Characters from the Histories & Memoirs of the Seventeenth Century

by Unknown

He had not more Application to any thing than the Preservation of his Health; it had an intire Preference to any thing else in his Thoughts, and he might be said without Aggravation to study that, with as little Intermission as any Man in the World. He understood it very well, only in this he failed, that he thought it was more reconcilable with his Pleasures, than it really was. It is natural to have such a Mind to reconcile these, that 'tis the easier for any Man that goeth about it, to be guilty of that Mistake.

This made him overdo in point of Nourishment, the better to furnish to those Entertainments; and then he thought by great Exercise to make Amends, and to prevent the ill Effects of his Blood being too much raised. The Success he had in this Method, whilst he had Youth and Vigour to support him in it, encouraged him to continue it longer than Nature allowed. Age stealeth so insensibly upon us, that we do not think of suiting our way of Reasoning to the several Stages of Life; so insensibly that not being able to pitch upon any precise Time, when we cease to be young, we either flatter ourselves that we always continue to be so, or at least forget how much we are mistaken in it.

63.

By BURNET.

The King was then thirty years of age, and, as might have been supposed, past the levities of youth and the extravagance of pleasure. He had a very good understanding. He knew well the state of affairs both at home and abroad. He had a softness of temper that charmed all who came near him, till they found how little they could depend on good looks, kind words, and fair promises; in which he was liberal to excess, because he intended nothing by them, but to get rid of importunities, and to silence all farther pressing upon him. He seemed to have no sense of religion: Both at prayers and sacrament he, as it were, took care to satisfy people, that he was in no sort concerned in that about which he was employed. So that he was very far from being an hypocrite, unless his assisting at those performances was a sort of hypocrisy, (as no doubt it was:) But he was sure not to encrease that by any the least appearance of religion. He said once to my self, he was no atheist, but he could not think God would make a man miserable only for taking a little pleasure out of the way. He disguised his Popery to the last. But when he talked freely, he could not help letting himself out against the liberty that under the Reformation all men took of enquiring into matters of religion: For from their enquiring into matters of religion they carried the humour farther, to enquire into matters of state. He said often, he thought government was a much safer and easier thing where the authority was believed infallible, and the faith and submission of the people was implicite: About which I had once much discourse with him. He was affable and easy, and loved to be made so by all about him. The great art of keeping him long was, the being easy, and the making every thing easy to him. He had made such observations on the French government, that he thought a King who might be checkt, or have his Ministers called to an account by a Parliament, was but a King in name. He had a great compass of knowledge, tho' he was never capable of much application or study. He understood the Mechanicks and Physick; and was a good Chymist, and much set on several preparations of Mercury, chiefly the fixing it. He understood navigation well: But above all he knew the architecture of ships so perfectly, that in that respect he was exact rather more than became a Prince. His apprehension was quick, and his memory good. He was an everlasting talker. He told his stories with a good grace: But they came in his way too often. He had a very ill opinion both of men and women; and did not think that there was either sincerity or chastity in the world out of principle, but that some had either the one or the other out of humour or vanity. He thought that no body did serve him out of love: And so he was quits with all the world, and loved others as little as he thought they loved him. He hated business, and could not be easily brought to mind any: But when it was necessary, and he was set to it, he would stay as long as his Ministers had work for him. The ruine of his reign, and of all his affairs, was occasioned chiefly by his delivering himself up at his first coming over to a mad range of pleasure.

64.

By BURNET.

