fond of change, though ne'er so dearly bought,

Our tribes outstrip the youth's ambitious thought;

His swiftest hopes with swifter homage meet,

And crowd their servile necks beneath his feet.

Thus to his aid while pressing tides repair,

He mounts, and spreads his streamers in the air.

The charms of empire might his youth mislead,

But what can our besotted Israel plead?

Swayed by a monarch, whose serene command

Seems half the blessing of our promised land;

Whose only grievance is excess of ease,

Freedom our pain, and plenty our disease!

Yet as all folly would lay claim to sense,

And wickedness ne'er wanted a pretence,

With arguments they'd make their treason good,

And righteous David's self with slanders load:

That arts of foreign sway he did affect,

And guilty Jebusites[353] from law protect,

Whose very chiefs, convict, were never freed,

Nay we have seen their sacrifices bleed!

Accuser's infamy is urged in vain,

While in the bounds of sense they did contain;

But soon they launcht into the unfathomed tide,

And in the depths they knew disdained to ride;

For probable discoveries to dispense,

Was thought below a pensioned evidence;

Mere truth was dull, nor suited with the port

Of pampered Corah,[354] when advanced to court.

No less than wonders now they will impose,

And projects void of grace or sense disclose.

Such was the charge on pious Michal[355] brought;

Michal, that ne'er was cruel even in thought;

The best of queens, and most obedient wife,

Impeached of curst designs on David's life!

His life, the theme of her eternal prayer,

'Tis scarce so much his guardian angel's care.

Not summer morns such mildness can disclose,

The Hermon lily, nor the Sharon rose.

Neglecting each vain pomp of majesty,

Transported Michal feeds her thoughts on high.

She lives with angels, and, as angels do,

Quits heaven sometimes to bless the world below;

Where, cherished by her bounteous plenteous spring,

Reviving widows smile, and orphans sing.

Oh! when rebellious Israel's crimes at height,

Are threatened with her Lord's approaching fate,

The piety of Michal then remain

In heaven's remembrance, and prolong his reign!

Less desolation did the pest pursue,

That from Dan's limits to Beersheba slew;[356]

Less fatal the repeated wars of Tyre,[357]

And less Jerusalem's avenging fire.[358]

With gentler terror these our state o'er-ran,

Than since our evidencing days began!

On every cheek a pale confusion sat,

Continued fear beyond the worst of fate!

Trust was no more, art, science, useless made,

All occupations lost but Corah's trade.

Meanwhile a guard on modest Corah wait,

If not for safety, needful yet for state.[359]

Well might he deem each peer and prince his slave,

And lord it o'er the tribes which he could save:

Even vice in him was virtue—what sad fate,

But for his honesty, had seized our state?

And with what tyranny had we been curst,

Had Corah never proved a villain first?

To have told his knowledge of the intrigue in gross,

Had been, alas, to our deponent's loss:[360]

The travelled Levite had the experience got,

To husband well, and make the best of's plot;

And therefore, like an evidence of skill,

With wise reserves secured his pension still;

Nor quite of future power himself bereft,

But limbos large for unbelievers left,

And now his writ such reverence had got,

'Twas worse than plotting to suspect his plot:

Some were so well convinced, they made no doubt

Themselves to help the foundered swearers out;

Some had their sense imposed on by their fear,

But more for interest sake believe and swear:

Even to that height with some the frenzy grew,

They raged to find their danger not prove true.

Yet, than all these a viler crew remain,

Who with Achitophel the cry maintain;

Not urged by fear, nor through misguided sense,

(Blind zeal and starving need had some pretence,)

But for the good old cause, that did excite

The original rebel's wiles,—revenge, and spite.

These raise the plot, to have the scandal thrown

Upon the bright successor of the crown,

Whose virtue with such wrongs they had pursued,

As seemed all hope of pardon to exclude.

Thus, while on private ends their zeal is built,

The cheated crowd applaud and share their guilt.

Such practices as these, too gross to lie

Long unobserved by each discerning eye,

The more judicious Israelites unspelled,

Though still the charm the giddy rabble held;

Even Absalom, amidst the dazzling beams

Of empire, and ambition's flattering dreams,

Perceives the plot, too foul to be excused,

To aid designs, no less pernicious, used;[361]

And, filial sense yet striving in his breast,

Thus to Achitophel his doubts exprest.

Why are my thoughts upon a crown employed,

Which, once obtained, can be but half enjoyed?

Not so when virtue did my arms require,

And to my father's wars I flew entire.

My regal power how will my foes resent,

When I myself have scarce my own consent?

Give me a son's unblemished truth again,

Or quench the sparks of duty that remain.

How slight to force a throne that legions guard,

The task to me; to prove unjust, how hard!

And if the imagined guilt thus wound my thought,

What will it, when the tragic scene is wrought?

Dire war must first be conjured from below,

The realm we'd rule we first must overthrow;

}

{ And when the civil furies are on wing,

{ That blind and undistinguished slaughters fling,

{ Who knows what impious chance may reach the king?

Oh! rather let me perish in the strife,

Than have my crown the price of David's life!

Or, if the tempest of the war he stand,

In peace, some vile officious villain's hand

His soul's anointed temple may invade,

Or, prest by clamorous crowds, myself be made

His murtherer; rebellious crowds, whose guilt

Shall dread his vengeance till his blood be spilt;

Which if my filial tenderness oppose,

Since to the empire by their arms I rose,

Those very arms on me shall be employed,

A new usurper crowned, and I destroyed:

}

{ The same pretence of public good will hold,

{ And new Achitophels be found as bold

{ To urge the needful change,—perhaps the old.

He said. The statesman with a smile replies,

A smile that did his rising spleen disguise:—

My thoughts presumed our labours at an end,

And are we still with conscience to contend?

Whose want in kings as needful is allowed,

As 'tis for them to find it in the crowd.

Far in the doubtful passage you are gone,

And only can be safe by pressing on.

The crown's true heir, a prince severe and wise,

Has viewed your motions long with jealous eyes;

Your person's charms, your more prevailing arts,

And marked your progress in the people's hearts.

Whose patience is the effect of stinted power,

But treasures vengeance for the fatal hour;

And if remote the peril he can bring,

Your present danger's greater from the king.

Let not a parent's name deceive your sense,

Nor trust the father in a jealous prince!

Your trivial faults if he could so resent,

To doom you little less than banishment.

What rage must your presumption since inspire?

Against his orders your return from Tyre;[362]

Nor only so, but with a pomp more high,

And open court of popularity,

The factious tribes—And this reproof from thee?

The prince replies,—O statesman's winding skill!

They first condemn, that first advised the ill.—

Illustrious youth, returned Achitophel,

Misconstrue not the words that mean you well.

The course you steer I worthy blame conclude,

But 'tis because you leave it unpursued.

A monarch's crown with fate surrounded lies;

Who reach, lay hold on death that miss the prize.

Did you for this expose yourself to shew,

And to the crowd bow popularly low;

For this your glorious progress next ordain,

With chariots, horsemen, and a numerous train;

With fame before you like the morning star,

And shouts of joy saluting from afar?

Oh from the heights you've reached but take a view,

Scarce leading Lucifer could fall like you!

And must I here my shipwrecked arts bemoan?

Have I for this so oft made Israel groan?

Your single interest with the nation weighed,

And turned the scale where your desires were laid.

Even when at helm a course so dangerous moved

To land your hopes, as my removal proved.[363]

I not dispute, the royal youth replies,

The known perfection of your policies,

Nor in Achitophel yet grudge or blame

The privilege that statesmen ever claim;

Who private interest never yet pursued,

But still pretended 'twas for others' good:

What politician yet e'er 'scaped his fate,

Who saving his own neck not saved the state?

From hence on every humourous wind that veered,

With shifted sails a several course you steered.

What from a sway did David e'er pursue,

That seemed like absolute, but sprung from you?

Who at your instance quashed each penal law,

That kept dissenting factious Jews in awe;

And who suspends fixt law's, may abrogate,

That done, form new, and so enslave the state,[364]

Even property, whose champion now you stand,

And seem for this the idol of the land,

Did ne'er sustain such violence before,

As when your counsel shut the royal store;

Advice, that ruin to whole tribes procured,

But secret kept till your own banks secured.

Recount with this the triple covenant broke,

And Israel fitted for a foreign yoke;

Nor here your counsels fatal progress staid,

But sent our levied powers to Pharaoh's aid.

Hence Tyre and Israel, low in ruins laid,

And Egypt, once their scorn, their common terror made.

Even yet of such a season can we dream,

When royal rights you made your darling theme;

For power unlimited could reasons draw,

And place prerogative above the law;

Which on your fall from office grew unjust,

The laws made king, the king a slave in trust;

Whom with state-craft, to interest only true,

You now accuse of ills contrived by you.

To this hell's agent:—Royal youth, fix here;

Let interest be the star by which you steer.

Hence, to repose your trust in me was wise,

Whose interest most in your advancement lies;

A tie so firm as always will avail,

When friendship, nature, and religion fail.

On our's the safety of the crowd depends,

Secure the crowd, and we obtain our ends;

Whom I will cause so far our guilt to share,

Till they are made our champions by their fear.

What opposition can your rival bring,

While sanhedrims[365] are jealous of the king?

His strength as yet in David's friendship lies,

And what can David's self without supplies?

Who with exclusive bills must now dispense,

Debar the heir, or starve in his defence;

Conditions which our elders ne'er will quit,

And David's justice never can admit.

Or, forced by wants his brother to betray,

To your ambition next he clears the way;

For if succession once to nought they bring,

Their next advance removes the present king:

Persisting else his senates to dissolve,

In equal hazard shall his reign involve.

Our tribes, whom Pharaoh's power so much alarms,

Shall rise without their prince to oppose his arms.

Nor boots it on what cause at first they join;

Their troops, once up, are tools for our design.

At least such subtle covenants shall be made,

Till peace itself is war in masquerade.

Associations of mysterious sense,

Against, but seeming for, the king's defence,[366]

Even on their courts of justice fetters draw,

And from our agents muzzle up their law.

By which a conquest if we fail to make,

'Tis a drawn game at worst, and we secure our stake.

He said, and for the dire success depends

On various sects, by common guilt made friends;

Whose heads, though ne'er so differing in their creed,

I' th' point of treason yet were well agreed.

Amongst these, extorting Ishban[367] first appears,

Pursued by a meagre troop of bankrupt heirs.

Blest times, when Ishban, he whose occupation

So long has been to cheat, reforms the nation!

Ishban, of conscience suited to his trade,

As good a saint as usurer ever made.

Yet Mammon has not so engrost him quite,

But Belial lays as large a claim of spite;

Who, for those pardons from his prince he draws,

Returns reproaches, and cries up the cause.

That year in which the city he did sway,

He left rebellion in a hopeful way;

Yet his ambition once was found so bold,

To offer talents of extorted gold,

(Could David's wants have so been bribed,) to shame

And scandalize our peerage with his name;

For which, his dear sedition he'd forswear,

And e'en turn loyal, to be made a peer.

Next him, let railing Rabsheka have[368] place,

So full of zeal he has no need of grace;

A saint that can both flesh and spirit use,

Alike haunt conventicles and the stews;

Of whom the question difficult appears,

If most i' th' preacher's or the bawd's arrears.

What caution could appear too much in him,

That keeps the treasure of Jerusalem!

Let David's brother but approach the town,

Double our guards, he cries, we are undone.[369]

Protesting that he dares not sleep in's bed,

Lest he should rise next morn without his head.

[370]"Next these, a troop of busy spirits press,

Of little fortunes, and of conscience less;

With them the tribe, whose luxury had drained

Their banks, in former sequestrations gained;

Who rich and great by past rebellions grew,

And long to fish the troubled streams anew.

Some, future hopes, some, present payment draws,

To sell their conscience and espouse the cause.

Such stipends those vile hirelings best befit,

Priests without grace, and poets without wit.

Shall that false Hebronite escape our curse,

Judas,[371] that keeps the rebels' pension-purse;

Judas, that pays the treason-writer's fee,

Judas, that well deserves his name-sake's tree;

Who at Jerusalem's own gates erects

His college for a nursery of sects;

Young prophets with an early care secures,

And with the dung of his own arts manures!

What have the men of Hebron[372] here to do?

What part in Israel's promised land have you?

Here Phaleg,[373] the lay-Hebronite, is come,

'Cause like the rest he could not live at home;

Who from his own possessions could not drain

An omer even of Hebronitish grain,

Here struts it like a patriot, and talks high

Of injured subjects, altered property;

An emblem of that buzzing insect just,

That mounts the wheel, and thinks she raises dust.

Can dry bones live? or skeletons produce

The vital warmth of cuckoldizing juice?

Slim Phaleg could, and, at the table fed,

Returned the grateful product to the bed.

A waiting-man to travelling nobles chose,

He his own laws would saucily impose,

'Till bastinadoed back again he went,

To learn those manners he to teach was sent.

Chastized he ought to have retreated home,

But he reads politics to Absalom;

For never Hebronite, though kicked and scorned,

To his own country willingly returned.

—But, leaving famished Phaleg to be fed,

And to talk treason for his daily bread,

Let Hebron, nay let hell, produce a man

So made for mischief as Ben-Jochanan;[374]

A Jew of humble parentage was he,

By trade a Levite, though of low degree;

His pride no higher than the desk aspired,

But for the drudgery of priests was hired

To read and pray in linen ephod brave,

And pick up single shekels from the grave.

Married at last, and finding charge come faster,

He could not live by God, but changed his master;

Inspired by want, was made a factious tool,

They got a villain, and we lost a fool.

Still violent, whatever cause he took,

But most against the party he forsook:

For renegadoes, who ne'er turn by halves,

Are bound in conscience to be double knaves.

So this prose-prophet took most monstrous pains,

To let his masters see he earned his gains.

But as the devil owes all his imps a shame,

He chose the apostate[375] for his proper theme;

With little pains he made the picture true,

And from reflexion took the rogue he drew.

A wondrous work, to prove the Jewish nation

In every age a murmuring generation;

To trace them from their infancy of sinning,

And shew them factious from their first beginning.

To prove they could rebel, and rail, and mock,

Much to the credit of the chosen flock;

A strong authority which must convince,

That saints own no allegiance to their prince;

As 'tis a leading-card to make a whore,

To prove her mother had turned up before.

But, tell me, did the drunken patriarch bless

The son that shewed his father's nakedness?

Such thanks the present church thy pen will give,

Which proves rebellion was so primitive.

Must ancient failings be examples made?

Then murtherers from Cain may learn their trade.

As thou the heathen and the saint hast drawn,

Methinks the apostate was the better man;

And thy hot father, waving my respect,

Not of a mother-church, but of a sect.

And such he needs must be of thy inditing;

This comes of drinking asses milk and writing.

If Balack[376] should be called to leave his place,

As profit is the loudest call of grace,

His temple, dispossessed of one, would be

Replenished with seven devils more by thee.

Levi, thou art a load; I'll lay thee down,

And shew rebellion bare, without a gown;

Poor slaves in metre, dull and addle-pated,

Who rhime below even David's psalms translated:

Some in my speedy pace I must out-run,

As lame Mephibosheth the wizard's son;[377]

To make quick way I'll leap o'er heavy blocks,

Shun rotten Uzza[378] as I would the pox;

And hasten Og and Doeg to rehearse,

Two fools that crutch their feeble sense on verse;

Who by my muse to all succeeding times

Shall live, in spite of their own doggrel rhimes.

Doeg,[379] though without knowing how or why,

Made still a blundering kind of melody;

Spurred boldly on, and dashed through thick and thin,

Through sense and nonsense, never out nor in;

Free from all meaning, whether good or bad,

And, in one word, heroically mad.

}

{ He was too warm on picking-work to dwell,

{ But fagotted his notions as they fell,

{ And, if they rhimed and rattled, all was well.

Spiteful he is not, though he wrote a satire,

For still there goes some thinking to ill-nature;

He needs no more than birds and beasts to think,

All his occasions are to eat and drink.

If he call rogue and rascal from a garret,

He means you no more mischief than a parrot;

The words for friend and foe alike were made,

To fetter them in verse is all his trade.

For almonds he'll cry whore to his own mother,

And call young Absalom king David's brother.[380]

Let him be gallows-free by my consent,

And nothing suffer since he nothing meant;

Hanging supposes human soul and reason,

This animal's below committing treason;

Shall he be hanged who never could rebel?

That's a preferment for Achitophel.

The woman, that committed buggary,

Was rightly sentenced by the law to die;

But 'twas hard fate that to the gallows led

The dog, that never heard the statute read.[381]

Railing in other men may be a crime,

But ought to pass for mere instinct in him;

Instinct he follows and no farther knows,

For, to write verse with him is to transprose;[382]

'Twere pity treason at his door to lay,

Who makes heaven's gate a lock to its own key.

Let him rail on, let his invective muse

Have four-and-twenty letters to abuse,

Which if he jumbles to one line of sense,

Indict him of a capital offence.

In fire-works give him leave to vent his spite,

Those are the only serpents he can write;

The height of his ambition is, we know,

But to be master of a puppet-show;

On that one stage his works may yet appear,

And a month's harvest keeps him all the year.

}

{ Now stop your noses, readers, all and some,

{ For here's a tun of midnight-work to come,

{ [383]Og from a treason-tavern rolling home.

Round as a globe, and liquored every chink,

Goodly and great he sails behind his link.

With all this bulk there's nothing lost in Og,

For every inch, that is not fool, is rogue;

A monstrous mass of foul corrupted matter,

As all the devils had spewed to make the batter.

When wine has given him courage to blaspheme,

He curses God, but God before curst him;

And if man could have reason, none has more,

That made his paunch so rich, and him so poor.

With wealth he was not trusted, for heaven knew

What 'twas of old to pamper up a Jew;

To what would he on quail and pheasant swell,

That even on tripe and carrion could rebel?

But though heaven made him poor, with reverence speaking,

He never was a poet of God's making;

The midwife laid her hand on his thick skull,

With this prophetic blessing—be thou dull;

Drink, swear, and roar; forbear no lewd delight

Fit for thy bulk; do any thing but write.

Thou art of lasting make, like thoughtless men,

A strong nativity—but for the pen;

Eat opium, mingle arsenic in thy drink,

Still thou mayst live, avoiding pen and ink.

I see, I see, 'tis counsel given in vain,

For treason, botched in rhyme, will be thy bane;

Rhyme is the rock on which thou art to wreck,

'Tis fatal to thy fame and to thy neck.

Why should thy metre good king David blast?

A psalm of his will surely be thy last.

Darest thou presume in verse to meet thy foes,

Thou, whom the penny pamphlet foiled in prose?

Doeg, whom God for mankind's mirth has made,

O'er tops thy talent in thy very trade;

Doeg to thee, thy paintings are so coarse,

A poet is, though he's the poet's horse.

A double noose thou on thy neck dost pull,

For writing treason, and for writing dull;

To die for faction is a common evil,

But to be hanged for nonsense is the devil.

Hadst thou the glories of thy king exprest,

Thy praises had been satire at the best;

But thou in clumsy verse, unlickt, unpointed,

Hast shamefully defied the Lord's anointed.

I will not rake the dunghill of thy crimes,

For who would read thy life that reads thy rhymes?

But of king David's foes, be this the doom,

May all be like the young man Absalom;

And, for my foes, may this their blessing be,

To talk like Doeg, and to write like thee!"

Achitophel each rank, degree and age,

For various ends neglects not to engage;

The wise and rich, for purse and counsel brought,

The fools and beggars, for their number sought;

Who yet not only on the town depends,

For even in court the faction had its friends.

These thought the places they possest too small,

And in their hearts wished court and king to fall;

Whose names the muse, disdaining, holds i' th' dark,

Thrust in the villain herd without a mark;

With parasites and libel-spawning imps,

Intriguing fops, dull jesters, and worse pimps.

Disdain the rascal rabble to pursue,

Their set cabals are yet a viler crew.

See where involved in common smoke they sit,

Some for our mirth, some for our satire fit;

These gloomy, thoughtful, and on mischief bent,

While those for mere good fellowship frequent

The appointed club, can let sedition pass,

Sense, nonsense, any thing to employ the glass;[384]

And who believe, in their dull honest hearts,

The rest talk treason but to shew their parts;

Who ne'er had wit or will for mischief yet,

But pleased to be reputed of a set.

