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The Irish are better represented in parliament than the Scotch, who indeed are
not represented at all. But are the Irish better governed than the Scotch?
Surely not. This circumstance has of late been used as an argument against
reform. It proves nothing against reform. It proves only this, that laws have no
magical, no supernatural, virtue; that laws do not act like Aladdin's lamp or
Prince Ahmed's apple; that priestcraft, that ignorance, that the rage of
contending factions, may make good institutions useless; that intelligence,
sobriety, industry, moral freedom, firm union, may supply in a great measure the
defects of the worst representative system. A people whose education and habits
are such that, in every quarter of the world they rise above the mass of those
with whom they mix, as surely as oil rises to the top of water, a people of such
temper and self-government that the wildest popular excesses recorded in their
history partake of the gravity of judicial proceedings, and of the solemnity of
religious rites, a people whose national pride and mutual attachment have passed
into a proverb, a people whose high and fierce spirit, so forcibly described in
the haughty motto which encircles their thistle, preserved their independence,
during a struggle of centuries, from the encroachments of wealthier and more
powerful neighbors, such a people cannot be long oppressed. Any government,
however constituted, must respect their wishes and tremble at their discontents.
It is indeed most desirable that such a people should exercise a direct
influence on the conduct of affairs, and should make their wishes known through
constitutional organs. But some influence, direct or indirect, they will
assuredly possess. Some organ, constitutional or unconstitutional, they will
assuredly find. They will be better governed under a good constitution than
under a bad constitution. But they will be better governed under the worst
constitution than some other nations under the best. In any general
classification of constitutions, the constitution of Scotland must be reckoned
as one of the worst, perhaps as the worst, in Christian Europe. Yet the Scotch
are not ill governed. And the reason is simply that they will not bear to be ill
governed.
In some of the Oriental monarchies, in Afghanistan for example, though there
exists nothing which an European publicist would call a Constitution, the
sovereign generally governs in conformity with certain rules established for the
public benefit; and the sanction of those rules is, that every Afghan approves
them, and that every Afghan is a soldier.
The monarchy of England in the sixteenth century was a monarchy of this kind. It
is called an absolute monarchy, because little respect was paid by the Tudors to
those institutions which we have been accustomed to consider as the sole checks
on the power of the sovereign. A modern Englishman can hardly understand how the
people can have had any real security for good government under kings who levied
benevolences, and chide the House of Commons as they would have chide a pack of
dogs. People do not sufficiently consider that, though the legal cheeks were
feeble, the natural checks were strong. There was one great and effectual
limitation on the royal authority, the knowledge that, if the patience of the
nation were severely tried, the nation would put forth its strength, and that
its strength would be found irresistible. If a large body of Englishmen became
thoroughly discontented, instead of presenting requisitions, holding large
meetings, passing resolutions, signing petitions, forming associations and
unions, they rose up; they took their halberds and their bows; and, if the
sovereign was not sufficiently popular to find among his subjects other halberds
and other bows to oppose to the rebels, nothing remained for him but a
repetition of the horrible scenes of Berkeley and Pomfret, He had no regular
army which could, by its superior arms and its superior skill, overawe or
vanquish the sturdy Commons of his realm, abounding in the native hardihood of
Englishmen, and trained in the simple discipline of the militia.
It has been said that the Tudors were as absolute as the Caesars. Never was
parallel so unfortunate. The government of the Tudors was the direct opposite to
the government of Augustus and his successors. The Caesars ruled despotically,
by means of a great standing army, under the decent forms of a republican
constitution. They called themselves citizens. They mixed unceremoniously with
other citizens. In theory they were only the elective magistrates of a free
commonwealth. Instead of arrogating to themselves despotic power, they
acknowledged allegiance to the senate. They were merely the lieutenants of that
venerable body. They mixed in debate. They even appeared as advocates before the
courts of law. Yet they could safely indulge in the wildest freaks of cruelty
and rapacity, while their legions remained faithful. Our Tudors, on the other
hand, under the titles and forms of monarchical supremacy, were essentially
popular magistrates. They had no means of protecting themselves against the
public hatred; and they were therefore compelled to court the public favor. To
enjoy all the state and all the personal indulgences of absolute power, to be,
adored with Oriental prostrations, to dispose at will of the liberty and even of
the life of ministers and courtiers, this nation granted to the Tudors. But the
condition on which they were suffered to be the tyrants of Whitehall was that
they should be the mild and paternal sovereigns of England. They were under the
same restraints with regard to their people under which a military despot is
placed with regard to his army. They would have found it as dangerous to grind
their subjects with cruel taxation as Nero would have found it to leave his
praetorians unpaid. Those who immediately surrounded the royal person, and
engaged in the hazardous game of ambition, were exposed to the most fearful
dangers. Buckingham, Cromwell, Surrey, Seymour of Sudeley, Somerset,
Northumberland, Suffolk, Norfolk, Essex, perished on the scaffold. But in
general the country gentleman hunted and the merchant traded in peace. Even
Henry, as cruel as Domitian, but far more politic, contrived, while reeking with
the blood of the Lamiae, to be a favorite with the cobblers.
