II. TEMPERANCE
The spiritual welfare of the soul was the prime object of importance to the Christian. Through the power of its doctrine of heavenly beauty Platonism had entered into the conception of this life considered in its heavenward aspect. It remained to show how it could explain the right manner of conduct for the soul in the presence of those strong passions which were felt as the disturbing elements of its inner welfare. In the Platonic system of morality there was a conception of temperance, σωφροσύνη, based upon an analysis of the soul sufficiently comprehensive to cover the entire scope of its activities; in fact, temperance was there conceived as the necessary condition for the presence of any virtue in the soul. The vitality of this teaching in English poetry is found in the second book of Spenser’s “Faerie Queene,” celebrating the exploits of the knight Guyon,
“In whom great rule of Temp’raunce goodly doth appeare.”
(Introd., stz. 5.)
The adventures of Guyon, through the discipline of which he perfects himself in temperance, fall into two distinct groups. Up to the sixth book the conflicts in which he is concerned are those calculated to try his mastery of the angry impulses of his nature. After the sixth book his struggles record his proficiency in governing the sensual desires of appetite. This division is made in accordance with the analysis of the soul on which Plato bases his doctrine of temperance. Within the soul are three distinct principles,—one rational and two irrational. The irrational principles are, first, the irascible impulse of spirit (θυμός) with which a man is angry and, second, the appetitive instinct the workings of which are manifested in all the sensual gratifications of the body, and in the love of wealth. The rational principle is that of reason by which a man learns truth. (“Republic,” IX. 580, 581.) Against this one rational principle the two irrational impulses are constantly insurgent, and temperance is that harmony or order resulting in the soul when the rational principle rules and the two irrational principles are obedient to its sovereignty. “And would you not say,” asks Socrates, “that he is temperate who has these same elements in friendly harmony, in whom the one ruling principle of reason, and the two subject ones of spirit and desire are equally agreed that reason ought to rule, and do not rebel?” (“Republic,” IV. 442.)
The rule of right reason in Guyon over his angry impulses is recorded in three instances; in each case the anger is aroused under varying conditions. The opening episode of the book presents Guyon checking the impetuous fury of his wrath when he learns that it has been aroused by a false presentation of the facts. Archimago, the deceitful enemy of truth, related to Guyon how the Red Cross Knight had violated the purity of a maiden; and the pretended maiden herself became a party to the lie. (II. i. 10, 11, 17.) When Guyon heard of this outrage he hastened to avenge the wrong.
“He staid not lenger talke, but with fierce ire
And zealous hast away is quickly gone
To seeke that knight.”
(II. i. 13.)
And yet he wondered how the Red Cross Knight could have done such a deed. He knew that he was a knight of honor and had won glory in his defence of Una. (II. i. 19.) He was quick, then, to restrain himself when about to charge upon the accused Knight, for on his shield he recognized the cross of his Lord. When he was on the point of clashing with his enemy, he
“gan abace
His threatned speare, as if some new mishap
Had him betidde, or hidden daunger did entrap.”
(II. i. 26.)
After an apology and an exchange of knightly courtesies with the Red Cross Knight he was able to
“turne his earnest unto game,
Through goodly handing and wise temperance.”
(II. i. 31.)
The second encounter of Guyon with the forces of wrath is the struggle with Furor and his mother Occasion. (II. iv. 3–36.) He has now to try his strength in conquering wrath when it has an occasion to be aroused. The power with which he strives is described as a fury of great might, but so ill-governed by reason that in its blind passion its force is spent to no purpose.
“And sure he was a man of mickle might,
Had he had gouvernance, it well to guide:
But when the franticke fit inflamd his spright,
His force was vaine, and strooke more often wide,
Then at the aymed marke which he had eide:
And oft himselfe he chaunst to hurt unwares,
Whilst reason blent through passion, nought descride,
But as a blindfold Bull at randon fares,
And where he hits, nought knowes, and whom he hurts nought cares.”
(II. iv. 7.)
Guyon struggles with this madman and finally, after he has quieted the reviling tongue of Occasion, who urges her son, Furor, on to the conflict, he binds him with iron chains.
“In his strong armes he stiffely him embraste,
Who him gainstriving, nought at all prevaild:
For all his power was utterly defaste,
And furious fits at earst quite weren quaild:
Oft he re’nforst, and oft his forces fayld,
Yet yield he would not, nor his rancour slacke.