But in the sacred annals of our plot,

Industrious Arod[385] never be forgot;

The labours of this midnight-magistrate

May vie with Corah's to preserve the state.

In search of arms he failed not to lay hold

On war's most powerful dangerous weapon, gold.

On war's most powerful dangerous weapon, gold.

And last, to take from Jebusites all odds,

Their altars pillaged, stole their very gods.

Oft would he cry, when treasure he surprised,

'Tis Baalish gold in David's coin disguised.

Which to his house with richer reliques came,

While lumber idols only fed the flame;

For our wise rabble ne'er took pains to enquire,

What 'twas he burnt, so it made a rousing fire.

With which our elder was enriched no more

Than false Gehazi with the Syrian's store;

So poor, that when our chusing-tribes were met,

Even for his stinking votes he ran in debt;

For meat the wicked, and, as authors think,

The saints he choused for his electing drink;

Thus every shift and subtle method past,

And all to be no Zaken[386] at the last.

Now, raised on Tyre's sad ruins, Pharaoh's pride

Soared high, his legions threatning far and wide;

As when a battering storm engendered high,

By winds upheld, hangs hovering in the sky,

Is gazed upon by every trembling swain,

This for his vineyard fears, and that his grain,

For blooming plants, and flowers new opening; these

For lambs yeaned lately, and far-labouring bees;

To guard his stock each to the gods does call,

Uncertain where the fire-charged clouds will fall;

Even so the doubtful nations watch his arms,

With terror each expecting his alarms.

Where, Judah, where was now thy lion's roar?

Thou only couldst the captive lands restore;

But thou, with inbred broils and faction prest,

From Egypt need'st a guardian with the rest.

Thy prince from sanhedrims no trust allowed,

Too much the representers of the crowd,

Who for their own defence give no supply,

But what the crown's prerogatives must buy;[387]

As if their monarch's rights to violate

More needful were, than to preserve the state!

From present dangers they divert their care,

And all their fears are of the royal heir:

Whom now the reigning malice of his foes,

Unjudged would sentence, and ere crowned depose;

Religion the pretence, but their decree

To bar his reign, whate'er his faith shall be.

By sanhedrims and clamorous crowds thus prest,

What passions rent the righteous David's breast!

Who knows not how to oppose or to comply,

Unjust to grant, and dangerous to deny!

How near in this dark juncture Israel's fate,

Whose peace one sole expedient could create,

Which yet the extremest virtue did require,

Even of that prince whose downfal they conspire!

His absence David does with tears advise,

To appease their rage; undaunted he complies.[388]

Thus he, who, prodigal of blood and ease,

A royal life exposed to winds and seas,

At once contending with the waves and fire,

And heading danger in the wars of Tyre,[389]

Inglorious now forsakes his native sand,

And, like an exile, quits the promised land.

Our monarch scarce from pressing tears refrains,

And painfully his royal state maintains,

Who now, embracing on the extremest shore,

Almost revokes what he enjoined before;

Concludes, at last, more trust to be allowed

To storms and seas than to the raging crowd.—

Forbear, rash muse, the parting scene to draw,

With silence charmed as deep as their's that saw!

Not only our attending nobles weep,

But hardy sailors swell with tears the deep;

The tide restrained her course, and, more amazed,

The twin-stars on the royal brothers gazed;

While this sole fear——

Does trouble to our suffering hero bring,

Lest, next, the popular rage oppress the king.

Thus parting, each for the other's danger grieved,

The shore the king, and seas the prince received.—

Go, injured hero! while propitious gales,

Soft as thy consort's breath, inspire thy sails;

Well may she trust her beauties on a flood,

Where thy triumphant fleets so oft have rode!

Safe on thy breast reclined, her rest be deep,

Rocked, like a Nereid, by the waves asleep;

While happiest dreams her fancy entertain,

And to Elysian fields convert the main!

Go, injured hero! while the shores of Tyre

At thy approach so silent shall admire,

Who on thy thunder still their thoughts employ,

And greet thy landing with a trembling joy.

On heroes thus the prophet's fate is thrown,

Admired by every nation but their own;

Yet while our factious Jews his worth deny,

Their aching conscience gives their tongue the lie.

Even in the worst of men the noblest parts

Confess him, and he triumphs in their hearts;

Whom to his king the best respects commend,

Of subject, soldier, kinsman, prince and friend;

All sacred names of most divine esteem,

And to perfection all sustained by him;

Wise, just, and constant, courtly without art,

Swift to discern and to reward desert;

No hour of his in fruitless ease destroyed,

But on the noblest subjects still employed;

Whose steady soul ne'er learnt to separate

Between his monarch's interest and the state,

But heaps those blessings on the royal head,

Which he well knows must be on subjects shed.

On what pretence could then the vulgar rage

Against his worth, and native rights engage?

Religious fears their argument are made,

Religious fears his sacred rights invade!

Of future superstition they complain,

And Jebusitic worship in his reign;

With such alarms his foes the crowd deceive,

With dangers fright, which not themselves believe.

Since nothing can our sacred rites remove,

Whate'er the faith of the successor prove;

Our Jews their ark shall undisturbed retain,

At least while their religion is their gain,

Who know by old experience Baal's commands

Not only claimed their conscience but their lands.

They grudge God's tythes; how therefore shall they yield

An idol full possession of the field?

Grant such a prince enthroned, we must confess

The people's sufferings than that monarch's less,

Who must to hard conditions still be bound,

And for his quiet with the crowd compound;

Or should his thoughts to tyranny incline,

Where are the means to compass the design?

Our crown's revenues are too short a store,

And jealous sanhedrims would give no more.

As vain our fears of Egypt's potent aid;

Not so has Pharaoh learnt ambition's trade,

Nor ever with such measures can comply,

As shock the common rules of policy.

None dread like him the growth of Israel's king;

And he alone sufficient aids can bring,

Who knows that prince to Egypt can give law,

That on our stubborn tribes his yoke could draw;

At such profound expence he has not stood,

Nor dyed for this his hands so deep in blood;

Would ne'er through wrong and right his progress take,

Grudge his own rest, and keep the world awake,

To fix a lawless prince on Judah's throne,

First to invade our rights, and then his own;

His dear-gained conquests cheaply to despoil,

And reap the harvest of his crimes and toil.

We grant his wealth vast as our ocean's sand,

And curse its fatal influence on our land,

Which our bribed Jews so numerously partake,

That even an host his pensioners would make.

From these deceivers our divisions spring,

Our weakness, and the growth of Egypt's king;

These, with pretended friendship to the state,

Our crowd's suspicion of their prince create,

Both pleased and frightened with the specious cry,

To guard their sacred rights and property.

To ruin thus the chosen flock are sold,

While wolves are ta'en for guardians of the fold;

Seduced by these we groundlessly complain,

And loath the manna of a gentle reign;

Thus our forefathers' crooked paths are trod,

We trust our prince no more than they their God.

But all in vain our reasoning prophets preach,

To those whom sad experience ne'er could teach.

Who can commence new broils in bleeding scars,

And fresh remembrance of intestine wars;

When the same household mortal foes did yield,

And brothers stained with brothers' blood the field;

When sons' curst steel the fathers' gore did stain,

And mothers mourned for sons by fathers slain!

When thick as Egypt's locusts on the sand,

Our tribes lay slaughtered through the promised land,

Whose few survivors with worse fate remain,

To drag the bondage of a tyrant's reign;

Which scene of woes, unknowing, we renew

And madly even those ills we fear pursue;

While Pharaoh laughs at our domestic broils,

And safely crowds his tents with nations' spoils.

Yet our fierce sanhedrim, in restless rage,

Against our absent hero still engage,

And chiefly urge, such did their frenzy prove,

The only suit their prince forbids to move;

Which till obtained they cease affairs of state,

And real dangers wave for groundless hate.

Long David's patience waits relief to bring,

With all the indulgence of a lawful king,

Expecting till the troubled waves would cease,

But found the raging billows still increase.

The crowd, whose insolence forbearance swells,

While he forgives too far, almost rebels.

At last his deep resentments silence broke,

The imperial palace shook, while thus he spoke:

Then Justice wake, and Rigour take her time,

For lo! our mercy is become our crime.

While halting punishment her stroke delays,

Our sovereign right, heaven's sacred trust, decays;

For whose support even subjects' interest calls,

Woe to that kingdom where the monarch falls!

That prince, who yields the least of regal sway,

So far his people's freedom does betray.

Right lives by law, and law subsists by power;

Disarm the shepherd, wolves the flock devour.

Hard lot of empire o'er a stubborn race,

Which heaven itself in vain has tried with grace!

When will our reason's long-charmed eyes unclose,

And Israel judge between her friends and foes?

When shall we see expired deceivers' sway,

And credit what our God and monarchs say?

Dissembled patriots, bribed with Egypt's gold,[390]

Even sanhedrims in blind obedience hold;

Those patriots' falsehood in their actions see,

And judge by the pernicious fruit the tree;

If aught for which so loudly they declaim,

Religion, laws, and freedom, were their aim,

Our senates in due methods they had led,

To avoid those mischiefs which they seem'd to dread;

But first, e'er yet they propt the sinking state,

To impeach and charge, as urged by private hate,

Proves that they ne'er believed the fears they prest,

But barbarously destroyed the nation's rest.

O whither will ungoverned senates drive?

And to what bounds licentious votes arrive?

When their injustice we are pressed to share,

The monarch urged to exclude the lawful heir.

Are princes thus distinguished from the crowd,

And this the privilege of royal blood?

But grant we should confirm the wrongs they press,

His sufferings yet were than the people's less;

Condemned for life the murdering sword to wield,

And on their heirs entail a bloody field,

Thus madly their own freedom they betray,

And for the oppression which they fear make way;

Succession fixed by heaven, the kingdom's bar,

Which, once dissolved, admits the flood of war;

Waste, rapine, spoil, without the assault begin,

And our mad tribes supplant the fence within.

Since, then, their good they will not understand,

'Tis time to take the monarch's power in hand;

Authority and force to join with skill,

And save the lunatics against their will.

The same rough means that 'suage the crowd, appease

Our senates, raging with the crowd's disease.

Henceforth unbiassed measures let them draw

From no false gloss, but genuine text of law;

Nor urge those crimes upon religion's score,

Themselves so much in Jebusites abhor;

Whom laws convict, and only they, shall bleed,

Nor Pharisees by Pharisees be freed.

Impartial justice from our throne shall shower,

All shall have right, and we our sovereign power.

He said; the attendants heard with awful joy,

And glad presages their fixed thoughts employ.

From Hebron now the suffering heir returned,[391]

A realm that long with civil discord mourned;

Till his approach, like some arriving god,

Composed and healed the place of his abode;

The deluge checked that to Judea spread,

And stopped sedition at the fountain's head.

Thus in forgiving David's paths he drives,

And, chased from Israel, Israel's peace contrives.

The field confessed his power in arms before,

And seas proclaimed his triumphs to the shore;

As nobly has his sway in Hebron shown,

How fit to inherit godlike David's throne.

Through Sion's streets his glad arrival's spread,

And conscious faction shrinks her snaky head;

His train their sufferings think o'erpaid to see

The crowds applause with virtue once agree.

Success charms all, but zeal for worth distrest,

A virtue proper to the brave and best;

'Mongst whom was Jothran,[392] Jothran always bent

To serve the crown, and loyal by descent;

Whose constancy so firm, and conduct just,

Deserved at once two royal masters' trust;

Who Tyre's proud arms had manfully withstood

On seas, and gathered laurels from the flood;

Of learning yet no portion was denied,

Friend to the muses, and the muses' pride.

Nor can Benaiah's[393] worth forgotten lie,

Of steady soul when public storms were high;

Whose conduct, while the Moor fierce onsets made,

Secured at once our honour and our trade.

Such were the chiefs who most his sufferings mourned,

And viewed with silent joy the prince returned;

While those, that sought his absence to betray,

Press first, their nauseous false respects to pay;

Him still the officious hypocrites molest,

And with malicious duty break his rest.

While real transports thus his friends employ,

And foes are loud in their dissembled joy,

His triumphs, so resounded far and near,

Missed not his young ambitious rival's ear;

And as, when joyful hunters' clamorous train

Some slumbering lion wakes in Moab's plain,

Who oft had forced the bold assailants yield,

And scattered his pursuers through the field,

Disdaining, furls his mane, and tears the ground,

His eyes inflaming all the desart round,

With roar of seas directs his chasers' way,

Provokes from far, and dares them to the fray;

Such rage stormed now in Absalom's fierce breast,

Such indignation his fired eyes confest.

Where now was the instructor of his pride?

Slept the old pilot in so rough a tide,

Whose wiles had from the happy shore betrayed,

And thus on shelves the credulous youth conveyed?

In deep revolving thoughts he weighs his state,

Secure of craft, nor doubts to baffle fate;

At least, if his stormed bark must go adrift,

To baulk his charge, and for himself to shift,

In which his dextrous wit had oft been shown,

And in the wreck of kingdoms saved his own;

But now with more than common danger prest,

Of various resolutions stands possest,

Perceives the crowd's unstable zeal decay,

Lest their recanting chief the cause betray,

Who on a father's grace his hopes may ground,

And for his pardon with their heads compound.

Him therefore, e'er his fortune sup her time,

The statesman plots to engage in some bold crime

Past pardon; whether to attempt his bed,

Or threat with open arms the royal head,

Or other daring method, and unjust,

That may confirm him in the people's trust.

But, failing thus to ensnare him, not secure

How long his foiled ambition may endure,

Plots next to lay him by as past his date,

And try some new pretender's luckier fate;

Whose hopes with equal toil he would pursue,

Nor cares what claimer's crowned, except the true.

Wake, Absalom, approaching ruin shun,

And see, O see, for whom thou art undone!

How are thy honours and thy fame betrayed,

The property of desperate villains made!

Lost power and conscious fears their crimes create,

And guilt in them was little less than fate;

But why shouldst thou, from every grievance free,

Forsake thy vineyards for their stormy sea?

For thee did Canaan's milk and honey flow,

Love dressed thy bowers, and laurels sought thy brow;

Preferment, wealth, and power, thy vassals were,

And of a monarch all things but the care.

Oh, should our crimes again that curse draw down,

And rebel arms once more attempt the crown,

Sure ruin waits unhappy Absalon,

Alike by conquest or defeat undone.

Who could relentless see such youth, and charms,

Expire, with wretched fate, in impious arms?

A prince so formed, with earth's and heaven's applause,

To triumph o'er crowned heads in David's cause.

Or, grant him victor, still his hopes must fail,

Who, conquering, would not for himself prevail;

The faction, whom he trusts for future sway,

Him and the public would alike betray;

Amongst themselves divide the captive state,

And found their hydra-empire in his fate.

Thus having beat the clouds with painful flight,

The pitied youth, with sceptres in his sight,

(So have their cruel politics decreed,)

Must by that crew, that made him guilty, bleed!

For, could their pride brook any prince's sway,

Whom, but mild David, would they chose to obey?

Who once at such a gentle reign repine,

The fall of monarchy itself design;

From hate to that their reformations spring,

And David not their grievance, but the king.

Seized now with panic fear the faction lies,

Lest this clear truth strike Absalom's charmed eyes;

Lest he perceive, from long enchantment free,

What all, beside the flattered youth, must see.

But whate'er doubts his troubled bosom swell,

Fair carriage still became Achitophel;

Who now an envious festival installs,

And to survey their strength the faction calls,

Which fraud, religious worship too, must gild;

But oh how weakly does sedition build!

For, lo! the royal mandate issues forth,

Dashing at once their treason, zeal, and mirth.[394]—

So have I seen disastrous chance invade,

Where careful emmets had their forage laid;

Whether fierce Vulcan's rage the furzy plain

Had seized, engendered by some careless swain;

Or swelling Neptune lawless inroads made,

And to their cell of store his flood conveyed;

The commonwealth, broke up, distracted go,

And, in wild haste, their loaded mates o'erthrow:

Even so our scattered guests confusedly meet,

With boiled, baked, roast, all justling in the street;

Dejecting all, and ruefully dismayed,

For shekel, without treat or treason paid.

Sedition's dark eclipse now fainter shows,

More bright each hour the royal planet grows,

Of force the clouds of envy to disperse,

In kind conjunction of assisting stars.

Here, labouring muse! those glorious chiefs relate,

That turned the doubtful scale of David's fate;

The rest of that illustrious band rehearse,

Immortalized in laureled Asaph's verse:

Hard task! yet will not I thy flight recall;

View heaven, and then enjoy thy glorious fall.

First write Bezaliel,[395] whose illustrious name

Forestals our praise, and gives his poet fame.

The Kenites rocky province his command,

A barren limb of fertile Canaan's land;

Which, for its generous natives, yet could be

Held worthy such a president as he.

Bezaliel with each grace and virtue fraught,

Serene his looks, serene his life and thought;

On whom so largely nature heaped her store,

There scarce remained for arts to give him more.

To aid the crown and state his greatest zeal,

His second care, that service to conceal;

Of dues observant, firm to every trust,

And to the needy always more than just;

Who truth from specious falsehood can divide,

Has all the gownsmen's skill without their pride;

Thus crowned with worth, from heights of honour won,

Sees all his glories copied in his son,[396]

Whose forward fame should every muse engage,

Whose youth boasts skill denied to others' age.

Men, manners, language, books of noblest kind,

Already are the conquest of his mind;

Whose loyalty, before its date, was prime,

Nor waited the dull course of rolling time;

The monster faction early he dismayed,

And David's cause long since confessed his aid.

Brave Abdael[397] o'er the prophet's school was placed;

Abdael, with all his father's virtue graced;

A hero who, while stars looked wondering down,

Without one Hebrew's blood restored the crown.

That praise was his; what therefore did remain

For following chiefs, but boldly to maintain

That crown restored? and in this rank of fame,

Brave Abdael with the first a place must claim.

Proceed, illustrious, happy chief proceed!

Fore-seize the garlands for thy brow decreed;

While the inspired tribe attend with noblest strain,

To register the glories thou shalt gain:

For sure the dew shall Gilboah's hills forsake,

And Jordan mix his stream with Sodom's lake;

Or seas retired their secret stores disclose,

And to the sun their scaly brood expose;

Or, swelled above the cliffs, their billows raise,

Before the muses leave their patron's praise.

Eliab[398] our next labour does invite

And hard the task to do Eliab right.

Long with the royal wanderer he roved,

And firm in all the turns of fortune proved.

Such ancient service, and desert so large,

Well claimed the royal household for his charge.

His age with only one mild heiress blessed,

In all the bloom of smiling nature dressed;

And blessed again, to see his flower allied

To David's stock, and made young Othriel's[399] bride.

The bright restorer of his father's youth,

Devoted to a son's and subject's truth:

Resolved to bear that prize of duty home,

So bravely sought, while sought by Absalom.

Ah, prince! the illustrious planet of thy birth,

And thy more powerful virtue, guard thy worth,

That no Achitophel thy ruin boast!

Israel too much in one such wreck has lost.

Even envy must consent to Helon's[400] worth;

Whose soul, though Egypt glories in his birth,

Could for our captive ark its zeal retain,

And Pharaoh's altars in their pomp disdain:

To slight his gods was small; with nobler pride,

He all the allurements of his court defied.

Whom profit nor example could betray,

But Israel's friend, and true to David's sway.

What acts of favour in his province fall,

On merit he confers, and freely all.

Our list of nobles next let Amri[401] grace,

Whose merits claimed the Abethdin's high place;

Who, with a loyalty that did excel,

Brought all the endowments of Achitophel.

Sincere was Amri, and not only knew,

But Israel's sanctions into practice drew;

Our laws, that did a boundless ocean seem,

Were coasted all, and fathomed all by him.

No rabbin speaks like him their mystic sense,

So just, and with such charms of eloquence;

To whom the double blessing does belong,

With Moses' inspiration, Aaron's tongue.

Than Sheva[402] none more loyal zeal have shown,

Wakeful as Judah's lion for the crown;

Who for that cause still combats in his age,

For which his youth with danger did engage.

In vain our factious priests the cant revive;

In vain seditious scribes with libel strive

To inflame the crowd; while he, with watchful eye,

Observes, and shoots their treasons as they fly:

Their weekly frauds his keen replies detect;

He undeceives more fast than they infect.

So Moses, when the pest on legions preyed,

Advanced his signal, and the plague was stayed.

Once more, my fainting muse, thy pinions try,

And strength's exhausted store let love supply.