The Tudors committed very tyrannical acts. But in their ordinary dealings with
the people they were not, and could not safely be, tyrants. Some excesses were
easily pardoned. For the nation was proud of the high and fiery blood of its
magnificent princes, and saw in many proceedings which a lawyer would even then
have condemned, the outbreak of the same noble spirit which so manfully hurled
foul scorn at Parma and at Spain. But to this endurance there was a limit. If
the government ventured to adopt measures which the people really felt to be
oppressive, it was soon compelled to change its course. When Henry the Eighth
attempted to raise a forced loan of unusual amount by proceedings of unusual
rigor, the opposition which he encountered was such as appalled even his
stubborn and imperious spirit. The people, we are told, said that, if they were
treated thus, "then were it worse than the taxes Of France; and England should
be bond, and not free." The county of Suffolk rose in arms. The king prudently
yielded to an opposition which, if he had persisted, would, in all probability,
have taken the form of a general rebellion. Towards the close of the reign of
Elizabeth, the people felt themselves aggrieved by the monopolies. The Queen,
proud and courageous as she was, shrank from a contest with the nation, and,
with admirable sagacity, conceded all that her subjects had demanded, while it
was yet in her power to concede with dignity and grace.
It cannot be imagined that a people who had in their own hands the means of
checking their princes would suffer any prince to impose upon them a religion
generally detested. It is absurd to suppose that, if the nation had been
decidedly attached to the Protestant faith, Mary could have re-established the
Papal supremacy. It is equally absurd to suppose that, if the nation had been
zealous for the ancient religion, Elizabeth could have restored the Protestant
Church. The truth is, that the people were not disposed to engage in a struggle
either for the new or for the old doctrines. Abundance of spirit was shown when
it seemed likely that Mary would resume her father's grants of church property,
or that she would sacrifice the interests of England to the husband whom she
regarded with unmerited tenderness. That queen found that it would be madness to
attempt the restoration of the abbey lands. She found that her subjects would
never suffer her to make her hereditary kingdom a fief of Castile. On these
points she encountered a steady resistance, and was compelled to give way. If
she was able to establish the Catholic worship and to persecute those who would
not conform to it, it was evidently because the people cared far less for the
Protestant religion than for the rights of property and for the independence of
the English crown. In plain words, they did not think the difference between the
hostile sects worth a struggle. There was undoubtedly a zealous Protestant party
and a zealous Catholic party. But both these parties were, we believe, very
small. We doubt, whether both together made up, at the time of Mary's death, the
twentieth part of the nation. The remaining nineteen twentieths halted between
the two opinions, and were not disposed to risk a revolution in the government,
for the purpose of giving to either of the extreme factions an advantage over
the other.
We possess no data which will enable us to compare with exactness the force of
the two sects. Mr. Butler asserts that, even at the accession of James the
First, a majority of the population of England were Catholics. This is pure
assertion; and is not only unsupported by evidence, but, we think, completely
disproved by the strongest evidence. Dr. Lingard is of opinion that the
Catholics were one-half of the nation in the middle of the reign of Elizabeth.
Rushton says that, when Elizabeth came to the throne, the Catholics were
two-thirds of the nation, and the Protestants only one-third. The most judicious
and impartial of English historians, Mr. Hallam, is, on the contrary, of
opinion, that two-thirds were Protestants and only one-third Catholics. To us,
we must confess, it seems, incredible that, if the Protestants were really two
to one, they should have borne the government of Mary, or that, if the Catholics
were really two to one, they should have borne the government of Elizabeth. We
are at a loss to conceive how a sovereign who has no standing army, and whose
power rests solely on the loyalty of his subjects, can continue for years to
persecute a religion to which the majority of his subjects are sincerely
attached. In fact, the Protestants did rise up against one sister, and the
Catholics against the other. Those risings clearly showed how small and feeble
both the parties were. Both in the one case and in the other the nation ranged
itself on the side of the government, and the insurgents were speedily put down
and punished. The Kentish gentlemen who took up arms for the reformed doctrines
against Mary, and the great Northern Earls who displayed the banner of the Five
Wounds against Elizabeth, were alike considered by the great body of their
countrymen as wicked disturbers of the public peace.
The account which Cardinal Bentivoglio gave of the state of religion in England
well deserves consideration. The zealous Catholics he reckoned at one-thirtieth
part of the nation. The people who would without the least scruple become
Catholics, if the Catholic religion were established, he estimated at
four-fifths of the nation. We believe this account to have been very near the
truth. We believe that people, whose minds were made up on either side, who were
inclined to make any sacrifice or run any risk for either religion, were very
few. Each side had a few enterprising champions, and a few stout-hearted
martyrs; but the nation, undetermined in its opinions and feelings, resigned
itself implicitly to the guidance of the government, and lent to the sovereign
for the time being an equally ready aid against either of the extreme parties.
