You shall be obeyed, Mr. Addison said. I thought it not amiss to take off the glare of those applauded qualities, which have dazzled the public at a distance, by shewing that they were either feigned or over-rated. But I come now to unmask the real character of this renowned princess. I shall paint her freely indeed, but truly as she appears to me. And, to speak my mind at once; I think it is not so much to her virtues, which at best were equivocal, as to her very VICES, that we are to impute the popular admiration of her character and government.
I before took notice of the high, indecent PASSION, she discovered towards her courtiers. This fierceness of temper in the softer sex was taken for heroism; and, falling in with the slavish principles of the age, begot a degree of reverence in her subjects, which a more equal, that is a more becoming, deportment would not have produced. Hence, she was better served than most of our princes, only because she was more feared; in other words, because she less deserved to be so. But high as she would often carry herself in this unprincely, I had almost said, unwomanly, treatment of her servants; awing the men by her oaths, and her women by blows; it is still to be remembered, that she had a great deal of natural TIMIDITY in her constitution.
What! interrupted Dr. Arbuthnot hastily, the magnanimous Elizabeth a coward? I should as soon have expected that charge against Cæsar himself, or your own Marlborough.
I distinguish, Mr. Addison said, betwixt a parade of courage, put on to serve a turn, and keep her people in spirits, and that true greatness of mind, which, in one word, we call magnanimity. For this last, I repeat it, she either had it not, or not in the degree in which it has been ascribed to her. On the contrary, I see a littleness, a pusillanimity, in her conduct on a thousand occasions. Hence it was, that both to her people and such of the neighbouring states as she stood in awe of, she used an excessive hypocrisy, which, in the language of the court, you may be sure, was called policy. To the Hollanders, indeed, she could talk big; and it was not her humour to manage those over whom she had gained an ascendant. This has procured her, with many, the commendation of a princely magnanimity. But, on the other hand, when discontents were apprehended from her subjects, or when France was to be diverted from any designs against her, no art was forgotten that might cajole their spirits with all the professions of cordiality and affection. Then she was wedded, that was the tender word, to her people: and then the interest of religion itself was sacrificed by this Protestant queen to her newly-perverted brother on the Continent.
Her foible, in this respect, was no secret to her ministers. But, above all, it was practised upon most successfully by the Lord Burghley; “for whom, as I have seem it observed, it was as necessary that there should be treasons, as for the state that they should be prevented[96].” Hence it was, that he was perpetually raising her fears, by the discovery of some plot, or, when that was wanting, by the proposal of some law for her greater security. In short, he was for ever finding, or making, or suggesting, dangers. The queen, though she would look big (for indeed she was an excellent actress), startled at the shadows of those dangers, the slightest rumours. And to this convenient timidity of his mistress, so constantly alarmed, and relieved in turn by this wily minister, was owing, in a good degree, that long and unrivalled interest, he held in her favour.
Still, further, to this constitutional fear (which might be forgiven to her sex, if it had not been so strangely mixed with a more than masculine ferocity in other instances) must be ascribed those favourite maxims of policy, which ran through her whole government. Never was prince more attached to the Machiavelian doctrine, DIVIDE ET IMPERA, than our Elizabeth[97]. It made the soul of her policies, domestic and foreign. She countenanced the two prevailing factions of the time. The Churchmen and Puritans divided her favour so equally, that her favourites were sure to be the chiefs of the contending parties. Nay, her court was a constant scene of cabals and personal animosities. She gave a secret, and sometimes an open, countenance to these jealousies. The same principle directed all her foreign[98] negociations.
And are you not aware, interrupted Dr. Arbuthnot, that this objected policy is the very topic that I, and every other admirer of the queen, would employ in commendation of her great ability in the art of government? It has been the fate of too many of our princes (and perhaps some late examples might be given) to be governed, and even insulted, by a prevailing party of their own subjects. Elizabeth was superior to such attempts. She had no bye-ends to pursue. She frankly threw herself on her people. And, secure in their affection, could defeat at pleasure, or even divert herself with, the intrigues of this or that aspiring faction.
We understand you, Mr. Addison replied; but when two parties are contending within a state, and one of them only in its true interest, the policy is a little extraordinary that should incline the sovereign to discourage this, from the poor ambition of controuling that, or, as you put it still worse, from the dangerous humour of playing with both parties. I say nothing of later times. I only ask; if it was indifferent, whether the counsels of the Cecils or of Leicester were predominant in that reign? But I mentioned these things before, and I touch them again now, only to shew you, that this conduct, however it may be varnished over by the name of wisdom, had too much the air of fearful womanish intrigue, to consist with that heroical firmness and intrepidity so commonly ascribed to queen Elizabeth[99].
And what if, after all, I should admit, replied Dr. Arbuthnot, that, in the composition of a woman’s courage, at least, there might be some scruples of discretion? Is there any advantage, worth contending for, you could draw from such a concession? Or, because you would be thought serious, I will put the matter more gravely. The arts of prudence, you arraign so severely, could not be taken for pusillanimity. They certainly were not, in her own time; for she was not the less esteemed or revered by all the nations of Europe on account of them. The most you can fairly conclude is, that she knew how to unite address with bravery, and that, on occasion, she could dissemble her high spirit. The difficulties of her situation obliged her to this management.
Rather say at once, returned Mr. Addison, that the constant dissimulation, for which she was so famous, was assumed to supply the want of a better thing, which had rendered all those arts as unnecessary as they were ignoble.