What tribute, Asaph,[403] shall we render thee?

We'll crown thee with a wreath from thy own tree!

Thy laurel-grove no envy's flash can blast;[404]

The song of Asaph shall for ever last.

With wonder late posterity shall dwell

On Absalom and false Achitophel:

Thy strains shall be our slumbering prophets' dream,

And when our Zion virgins sing their theme,

Our jubilees shall with thy verse be graced;

The song of Asaph shall for ever last.

How fierce his satire, loosed; restrained, how tame;

How tender of the offending young man's fame!

How well his worth, and brave adventures stiled;

Just to his virtues, to his error mild!

No page of thine that fears the strictest view,

But teems with just reproof, or praise, as due;

Not Eden could a fairer prospect yield,

All paradise, without one barren field

Whose wit the censure of his foes has past:

The song of Asaph shall for ever last.

What praise for such rich strains shall we allow?

What just rewards the grateful crown bestow?

While bees in flowers rejoice, and flowers in dew,

While stars and fountains to their course are true,

While Judah's throne, and Zion's rock stand fast,

The song of Asaph, and the fame shall last.

Still Hebron's honoured happy soil retains

Our royal hero's beauteous dear remains;[405]

Who now sails off, with winds nor wishes slack,

To bring his sufferings' bright companion back.

But ere such transport can our sense employ,

A bitter grief must poison half our joy;

Nor can our coasts restored those blessings see

Without a bribe to envious destiny!

Cursed Sodom's doom forever fix the tide,

Where, by inglorious chance, the valiant died.

Give not insulting Askalon to know,

Nor let Gath's daughters triumph in our woe!

No sailor with the news swell Egypt's pride,

By what inglorious fate our valiant died!

Weep, Arnon! Jordan, weep thy fountains dry,

While Zion's rock dissolves for a supply.

Calm were the elements, night's silence deep,

The waves scarce murmuring, and the winds asleep;

Yet fate for ruin takes so still an hour,

And treacherous sands the princely bark devour;[406]

Then death unworthy seized a generous race,

To virtue's scandal, and the stars' disgrace!

Oh, had the indulgent powers vouchsafed to yield,

Instead of faithless shelves, a listed field;

A listed field of heaven's and David's foes,

Fierce as the troops that did his youth oppose,

Each life had on his slaughtered heap retired,

Not tamely and unconquering thus expired.

But destiny is now their only foe,

And, dying, even o'er that they triumph too;

With loud last breaths their masters 'scape applaud,

Of whom kind force could scarce the fates defraud;

Who, for such followers lost, O, matchless mind!

At his own safety now almost repined!—

Say, royal Sir, by all your fame in arms,

Your praise in peace, and by Urania's charms,

If all your suffering's past so nearly prest,

Or pierced with half so painful grief, your breast?

Thus some diviner muse her hero forms,

Not soothed with soft delights, but tossed in storms;

Nor stretched on roses in the myrtle grove,

Nor crowns his days with mirth, his nights with love,

But far removed in thundering camps is[407] found,

His slumbers short, his bed the herbless ground;

In tasks of danger always seen the first,

Feeds from the hedge, and slakes with ice his thirst.

Long must his patience strive with fortune's rage,

And long opposing gods themselves engage;

Must see his country flame, his friends destroyed,

Before the promised empire be enjoyed:

Such toil of fate must build a man of fame,

And such, to Israel's crown, the god-like David came.

What sudden beams dispel the clouds so fast,

Whose drenching rains laid all our vineyards waste?

The spring so far behind her course delayed,

On the instant is in all her bloom arrayed;

The winds breathe low, the element serene,

Yet, mark! what motion in the waves is seen!

Thronging and busy as Hyblæan swarms,

Or straggled soldiers summoned to their arms.

See where the princely bark in loosest pride,

With all her guardian fleet, adorns the tide!

High on her deck the royal lovers stand,

Our crimes to pardon e'er they touched our land.

Welcome to Israel and to David's breast!

Here all your toils, here all your sufferings rest.

This year did Ziloah[408] rule Jerusalem,

And boldly all sedition's syrtes[409] stem,

Howe'er encumbered with a viler pair

Than Ziph or Shimei,[410] to assist the chair;

Yet Ziloah's loyal labours so prevailed,

That faction, at the next election, failed;

When even the common cry did justice sound,

And merit by the multitude was crowned;

With David then was Israel's peace restored,

Crowds mourned their error, and obeyed their lord.

---

NOTES
ON
ABSALOM AND ACHITOPHEL.
PART II.

---

[Note I.]

That arts of foreign sway he did affect,

And guilty Jebusites from law protect,

Whose very chiefs, convict, were never freed;

Nay, we have seen their sacrificers bleed.—P. [320.]

It is certain, that, whatever the private wishes of Charles may have been, he neither did nor durst interfere, by his royal prerogative, to prevent the execution of Stafford, Coleman, Langhorne, Plunket, and other Catholics of rank, who were condemned on account of the Popish Plot. Ireland, Fenwic, Gavan, Turner, and Harcourt, Jesuits, with Whitebread, the provincial of the order, were all tried, sentenced, and executed for the same conspiracy; persisting, to their last breath, in the most solemn and deliberate asseverations of innocence: But their dying testimonies only irritated the populace the more against a religion, which taught its votaries to go down to the grave with a manifest lie, as they supposed, in their right hand.

[Note II.]

Mere truth was dull, nor suited with the port

Of pampered Corah, when advanced to court.

— — — — — — —

Meanwhile a guard on modest Corah wait,

If not for safety, needful yet for state.—P. [320.]

The Parliament, before whom Oates was examined, did not confine themselves to simple approbation of his conduct. He was treated in a manner suitable to the sense they had of his merit and importance. The charge of his personal safety was recommended by the House of Commons to the Lord General, the care of his lodgings and accommodation to the Lord Chamberlain, and that of supplying him with money to the Lord High Treasurer of England.

The state of Oates, in his splendour, is very well described by North: "He was now in his trine exaltation; his plot in full force, efficacy, and virtue; he walked about with his guards, assigned for fear of the Papists' murdering him. He had lodgings at Whitehall, and L. 1200 per annum pension; and no wonder, after he had the impudence to say to the House of Lords, in plain terms, that, if they would not help him to more money, he must be forced to help himself. He put on an episcopal garb, (except the lawn sleeves,) silk gown and cassock, great hat, sattin hatband and rose, long scarf, and was called, or blasphemously called himself, the Saviour of the Nation. Whoever he pointed at was taken up and committed; so that many people got out of his way as from a blast, and glad they could prove their last two years conversation. The very breath of him was pestilential; and if it brought not imprisonment or death over such on whom it fell, it surely poisoned reputation, and left good Protestants arrant Papists, and something worse than that, in danger of being put into the plot as traitors." Examen. p. 205.

[Note III.]

To have told his knowledge of the intrigue in gross,

Had been, alas! to our deponent's loss.—P. [322.]

Oates never would say he had told all he knew, but always reserved some part of his evidence to be changed or altered with the shifting wind of faction or popularity. According to his first narrative, the plot was laid against the persons of the king and Duke of York; and their assassination was to take place during the fire of London. But he had the impudence to say, in his picture of King James, that both his brother and he were in that very plot for firing the city, a secret which, he alleges, he could not discover at the time, on account of a promise to Prince Rupert; and is pleased to add, that the prince heartily repented of giving, and he of taking, that counsel. When he was asked, in the House of Commons, whether he had told all he knew of the conspiracy? this cautious witness, who was determined to have the whole credit of saving the kingdom his own way, instead of entrusting the House with the secret, told them a parable of a fox, who, having occasion to cross a frozen stream with a goose, and being unwilling to hazard his spoil, first carried over a stone of equal weight with the goose, to see if the ice would bear it. In short, neither he, nor any of his imitators, would say more, than that their immediate evidence was all which they as yet thought meet to declare.

This would have been tolerated no where but in England, and during that period of terror, suspicion, and infatuation, when these perjured caitiffs were as dear to the people as those who tell stories of Rawhead and Bloody-bones are to their nursery audience. The author has said, and with much truth,

'Twas worse than plotting to suspect his plot.

The discovery of Coleman's letters, however irreconcileable with the tale of the witnesses, above all, the murder of Godfrey, gave such a bloody confirmation, that the people swallowed all that could be told them about the horrors of the conspiracy; and, to use the warm expression of the author of the "Examen," one might have denied his Redeemer with less contest than attainted the veracity of Oates.

This popular ferment began to abate after the execution of Lord Stafford; and, as the witnesses sunk in reputation, the king began by degrees to discountenance Oates. He expelled him from Whitehall, withdrew his guards, and reduced his pension to L.600. Upon this Oates altered his dress, assumed a sword, and associated with the more desperate of the popular faction, such as Rumbold, Colledge, and Fergusson. In the reign of James II., his fortunes suffered a yet more melancholy reverse; for, being most satisfactorily convicted of perjury, by upwards of eighty witnesses, he was sentenced to two fines of 1000 merks each; to be whipped, on two different days, from Aldgate to Newgate, and from Newgate to Tyburn; to be imprisoned for life, and to be pilloried five times every year. James had the imprudence to exult in this cruel punishment. He told Sir John Reresby, that the Popish plot was now dead; and, when that courtier obsequiously answered, "and buried, please your majesty," he thought the jest worth repeating, which his brother would hardly have done. It is true, no punishment could be bad enough for the author of so many legal murders; but the severity of the sentence was an injury to the law of the land, though done through the person of so vile a criminal. The man's impudence supported him under the conviction; and his fortitude under the punishment was the means of regaining a share of his fallen credit. After the Revolution, he was pardoned, and received a pension of L.400, with the amount of which he was much dissatisfied, as well as with the refusal of the Parliament to reverse his sentence, and restore his capacity for his old trade of bearing evidence.

[Note IV.]

Even Absalom———

Perceives the plot, too foul to be excused,

To aid designs, no less pernicious, used.—P. [323.]

North, and other Tory writers, have affected to consider Shaftesbury as the original author of the Popish plot. Of this there is no proof whatever; and the internal evidence derived from the account of the plot itself, is altogether inconsistent with the very idea. Shaftesbury could never have given birth to such a heap of inconsistent fables; a plan which he had forged would have been ingenious, consistent with itself, accommodated to the circumstances of parties, and the times, and therefore, in all probability, being less suited to the vulgar palate, would not have made half the impression on the public. But we can easily believe the truth of what he is alleged to have said, "that whoever started the game, he had the full advantage of the chase." In fact, this wonderful tale, probably at first invented by two or three obscure knaves, with the sordid view of profiting by the credulity of the English nation, would have fallen to the ground, had it not been fostered and cherished by Shaftesbury, who very soon perceived it could be made the means of turning out Lord Danby, and driving matters to extremity against the Catholic faction. He might well indeed exult in his management in the former particular, since Danby was the first to introduce into the House of Commons that very discussion about the plot, to which, as Shaftesbury managed it, he himself fell a sacrifice.[411] But it was chiefly as a means of bringing forward the Bill of Exclusion, and of crushing for ever the hopes of his mortal foe the Duke of York,[412] that Shaftesbury became the patron of all investigations connected with the plot, pushed them on with vigour and vehemence, and dipped himself deep in the blood of the innocent persons who fell sacrifices to the popular clamour he had excited, and to evidence, which much less than Shaftesbury's abilities might easily have discovered to be inconsistent and fabulous.

A humorous pamphlet, already quoted, represents Shaftesbury as abandoning his pretensions to the crown of Poland, for the purpose of following up the discovery of the Popish plot. "In the very height of all this expectation, one night as his majesty elect lay musing upon his bed, restless with the thoughts and expectation of the approaching empire, there appeared to him, by the light of a lamp that was burning in his chamber, a dreadful and most monstrous vision. The shape and figure of it was very confused and irregular: sometimes it looked like the whore of Babylon, naked, and of immense privities; presently, in the twinkling of an eye, the form was changed, and it appeared like a justice of the peace, strangled by a crew of ruffians, who afterwards ran him through the body with his own sword, that it might be thought he hanged himself; on a sudden it was altered again, and seemed a troop of pilgrims, armed with black bills, that came the Lord knows whence, landed the Lord knows where, and are gone the Lord knows whither. His majesty seeing it vary so often, and so terribly, calling up all the faith he had to his assistance, boldly demanded 'In the name of, &c. what art thou?' Instantly, after a terrible clap of thunder, accompanied with several flashes of lightning, it contracted itself into the shape of a doctor of Salamanca, and, in a hideous tone, cried out, 'I am a Plot. Woe to England! farewell till 78;' and vanished. No sooner was it gone, but a stupid amazement seized upon the majesty of Poland, and cast him into a deep sleep, where he lay till morning, when, awakening, he found himself stript of all the high and aspiring thoughts that before had filled his mind; pity and compassion towards his native country utterly cooled his ambition, and from that moment he laid by all thoughts of converting the Turk, and resolved to stay at home for confounding the pope.

"Thus has this good man, (for he is no more his majesty,) again refused the highest promotion that perhaps any subject of England was ever raised to, merely to stand in a gap here, and slay the plague that was coming upon us."[413]

[Note V.]

Have I for this———

Even when at helm, a course so dangerous moved,

To land your hopes, as my removal proved.

P. [325.]

In 1679, the national discontent running exceedingly high, both on account of the Popish plot, and for other reasons, the king, by the advice of Sir William Temple, summoned a council of thirty persons, fifteen of whom were the great officers of the crown, and fifteen chosen from the country party. Shaftesbury was made president of this council, against the opinion of Temple; and quickly found the means of pressing his favourite measure of the Exclusion Bill. Monmouth, upon whose interest in the king's affections he had great reliance, was the person whom he proposed to nominate as successor, either by a law to be passed for the purpose, or by prevailing on the king to declare him legitimate. For this purpose, the interest of Shaftesbury was exerted to have the duke sent down to Scotland, to oppose the insurgent Covenanters, whom he defeated at Bothwell Bridge. The king's illness, and the sudden revolution which took place in his councils, upon the unexpected return of the Duke of York from Flanders, ruined this project, and occasioned the disgrace of Monmouth, and the dismissal of Shaftesbury.

[Note VI.]

Amongst these, extorting Ishban first appears,

Pursued by a meagre troop of bankrupt heirs.

P. [328.]

Sir Robert Clayton, alderman of London, and one of the representatives of the city during the two last parliaments of King Charles II., was warmly attached to the Whig party. He took an active concern, as a magistrate, in examining the sham-plotter, Fitz-Harris; and was charged by the Tories with an attempt to suborn that person to swear, that he had been hired by the court to fix a plot upon the Protestants. The examination of Fitz-Harris, who swore, and counter-swore, in many different ways, besides avouching that he was bribed to concoct a sham-plot, and to ascribe it to the Whigs, (a base manœuvre, too often played off by both parties to be incredible,) added a thousand improbable falsehoods about a Papist plot against the Protestants. When removed from the city jail, and committed to the Tower, he told another story: He was then in the power of the king, and alleged, that Howard, and others, were in a plot to seize the king's person, and that they had employed him to contrive the aforesaid sham-plot, in order to charge upon the court the crime of subornation, &c. He added, that Clayton, Bethel, Cornish, and Treby, the city-recorder, extorted from him, by threats, his previous declaration concerning the Popish plot, and used the most urgent means to compel him to impute the guilt of Godfrey's murder to Danby, and to fix an accession to the Popish conspiracy on the queen and Duke of York. The man was executed adhering to this last story. Clayton, and the others accused of such infamous practices, exculpated themselves in a pamphlet, entitled, "Truth Vindicated," in which they showed many objections to Fitz-Harris's final declaration. We must be contented to leave the affair in mystery; and to regret there ever was a time in England, when the character and common practices of both the leading parties in the kingdom were by no means pure enough to exempt either from such foul suspicions.

Sir Robert Clayton, with the other London members, all of whom were zealous Whigs, and whose re-election was hailed by the acclamations of their party,[414] attended the Oxford Parliament in formidable array; they were escorted by a numerous band of armed partizans, who wore on their hats ribbons, bearing the label, "No Popery, no Slavery," and were obviously prepared for something more than an usual attendance upon their duty in the House of Commons. According to Dugdale's evidence, Sir Robert Clayton was present at a carousal at Lord Lovelace's, near Oxford, where Colledge, one of their principal myrmidons, sung the unlucky ballad, which went so far towards his condemnation.[415]

The story, that Sir Robert Clayton wished to purchase a peerage, seems to have become popular. In the last will and testament of the Charter of London is this, among other jocular bequests; "To Sir Robert Clayton I bequeath all that the chamberlain has left of the common stock, to purchase Paddington manor, with the demesnes and appurtenances thereto, since there are now no dukedoms to be purchased; and it is thought that Tyburn, paying his arrears next year to the city, will yield a better rate than 20l. per cent. in the banker's hands."—Somers' Tracts, p. 185. His usury is also hinted at in a poem called, "The Duke of Buckingham's Litany," and its consequences are enumerated among the other follies of that prodigal peer:

From learning new morals from Bedlam Sir Payton;

And truth and modesty from Sir Ellis Layton;

From making our heirs, to be Morrice and Clayton,

Libera nos, Domine.

It ought to be mentioned to Sir Robert Clayton's honour, that out of his wealth, howsoever procured, he dedicated a portion to found the mathematical school in Christ Church Hospital.

[Note VII.]

Next him, let railing Rabsheka have place,

So full of zeal, he has no need of grace;

A saint, that can both flesh and spirit use,

Alike haunt conventicles and stews.—P. [328.]

Sir Thomas Player, chamberlain of the city of London, was, like Sir Robert Clayton, one of the city members, both in the Westminster and Oxford parliaments; and, being as zealous as his colleague in the popular cause, what has been said concerning their mode of marching to Oxford, applies to him as well as to the other. He is accused of libertinism, in the pasquinade quoted in the last note, where the Charter of London makes him this bequest: "To Sir Thomas Player, I leave all the manor of Moorfields, with all the wenches and bawdy-houses thereunto belonging, with Mrs Cresswells[416] for his immediate inheritance, to enjoy and occupy all, from the bawd to the whore downward, at nineteen shillings in the pound cheaper than any other person, because he may not exhaust the chamber by paying old arrears, nor embezzle the stock by running into new scores."[417]

[Note VIII.]

Let David's brother but approach the town,

Double our guards, he cries, we are undone.

P. [328.]

When the Duke of York unexpectedly returned from Brussels, on the news of the king's illness, his arrival spread discomfiture through Shaftesbury's party in court, and rage and alarm among those in the city. Sir Thomas Player, at the head of a numerous body of citizens, or persons who called themselves so, made his appearance before the lord-mayor, and court of aldermen; and after having expatiated, in a set speech, upon the horrors of Popery, and upon the return of the Duke of York, whose religion had first led to the conspiracy, and whose recent arrival must necessarily give it new life, he gravely demanded, that the city-guards should be doubled, and that four companies, instead of two, should be appointed to duty every night. The lord-mayor, after some discussion, evaded Sir Thomas's request, by referring it to the livery. In the vehemence of the chamberlain's oratory, a remarkable expression, noticed in the text, chanced to escape him, "that he durst hardly go to sleep, for fear of awaking with his throat cut." In the pretended account of this interview, he is only made to say, that it was now out of doubt, that the Papists had burnt the city; "And if they had not been disappointed, would have cut our throats too at the same time, while we were endeavouring to save the small remainder of our goods." But the publisher acknowledges, he could give but an imperfect account of the "speech of this worthy and deserving knight, and the Lord Mayor's generous reply thereunto." "Cutting throats," indeed, appears to have been a frequent terror of the zealous knight. In the Westminster parliament, he made a speech on the Exclusion Bill, in which, after stating that he had read in Scripture of one man dying for a nation, but never of three nations dying for one man; he assured the House, that they "would be embroiled in blood before they were aware of it;" that he had "no patience to think of sitting still while his throat was a cutting;" and therefore prayed, they would endeavour to have laws that might enable them to defend themselves.[418] In the parliament of Oxford, Sir Thomas Player made a violent speech, upon Fitzharris being withdrawn from the city jail, and sent to the Tower, with a view, as he contended, of stifling his evidence against the Duke of York and the Papists; and concluded by making a motion, which was carried, that if any judge, justice, or jury, should proceed upon him, and he be found guilty, they be declared guilty of his murder, and betrayers of the rights of the commons of England. In short, Sir Thomas Player was a hot-headed violent factionary; but Rouse, one of his dependants who suffered for the Rye-house plot, with his dying breath cleared Sir Thomas of any accession to that conspiracy; and declared, that he broke with Lord Shaftesbury, upon perceiving the violent plans which he agitated after his being freed from the Tower. State Trials, p. 750.