Then him to ground he cast, and rudely hayld,
And both his hands fast bound behind his backe,
And both his feet in fetters to an yron racke.”
(II. iv. 14.)
The third trial of Guyon’s reason is by a species of wrath so wilfully furious that it runs to seek an occasion for a quarrel, and finds no rest until it has succeeded. This type of irascible impulse is portrayed in Pyrochles. He delights in deeds of daring might, and in blood and spoil. (II. iv. 42.) His squire, Atin by name, acts as his forerunner to seek an occasion for his lord’s furious delight. (II. iv. 43.) But Guyon masters himself both in his refusal to fight for no good reason, and in his behavior when forced against his wishes to a conflict with Pyrochles. Guyon bids Atin tell his master that he, Guyon, has bound Occasion, and the Palmer, who is the rational element of Guyon personified, lectures the squire on the folly of wilful anger.
“Madman (said then the Palmer) that does seeke
Occasion to wrath, and cause of strife;
She comes unsought, and shonned followes eke.
Happy, who can abstaine, when Rancour rife
Kindles Revenge, and threats his rusty knife;
Woe never wants, where every cause is caught,
And rash Occasion makes unquiet life.”
(II. iv. 44.)
Even when Guyon is compelled by Pyrochles to the fight, the Knight does not give way to unrestrained wrath, but ever tempers his passion with reason. In the conflict Pyrochles thundered blows:
“But Guyon, in the heat of all his strife,
Was warie wise, and closely did awayt
Avauntage, whilest his foe did rage most rife.”
(II. v. 9.)
When at last Guyon has his foe at his feet, he spares his life, so firmly he holds his passion in check.
“Eftsoones his cruell hand Sir Guyon stayd,
Tempring the passion with advisement slow,
And maistring might on enimy dismayd.”
(II. v. 13.)
Thus far Guyon’s life has exemplified the rule of reason over the irrational element of wrath; the remaining episodes of his life centre about the struggle of the irrational element of appetite. In this his soul is tried in three various forms of sensual desire. In Phædria the first form is typified. She represents the light gaieties of frivolous mirth and wantonness which the courteous nature of Guyon may suffer to play until they pass the bounds of modesty. (II. vi. 21.) When, however, she tried to win his heart from warlike enterprise into dissolute delights of sense, Guyon
“was wise, and warie of her will,
And ever held his hand upon his hart:
Yet would not seeme so rude, and thewed ill,
As to despise so courteous seeming part,
That gentle Ladie did to him impart,
But fairely tempring fond desire subdewd,
And ever her desired to depart.”
(II. vi. 26.)
The second trial of Guyon’s temperance comes in the House of Mammon, where he triumphs over sensual desire in the form of covetousness. Mammon offers him mountains of gold, if he will but serve him (II. vii. 9.); he tries to induce him to accept by saying that money is the one necessity to supply all the wants of man. (II. vii. 11.) But Guyon answers:
“Indeede (quoth he) through fowle intemperaunce,
Frayle men are oft captiv’d to covetise.”
(II. vii. 15.)
When Mammon urges him to seat himself on the silver stool in the Garden of Proserpina, to rest awhile and eat of the golden fruit of the trees,—
“All which he did, to doe him deadly fall
In frayle intemperance through sinful bayt;”
Guyon
“was warie wise in all his way,
And well perceived his deceiptfull sleight,
Ne suffred lust his safetie to betray;
So goodly did beguile the Guyler of the pray.”
(II. vii. 64.)
The culminating trial of the Knight’s temperance is made in Acrasia’s Bower of Bliss. Acrasia typifies that form of beauty that allures the senses with pleasure, but ruins the soul with its poisonous delight. (II. i. 52, 53.) The only fear that she and the inmates of her bower have is
“wisedomes powre, and temperaunces might,
By which the mightiest things efforced bin.”
(II. xii. 43.)
During the passage to this place of delight, and while he was within its precincts, Guyon was able to withstand every assault of sensual desire upon his soul. When the Palmer, speaking as reason dictated, told him that the piteous cry of a woman in distress was only a deceitful ruse to win him to harm—
“The knight was ruled, and the Boatman strayt
Held on his course with stayed stedfastnesse.”
(II. xii. 28, 29.)
Again, when Guyon’s senses are “softly tickled” by the rare melody of the mermaids, as it mingled with the strange harmony of the rolling sea, he bids the boatman row easily.