Thus lived and died King Charles the second. He was the greatest instance in history of the various revolutions of which any one man seemed capable. He was bred up, the first twelve years of his life, with the splendor that became the heir of so great a Crown. After that he past thro' eighteen years in great inequalities, unhappy in the war, in the loss of his Father, and of the Crown of England. Scotland did not only receive him, tho' upon terms hard of digestion, but made an attempt upon England for him, tho' a feeble one. He lost the battle of Worcester with too much indifference: And then he shewed more care of his person, than became one who had so much at stake. He wandered about England for ten weeks after that, hiding from place to place. But, under all the apprehensions he had then upon him, he shewed a temper so careless, and so much turned to levity, that he was then diverting himself with little houshold sports, in as unconcerned a manner, as if he had made no loss, and had been in no danger at all. He got at last out of England. But he had been obliged to so many, who had been faithful to him, and careful of him, that he seemed afterwards to resolve to make an equal return to them all: And finding it not easy to reward them all as they deserved, he forgot them all alike. Most Princes seem to have this pretty deep in them; and to think that they ought never to remember past services, but that their acceptance of them is a full reward. He, of all in our age, exerted this piece of prerogative in the amplest manner: For he never seemed to charge his memory, or to trouble his thoughts, with the sense of any of the services that had been done him. While he was abroad at Paris, Colen, or Brussells, he never seemed to lay any thing to heart. He pursued all his diversions, and irregular pleasures, in a free carrier; and seemed to be as serene under the loss of a Crown, as the greatest Philosopher could have been. Nor did he willingly hearken to any of those projects, with which he often complained that his Chancellor persecuted him. That in which he seemed most concerned was, to find money for supporting his expence. And it was often said, that, if Cromwell would have compounded the matter, and have given him a good round pension, that he might have been induced to resign his title to him. During his exile he delivered himself so entirely to his pleasures, that he became incapable of application. He spent little of his time in reading or study, and yet less in thinking. And, in the state his affairs were then in, he accustomed himself to say to every person, and upon all occasions, that which he thought would please most: So that words or promises went very easily from him. And he had so ill an opinion of mankind, that he thought the great art of living and governing was, to manage all things and all persons with a depth of craft and dissimulation. And in that few men in the world could put on the appearances of sincerity better than he could: Under which so much artifice was usually hid, that in conclusion he could deceive none, for all were become mistrustful of him. He had great vices, but scarce any vertues to correct them: He had in him some vices that were less hurtful, which corrected his more hurtful ones. He was during the active part of life given up to sloth and lewdness to such a degree, that he hated business, and could not bear the engaging in any thing that gave him much trouble, or put him under any constraint. And, tho' he desired to become absolute, and to overturn both our religion and our laws, yet he would neither run the risque, nor give himself the trouble, which so great a design required. He had an appearance of gentleness in his outward deportment: But he seemed to have no bowels nor tenderness in his nature: And in the end of his life he became cruel. He was apt to forgive all crimes, even blood it self: Yet he never forgave any thing that was done against himself, after his first and general act of indemnity, which was to be reckoned as done rather upon maxims of state than inclinations of mercy. He delivered himself up to a most enormous course of vice, without any sort of restraint, even from the consideration of the nearest relations: The most studied extravagancies that way seemed, to the very last, to be much delighted in, and pursued by him. He had the art of making all people grow fond of him at first, by a softness in his whole way of conversation, as he was certainly the best bred man of the age. But when it appeared how little could be built on his promise, they were cured of the fondness that he was apt to raise in them. When he saw young men of quality, who had something more than ordinary in them, he drew them about him, and set himself to corrupt them both in religion and morality; in which he proved so unhappily successful, that he left England much changed at his death from what he had found it at his Restoration. He loved to talk over all the stories of his life to every new man that came about him. His stay in Scotland, and the share he had in the war of Paris, in carrying messages from the one side to the other, were his common topicks. He went over these in a very graceful manner; but so often, and so copiously, that all those who had been long accustomed to them grew weary of them: And when he entred on those stories they usually withdrew: So that he often began them in a full audience, and before he had done there were not above four or five left about him: Which drew a severe jest from Wilmot, Earl of Rochester. He said, he wondred to see a man have so good a memory as to repeat the same story without losing the least circumstance, and yet not remember that he had told it to the same persons the very day before. This made him fond of strangers; for they hearkned to all his often repeated stories, and went away as in a rapture at such an uncommon condescension in a King.

His person and temper, his vices as well as his fortunes, resemble the character that we have given us of Tiberius so much, that it were easy to draw the parallel between them. Tiberius's banishment, and his coming afterwards to reign, makes the comparison in that respect come pretty near. His hating of business, and his love of pleasures; his raising of favourites, and trusting them entirely; and his pulling them down, and hating them excessively; his art of covering deep designs, particularly of revenge, with an appearance of softness, brings them so near a likeness, that I did not wonder much to observe the resemblance of their face and person. At Rome I saw one of the last statues made for Tiberius, after he had lost his teeth. But, bating the alteration which that made, it was so like King Charles, that Prince Borghese, and Signior Dominica to whom it belonged, did agree with me in thinking that it looked like a statue made for him.

65.