[Note IX.]

Judas, that keeps the rebels' pension-purse;

Judas, that pays the treason-writer's fee;

Judas, that well deserves his name-sake's tree;

Who at Jerusalem's own gates erects

His college for a nursery of sects.—P. [329.]

Under the name of Judas, Dryden describes the famous Robert Ferguson, a native of Scotland, and, by profession, an independant preacher, and teacher of an academy at Islington.—Ath. Ox. Vol. II. p. 743. He was one of those dark, intriguing, subtile, and ferocious characters, that emerge into notice in times of turmoil and civil dissension, and whose appearance as certainly bodes revolution, as the gambols of the porpoise announce a tempest. Through the whole of his busy and desperate career, he appears to have been guided less by any principle, moral or political, than by the mere pleasure of dealing in matters deep and dangerous, and exerting his ingenuity to shake the quiet of the kingdom at the risk of his own neck. In organizing dark and bloody intrigues; in maintaining the courage of the zealots whom he engaged in them; in carrying on the mystic correspondence by which the different parts of the conspiracy were to be cemented and conjoined; in guarding against the risque of discovery, and, lastly, in effecting with nicety a hairbreadth escape when it had taken place,—all these perilous, dubious, and criminal manœuvres, at which the noble-minded revolt, and the peaceful are terrified, were the scenes in which the genius of Ferguson delighted to exert itself. When the magistracy of London was thrown into the hands of the crown, the charter annulled, and all means of accomplishing a revolution by the ancient existing authorities, were annihilated, such a character as Ferguson became of inestimable value to Shaftesbury, considering the new plans which he had in agitation, and the persons by whom they were to be accomplished. Accordingly, he shared much of that politician's confidence, while his influence, as a popular and violent preacher in the city, gave him every facility of selecting and training the persons fittest to assist in the meditated insurrection. His chapel, in Moorfields, was crowded with multitudes of fanatics, whom fired by his political sermons, and occasionally stimulated by libels and pamphlets, from a private press of which he had the management, as well as of a purse that maintained it. He distributed most of the pamphlets written on the Whig party, and was by no means averse to father even the most dangerous of them; his vanity, according to Burnet, getting the better of his prudence. Some notable pieces, however, of his composition, are still known; his style was of that diffuse, coarse, and periphrastic nature, best suited to the apprehension of the vulgar, upon whose dull intellects sentiments are always impressive, in proportion to the length of time they are forced to dwell on them. He wrote the "Appeal from the Country to the City," where, in plain words, he points out the Duke of Monmouth as successor to the crown, and that because he had a dubious, or rather no title at all to claim it. "No person is fitter than his Grace the Duke of Monmouth, as well for quality, courage, and conduct, as for that his life and fortune stand on the same bottom with yours. He will stand by you, and therefore you ought to stand by him. And remember the old rule is, He, that has the worst title, ever makes the best king; as being constrained, by a gracious government, to supply what he wants in title; that, instead of God and my right, his motto may be, God and my people." He proceeds to quote a historical example for putting Monmouth on the throne, under the tutelage of Shaftesbury, by stating that, after the death of Alexander, nothing would pacify the dissensions which ensued, "but the choosing of King Philip's illegitimate son, Aridæus, who, notwithstanding that he was a man but of reasonable parts himself, might, as they thought, perform the office well enough, by the help of his wise protector Perdiceas." This extraordinary piece is filled with the most violent declamations against the Papists, in that tawdry, bombastic, and inflammatory eloquence, wherewith, to speak according to Dryden's parable, he "tempted Jerusalem to sin."[419]

Ferguson also wrote the second part of "No Protestant Plot," another very violent pamphlet, and several treatises on the same subject. Meanwhile, other means were prepared to effect the desired change of government. It is not necessary to enter particularly into the well-known history of the Rye-house plot. Every body knows, that, while Russel, Sidney, Monmouth, and others, undertook to raise an insurrection in the country, Shaftesbury promised to head ten thousand brisk boys in the city of London. Among these brisk boys were a fanatic party, who agitated projects of assassinating the King and the Duke of York, unknown to the more generous nobles, who proposed only to secure the king's person. In all and each of these cabals, Ferguson acted a distinguished part. When Shaftesbury fled from his house into lurking places about Wapping, he trusted Ferguson with the secret of his residence, although concealed from the noble-minded Russel, and the generous Monmouth. By his intervention, he heartened and encouraged the associates to break forth into open insurrection. With the inferior conspirators, Ferguson was yet more intimate, and seems, in fact, to have given life to the vague and desperate plans of lopping, as they called the assassination of the royal brothers, by the countenance which he pretended to procure the conspirators from those of superior rank. He told West, he would procure the Duke of Monmouth's written consent to his father's murder; although he afterwards allowed, he durst not even mention such a plan to him. At length, when Shaftesbury, weary of the delays of the other conspirators, left England for ever, Ferguson and Walcot were the companions of his flight. By this the plan of insurrection was for a time confounded, for the higher order of the malcontents were ignorant of the lines of communication by which the city cabal was conducted. Ferguson was therefore recalled, and in an evil hour returned from Holland. His arrival gave new life both to the upper and inferior conspiracy: in the former, six of the leaders formed themselves into a regular committee, to extend their influence and correspondence through the kingdom, and unite measures with the disaffected in Scotland. The lower band of assassins matured and prepared their plan for assassinating the king and duke as they returned from Newmarket. Ferguson, who still acted in the capacity of treasurer, which Dryden has assigned him, paid for the arms provided for the enterprize; and, by his daring language, encouraged them to proceed. He offered, in mockery, to consecrate the blunderbuss with which Rumbold was to fire into the carriage; and when Sunday was fixed for the day of action, he quoted the old Scottish proverb, "the better day, the better deed." Even when, by the treachery of Keeling, the plot was finally discovered, and the conspirators were dispersing in dismay and terror, Ferguson took his leave of them with great gaiety, and, trusting to the plots of Argyle and Jerviswood, with which he was also intimate, told them, he hoped to meet them all at Dunbar. This indifference, at such a crisis, led to a supposition, that he had some secret correspondence with government: it was even said, that the messenger who arrested Ferguson suffered him to escape, but of this there seems no evidence. He retired to Holland, where he joined the unfortunate Monmouth, and was a principal agent in pushing him on to his western invasion, when, if left to himself, he would have remained in quiet. He drew the proclamation which Monmouth issued at his landing, a prolix, ill-worded production, stuffed with all the true, and all the false accusations against James II., and where the last so much drowned the others, that it was only calculated to make an impression on the lowest vulgar. He was always earnest with Monmouth, to take upon himself the title of king; and may be said to have contributed greatly to every false step which he made, and to the final destruction in which they ended. Of this Monmouth was so sensible, that he told the king in their last interview, "That Ferguson was chiefly the person who instigated him to set up his title of king, and had been a main adviser and contriver of the whole affair, as well to the attempting, as acting, what had been done;" but he had little to answer when Halifax expressed his surprise, that he should have given ear to him who, as he had long before told the late king, "was a bloody rogue, and always advised to the cutting of throats." Ferguson was taken, on this occasion, the third day after the battle of Sedgemore. Yet, when so much blood was spilt, both with, and without the forms of law, this man, who had been most active in the conspiracy against the king, when Duke of York, and had now organized an invasion and insurrection in his dominions, was, by the inexorable James, freely pardoned and dismissed, to council and assist the next conspiracy. Perhaps his life was saved by Sunderland, lest he had disclosed what he probably knew of his intercourse with the Prince of Orange, and even with Monmouth himself. Ferguson seems, on his liberation, to have returned to Holland; and did not fail to take a share in the intrigues which preceded the Revolution. He managed the dissenters for the interest of the Prince of Orange; and endeavoured to press upon William a sense of their importance. But other, and more important engines, were now at work; and Ferguson seems to have enjoyed but a subaltern consideration: Burnet, who made such a figure in the expedition, avers, he did not even know him by sight.[420] When the Prince of Orange was at Exeter, the dissenters refused him the keys of their meeting house. But Ferguson was accustomed to surmount greater obstacles. "I will take," said he, laughing, "the kingdom of heaven by storm," and broke open the door with his own hand. After the Revolution was accomplished, one would have thought Ferguson's machinations might have ended. He had seen his party triumphant; he had been rewarded with a good post;[421] and, what was probably dearer to him than either principle or profit, his intrigues had successfully contributed to the achievement of a great change of government. But it was not in his nature to be in repose; and, having spent all the former part of his life in caballing to drive James from the throne, he now engaged with the same fervour in every conspiracy for his restoration. In the very year which succeeded that of the Revolution, we find him deeply engaged with Sir James Montgomery, and the other Scottish presbyterians, who, discontented with King William, had united with the Jacobites. The Marquis of Anandale having absconded on account of his share in this conspiracy, Ferguson secreted him for several weeks; a kindness which the Marquis repaid, by betraying him to government.[422] With his usual good fortune, he was dismissed; either in consideration of former services, or because a full proof against him was not to be obtained. After this, he continued to engage in every plot against the government; and each year published one or two pamphlets, which put his ears, if not his neck, in peril. His last grand exhibition was an attack upon Trenchard, the secretary of state, for the use of blank and general warrants.[423] But that adventure, as the romance writers say, was reserved for another demagogue. Finally, Ferguson, who had in this remarkable manner kept his promise of being engaged in every conspiracy of his time, and, had gained the honourable epithet of "The Plotter," died quietly, and in peace, after having repeatedly seen the scaffold stream with the blood of the associates of his various machinations. One touch alone softens the character of this extraordinary incendiary. In all his difficulties, he is never charged with betraying his associates. His person is thus remarkably described in the proclamation for apprehending his person, among the other Rye-house assassins.

A description of several of the conspirators that are fled. London Gazette, from August 2d, to August 6th, 1683.

"Robert Ferguson, a tall lean man, dark-brown hair, a great Roman nose, thin jawed, heat in his face, speaks in the Scotch tone, a sharp piercing eye, stoops a little in the shoulders. He has a shuffling gait, that differs from all men; wears his periwig down almost over his eyes; about 45 or 46 years old."

[Note X.]

Here Phaleg, the lay Hebronite, is come.—P. [329.]

Of James Forbes I can give but a slight account. He was placed by the Duke of Ormond as travelling tutor to the young Earl of Derby, who had married his grand-daughter. Carte says, he was a gentleman of parts, virtue, and prudence, but of too mild a nature to manage his pupil. In Paris the earl addicted himself to the society of one Merrit, a worthless profligate; and the governor having cautioned his charge against this acquaintance, was assaulted at disadvantage by Merrit, and dangerously wounded. Lord Derby, it seems, not only countenanced Merrit's assault upon Mr Forbes, but, at the instigation of some young French rakes, consented to his governor's being tossed in a blanket. The Duke of Ormond, finding that the earl was wild and impatient of restraint, and that his tutor's sage remonstrances had but little effect, recalled Forbes, and sent in his stead Colonel Thomas Fairfax, a gallant and brave man, and roughly honest. Lord Derby was at first restiff; but Fairfax telling him plainly, that he was sent to govern him, and would govern him, and that his lordship must submit, and should do it, the young nobleman had the sense to comply, broke off his evil acquaintances, and behaved ever after with great propriety.[424] Forbes's misadventures in Paris, though, according to Carte, they inferred no real dishonour, are severely alluded to by Dryden in the text. I am not anxious to unrip the ancient chronicle of scandal, in order to trace Phaleg's amours. He appears to have become one of Monmouth's dependants.

[Note XI.]

Let Hebron, nay let hell, produce a man,

So made for mischief as Ben-Jochanan.—P. [330.]

The Reverend Samuel Johnson, a party-writer of considerable merit. He was a native of Warwickshire, and took orders after a regular course of study at Cambridge. He obtained the small living of Curingham, in Essex, by the patronage of a Mr Biddolph. The emoluments of this benefice did not exceed eighty pounds a-year; and it was the only church preferment he ever enjoyed. Dryden alludes to his poverty in describing his original situation. Mr Johnson's patron, observing his turn for politics, exhorted him to study the English constitution in Bracton and Fortescue; but by no means to make his sermons the vehicle for his political sentiments. The opinions which he formed in the course of study, were such as recommended him as chaplain to the famous Lord Russell.

While he was in this situation, and during the dependance of the Bill of Exclusion, he endeavoured at once to show the danger to a national religion from a sovereign who held opposite tenets, and to explode the doctrine of passive obedience, in a work entitled, "Julian the Apostate; with a short Account of his Life, and a Parallel betwixt Popery and Paganism." In this performance, according to Wood, he was assisted by Thomas Hunt the lawyer. This book, which made a good deal of noise at the time, was answered by the learned Hickes, in a treatise called "Jovian," in which, according to Anthony a Wood, the doctor hath, with unquestionable clearness, laid open the folly, "ignorance, weakness, and pernicious drift of that traitorous scribbler." Without entering into the controversy, there can be little doubt, that, so far as the argument from the example of the primitive Christians is sound, Johnson has fairly made out his case. Indeed Dryden has little left to say, except, that if they did resist Julian, which he seems to admit, they were very wrong in so doing, and the less that is said about it, the more will be the credit of the ancient church. Johnson prepared a reply to "Jovian," called, the "Arts of Julian to undermine Christianity;" but the Rye-house Plot having intervened, he did not judge it prudent to publish it. He was called before the Privy Council, who insisted upon knowing why this book, which had been entered at Stationers Hall, was not published? His answer alleged, that the ferment of the nation was so great as to render the further discussion of the question imprudent. They then demanded a copy of the book; and added, that, if they approved it, it should be published. To this insidious proposal he boldly replied, that, having suppressed the book, it only contained his private thoughts, which he could be compelled to disclose to no man on earth. For this answer he was committed to prison, and his house searched for the copies, which had fortunately been bestowed elsewhere. The court finding themselves unable to reach Johnson for not publishing his second work, determined to try him for publishing his first. Accordingly, he was brought to the bar and insulted by Jefferies, who told him, he would give him a text, "Let every man study to be quiet, and mind his own business."—"I minded my business as an Englishman," answered this spirited man, "when I wrote that book." All defence was in vain; he was condemned to a heavy fine, and to lie in jail till it was paid, which in his circumstances was equal to a sentence of perpetual imprisonment. Even from his prison house, where he lay for five years, amid the accumulated distresses of sickness and poverty, he let his countrymen hear his voice, and failed not to enter an animated and vigorous protest against each new encroachment upon the liberty and religion of England.[425] At length, having published "An humble and hearty Address to all the English Protestants in this present Army,"[426] exhorting them not to serve as instruments to eradicate their religion and enslave their country, he again fell under the grasp of power, was tried and sentenced to be thrice pilloried, and whipped from Newgate to Tyburn; having been previously degraded from his ecclesiastical orders. He bore both the previous ceremony of degradation, and the cruel punishment which followed, with the greatest magnanimity. When they disrobed him, he told the divines present, that he could not but grieve, since all he had written was to keep the gowns on their backs, they should nevertheless be the unhappy instruments to pull off his. When they put a Bible into his hand as a part of the formality of degradation, and again took it from him, he was much affected, and said with tears, they could not, however, deprive him of the use and benefit of that sacred deposit.[427] On the 1st of December, 1686, he suffered the remainder of his inhuman sentence; the pain being his, but the infamy that of the persons who imposed it.

After the Revolution, the proceedings against this staunch patriot were declared illegal; and he received a pension of L.300 yearly, with L.1000 in money, and a post for his son. Crewe, Bishop of Durham, who acted as one of the commissioners for discharging the duty of the Bishop of London, and as such was active in Mr Johnson's degradation, compounded with him against a suit at law, by payment of a handsome sum. Yet Johnson's dangers were not over; for, such was the enmity of the adherents of King James against him, that a party of desperate assassins broke into his house by night, beat, wounded, and threatened to pistol him, for the books he had written; but, upon his wife's intreaties, at length desisted from their bloody design. The latter part of his days were spent in quietness and independence.

The reader may contrast the character which Dryden has given of Johnson, with that of Hampden, who, in an account of him to the Duchess of Mazarine, says; "Being two years with him in the same prison, I had the opportunity to know him perfectly well; and, to speak my thoughts of him in one word, I can assure your Grace, that I never knew a man of better sense, of a more innocent life, nor of greater virtue, which was proof against all temptation, than Mr Johnson."—See Memorials of his Life prefixed to his Works in folio.

[Note XII.]

If Balack should be called to leave his place,

As profit is the loudest call of grace,

His temple, dispossessed of one, would be

Replenished with seven devils more by thee.—P. [331.]

The famous Gilbert Burnet was then lecturer at St Clements, and preacher at the Rolls chapel, under the patronage of Sir Harbottle Grimstone, Master of the Rolls. King Charles was so anxious that he should be dismissed, as to make it his particular request to Sir Harbottle; but the Master excused himself. It was here he preached that famous sermon on the day of the Gunpowder Treason, 5th November, 1684, when he chose for his text, "Save me from the lion's mouth, thou hast heard me from the horns of the unicorns;" which, in spite of the doctor's protestations to the contrary, certain suspicious persons considered as an allusion to the supporters of the king's arms. For this he was finally disgraced, and turned out of the chapel of the Rolls. See note on the Buzzard, in the "Hind and Panther."

[Note XIII.]

Some in my speedy pace I must out-run,

As lame Mephibosheth, the wizard's son.—P. [331.]

Samuel Pordage, a minor poet and dramatist of the time, drew this passing sarcasm on his person and pedigree, by a stupid poem, called "Azariah and Hushai," published 1681-2; being an attempt to imitate or answer "Absalom and Achitophel:" with what success the reader may judge, from the following character of Dryden:

Shimei, the poet laureat of that age,

The falling glory of the Jewish stage,

Who scourged the priest, and ridiculed the plot,

Like common men, must not be quite forgot.

Sweet was the muse that did his wit inspire,

Had he not let his hackney muse to hire:

But variously his knowing muse could sing,

Could Doeg praise, and could blaspheme the king;

The bad make good, good bad, and bad make worse.

Bless in heroics, and in satires curse.

Shimei to Zabed's[428] praise could tune his muse,

And princely Azaria could abuse.

Zimri, we know, he had no cause to praise,

Because he dubbed him with the name of Bayes:

Revenge on him did bitter venom shed,

Because he tore the laurel from his head;

Because he durst with his proud wit engage,

And brought his follies on the public stage.

Tell me, Apollo, for I can't divine,

Why wives he cursed, and praised the concubine;

Unless it were, that he had led his life

With a teeming matron, ere she was a wife;

Or that it best with his dear muse did suit,

Who was for hire a very prostitute.

He also stepped forward to break a lance with our author, on the subject of Shaftesbury's acquittal; and answered the "Medal" by a very stupid poem, called the "Medal Reversed." To all this scurrilous doggrel, Dryden only replied by the single couplet above quoted. He calls Mephibosheth "the wizard's son," because the Reverend John Pordage, vicar of Bradfield, in Berkshire, and father of the poet, Samuel, was ejected from his cure by the commissioners of Berkshire, for conversation with evil spirits, and for blasphemy, ignorance, scandalous behaviour, devilism, uncleanness, and heaven knows what. His case of insufficiency is among the State Trials, from which he seems to have been a crazy enthusiast, who believed in a correspondence with genii and dæmons.

Samuel Pordage was a member of the society of Lincoln's Inn. He wrote three plays, namely, the "Troades," translated from Seneca, "Herod and Mariamne," and "The Siege of Babylon." He also published a romance called "Eliana," and prepared a new edition of "God's Revenge against Murder," which was published after his death. Pordage was, moreover, author of "Heroic Stanzas on his Majesty's Coronation, 1661," and probably of other occasional pieces, deservedly doomed to oblivion.

[Note XIV.]

Shun rotten Uzza as I would the pox.—P. [331.]

Jack Hall, ranked as a sort of third-rate poet and courtier among the minor wits of the time. In the "Essay on Satire," he is mentioned as a companion of "little Sid, for simile renowned." Whether we suppose Sidley, or Sidney, to be represented under that character, as they were both at present in the country party, it is possible that Jack Hall went into opposition with his friend and admirer. See the note upon Hall, appended to the "Essay on Satire."