“But him the Palmer from that vanity,
With temperate advice discounselled,
That they it past.”
(II. xii. 34.)
Even when Guyon began to lessen his pace at the sight of the fair maidens sporting in the lake, which kindled signs of lust in his countenance, his reason was able to resist.
“On which when gazing him the Palmer saw,
He much rebukt those wandring eyes of his,
And counseld well, him forward thence did draw.”
(II. xii. 69.)
He has now become so strong that he can perform the great object of his adventures, the destruction of the Bower of Bliss and the capture of the enchantress, Acrasia. (II. xii. 83, 84.)
So powerful is the hold on Spenser’s mind of this Platonic conception of the nature of the struggle in the soul striving to be temperate that it colors even the Aristotelean doctrine of the mean which is worked out in the episode of Medina’s castle. (II. ii. 13 et seq.) According to Aristotle temperance is a mean between the excess and defect of pleasure. (“Nich. Ethics,” III, 10.) In Spenser, Medina is the mean; her two sisters, Elissa and Perissa, are the defect and excess respectively. (II. ii. 35, 36.) Yet Spenser has colored the character of each in accordance with the Platonic division of the soul. The three sisters are daughters of one sire by three different mothers; that is, they are the three principles of the soul (the sire); namely, right reason (Medina), wrath or spirit (Elissa), and sensual desire (Perissa). Thus Spenser describes Elissa:
“with bent lowring browes, as she would threat,
She scould, and frownd with froward countenaunce;”
(II. ii. 35.)
and Perissa
“Full of disport, still laughing, loosely light,
And quite contrary to her sisters kind;
No measure in her mood, no rule of right,
But poured out in pleasure and delight.”
(II. ii. 36.)
So, too, in the description of the lovers of each, the presence of the two irrational principles is felt. In Hudibras, the devoted Knight of Elissa—
“not so good of deedes, as great of name,
Which he by many rash adventures wan,
· · · · ·
More huge in strength, then wise in workes he was,
And reason with foole-hardize over ran,”—
(II. ii. 17.)
the angry impulse of the soul is reflected; while in Sans Loy, the lover of Perissa, who had attempted to violate the purity of Una,—
“The most unruly, and the boldest boy,
That ever warlike weapons menaged,
And to all lawlesse lust encouraged,”—
(II. ii. 18.)
it is apparent that the appetitive element of the soul is figured. Temperance, then, according to Spenser, is not the golden mean between the excess and defect of pleasure, but between two disturbing passions.
“But temperance (said he) with golden squire
Betwixt them both can measure out a meane,
Neither to melt in pleasures whot desire,
Nor fry in hartlesse griefe and dolefull teene.”
(II. i. 57.)
This struggle between the rational principle and the irrational elements in the soul does not, however, constitute temperance. That virtue, or rather that condition of all virtue, is the harmony and order resulting in the soul after reason has quieted the disturbing passions, and is conceived by Plato as its very health or beauty. “‘Healthy,’ as I conceive,” says Socrates, “is the name which is given to the regular order of the body, whence comes health and every other bodily excellence.... And ‘lawful’ and ‘law’ are the names which are given to the regular order and action of the soul, and these make men lawful and orderly:—and so we have temperance and justice.” (“Gorgias,” 504.) The fruition of this idea in Spenser’s mind is noticeable in his manner of speaking about temperance throughout his poem. Amavia had been able to win her husband back to the ways of purity through wise handling and “faire governaunce.” (II. i. 54.) The Red Cross Knight mentions the “goodly governaunce” of Guyon’s life. (II. i. 29.) Spenser comments in an introductory stanza on the Knight’s demeanor in pleasures and pains:
“And Guyon in them all shewes goodly maisteries.”
The Knight and the Palmer move on in their path of progress “in this faire wize,” that is, in the ways of temperance. (II. i. 34.) When Archimago meets Guyon, he meets
“Faire marching underneath a shady hill,
A goodly knight,”
· · · · ·
“His carriage was full comely and upright,
His countenaunce demure and temperate.”
(II. i. 5, 6.)
The feeling of order is conveyed through the movements of Guyon’s charger. The Palmer
“ever with slow pace the knight did lead,
Who taught his trampling steed with equall steps to tread.”
(II. i. 7.)
Medina, when she welcomes Guyon to her castle, meets him
“Faire marching forth in honorable wize.”