[Note XV.]

Doeg, though without knowing how or why,

Made still a blundering kind of melody.—P. [331.]

Elkanah Settle, whose original quarrel with our author is detailed in the introductory remarks to their prose controversy, had now further incensed him, by tergiversation in politics: For Elkanah, although originally a Tory, was induced, probably by his connections as poet-laureat for the city, to go over to the party of Monmouth and Shaftesbury.[429] His new friends made use of his talents in a two-fold capacity. Shaftesbury employed him to write a pamphlet in favour of the Exclusion, entitled, "The Character of a Popish Successor." When Settle afterwards recanted, he said, this piece, which made some noise at the time, was retouched by "his noble friend in Aldersgate Street," whose only objection was, that it was not sufficiently violent in favour of insurrection. Settle, having a mechanical turn, was also employed as chief engineer at the solemn pope-burning, which we have so often mentioned; in which charge he acquitted himself much to the satisfaction of his employers. On account of his literary and mechanical merits, Sir Roger L'Estrange allots him the double office of poet-laureat and master of the ordnance to the Whig faction, in the following passage of a dialogue between Jest and Earnest:

"Jest. For instance, I knew a lusty fellow, who would not willingly be thought valiant,[430] who has an indifferent hand at making of crackers, serpents, rockets, and the other playthings that are proper on the 5th of November; and has for such his skill received applause, and victuals, from the munificent gentlemen about Temple-bar.

"Earnest. And he, I'll warrant, is made master of the ordnance?

"Jest. True; and I think him very fit for it. But he's like to have another employment, of a strangely different nature; for, because this dull wretch, once upon a time, wrote a fulsomely nonsensical poem, in prose, being a character of a bugbear, he, forsooth, is designed poet-laureat too!

"Earnest. These two offices, as you say, one would think, should require diverse accomplishments: But then it may be said, that these may well enough be supplied by one man; the poet to make ballads in peace, and betake himself to his other business in war.

"Jest. Nay, his squibs and his poems have much what the same fortune; they crack and bounce, and the boys and girls laugh at them.

"Earnest. Well, how great are the advantages! I thought the author of the satyric work upon the "Observator," and Heraclitus, or the Person of Honour, that obliged the pie-folks with poetical reflections upon "Absalom and Achitophel;" I say, I thought these forsaken scribblers might have bid fairest for the evergreen twig.

"Jest. I thought so too; but hunger will break stone-walls. Elk. promises to vindicate Lucifer's first rebellion for a few guineas. Poor Absalom and Achitophel must e'en hide themselves in the Old Testament again; and I question whether they'll be safe there from the fury of this mighty Cacadoggin.

"Earnest. Silly chit! has he not learned the apologue of the Serpent and the File? But fare him well."—Heraclitus Redens, No. 50.

From the last part of this passage, it appears that Settle was then labouring upon his answer to "Absalom and Achitophel," for which Dryden condemned him to a disgraceful immortality. At length he came forth with "Absalom Senior, or Achitophel Transprosed."[431]

In this piece Dryden's plan is followed, by applying the names and history of scripture to modern persons and events. Thus, Queen Elizabeth is Deborah, and Sir Francis Drake, Barak; the Papists are the worshippers of Baal, and the Duke of York is Absalom. This circumstance did not escape the wit of Dryden, who says of Settle, in the text,

For almonds he'll cry whore to his own mother,

Or call young Absalom King David's brother.

Indeed, Elkanah seems himself to have been sensible of the absurdity of this personification, by which the king's brother, almost as old as himself, was converted into the blooming son of David; and apologizes, in his preface addressed to the Tories, for "the freedom of clapping but about a score of years extraordinary on the back of Absalom. Neither is it," he continues, "altogether so unpardonable a poetical licence; since we find as great slips from the author of your own 'Absalom,' where we see him bring in a Zimri into the court of David, who, in the scripture story, died by the hand of Phineas, in the days of Moses.[432] Nay, in the other extreme, we find him, in another place, talking of the martyrdom of Stephen, so many ages after; and, if so famous an author can forget his own rules of unity, time, and place, I hope you'll give a minor poet some grains of allowance."

Sir E. Godfrey's murder is disguised under that of Amnon, Tamar's rape being explained the discovery of the plot:

Baal's cabinet intrigues he open spread;

The ravish'd Tamar, for whose sake he bled.

As Settle's poems have long fallen into total oblivion, from which his name has only been rescued by the satirical pen of Dryden, and as he was once thought no unequal rival for that great poet, the reader may be curious to see a specimen of his style; I have therefore inserted the few of the leading characters of "Absalom Senior," in which he has "rhymed and rattled" with most tolerable success.

Duke of Monmouth.

In the first rank the youthful Ithream stood,

His princely veins filled with great David's blood;

With so much manly beauty in his face,

Scarce his high birth could lend a nobler grace;

And for a mind fit for this shrine of gold,

Heaven cast his soul in the same beauteous mould,

With all the sweets of prideless greatness blest,

And affable as Abraham's angel guest.

Shaftesbury.

That second Moses' guide resolved to free

Our Israel from her threatening slavery;

Idolatry and chains, both from the rods

Of Pharaoh masters and Egyptian gods.

— — — — — — —

Such our Barzillai; but Barzillai too,

With Moses' fate does Moses' zeal pursue;

Leads to that bliss which his own silver hairs

Shall never reach, rich only to his heirs.

Kind patriot, who, to plant us banks of flowers,

With purling streams, cool shades, and summer bowers,

His age's needful rest away does fling,

Exhausts his autumn to adorn our spring;

While his last hours in toils and storms are hurled,

And only to enrich the inheriting world.

Thus prodigally throws his life's short span,

To play his country's generous pelican.

The ungainly appearance, uncouth delivery, and versatile politics of the famous Duke of Lauderdale, are thus described:

Let not that hideous bulk of honour 'scape,

Nadab, that sets the gazing crowd agape;

That old kirk-founder, whose coarse croak could sing

The saints, the cause, no bishop, and no king;

When greatness cleared his throat, and scoured his maw,

Roared out succession, and the penal law.

— — — — — — —

To Absalom's side does his Old Covenant bring,

With state razed out, and interlined with king.

Jefferies.

Of low-born tools we bawling Shimei saw,

Jerusalem's late loud-tongued mouth of law;

By blessings from almighty bounty given,

Shimei, no common favourite of heaven,

Whom, lest posterity should lose the breed,

In five short moons indulgent heaven raised seed,

Made happy in an early teeming bride,

And laid a lovely heiress by her side.[433]

But, as was reasonably to be expected, Settle has exerted his whole powers of satire and poetry in the description of his antagonist Dryden: And here let me remark, that almost all the adversaries of our author commence their attack, by an unwilling compliment to his poetical powers:

But Amiel[434] had, alas! the fate to hear

An angry poet play his chronicler;

A poet raised above Oblivion's shade,

By his recorded verse immortal made.

But, sir, his livelier figure to engrave,

With branches added to the bays you gave,

No muse could more heroic feats rehearse;

Had with an equal all-applauding verse,

Great David's sceptre, and Saul's javelin, praised,

A pyramid to his saint, Interest, raised:

}

{ For which, religiously, no change he mist,

{ From commonwealth's man up to royalist;

{ Nay, would have been his own loathed thing, called priest;

Priest, which with so much gall he does describe,

'Cause once unworthy thought of Levi's tribe.

}

{ Near those bright towers, where Art has wonders done,

{ And at his feet proud Jordan's waters run,

{ Where David's sight glads the blest summer's sun,

A cell there stands, by pious founders raised,

Both for its wealth and learned rabbins praised;

To this did an ambitious bard aspire.

To be no less than lord of that blest choir;

Till wisdom deemed so sacred a command

A prize too great for his unhallowed hand.

Besides, lewd Fame had told his plighted vow

To Laura's cooing love, perched on a drooping bough;

Laura, in faithful constancy confined

To Ethiop's envoy, and to all mankind;

Laura, though rotten, yet of mould divine,

He had all her ——, and she had all his coin;

Her wit so far his purse and sense could drain.

Till every —— was sweetened to a strain;

And if at last his nature can reform,

As weary grown of love's tumultuous storm.

'Tis age's fault, not his, of power bereft,—

He left not whoring, but of that was left.

Settle's end was utterly inglorious. In 1683, he deserted the cause of the Whigs, and returned to that of the Tories; for whom he wrote several periodical tracts, in one of which, entitled, "A Narrative," he accused his old patron Shaftesbury of correcting the famous "Character of a Popish Successor;" and objecting, that it did not speak favourably enough of rebellion.[435] Whether compelled by poverty, or through zeal for the royal cause, he became a trooper in King James's army, when it was encamped on Hounslow-Heath.[436] Finally, he took the prophetic hint conveyed in Dryden's lines, and became, not indeed the master, but the assistant, to a puppet-show, kept by a Mrs Minns, in Bartholomew-fair. Thus, the expression, which Dryden had chiefly used in contemptuous allusion to the share which Settle had in directing the Pope-burning, and the fire-works which accompanied it, was literally fulfilled.[437] Nay, poor Elkanah, in his old age, was at length obliged not only to write for the puppet-show, but to appear in it as a performer, inclosed in a case representing a green dragon of his own proper device. There are few readers, who need to be reminded of Pope's famous lines,—

Yet lo! in me what authors have to brag on!

Reduced at last to hiss in my own dragon.

Avert it, heaven! that thou, my Cibber, e'er

Should'st wag a serpent-tail in Smithfield fair!

In the close of life, this veteran scribbler found admission to the Charter-house; and in that hospital, in the year 1724, died the rival of Dryden.

In person, Elkanah Settle was tall, red-faced, and wore a satin cap over his short black hair.

[Note XVI.]

Now stop your noses, readers, all and some,

For here's a tun of midnight-work to come,

Og from a treason-tavern rolling home.—P. [333.]

Our author had very shortly before the publication of the second part of "Absalom and Achitophel," made his enemy, Shadwell, the subject of a separate and cutting personal satire, called "Mac Flecnoe." That poem, as we have noticed in the introductory remarks, has reference principally to the literary character of his adversary; while, in the lines which follow, he considers him chiefly as a political writer, and factionary of the popular party. Shadwell's corpulence, his coarse and brutal debauchery, his harsh and clumsy style of poetry, fell under the lash on both occasions; and it is astonishing, with what a burning variety of colours these qualities are represented. The history of his literary disputes with Dryden may be perused in the introduction to "Mac Flecnoe." In the "Vindication of the Duke of Guise," Dryden has also given a severe flagellation to his corpulent adversary, in which he says, "that although Shadwell has often called him an atheist in print, he believes more charitably of his antagonist, and that he only goes the broad way, because the other is too narrow for him."

Besides avenging abundance of personal abuse, Dryden, in the person of Shadwell, chastises a great supporter of the Whig cause and principles. Shadwell himself complains, that, in the days of Charles and James, he "was silenced for a non-conformist poet." He was the chief among the "corrector-men," as the authors and publishers of the Whig party were oddly entitled;[438] and received the reward of his principles at the Revolution, succeeding, as is well known, our author in the office of poet laureat. In the epilogue to the "Volunteers," a play of Shadwell's, acted after his death, the friends of the Revolution are called upon to applaud their favourite bard's last production:

Crown you his last performance with applause,

Who love, like him, our liberties and laws;

Let but the honest party do him right,

And their loud claps will give him fame, in spite

Of the faint hiss of grumbling Jacobite.

[Note XVII.]

These, gloomy, thoughtful, and on mischief bent;

While those for mere good fellowship frequent

The appointed club, can let sedition pass,

Sense, nonsense, any thing to employ the glass.—P. [335.]

The reader will find some account of the King's Head Club, Vol. VII. p. 154. North gives the following lively account of the vulgar, as he calls them, of the popular faction. Their employ, according to him, was, "to run about whispering here and there, by which management they kept up the spirits of their fools, whose fire, without a continual pabulum of fresh news, talks, and hopes, would go out. Amongst these, the cues and hints went about; honest, drunken, lying fellows, good company, and always dear friends. A nod, with a wink, had a notable signification, if it followed, 'Have patience, you shall see.'—'I know somewhat extraordinary will be done shortly and soon, which will secure all on our side.' And thus passively wicked were these underlings, or fry of the party: they knew of the intrigue no more, and were concerned as the wood of drums and the brass of trumpets are in the war."[439]—"The pastime of this meeting, called the Club, was very engaging to young gentlemen, and one, who had once tasted the conversation, could scarcely ever quit it. For some or others were continually coming and going, to import or export news or stories, as the trade required and afforded. There it was known in half an hour, what any member said at the committee of elections, or in the house, if it sat late. And every post carried the news and tales legitimated there, as also the malign constructions of all the good actions of the government, especially to places where elections were depending to shape men's characters into fit qualifications to be chosen or rejected. The Pope himself could not make saints so readily as they Papists, and so half-three-quarter Papists, as belief was prompt or difficult. And a lewd atheistical fellow was as readily washed clean, and made a zealous Protestant. For that genus of perfection was not wanted in this dispensation, where no vice, immorality, heresy, atheism, or blasphemous wit, had not professors ready to embrace willing disciples, who, for the sake of such sublimities of wit and sense as they were accounted, were ready to prostitute all principles of duty, and especially those that regarded allegiance to the crown."[440]

The well-known distinction of this famous club was a green ribband: in opposition to which, the Tories wore in their hats a scarlet ribband, with the motto, Rex et Hæredes. The prologue to "Anna Bullen" very sensibly expostulates against these party badges:

Was't not enough, vain men, of either side,

Two roses once the nation did divide;

But must it be in danger now agen,

Betwixt the scarlet and green ribbon men?

[Note XVIII.]

But in the sacred annals of our plot,

Industrious Arod never be forgot;

The labours of this midnight magistrate

May vie with Corah's, to preserve the state.—P. [335.]

Sir William Waller, son of the parliamentary general of the same name, distinguished himself during the time of the Popish plot, by an uncommon decree of bustling activity. He was a justice of peace; and, unawed by the supposed fate of his brother in the commission, and in knighthood, Sir Edmondbury Godfrey, he stood forth the bold investigator of this bottomless conspiracy. It was he who had the fortune, by the assistance of Captain Dangerfield, to detect what was called the Meal-Tub Plot, which that fellow, who had been trafficking with both factions, and probably meant to cheat both, chose to represent as a sham conspiracy, contrived to ruin Shaftesbury and his friends. Upon this occasion, Sir William had much closeting with a magnanimous midwife, called Mrs Cellier, whom Dangerfield charged as an agent of the court, and who afterwards alleged, that the knight took some uncommon means to extort confessions from her. Sir William Waller was also the person who discovered Fitzharris's Plot; and he intimated, that the king, who intended to turn it upon the Protestants, was so much displeased with his blowing up the project, that he threatened to have him assassinated. The Tories alleged, that the pleasure of making these discoveries was not Sir William's sole reward, any more than zeal was his only motive for gutting the Popish chapels. "In which," says North, "he proceeded with such scandalous rigour, as to bring forth the pictures and other furniture of great value, and burn them publicly; which gave occasion to suspect, and some said positively, that, under this pretence, he kept good things for himself; in a word, he was called the priest-catcher."[441] Anthony Wood joins in the accusation of his rifling the Papists' houses of goods, and appropriating chapel ornaments as popish trinkets. I find that respectable person, Miles Prance, the witness, enters into a solemn vindication of the justice, from the practices alleged by North, Wood, and by the poet. "Another damnable scandal they have broached, which, though it be principally levelled at Sir William Waller, as if he, under pretence of searching for priests, and seizing popish trinkets, should take away money, plate, and other things of value from the owners, and necklaces of pearl for beads; yet, since I very frequently went along with him, it does obliquely reflect upon me, and I cannot but do that worthy gentleman the right to justify him against such a most false, groundless, and malicious slander: I do therefore declare, in the presence of God, and shall be ready to attest upon oath, that whensoever I attended him in searches, which was almost every day, I could never discover in him the least inclination to any such base practices; but that, to the contrary, he behaved himself as a good Christian and just magistrate; for, wherever we came, what money we found was left in the owner's possession; and as for chalices, and pieces of plate belonging to priests, and used in their mass, or for keeping of holy oil, we did indeed batter or break them to pieces, but always returned all the pieces to the proprietors. But their copes and priestly vestments, superstitious pictures, habits of monks belonging to their peculiar orders, and such like trumpery, we did sometimes take away, and cause them to be publicly burned, never making any advantage thereof. And as to any necklaces of pearl, reported to be by him taken away, I am more than confident the same is as arrand a lie, as that he thought one Bedingfield, whom he took at Newark, to have been the same Bedingfield, who died in the Gatehouse; for he well knew it was another man."[442] Prance confirms this attestation by a special case, in which Sir William returned to a priest, not only his money, but a silver tobacco-box.[443]

Derrick mentions Sir William standing candidate, in 1679, to be a member of Parliament, in which he failed; and adds, that the publicans, who trusted him, found much ado to get their money. When the court party gained an ascendance, Sir William Waller was first struck out of the commission, and afterwards committed to prison, to the great triumph of the Tories.[444] He afterwards went to Holland, and with Robert Ferguson and Bethel is specially excepted from the general pardon granted after Monmouth's defeat. Ralph, Vol. I. p. 918.

[Note XIX.]

Who for their own defence give no supply,

But what the crown's prerogatives must buy;

As if their monarch's rights to violate

More needful were, than to preserve the state!—P. [336.]

The Whigs of those days had constant recourse to the desperate remedy of refusing supplies, when dissatisfied with the court. This ultimate measure ought only to be adopted in cases of extremity; because the want of means to maintain the usual current expences for the law, and the defence of the country, gives a perilous shock to the whole system of government. At that time, however, it was held so effectual a check, and so necessary, that the Whig citizens, in a paper of instructions furnished to their representatives in 1680-1, having thanked them for their good service, more especially for their zeal for the Exclusion Bill, proceed to recommend, "that they would still literally pursue the same measures, and grant no supplies to the crown, till they saw themselves effectually secured from popery and arbitrary power."

[Note XX.]

His absence David does with tears advise,

To appease their rage; undaunted he complies.—P. [337.]

In 1678-9, when the plot hung like a comet over England, the king thought it necessary to assent to the counsel of the Earl of Danby, and request the Duke of York to give way to the storm, and silence the popular clamour, by retreating for a season to the Continent. The Duke requested a particular order, lest it should be supposed he fled from a consciousness of guilt. The order was in these words: "I have already given you my resolution at large, why I think it fit that you absent yourself some time beyond the seas. As I am truly sorry for the occasion, so you may be sure I shall never desire it longer than it may be absolutely necessary for your good and my service. In the meantime, I think proper to give it you under my hand, that I expect this compliance from you, and desire it may be as soon as conveniently you can. You may easily perceive with what trouble I write this to you, there being nothing I am more sensible of than the kindness you have ever had for me. I hope you are as just to me, as to be assured, that no absence, nor any thing else, can ever change me from being truly and kindly yours, C. R. February 28th 1678-9." Superscribed, "For my most dear friend the Duke of York."

Authors differ concerning the "store of parting tears," which were shed on the separation of the royal brothers. Burnet says, that the duke wept much, but the king did not seem affected. Others affirm, that both brothers testified much emotion. The duke retired to Brussels, where he remained till the time of the king's illness, so often mentioned.

[Note XXI.]

Dissembled patriots, bribed with Egypt's gold,

Even sanhedrims in blind obedience hold.—P. [341.]

That Charles II. was a pensioner of France, is now generally allowed. But, though Louis was willing to afford the king of England such supplies as to save him from the necessity of throwing himself on his parliament, it was equally his policy to foster such opposition to him in that assembly, as might totally engage the eyes of both parties upon domestic feuds, and withdraw them from marking his own ambitious strides towards universal power. For this it was necessary, that his minister Barillon should have an understanding with the leaders of the popular party. Hence each faction, as truly as loudly, accused the other of the unworthy dependence on France, to which both were in secret reduced. An account of the French intrigues with the popular party, and of the money distributed among their chiefs, may be found in Dalrymple's Memoirs.

[Note XXII.]

From Hebron now the suffering heir returned,

A realm that long with civil discord mourned;

Till his approach, like some arriving god,

Composed and healed the place of his abode.—P. [343.]

In some respects, the presence of the Duke of York in Scotland was very acceptable to the nobles and gentry of that kingdom. There is, among Somers' Tracts, a letter from a person of quality in Scotland, who professes, that, although a zealous Protestant, he had been converted from his opinion in favour of the Bill of Exclusion, by "the personal knowledge of his very many excellencies and virtues." Doubtless, many circumstances drew the Scots to the faction and favour of the Duke. They saw the halls of their ancient palace again graced with the appearance of royalty, and occupied by a descendant of their long line of kings. The formal, grave, and stately decorum of James, was more suitable to the manners of a proud, reserved, and somewhat pedantic people, than the lighter manners of Charles. The proud, as well as the ingenious, know, and feel, the value of favours conferred by those who resemble them. York applied himself particularly to secure the personal attachment of the Highland chiefs, and to staunch the feuds by which their clans were divided. He, no doubt, reckoned upon the assistance of these ready warriors, in case the sword had been drawn in England; but he little foresaw, that the last hopes of his family were to depend on the generous attachment of the descendants of the chieftains whom he then cultivated, and that his race were to involve in their fall the ruin of the patriarchal and feudal power of these faithful adherents. But if the conduct of James in these particulars was laudable, on the other hand, by introducing an inconsistent and absurd test into the law, by making it the means of ruining a loyal and innocent nobleman, the Earl of Argyle, by satiating his own eyes with the tortures inflicted on the Covenanters,—he gave tokens of that ill-judged and bigotted severity, which was the cause of his being precipitated from the throne. Settle gives a juster, if a less poetical, account of the manner in which he spent his exile:

Whilst sweating Absalon, in Israel pent,

For fresher air was to bleak Hebron sent,—

Cold Hebron, warmed by his approaching sight,

Flushed with his gold, and glowed with new delight,—

Till sacred, all-converting interest,

To loyalty their almost unknown guest,

Oped a broad gate, from whence forth issuing come

Decrees, tests, oaths, for well-soothed Absalom.

[Note XXIII.]

'Mongst whom was Jothran, Jothran always bent

To serve the crown, and loyal by descent.—P. [343.]

Admiral Legge, created Earl of Dartmouth by Charles II., and a particular friend of the Duke of York. When James came to the throne, he loaded Dartmouth with favours, and paid a singular testimony to the family loyalty, celebrated in the text. In 1687, while the earl attended the king on his progress, the city of Coventry presented his majesty with a massive gold cup, which he instantly delivered to Lord Dartmouth, telling him, it was an acknowledgement from the city for the sufferings of his father, who had long lain in jail there, on account of his adherence to the king during the civil wars. In the succeeding year, Dartmouth was made admiral of the fleet of England. He was, perhaps, the worthiest man, and most faithful servant, in the court of King James, whom he truly loved and served, though he disapproved of his arbitrary encroachments, and spoke his mind on the subject without fear or scruple. Although a hereditary enemy of Lord Russell, Dartmouth had the generosity to interfere in his favour. He set sail from Torbay, with the English fleet, to intercept that of the Prince of Orange, at the time of the Revolution. Had they met, a bloody action must have been the consequence; but God ordered it otherwise. The same wind, which carried the Dutch fleet into Torbay, forced back the English to the Downs; and before Dartmouth could again put to sea, the officers and sailors were as unwilling to resist the Prince of Orange, as the nobles and land army. When Lord Dartmouth found it was entirely out of his power to serve King James, he called a council of war, and joined in an address to King William. In 1691-2, he was committed to the Tower, on suspicion of holding correspondence with his old master.

[Note XXIV.]

Nor can Benaiah's worth forgotten lie,

Of steady soul when public storms were high;

Whose conduct, while the Moor fierce onsets made,

Secured at once our honour and our trade.—P. [343.]

General Edward Sackville, a gentleman of good quality, related to the Dorset family, who had served at Tangier with great reputation, both for courage and judgment. Being a particular friend of the Duke of York, he expressed himself very contemptuously concerning the Popish conspiracy, saying, "they were sons of whores who believed there was a plot, and he was a lying rogue that said it." The Commons, being then in the very height of their fermentation on this subject, not only expelled Sackville from the House, but prepared an address to the king, that he might be made incapable of holding any office. He was committed to the Tower, but shortly afterwards set free, and restored to his military rank, though not to his seat in the House. After noticing Dartmouth, Sackville, and the other real friends of the Duke of York, the poet stigmatizes those concealed enemies, who now affected to congratulate his return:

——Those who sought his absence to betray,

Press first their nauseous false respects to pay;

Him still the officious hypocrites molest,

And with officious duty break his rest.

A marginal note on Luttrell's copy points out the Earl of Anglesea as particularly concerned in this sarcasm. In a prologue, spoken before the duke at his first appearance at the theatre after his return, Dryden is equally severe on these time-serving courtiers:

Still we are thronged so full with Reynard's race,

That loyal subjects scarce can find a place.

Thus modest truth is cast behind the crowd,

Truth speaks too low, hypocrisy too loud.

Let them be first to flatter in success;

Duty can stay, but guilt has need to press.

[Note XXV.]

Who now an envious festival installs,

And to survey their strength the faction calls,

Which fraud, religious worship too, must gild;

But oh how weakly does sedition build!

For, lo! the royal mandate issues forth,

Dashing at once their treason, zeal, and mirth.—P. [346.]

The Duke of York maintained some interest in the city, by being captain-general of the Artillery Company, who invited him to dine at Merchant-Taylors' Hall, on April 21, 1682. The party of Monmouth and Shaftesbury resolved to have a meeting in opposition to that which was proposed; and tickets, at a guinea a piece, of which the following is a copy, were circulated among their adherents:

"It having pleased Almighty God, by his wonderful providence, to deliver and protect his majesties person, the Protestant religion, and English liberties, hitherto from the hellish and frequent attempts of their enemies the Papists; in testimony of thankfulness herein, and for the preserving and improving mutual love and charity among such as are sensible thereof, you are desired to meet many of the loyal Protestant nobility, gentry, clergy, and citizens, on Friday the 21st day of this instant April, 1682, at ten of the clock, at St Michael's Church, in Cornhill, there to hear a sermon, and from thence to go to Haberdashers' Hall, to dinner, and to bring this ticket with you."

A sermon was accordingly prepared for this great occasion;[445] and doubtless contained what is vulgarly called a touch of the times. All other preparations for this great entertainment were made with proper magnificence; but the design was utterly quashed by the following proclamation:

"Whitehall, April 19. His Majesty was pleased, this afternoon, to make the following order in council, at the court of Whitehall, this 19th day of April, 1682. By his Majesty, and the Lords of his Majesty's most honourable privy council.

"Whereas, the appointing of publique fasts and thanksgiving is matter of state, and belongs only to his majesty, by his prerogative, and his majesty being informed that, in the city of London, invitations have been made of great and unusual numbers, by printed tickets, one of which is hereunto annext; his majesty looks upon the same as an insolent attempt, in manifest derogation of his right, and of dangerous consequence: The matter of the said invitation being of a publique nature, and the manner of carrying it on, tending to sedition, and raising distinctions and confederacies among his subjects, against the known laws and peace of the kingdom, his majesty, therefore, by the advice of his council, hath thought fit, and doth hereby strictly charge and command the Lord Mayor and Aldermen of London, as they will answer the contrary at their peril, to take immediate and effectual care to prevent and hinder the said meeting, as an unlawful assembly; and all sheriffs, constables, and others his majesty's officers in the said city, are hereby commanded to be aiding and assisting therein."

This disappointment, trifling as it may seem, was of great disadvantage to the Whigs. It made them ridiculous; which is more fatal to a political party than any other misfortune; for few chuse to belong to the faction who have the laugh against them. The Tory poets exulted in the opportunity of showing their wit; and we have perpetual allusions to this ludicrous incident, in the fugitive pieces of the time. Thus, Otway, in the prologue to the "City Heiress, or Sir Timothy Treatall:"

This dæmon lately drew in many a guest,

To part with zealous guinny for no feast;

Who, but the most incorrigible fops,

Forever doomed in dismal cells, called shops,

To cheat and damn themselves to get their livings,

Would lay sweet money out in sham thanksgivings?

Sham-plots you may have paid for o'er and o'er,

But who e'er paid for a sham treat before?

In a congratulatory poem on the Whigs entertainment, we have a similar strain of exultation, though, I believe, it is there ironical:

Hollow boys, hollow, hollow once again!

'Tother half crown shall then reward your pain;

Alas! poor Whigg, where wilt thou sneaking go,

Thy wine is spilt, thy pyes and cakes are dough;

Down go the coppers, tables, shelves, and all,

And so fare well to Haberdashers' Hall.

"The Loyal Feast, appointed to be kept in Haberdashers' Hall, on Friday the 21st of April, 1682, by his Majesty's most loyal true-blue Protestant Subjects, and how it was defeated."

The Whigs from north to south, from east to west,

Did all contribute to a loyal feast;

To this great work, a guiney was the least.

They cleared the stalls of fish, flesh, fowl, and beast,

Where Tony and brave Perkin was a guest;

But what succeeded this, made up the jest.

— — — — — — —

Tony was small, but of noble race,

And was beloved of every one;

He broached his tap, and it ran apace,

To make a solemn treat for all the town.

He sent to yeoman, knight, and lord,

The holy tribe to entertain,

With all the nation could afford;

But Tony will never be himself again.

— — — — — — —

With thanks and prayers for our good king,

They vowed to solemnize the day;

But royal Charles, he smoked the thing,

And sent the rabble with a pox away.

He sent his summons to the cit,

Seditious meetings to refrain;

The feast was broke, and the guests were beshit,

And Tony will never be himself again.

And now the capons fly about,

With fricassees of amber grice,

And chickens ready dressed, they shout

About the street for pence apiece.

The Whigs did wish the counsel choked,

Who did this noble feast restrain;

All down in the mouth, to be thus bawked,

Poor Tony will ne'er be himself again.

[Note XXVI.]

First write Bezaliel, whose illustrious name

Forestals our praise, and gives his poet fame:

The Kenites rocky province his command.—P. [347.]

The Marquis of Worcester, Lord President of Wales, was a keen opponent of the Bill of Exclusion; insomuch, that, by a vote of the Commons in 1680, he was declared a favourer of Popery, (then an imputation of tremendous import,) and an address was appointed to be preferred against him, Halifax, Clarendon, and others, as enemies to the king and kingdom. It may be supposed, that this was far from lowering the marquis in the king's esteem; on the contrary, in 1682, he was created Duke of Beaufort. At the Duke of Monmouth's invasion he commanded in Bristol, and was an effectual means of stopping his progress; for, when he approached that city, which contained many of his partisans, the Duke of Beaufort, finding there was great danger of an insurrection in the place, declared, that he would burn the town the instant he saw the slightest symptoms of disloyalty. When this was made known to Monmouth, he exclaimed, "God forbid I should be the means of exposing so noble a city to the double calamity of sword and fire!" Accordingly, he instantly altered the direction of his march, leaving behind him that rich and populous city, which, if he could have carried it, contained men to increase his forces, stores to supply them, arms to equip them, and money to pay them. This proved a fatal indulgence of compassion:

"Ambition should be made of sterner stuff."

The Duke of Beaufort continued to be a friend to James, after, by abdicating his throne, he had ceased to be a friend to himself. He voted against William in the Convention Parliament. Lord Herbert, of Ragland, the duke's eldest son, in whom he "saw all his glories copied," as the poet has it, was, according to Wood, entered at Christ Church, Oxford, and took the degree of Master of Arts in 1681.

An account of the Duke of Beaufort's noble house-keeping, and mode of educating his family, has been preserved by Roger North, and presents so curious a picture of the interior of a great family, in the end of the 17th century, that I think the reader will be pleased to see it:

"One year his lordship, (the Lord Chief Justice North, afterwards Lord Keeper Guilford,) concluding at Bristol, made a visit at Badminton to the Duke of Beaufort, and staid about a week. For the duke was descended from a North of his lordship's family, viz. one of the Lord Edward North's daughters, whom a lineal ancestor of his Grace married. So, besides conformity of principle, with respect to the public, they were, by this relation, qualified for mutual respect and honour. I mention this entertainment as an handle of shewing a princely way of living, which that noble duke used, above any other, except crowned heads, that I have had notice of in Europe; and, in some respects, greater than most of them, to whom he might have been an example. He had above L. 2000 per annum in his hands, which he managed by stewards, bailiffs, and servants; and, of that, a great part of the country, which was his own, lying round about him, was part, and the husbandmen, &c. were of his family, and provided for in his large expanded house. He bred all his horses, which came to the husbandry first colts, and, from thence, as they were fit, were taken into his equipage; and, as by age, or accident, they grew unfit for that service, they were returned to the place from whence they came, and there expired; except what, for plenty or unfitness, were sold or disposed of. He had about two hundred persons in his family, all provided for, and, in his capital house, nine original tables covered every day: and, for the accommodation of so many, a large hall was built, with a sort of alcove at one end, for distinction; but yet the whole lay in the view of him that was chief, who had power to do what was proper for keeping order amongst them; and it was his charge to see it done. The tables were properly assigned, as, for example, the chief steward with the gentlemen and pages; the master of the horse with the coachmen and liveries; an under steward with the bailiffs and some husbandmen; the clerk of the kitchen with the bakers, brewers, &c. all together; and other more inferior people, under these, in places apart. The women had their dining-room also, and were distributed in like manner: my lady's chief woman with the gentlewomen; the housekeeper with the maids, and some others. The method of governing this great family was admirable and easy, and such as might have been a pattern for any management whatever; for, if the Duke or Duchess (who concerned herself much more than he did; for every day of her life, in the morning, she took her tour, and visited every office about the house, and so was her own superintendant) observed any thing amiss or suspicious, as a servant riding out, or the like, nothing was said to that servant, but his immediate superior, or one of an higher order, was sent for, who was to enquire and answer if leave had been given, or not; if not, such servant was straight turned away. No fault of order was passed by; for it may be concluded, there are enough of them that pass undiscovered. All the provisions of the family came from foreign parts, as merchandize. Soap and candle were made in the house, so likewise the malt was ground there; and all the drink that came to the duke's table, was of malt sun-dried upon the leads of his house. Those are large; and the lanthorn is in the centre of an asterisk of glades, cut through the wood of all the country round, four or five in a quarter, almost a perte de vue. Diverse of the gentlemen cut their trees and hedges to humour his vistos; and some planted their hills in his lines, for compliment, at their own charge. All the trees, planted in his parks and about, were fenced with a dry wall of stone, taken out where the tree was set. And with all this menagery and provision, no one, that comes and goes for visits, or affairs with the duke, (who was lord-lieutenant of four or five counties, and Lord President of Wales,) that could observe any thing more to do there than in any other nobleman's house; so little of vain ostentation was to be seen there. At the entrance where coaches ordinarily came in, the duke built a neat dwelling-house; but pompous stables, which would accommodate forty horses, as well as the best stables he had. This was called the inn, and was contrived for the ease of the suitors, as I may call them; for, instead of half-a-crown to his servants at taking horse, sixpence there, for form, served the turn; and no servant of his came near a gentleman's horse; but they were brought by their own servants, except such as lodged, whose equipages were in his own stables.

"As for the duke and duchess, and their friends, there was no time of the day without diversion. Breakfast in her gallery, that opened into the gardens; then perhaps a deer was to be killed, or the gardens and parks, with the several sorts of deer, to be visited; and if it required mounting, horses of the duke's were brought for all the company. And so, in the afternoon, when the ladies were disposed to air, and the gentlemen with them, coaches and six came to hold them all. At half an hour after eleven, the bell rang to prayers, so at six in the evening; and, through a gallery, the best company went into an aisle in the church, (so near was it,) and the duke and duchess could see if all the family were there. The ordinary pastime of the ladies was in a gallery on the other side, where she had diverse gentlewomen commonly at work upon embroidery and fringe-making; for all the beds of state were made and finished in the house. The meats were very neat, and not gross; no servants in livery attended, but those called gentlemen only; and, in the several kinds, even down to the small beer, nothing could be more choice than the table was. It was an oblong and not an oval; and the duchess, with two daughters only, sat at the upper end. If the gentlemen chose a glass of wine, the civil offers were made either to go down into the vaults, which were very large and sumptuous, or servants, at a sign given, attended with salvers, &c. and many a brisk round went about; but no sitting at table with tobacco and healths, as the too common use is. And this way of entertaining continued a week, while we were there, with incomparable variety: for the duke had always some new project, building, walling, or planting, which he would show, and ask his friends their advice about; and nothing was forced or strained, but easy and familiar, as if it was, and really so I thought it to be, the common course and way of living in that family.

"One thing more I must needs relate, which the duke told us smiling, and it was this: When he was in the midst of his building, his neighbour, the Lord Chief Justice Hales, made him a visit; and observing the many contrivances the duke had for the disposing of so great a family, he craved leave to suggest one to him, which he thought would be much for his service, and it was, to have but one door to his house, and the window of his study, where he sat most, open upon that. This shows how hard it is for even wise and learned men to consider things without themselves. The children of the family were bred with a philosophical care. No inferior servants were permitted to entertain them, lest some mean sentiments, or foolish notions and fables, should steal into them; and nothing was so strongly impressed upon them as a sense of honour. Witness the Lord Arthur, who, being about five years old, was very angry with the judge for hanging men. The judge told him, that, if they were not hanged, they would kill and steal. 'No,' said the little boy, 'you should make them promise upon their honour they will not do so, and then they will not.' It were well if this institutionary care of parents were always correspondent in the manners of all the children; for it is not often found to prove so." Life of the Lord Keeper Guilford, p. 132.

[Note XXVII.]

Brave Abdael o'er the prophet's school was placed;

Abdael, with all his father's virtue graced.—P. [348.]

Christopher, Duke of Albemarle, son to the restorer of the monarchy. He seems to have had no particular character of his own, excepting that he was fond of mechanics, and suggested some improvements on the diving-bell. The Whig writers seldom mention him without a sneer at his understanding.[446] His talents were, however, sufficient to recommend him to be chancellor of Cambridge, in place of the Duke of Monmouth, once the idol of the university, but whose picture they, in 1682, consigned to the flames, with all the solemnities of dishonour.[447] There is a Pindaric ode upon the election of the Duke of Albemarle to this presidency over the seat of the Muses, containing a suitable quantity of bombast and flattery; it concludes by promising his grace a poetical immortality:

Some happy favourite of the nine,

Some Spenser, Cowley, Dryden, shall be thine;

Happy bards, who erst did dream

Near thy own Cam's inspiring stream;

He midst the records of immortal fame,

He midst the stars shall fix thy name,

The muses safety, and the muses theme.

When Monmouth undertook his ill-fated expedition, Albemarle marched against him with the militia of Devon; but the ex-chancellor of Cambridge baffled the attempts of his successor to coop him up at Lyme, and compelled him to retreat with some disorder. Monmouth, after assuming the title of king, sent a summons to Albemarle to claim his allegiance, who returned a cold and contemptuous answer. In 1687, Albemarle was sent abroad as governor of Jamaica; in which island he died.

[Note XXVIII.]

Eliab our next labour does invite,

And hard the task to do Eliab right.—P. [348.]

Sir Henry Bennet was the constant attendant of Charles II. during his exile: after the Restoration, he became a member of the Cabal administration, and secretary of state. He was finally Lord Chamberlain, and through many turns of politics retained the favour of Charles II., perhaps as much from making himself useful in his pleasures, as from the recollection of his faithful attachment. He was learned, and accustomed to business; but, being naturally of a slow understanding, and having acquired a formal manner during his stay in Spain, much enhanced by a black patch which he wore to conceal a wound on his nose, there was something ridiculously stiff in his demeanour. Charles II., who put no value upon a friend in comparison to a jest, is said to have had much delight in seeing the Duke of Buckingham, or any of his gay courtiers, by the help of a black patch and a white staff, enact Harry Bennet. Mulgrave thinks, that a ludicrous idea being thus associated with Arlington, and all that concerned him, he came to be generally thought a man of less abilities, than he really was. He adds, he was of a generous temper, and served his friends warmly. Being once ungratefully used by one whom he had benefited, he asked Mulgrave, what effect he thought it would have upon him; and prevented his answer, by saying, it should neither cool his present friendship, nor prevent him of the greatest happiness of his life, which was to serve the first deserving person that fell in his way.[448] Although the Duke of York disliked Arlington, yet he suffered him to retain his situation at court. His religion may have saved him from disgrace; for Arlington was privately a Catholic, and avowed himself to be so on his death-bed.[449] He died July, 1685.