(II. ii. 14.)
The clearest explanation, however, of Spenser’s conception of temperance as the condition of the soul’s excellence in the body is given in his reflection at the opening of the eleventh book of the second canto, which records the repulse of the bodily senses from the dwelling-place of Alma, or the soul. No war is so fierce as that of the passions with the soul.
“But in a body, which doth freely yeeld
His partes to reasons rule obedient,
And letteth her that ought the scepter weeld,
All happy peace and goodly government
Is setled there in sure establishment;
There Alma like a virgin Queene most bright,
Doth florish in all beautie excellent:
And to her guestes doth bounteous banket dight,
Attempred goodly well for health and for delight.
(II. xi. 2.)
After this examination of Spenser’s ideals of holiness and temperance, it is clear why Platonism as a system of ethics is absent in the remaining books of the “Faerie Queene.” Spenser’s avowed aim in his poem was “to fashion a gentleman or noble person in vertuous and gentle discipline.” Since he conceives of life as a constant warfare with inward and outward foes, his method of presenting his thought is to send each virtue on a journey during which it is to perfect itself by overcoming the vices to whose assaults it is especially liable. This plan is carefully followed in the first two books. The allegorical scheme is unbroken; the personages encountered by the Knights are objectified states of their own spiritual consciousness. In the remaining books, however, the allegorical scheme has well-nigh broken down; and the poetic method is that of the romantic epic of adventure in the manner of Ariosto. This change was due very largely to the fact that after Spenser had completed his first two books he had exhausted the ethical teachings of Plato; and when he went on to his remaining books, he passed out of the sphere of virtue as taught by Plato into an essentially different realm of thought in which the graces of courtly accomplishment were dignified as virtues. He tried to treat these later virtues of chastity, friendship, justice, courtesy, and constancy as if they were coördinate with the virtues of holiness and temperance. But they fall into a distinct class by themselves. They are the ideals of conduct to be followed when man is acting in his purely social capacity as a member of society. They may be dignified as virtues, but can never be coördinate with the Platonic conception of virtue, which conceives of it not as an outward act, but as the very health of the soul when realizing, unhampered by any disturbing influences, its native impulses toward the good.
The difference between these two conceptions is strikingly illustrated by a comparison of Spenser’s idea of justice with the Platonic notion. According to the English poet, justice is purely retributive, a dispensing of reward and punishment. The education of the Knight of Justice, Arthegal, by Astræa, is thus described:
“There she him taught to weigh both right and wrong
In equall ballance with due recompence,
And equitie to measure out along,
According to the line of conscience,
When so it needs with rigour to dispence.”
(V. i. 7.)
In Plato, on the other hand, justice is the same thing as temperance, an inward state of the soul and the condition of any virtue. “But,” says Socrates, “in reality justice was such as we were describing, being concerned however not with the outward man, but with the inward, which is the true self and concernment of man: for the just man does not permit the several elements within him to interfere with one another, or any of them to do the work of others,—he sets in order his own inner life, and is his own master and his own law, and at peace with himself; and when he has bound together the three principles within him ... and is no longer many, but has become one entirely temperate and perfectly adjusted nature, then he proceeds to act ... always thinking and calling that which preserves and cöoperates with this harmonious condition, just and good action, and the knowledge which presides over it, wisdom, and that which at any time impairs this condition, he will call unjust action, and the opinion which presides over it ignorance.” (“Republic,” IV. 443.) Spenser did not attempt to incorporate this idea into his notion of justice; he had already exhausted it in his second book, in his explanation of temperance. Nothing was left for him to do but to shift his mind from a conception of virtue as one, to an inferior notion of virtue as a manifold of personal graces. But in thus changing his idea, he destroyed the unity of his work. In his first two books he had explained how the soul could perfect itself in the full scope of its powers; and in doing this he had taught the Platonic doctrines of a heavenly beauty and of temperance as the condition of virtue in the soul. Here lay the basic idea of his conception of a gentleman.
“But vertue’s seat is deepe within the mynd,
And not in outward shows, but inward thoughts defynd.”
(VI., Introd., stz. 5.)
This idea, however, is not felt as the informing spirit of his books on courtesy and on friendship, but appears only in scattered reflections. In the later books the inferior conception of virtue is the controlling idea, and Spenser has failed to harmonize it with his earlier and finer one.