[Note XXIX.]

And blessed again, to see his flower allied

To David's stock, and made young Othriel's bride.—P. [349.]

Lady Isabella Bennet, only daughter and heiress of the Earl of Arlington, was married to Henry Fitzroy, Duke of Grafton, second son of Charles II. by the Duchess of Cleveland. This match was against the inclination of the duke's mother; for Derrick says, he saw a letter from her to Danby, dated at Paris, in 1675, thanking him for endeavouring to prevent the match. The Duke of Grafton was bred to the sea. After Monmouth had taken the popular courses which we have reviewed, the king endeavoured to set Grafton, though inferior in all personal accomplishments, in opposition to him, in the hearts of the people. He was appointed steward of the Loyal Apprentices' entertainment,[450] and otherwise placed in the public eye, as the rival of Monmouth. He also was admitted to share his more profitable spoils, getting one of the regiments of the guards, formerly under Monmouth's command, when the Duke of Richmond was made Master of the Horse.[451] Grafton was sent against Monmouth on his landing in the west, and attempted to beat up his rear with a body of horse, as he marched towards Frome; but was defeated, and very nearly made prisoner.[452] The Duke of Grafton participated in the general discontent which James II's measures excited through the kingdom, and remonstrated against them with professional frankness. The king ridiculed a seaman's pretensions to tenderness of conscience; and Grafton answered sturdily, that "if he had not much religion himself, he belonged to a party who had." He was with the king when he headed his army to march against the Prince of Orange, and joined with Churchill, in exhorting him to hazard a battle. We must hope, that they meant to share the risque which they recommended; and that it was only a consciousness that the king had deserted his own cause, which induced them to go over to the prince, when their counsel was rejected. On the 28th September, 1690, the Duke of Grafton was mortally wounded at the siege of Cork, as he commanded the squadron which covered the landing. He seems to have been a brave, rough, hardy-tempered man, and would probably have made a figure as a naval officer.

[Note XXX.]

Even envy must consent to Helon's worth;

Whose soul, though Egypt glories in his birth,

Could for our captive ark its zeal retain,

And Pharaoh's altars in their pomp disdain.—P. [349.]

Lewis Duras, Earl of Feversham, brother of the French Marshals Duras and De Lorge, and nephew to the famous Marshal Turenne. He was born of a Huguenot family, and retained his religion, or the form of it, when both his brothers conformed to the Catholic church. The Duke of York's opportune return from Flanders is said, by Sir John Reresby, to have been planned by this nobleman; who is, therefore, introduced here with singular propriety. He is said to have been brave; but appears, from the only remarkable action in which he was ever engaged, to have been a bad general, and a cruel man. James II., who had a high esteem for Feversham, placed him at the head of that body of disciplined troops, which checked the career of Monmouth. He advanced to Bridgewater, of which Monmouth had got possession, with some of the finest regiments in the service, and 30 field pieces. The unfortunate adventurer seemed to have no refuge left, but to disperse his forces, and fly for his safety; when the mode in which Feversham conducted himself gave him a fair chance for victory and a crown. He encamped in the open country, three miles from the enemy, with only a dry ditch in his front; dispersed his cavalry in the neighbouring hamlets, and retired quietly to bed, without either sending out reconnoitering parties, or establishing advanced posts.[453] It is no wonder, that, that in such a careless state, he should have been completely surprised; it is only singular, that, even allowing for the cowardice of Lord Grey, who fled, instead of performing the safe and easy duty committed to him of firing the horse-quarters of Feversham's army, he should have been able to recover the consequences of his negligence. Monmouth's men fought for three hours after they had been deserted by their cavalry, with the innate courage of English peasants. Feversham was still hard pressed, notwithstanding the gallant assistance afforded him by Dumbarton; when the Bishop of Bath and Wells decided the day, by causing the artillery to be turned upon the flank of Monmouth's followers. When they had given way, Feversham exhibited more of the cold-blooded cruelty of his country, than he had done of their genius and fiery valour, while the battle lasted. The military bishop also proved himself a better lawyer than the general, as he had shewn himself in the fight a better soldier; but it was not till a warm expostulation was made on his part that the general ceased to execute the prisoners by martial law, and reserved them to a still more cruel fate from the forms of law, as administered by the brutal Jefferies. Neither Feversham's blunders, nor his brutality, seemed to lessen his merit in the eye of his sovereign. He received the order of the Garter, on the 31st July, 1685, probably on the vacancy occasioned by the Duke of Monmouth's death, whose memory was on this occasion treated with signal ignominy.[454] At the time of the Revolution, Lord Feversham was commander in chief, and proved himself incapable of taking any spirited steps for James's interest; for the army he commanded, though the officers were disaffected, would probably have fought, had they been once fairly committed in opposition to the Dutch. When the king resolved to abandon everything, and forsake his kingdom, he left behind, a letter to Feversham, stating that he should not expect his troops at present to expose themselves. The general might have secured a part of his forces, by retreating along with the high-spirited Viscount of Dundee, who marched back into Scotland with the Scottish regiments; but Feversham was a man of another mould, and rather chose to augment the general confusion, by disbanding the army. When James was detected by the fishermen of Kent, in his attempt to leave the kingdom, Feversham, with a party of his guards, was sent to conduct him back to his capital. James also chose him for the messenger, when, yielding to sad necessity, he sent a letter to the Prince of Orange, inviting him to St James's. With a view, doubtless, to increase the terror of the king's mind, and precipitate his intention of a second flight, the prince arrested the bearer of this humiliating embassy. This was the last public occasion on which James had occasion to employ the services of the unmilitary nephew of the great Turenne, whose name is connected with the most blame-worthy and most melancholy passages of his reign.

[Note XXXI.]

Our list of nobles next let Amri grace,

Whose merits claimed the Abethdin's high place;

Who, with a loyalty that did excel,

Brought all the endowments of Achitophel.—P. [349.]

These lines, which sufficiently vouch their author to have been Tate, refer to Sir Heneage a Finch, an eminent lawyer, who was first attorney-general, and, upon Shaftesbury losing his seals, succeeded him as Lord Keeper. He was a most incorruptible judge, and could not be swayed in his decisions even by the king's interference, which upon all political occasions was omnipotent with him. He was a good lawyer, and a ready orator; but upon this last accomplishment, he set, as all lawyers do, rather too high a value: for they, whose profession necessarily leads them often to speak against their own opinion, and often to make much of trifles, are apt to lose, in the ingenuity of their arguments, the power of making a real impression upon the bosom of their hearers. North says, that the business, rather than the justice, of the court, flourished exceedingly under Finch; for he was a formalist, and took exceeding pleasure in encouraging and listening to nice distinctions of law, instead of taking a broad view of the equity of each case. He was a steady and active supporter of the Tory party on all occasions; in reward of which, he was created Earl of Nottingham. After a long and lingering disease, which terminated in a deep depression of spirits, this great lawyer died in 1682, and was succeeded by Lord Guilford, as Lord Keeper.

[Note XXXII.]

Than Sheva none more loyal zeal have shown,

Wakeful as Judah's lion for the crown.—P. [350.]

Sir Roger L'Estrange was descended of a good family in Norfolk, and during the civil war was in arms for the king.[455] Being taken prisoner by the parliament, he was condemned to die, but found means to obtain a pardon. He was a good performer on the violin; a quality which recommended him to Cromwell, under whose government he lived, if we may trust one of his antagonists, in ease and affluence; a circumstance with which he was afterwards as often reproached as our author with his panegyric on the Protector. The instant, however, that the restoration of monarchy approached, L'Estrange was among the first to hail it, and stepped forth to answer a pamphlet of Milton, on the subject of a republic, by a retort, which he irreverently entitled, "No Blind Guides." After the Restoration, he was the great champion of the court, the high church, and the Tory party. His principal vehicle of political instruction was the "Observator," a paper published twice a week; but he also edited another, called "Heraclitus Ridens;" and, independently of both, published answers, replies, rebutters, and sur-rebutters, to every attack made upon him, besides quires of pamphlets on all popular subjects. For these good services, he was knighted by King James. His style is in the last degree mean, crabbed, and low; yet he possesses some power of argument and sarcasm. He appears to have first invented, or at least first practised to a great extent, the foolish custom of printing emphatic passages in a different type from the rest of the page, and thereby too often effecting a point, which the reader is unable to trace. For the other deeds of L'Estrange, and his numerous bead-roll of fugitive pieces, the reader may consult the article in the Biographia.

[Note XXXIII.]

Calm were the elements, night's silence deep,

The waves scarce murmuring, and the winds asleep;

Yet fate for ruin takes so still an hour,

And treacherous sands the princely bark devour.—P. [351.]

The Duke of York, after a short visit to England, returned to Scotland by sea. The vessel unfortunately struck upon a bank, called the Lemman Ore; and the duke, with a few attendants, who crowded into the barge, were all who escaped from the wreck. Burnet says, that the duke showed no anxiety about the safety of any one save his dogs and his priests, whom the bishop maliciously classes together. Others say, he was principally interested about Churchill, who, at the Revolution, requited his anxiety but indifferently. The Gazette says, that when the barge put off, the poor sailors, who remained to perish, manned the sides in the usual honorary form, and, indifferent to their own fate, hailed the duke's safety with three cheers; a circumstance alluded to a few lines below, where it is said, the sufferers,

With last loud breaths, their master's 'scape applaud.

In this shipwreck perished the Earl of Roxburghe, Mr Hyde, a son of the great Clarendon, the Lord O'Brien, the Laird of Hoptoun, Sir Joseph Douglas, Colonel Macnaughton, and about 300 seamen, besides the persons of the duke's retinue.

The verses, which follow those concerning this lamentable accident, describe the return of the Duke of York with his Duchess to England; a voyage which they performed without any sinister accident, and landed there upon the 27th May, 1682. On this occasion, they received many poetical greetings, both on the duke's escape and their happy arrival; as, for example, Otway's "Prologue to the Duchess, on her return from Scotland, at the Duke's theatre, at Venice Preserved, &c. acted 31st May, 1682."

"A Pindarique Ode on their Royal Highnesses Return from Scotland, after their escape at Sea."

"To the Duke on his Return, 29th May, 1682, written by Nathaniel Lee."

"A Congratulatory Poem to her Royal Highness, upon the arrival of their Royal Highnesses in England, May 27th, 1682."

"To his Royal Highness at his happy Return from Scotland, written by a Person of Quality, 30th May, 1682."

Heaven, who declares, in wonders so divine,

Care of succession in the rightful line,

That it protects you, with a guardian hand,

From Whiggish lemans, both of sea and land.

Also, "A Panegyric on their Royal Highnesses, and Congratulation on their Return from Scotland."

[Note XXXIV.]

This year did Ziloah rule Jerusalem,

And boldly all sedition's syrtes stem.—P. [353.]

Sir John Moor, the tory Lord Mayor, an aged and respectable citizen, of a mild character, and even hesitating and cautious in forming his measures, though sufficiently determined when once satisfied of their propriety. "Which character," says North, "was cut out for this time and public occasion; for nothing but such firmness of mind, and manifest goodness, with a seeming passive disposition, could have protected from those rages of violence, as very often threatened him, and which, probably, had broke loose on any one in his post, that had carried matters with a stern and minatory behaviour."[456] He was proposed by the court-party in the city for Lord Mayor, and, being scarcely opposed by the other faction, easily carried his election. The Whigs were led into this blunder, by mistaking the principles, and under-rating the resolution, of the candidate. Sir John Moor had been bred a non-conformist; and, though he had taken the test with a view to civic honours, that was no more than had been done by Bethel, Cornish, and others, who retained in full vigour their sectarian principles. Besides, from the gentleness and softness of the new Lord Mayor's demeanour, his smooth and diffident way of talking in private, and his embarrassed elocution in public, they conceived that, even if completely gained by the court, he would prove too passive and timorous, to serve them essentially against active and energetic opponents. In both these particulars they were woefully mistaken. Sir John proved to be most keenly disposed to second all the court measures; and he was kept up to the pitch of resolution necessary for carrying them through, by the constant support, encouragement, and advice of the Duke of Ormond, whom the court employed to back him, and who, during the contests which followed, dined with the Lord Mayor two or three times every week.[457] This election, and its consequences, was a severe blow to the fanatical interest in the city; the jovial custom of banquets and feasting was revived; and the musicians, who had been long under restraint, were restored to their privilege, which they employed in chaunting forth the praises of Sir John the Restorer.[458] More, of Morehall, was not for a time more celebrated in song, than the Lord Mayor, his namesake; and a general revolution appeared to have taken place in the manners, as well as the principles, of the citizens, which, under the Whig government, had savoured not a little of the ancient days of fanatical severity.

[Note XXXV.]

Howe'er encumbered with a viler pair

Than Ziph or Shimei, to assist the chair;

Yet Ziloah's loyal labours so prevailed,

That faction, at the next election, failed.—P. [353.]

Ziph and Shimei were the Whig sheriffs in 1681; concerning whom, see note upon Shimei in Part First. The viler pair were Thomas Pilkington, and Samuel Shute, who followed out the practice of their predecessors, in the mode of packing the juries on political trials, and had the honour to arrange that which acquitted the Earl of Shaftesbury. They were much hated by the court; and, when they came with the recorder to invite the King to dine with the Lord Mayor, Charles forgot his usual politeness so far, as to answer sternly, "so agreeable was the city's invitation, that he would accept it, though brought by messengers so unwelcome to him as these two sheriffs."[464] Sir John Moor had a most violent contest with these two persons, concerning the election of sheriffs for the ensuing year, about which the court were exceedingly anxious.

It had been customary, when these elections were matters of little consequence, that the Lord Mayor designated a citizen to hold the office of sheriff, by the ceremony of drinking to him, and sending him the cup. It was agreed by the court, that this custom should be revived, as throwing the choice of one of the sheriffs into the hands of their partizan, Sir John Moor. This being settled, the Mayor, in full form, drank to Dudley North, brother of the Lord Keeper Guilford, a Levant merchant, who accepted of that expensive office, to please his brother, and to serve the court. The popular party determined to controvert this election; denying that a sheriff could be elected otherwise than by the Livery, and proposed Papillon and Dubois, sturdy Whigs, for their candidates. The court, on the other hand, contending that North was duly and incontrovertibly elected, by the jolly mode already mentioned, proposed a Mr Box for the other sheriff, whose office only they allowed to be vacant. The Common Hall, held on this occasion, was as tumultuary as a raging tempest. At length the Lord Mayor, with the party who denied there were two vacancies, withdrew; while the country party remained, and polled for Papillon and Dubois, under the direction of Shute and Pilkington, the last year's sheriffs. The court, affecting to consider this as a riot, interfered on that pretext, and a warrant was granted for committing the sheriffs to the Tower. Having found bail to answer for a misdemeanour, they returned to the charge with the same ardour as ever, and were actually about to complete their poll, when the hall was adjourned by the orders of the Lord Mayor. The whole weight of the court was necessary to keep up the Lord Mayor's heart at this crisis. He was sent for to the Privy Council, encouraged, soothed, schooled, and finally assured, by a writing under the Lord Keeper's hand, that he might adjourn the Common Hall, &c. as he thought proper. Thus heartened, the Lord Mayor assumed to himself the whole management of the poll, although the sheriffs opened books for another, and, denying the legality of any election, excepting his own, declared Box duly returned. This citizen, however, apprehensive of the consequences of acting under so dubious a nomination, fined off, and declined to serve. One Rich was found, with more zeal and courage; and, during the tumult of a Common Hall, which resounded with the cries of "no election," &c. this gentleman was elected sheriff by a few of the Lord Mayor's partizans, and declared duly returned by the Lord Mayor, who immediately proceeded to dissolve the Common Hall. North and Rich were accordingly sworn in as sheriffs for the year; but a guard of the Train Bands was necessary to protect them, while they thus qualified themselves for entering on their office.

This contest was followed by another, for the office of Lord Mayor. Gould, the popular candidate, was returned by a considerable majority; but, upon a scrutiny, the court-party, by dint of real or pretended disqualifications, gained such an advantage, that Pritchard, their candidate, was returned by a majority of fourteen voices.

The importance of these elections was soon visible. The popular party were utterly disheartened, and their leaders exposed to the same practices from packing juries, which they had themselves employed. The court used their victory remorselessly. Pilkington, the ex-sheriff, was found liable in 100,000l. damages, for having said that "the Duke of York had fired the city, and was now come to cut all their throats." Those concerned in carrying on the double poll, were severely fined, as guilty of a riot. Sir Patience Ward, an alderman of the popular party, was declared obnoxious to a charge of perjury, for an inconsistence in his evidence on Pilkington's trial.[465] In short, the royal vengeance was felt by all who had been active in opposition to the court.

But the extent of the court's victory was best evinced by the conduct of Shaftesbury; who, seeing his strong-hold, the magistracy of the city, thus invaded, and occupied by his enemies, fled from his house in Aldersgate-street, and for some time lay concealed in Wapping, trusting for his safety to the very lowest of mankind. From this hiding place, he sent forth messages to the other heads of the party, in which he urged the most desperate measures. But, finding it impossible to combine the various persons concerned in one plan of enterprize, and sensible of the danger of discovery, which each day's delay rendered more imminent, after a bitter contest between fear and rage, he fled to Amsterdam. His retreat was followed by the trial of the conspirators in the Rye-house Plot; and doubtless, the court, on that occasion, knew well how to avail themselves of the power of selecting juries so long possessed by their enemies, and now in their own hands. During the short remainder of this reign, the king's authority was paramount and supreme; his enemies were at his feet, and not a whisper of opposition disturbed his repose;—a deceitful and delusive calm, which his unfortunate successor soon saw changed into a tempest.

---

THE
MEDAL.
A
SATIRE AGAINST SEDITION.

---

Per Graium populos, mediqæue per Elidis urbem

Ibat ovans; Divumque sibi poscebat honores.

---

THE MEDAL.

The Medal was published in the beginning of March 1682, about four months after the appearance of the first part of "Absalom and Achitophel," and eight months before the publication of the second part of that poem. The circumstances, which led to it, require us to notice Shaftesbury's imprisonment and acquittal.

On the 2d July, 1681, the Earl of Shaftesbury was apprehended, by virtue of a warrant from council, and after his papers had been seized, and he himself had undergone an examination, was committed to the Tower. Upon the 24th November, 1681, a bill for high-treason was presented against him to the grand jury of Middlesex. When the witnesses were adduced, the jurors demanded, that they might be examined in private; and Pilkington, the Whig sheriff, required, that they should be examined separately. Both requests were refused by the court. One Booth was then examined, who swore, that Lord Shaftesbury had told him, he intended to carry down to the Oxford parliament a party of fifty gentlemen, and their servants, armed and mounted, to be commanded by a Captain Wilkinson; and that his Lordship stated this force to be provided, for the purpose of repelling any attack which the king's guards might make on the parliament, and, if necessary, to take the king from his bad advisers by force, and bring him to the city of London. The witness, said he, was invited by Wilkinson to be one of this band, and provided himself with a good horse and arms for the service; which was prevented by the sudden dissolution of the Oxford parliament. Seven other witnesses, Smith, Turberville, Haynes, and three persons called Macnamara, swore, that Shaftesbury had used to them, and each of them individually, the most treasonable expressions concerning the king's person; had declared he had no more title to the crown than the Duke of Buckingham; that he deserved to be deposed; and that he, Shaftesbury, would dethrone him, and convert the kingdom into a commonwealth. Here was enough of swearing at least to make a true bill. But the character of the witnesses was infamous; Booth was a swindler, and could never give an account of the stable in which he kept his pretended charger, or produce any one who had seen it. Smith, by his own confession, had changed his religion twice, was one of the evidences of the Popish plot, and intimate with the villain Oates. Turberville stood in the same predicament of an infamous fellow, and an evidence for the plot; he is said to have apologised for his apostacy, by saying plainly, that "the Protestant citizens had forsaken him, and, God damn him, he would not starve." The other witnesses were Irishmen, and there was something remarkable in their history. They had pretended to discover a Catholic plot in Ireland, which, if one had existed any where, was doubtless the place where it might have been found. Their evidence, however, contained pretty much such a raw-head and bloody-bones story as that of Oates, and equally unworthy of credit. Yet Shaftesbury constituted himself their protector, and had them brought over to England, where he doubtless intended, that their Irish plot should be as warmly agitated in the Oxford parliament, as the English conspiracy in that of 1679. Macnamara's "Narrative of the Conspiracy" is dedicated to his Lordship, because it was not only known to the dedicator, "but to the whole Christian world, how conspicuous his Lordship had been for his indefatigable zeal and vigilance over the safety of his majesty's most sacred person, and the welfare of the whole extent of his dominions." The sudden dissolution of the Oxford parliament, which had such important consequences in various respects, prevented the prosecution of the Irish plot. Besides, it seems to have escaped even Shaftesbury, that popular terror, the most powerful of engines, loses its excitability by too frequent alarms. The theme of a plot began to be listened to with indifference. That of Ireland fell to the ground, without exciting clamour or terror, but the witnesses remained. There is a story of some Irish recruits, who, being detected in a brawl, justified themselves, by saying, they were paid by the king for fighting, and it was quite the same to them where they fought, or with whom. The witnesses were equally sedulous in their vocation, and equally indifferent about the application of their labours; for, finding the court had obtained an ascendency, they readily turned with the tide, and bore evidence, as we have seen, against their original protector and encourager. The Tories basely availed themselves of the readiness with which this hungry pack of bloodhounds turned against their huntsman, and triumphantly claimed for them the same credit which the Whigs had demanded in former cases; although they must have been conscious, that they were employing the worst arts, as well as the most infamous implements, of their enemies. Besides the infamy of these men's character, their story was very improbable; as it could hardly be supposed, that Shaftesbury, the veteran leader of a party, should have committed himself so deeply in unnecessary and unreserved communication with these vulgar banditti, or expressed himself against the king in such low and gross language as they imputed to him.

Such being the oral testimony, and such its defects, the crown lawyers endeavoured to aid it, by founding upon certain papers found in Shaftesbury's study. One of these contained the names of the principal persons in the nation, divided into two lists, one titled, Worthy Men, and the other, Men Worthy; which last contained the principal Tories, and the legend was understood to mean, "men worthy to be hanged." This was too enigmatical to bear much argument. But there was also found a draught of an association against Popery, in which many dangerous topics were stated. It was thereby declared, that the Papist Plot was still advancing, and that the Catholics had been highly encouraged by James Duke of York; that mercenary forces had been levied, and kept on foot, contrary to law, and to the danger of the king's person: Therefore the persons associating were to bind themselves to defend, first the Protestant religion, and then the king's person and liberties of the subject, against all encroachment and usurpation of arbitrary power, and to endeavour to disband all such mercenary forces as were kept up in and about the city of London, to the great amazement and terror of all the good people of the land; also, never to consent that the Duke of York, or any professed Papist, should succeed to the crown, but by all lawful means, and by force of arms if necessary, to resist and oppose his so doing. By a still more formidable clause, it was provided, that the subscribers were to receive orders from the parliament if sitting; but if it should be dissolved, from the majority of the association itself. Lastly, that no one should separate from the rest of the association, on pain of being by the others prosecuted and suppressed, as a perjured person and public enemy. Much dangerous, and even treasonable, inference may be drawn from this model. But it was only an unsigned scroll, and did not appear to have been framed, or even revised and approved of, by Shaftesbury.

With such evidence against him, Shaftesbury might have gone safely before a jury of indifferent men, could such have been found. But the Whig sheriffs, Shute and Pilkington, left nothing to hazard, and took good care the assize should consist of men picked out of the very centre of their own party. We recognize the names of Godfrey, brother to Sir Edmondbury; of Papillon and Dubois, the Whig candidates for the shrievalty against North and Rich; of Sir Samuel Barnardiston, who maintained a furious action against the high-sheriff of Suffolk, for a double return; of Shepherd, the wine-merchant, at whose house the Duke of Monmouth, Lord Russel, &c. afterwards held their meetings; of Edwin, the presbyterian, and others less noted in history, but not less remarkable at the time for the violence of their party-zeal. After a short consideration, they returned the bill Ignoramus; upon which there was a shout of continued applause in the court, which lasted for an hour, and the city, in the evening, blazed with bonfires, to celebrate the escape of their Protestant leader. Such was the history of this noted trial, which took place at a time when the course of law had lost its deep still channel, and all causes were carried by a fierce impetuous torrent, which threatened to break down the banks, and become a general inundation. Accustomed to a pure administration of justice, we now look back with disgust and horror upon times, when, to bring in a just verdict, it was necessary to assemble a packed jury.

The triumph of the Whigs was unbounded; and, among other symptoms of exultation, it displayed itself in that which gave rise to this poem of Dryden. This was a medal of Lord Shaftesbury, struck by William Bower, an artist, who had executed some popular pieces allusive to the Roman Catholic plot.[466] The obverse presented the bust of the earl, with the legend, Antonio Comiti De Shaftesbury; the reverse, a view of London, the bridge, and the Tower; the sun is rising above the Tower, and just in the act of dispersing a cloud; the legend around the exergue is Lætamur, and beneath is the date of his acquittal, 24th November, 1681. The partizans of the acquitted patriot wore these medals at their breasts; and care was taken that this emblem should be made as general as possible.[467]

The success of "Absalom and Achitophel" made the Tories look to our author as the only poet whose satire might check, or ridicule, the popular triumph of Shaftesbury. If the following anecdote, which Spence has given on the authority of a Catholic priest, a friend of Pope, be absolutely correct, Charles himself engaged Dryden to write on this theme. "One day as the king was walking in the Mall, and talking with Dryden, he said, 'If I was a poet, and I think I am poor enough to be one, I would write a poem on such a subject, in the following manner.' He then gave him the plan of "The Medal." Dryden took the hint, carried the poem, as soon as it was written, to the king, and had a present of a hundred broad pieces for it."

The merits of "The Medal," as a satirical poem, are universally acknowledged; nor does it greatly suffer from being placed, as the subject naturally invites, in comparison with "Absalom and Achitophel." The latter, as a group of figures, presents greater scope and variety, and may be therefore more generally interesting than the portrait of an individual; but it does not more fully display the abilities of the artist. Nothing can be more forcibly described, than the whole of Shaftesbury's political career; and, to use the nervous language of Johnson, "the picture of a man, whose propensions to mischief are such, that his best actions are but inability of wickedness, is very skilfully delineated, and strongly coloured." The comparison of his best and most politic councils, to the cures affected by those called white witches, whom it was unlawful to consult, because, even in accomplishing innocent purposes, they used infernal arts, is poignantly severe. The succeeding lines, in which the poet ridicules bitterly that appeal to the people, which the demagogues of that, as of all periods, were desirous to represent as the criterion of truth, contains the essence of all that an hundred philosophers can say upon the topic. His stern and indignant picture of the citizens of London, unjust as it is, if meant to express their general character, is, in individual instances, too often verified. That looseness which habitual chicane in trade introduces into mercantile morality; that bustling activity, which, however meritorious when within its sphere, is so apt to extend itself where its exertion is only mischievous and absurd; and that natural turn to democracy, which arises from frequenting popular meetings and from ambition of civic honours; that half-acquaintance with the affairs of other countries, and half-intimacy with the laws of our own, acquired in the course of mercantile transactions,—all combine, but too often, to turn an useful sober citizen, into a meddling, pragmatical, opinionative politician. The strong and gloomy picture of the fanatics, which succeeds, describes a race of men now in a great measure extinct, of whom the influence, though declining, even in the poet's time, continued to be powerful, and which had, in the preceding generation, prostrated before them both the mitre and the throne. The comparison of the fanatical ideas of religion entertained by these dissenting teachers, with the supposed principles of the libertine and latitudinarian Shaftesbury, gave scope for some nervous satire, and led the author naturally to consider the probable result of the schemes of these incongruous allies. These he predicts, according to the progress of things after the great civil war, to be successively the dominion of presbytery, and depression of the gentry; the insurrection of the independents, and other sects, against their spiritual tyranny; quarrels between the civil and military leaders; the commons destroying the peerage; a democratical republic; a military tyranny; and, by the blessing of heaven, a restoration of the rightful heir. All these scenes had already passed at no distant period; and now, while the sword was yet in the sheath, though the hand was upon its hilt, the masterly and energetic language in which they are detailed may have tempted many to pause and think, whether the evils, of which they complained, deserved the risque of so desperate a remedy.

Such is the plan of this admirable poem. The language is as striking as the ideas and subject. The illustrations and images are short and apposite, such as give force to the argument, and flow easily into the diction, without appearing to have been laboured, or brought from a distance. I fear, however, some of the scriptural allusions are censurable, as too free, if not profane. The verse has all the commanding emphasis, with which Dryden, beyond any other poet, knew how to body forth and adorn his poetical arguments. One Alexandrine is prolonged two syllables beyond the usual length; a circumstance hardly worth notice, were it not to show the sharp-sighted malice of Dryden's enemies, who could discover this single inaccuracy, if, indeed, the licence was not intentional, amid so much sounding versification.[468]

As "The Medal" attracted immediate and extensive attention, the Whig champions stepped forth to the contest. "The Mushroom," by Edmund Hickeringell, first appeared; and, in succession, "The Medal Reversed," by Samuel Pordage, which procured its author a couplet in the second part of "Absalom and Achitophel;" "The Loyal Medal Vindicated," and the "Medal of John Bayes;" all of which, and perhaps many more, appeared in the summer and autumn of 1681. Two satires, of a more general nature, entitled, "Dryden's Satire to his Muse," and, "The Tory Poets," were also published against our author in the course of that year; a sufficient proof of the irritation of that party, whose chief he had now twice held up to public detestation.—The popularity of "The Medal" did not cease with the crisis which gave it birth; it went through many editions, and only became less known, when successive changes had totally worn away all remembrance of the intrigues of the eminent politician against whom it was directed. Johnson has said, "It is now not much read, nor perhaps generally understood; yet, a slight acquaintance with the history of the period removes all obscurity; and, though we cannot sympathize with the fervour of politics which it contains, the poetry has claims to popularity, widely independent of the temporary nature of the subject."

As the reader is now to take a long farewell of Lord Shaftesbury, it may not be unnecessary to remind him, that, when freed from the accusation of high treason, the earl continued to agitate plans of opposition to the government, which became more and more violent, as the ascendency of the court became more powerful, until open force seemed to be the only means left of accomplishing what undoubtedly he had at first hoped to carry through by political intrigue. At length he found it necessary to fly from his house in Aldersgate-Street, and take refuge in the suburbs of the city, from whence he sent messages to his associates, urging them to take arms. But he was now doomed to experience what his ardent temper had before prevented him from considering. When they came to the crisis, the different views and dispositions of the allies began to discover themselves. Russell limited his wishes to security for liberty; Monmouth stipulated his own succession on Charles' death; Sidney demanded a free commonwealth; and all dreaded Shaftesbury, who, they were sensible, was determined to be at the head of the kind of government adopted, whatever that might be. Nor were their tempers less discordant than their plans. While an inferior order of conspirators were organizing plans for assassinating the whole royal family, Monmouth was anxious for the life of his father, Russell averse to shedding the blood of his countrymen, Grey, Howard, and Trenchard, from meaner motives, unwilling to encounter the dangers of war. After a desperate threat to commence the rising, and make the honour and danger all his own, Shaftesbury at length fled to Holland, where he landed in November 1682. The magistrates of Amsterdam gave him welcome, and enrolled him among their citizens, to evade any claim by the court of England on his person; yet they failed not to remind him of his former declaration, of Delenda est Carthago, accompanying the freedom which they presented to him with these words: Ab nostra Carthagine, nondum deleta, salutem accipe. Here, while pondering the consequences of former intrigues, and perhaps adjusting new machinations, Shaftesbury was seized with the gout in his stomach, and expired on the 21st January, 1682-3.

To sift the character of this extraordinary man, and divide his virtues from his vices, his follies from his talents, would be a difficult, perhaps an impossible task. Charles is said to have borne testimony, that he had more law than all his judges, and more divinity than all his bishops. But his shining qualities were sullied by that inordinate ambition, which brought its own punishment, in an unworthy flight, an untimely, at least a precipitated, death, and a dubious reputation.

Sleep, thou most active of mankind! oh make

Thy last low bed, and death's long requiem take,

Thou who, whilst living, kept'st the world awake![469]

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EPISTLE
TO
THE WHIGS.

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For to whom can I dedicate this poem with so much justice as to you? 'Tis the representation of your own hero; 'tis the picture drawn at length, which you admire and prize so much in little. None of your ornaments are wanting; neither the landscape of your Tower, nor the rising sun, nor the anno domini of your new sovereign's coronation. This must needs be a grateful undertaking to your whole party; especially to those who have not been so happy as to purchase the original. I hear the graver has made a good market of it; all his kings are bought up already, or the value of the remainder so enhanced, that many a poor Polander,[470] who would be glad to worship the image, is not able to go to the cost of him, but must be content to see him here. I must confess I am no great artist; but sign-post painting will serve the turn to remember a friend by, especially when better is not to be had. Yet, for your comfort, the lineaments are true; and though he sat not five times to me, as he did to B,[471] yet I have consulted history; as the Italian painters do, when they would draw a Nero or a Caligula: though they have not seen the man, they can help their imagination by a statue of him, and find out the colouring from Suetonius and Tacitus. Truth is, you might have spared one side of your medal; the head would be seen to more advantage if it were placed on a spike of the Tower, a little nearer to the sun, which would then break out to better purpose.[472]

You tell us, in your preface to the "No-protestant Plot,"[473] that you shall be forced hereafter to leave off your modesty; I suppose you mean that little which is left you, for it was worn to rags when you put out this medal. Never was there practised such a piece of notorious impudence in the face of an established government. I believe, when he is dead, you will wear him in thumb-rings, as the Turks did Scanderbeg, as if there were virtue in his bones to preserve you against monarchy. Yet all this while you pretend not only zeal for the public good, but a due veneration for the person of the king. But all men, who can see an inch before them, may easily detect those gross fallacies. That it is necessary for men in your circumstances to pretend both, is granted you; for without them there could be no ground to raise a faction. But I would ask you one civil question, what right has any man among you, or any association of men, to come nearer to you, who, out of parliament, cannot be considered in a public capacity, to meet, as you daily do, in factious clubs, to vilify the government in your discourses, and to libel it in all your writings? Who made you judges in Israel? Or how is it consistent with your zeal for the public welfare, to promote sedition? Does your definition of loyal, which is, "to serve the king according to the laws," allow you the licence of traducing the executive power with which you own he is invested? You complain that his majesty has lost the love and confidence of his people; and by your very urging it, you endeavour what in you lies to make him lose them. All good subjects abhor the thought of arbitrary power, whether it be in one or many: if you were the patriots you would seem, you would not at this rate incense the multitude to assume it; for no sober man can fear it, either from the king's disposition, or his practice; or even where you would odiously lay it, from his ministers. Give us leave to enjoy the government and benefit of laws under which we were born, and which we desire to transmit to our posterity. You are not the trustees of the public liberty: and if you have not right to petition in a crowd,[474] much less have you to intermeddle in the management of affairs, or to arraign what you do not like; which, in effect, is every thing that is done by the king and council. Can you imagine, that any reasonable man will believe you respect the person of his majesty, when it is apparent that your seditious pamphlets are stuffed with particular reflections on him? If you have the confidence to deny this, it is easy to be evinced from a thousand passages, which I only forbear to quote, because I desire they should die and be forgotten. I have perused many of your papers; and to show you that I have, the third part of your "No-protestant Plot" is much of it stolen from your dead author's pamphlet, called the "Growth of Popery;"[475] as manifestly as Milton's "Defence of the English People" is from Buchanan, "De jure regni apud Scotos:" or your first Covenant, and new Association, from the Holy League of the French Guisards.[476] Any one, who reads Davila, may trace your practices all along. There were the same pretences for reformation and loyalty, the same aspersions of the king, and the same grounds of a rebellion. I know not whether you will take the historian's word, who says it was reported, that Poltrot, a Huguenot, murdered Francis Duke of Guise, by the instigations of Theodore Beza, or that it was a Huguenot minister, otherwise called a Presbyterian, (for our church abhors so devilish a tenet,) who first writ a treatise of the lawfulness of deposing and murdering kings of a different persuasion in religion; but I am able to prove, from the doctrine of Calvin, and principles of Buchanan, that they set the people above the magistrate; which, if I mistake not, is your own fundamental, and which carries your loyalty no farther than your liking. When a vote of the House of Commons goes on your side, you are as ready to observe it, as if it were passed into a law; but, when you are pinched with any former, and yet unrepealed act of parliament, you declare, that, in some cases, you will not be obliged by it. The passage is in the same third part of the "No-protestant Plot," and is too plain to be denied. The late copy of your intended association, you neither wholly justify nor condemn;[477] but as the Papists, when they are unopposed, fly out into all the pageantries of worship, but, in times of war, when they are hard pressed by arguments, lie close intrenched behind the council of Trent, so now, when your affairs are in a low condition, you dare not pretend that to be a legal combination, but whensoever you are afloat, I doubt not but it will be maintained and justified to purpose, for, indeed, there is nothing to defend it but the sword; it is the proper time to say any thing when men have all things in their power.

In the mean time, you would fain be nibbling at a parallel betwixt this association, and that in the time of Queen Elizabeth.[478] But there is this small difference betwixt them, that the ends of the one are directly opposite to the other: one, with the queen's approbation and conjunction, as head of it; the other, without either the consent or knowledge of the king, against whose authority it is manifestly designed. Therefore you do well to have recourse to your last evasion, that it was contrived by your enemies, and shuffled into the papers that were seized, which yet you see the nation is not so easy to believe as your own jury; but the matter is not difficult, to find twelve men in Newgate who would acquit a malefactor.

I have only one favour to desire of you at parting; that, when you think of answering this poem, you would employ the same pens against it, who have combated with so much success against "Absalom and Achitophel;" for then you may assure yourselves of a clear victory, without the least reply. Rail at me abundantly; and, not to break a custom, do it without wit: by this method you will gain a considerable point, which is wholly to wave the answer of my arguments.[479] Never own the bottom of your principles, for fear they should be treason. Fall severely on the miscarriages of government; for, if scandal be not allowed, you are no free-born subjects. If God has not blessed you with the talent of rhyming, make use of my poor stock, and welcome; let your verses run upon my feet; and for the utmost refuge of notorious blockheads, reduced to the last extremity of sense, turn my own lines upon me, and, in utter despair of your satire, make me satirise myself.[480] Some of you have been driven to this bay already; but, above all the rest, commend me to the non-conformist parson, who writ the "Whip and Key." I am afraid it is not read so much as the piece deserves, because the bookseller is every week crying help, at the end of his Gazette, to get it off. You see I am charitable enough to do him a kindness, that it may be published as well as printed; and that so much skill in Hebrew derivations may not lie for waste-paper in the shop: Yet, I half suspect he went no farther for his learning, than the index of Hebrew names and etymologies, which is printed at the end of some English bibles. If Achitophel signify "the brother of a fool," the author of that poem will pass with his readers for the next of kin; and perhaps, it is the relation that makes the kindness.[481] Whatever the verses are, buy them up, I beseech you, out of pity; for I hear the conventicle is shut up, and the brother of Achitophel out of service.[482]

Now, footmen, you know, have the generosity to make a purse for a member of their society, who has had his livery pulled over his ears; and even protestant socks[484] are bought up among you, out of veneration to the name. A dissenter in poetry from sense and English, will make as good a protestant rhymer, as a dissenter from the church of England a protestant parson. Besides, if you encourage a young beginner, who knows but he may elevate his style a little above the vulgar epithets of "profane, and saucy Jack," and "atheistic scribbler," with which he treats me, when the fit of enthusiasm is strong upon him; by which well-mannered and charitable expressions, I was certain of his sect before I knew his name. What would you have more of a man? He has damned me in your cause from Genesis to the Revelations; and has half the texts of both the Testaments against me, if you will be so civil to yourselves as to take him for your interpreter, and not to take them for Irish witnesses.[485] After all, perhaps, you will tell me, that you retained him only for the opening of your cause, and that your main lawyer is yet behind. Now, if it so happen he meet with no more reply than his predecessors, you may either conclude that I trust to the goodness of my cause, or fear my adversary, or disdain him, or what you please; for the short of it is, it is indifferent to your humble servant, whatever your party says or thinks of him.

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