We are very far from saying that the English of that generation were
irreligious. They held firmly those doctrines which are common to the Catholic
and to the Protestant theology. But they had no fixed opinion as to the matters
in dispute between the churches. They were in a situation resembling that of
those Borderers whom Sir Walter Scott has described with so much spirit,
"Who sought the beeves that made their broth In England and in Scotland both."
And who
"Nine times outlawed had been By England's king and Scotland's queen."
They were sometimes Protestants, sometimes Catholics; sometimes half Protestants
half Catholics.
The English had not, for ages, been bigoted Papists. In the fourteenth century,
the first and perhaps the greatest of the reformers, John Wicliffe, had stirred
the public mind to its inmost depths. During the same century, a scandalous
schism in the Catholic Church had diminished, in many parts of Europe, the
reverence in which the Roman pontiffs were held. It is clear that, a hundred
years before the time of Luther, a great party in this kingdom was eager for a
change at least as extensive as that which was subsequently effected by Henry
the Eighth. The House of Commons, in the reign of Henry the Fourth, proposed a
confiscation of ecclesiastical property, more sweeping and violent even than
that which took place under the administration of Thomas Cromwell; and, though
defeated in this attempt, they succeeded in depriving the clerical order of some
of its most oppressive privileges. The splendid conquests of Henry the Fifth
turned the attention of the nation from domestic reform. The Council of
Constance removed some of the grossest of those scandals which had deprived the
Church of the public respect. The authority of that venerable synod propped up
the sinking authority of the Popedom. A considerable reaction took place. It
cannot, however, be doubted, that there was still some concealed Lollardism in
England; or that many who did not absolutely dissent from any doctrine held by
the Church of Rome were jealous of the wealth and power enjoyed by her
ministers. At the very beginning of the reign of Henry the Eighth, a struggle
took place between the clergy and the courts of law, in which the courts of law
remained victorious. One of the bishops, on that occasion, declared that the
common people entertained the strongest prejudices against his order, and that a
clergyman had no chance of fair play before a lay tribunal. The London juries,
he said, entertained such a spite to the Church that, if Abel were a priest,
they would find him guilty of the murder of Cain. This was said a few months
before the time when Martin Luther began to preach at Wittenburg against
indulgences.
As the Reformation did not find the English bigoted Papists, so neither was it
conducted in such a manner as to make them zealous Protestants. It was not under
the direction of men like that fiery Saxon who swore that he would go to Worms,
though he had to face as many devils as there were tiles on the houses, or like
that brave Switzer who was struck down while praying in front of the ranks of
Zurich. No preacher of religion had the same power here which Calvin had at
Geneva and Knox in Scotland. The government put itself early at the head of the
movement, and thus acquired power to regulate, and occasionally to arrest, the
movement.
To many persons it appears extraordinary that Henry the Eighth should have been
able to maintain himself so long in an intermediate position between the
Catholic and Protestant parties. Most extraordinary it would indeed be, if we
were to suppose that the nation consisted of none but decided Catholics and
decided Protestants. The fact is that the great mass of the people was neither
Catholic nor Protestant, but was, like its sovereign, midway between the two
sects. Henry, in that very part of his conduct which has been represented as
most capricious and inconsistent, was probably following a policy far more
pleasing to the majority of his subjects than a policy like that of Edward, or a
policy like that of Mary, would have been. Down even to the very close of the
reign of Elizabeth, the people were in a state somewhat resembling that in
which, as Machiavelli says, the inhabitants of the Roman empire were, during the
transition from heathenism to Christianity; "sendo la maggior parte di loro
incerti a quale Dio dovessero ricorrere." They were generally, we think,
favorable to the royal supremacy. They disliked the policy of the Court of Rome.
Their spirit rose against the interference of a foreign priest with their
national concerns. The bull which pronounced sentence of deposition against
Elizabeth, the plots which were formed against her life, the usurpation of her
titles by the Queen of Scotland, the hostility of Philip, excited their
strongest indignation. The cruelties of Bonner were remembered with disgust.
Some parts of the new system, the use of the English language, for example, in
public worship, and the communion in both kinds, were undoubtedly popular. On
the other hand, the early lessons of the nurse and the priest were not
forgotten. The ancient ceremonies were long remembered with affectionate
reverence. A large portion of the ancient theology lingered to the last in the
minds which had been imbued with it in childhood.
The best proof that the religion of the people was of this mixed kind is
furnished by the Drama of that age. No man would bring unpopular opinions
prominently forward in a play intended for representation. And we may safely
conclude, that feelings and opinions which pervade the whole Dramatic Literature
of a generation, are feelings and opinions of which the men of that generation
generally partook.
The greatest and most popular dramatists of the Elizabethan age treat religious
subjects in a very remarkable manner. They speak respectfully of the fundamental
doctrines of Christianity. But they speak neither like Catholics nor like
Protestants, but like persons who are wavering between the two systems, or who
have made a system for themselves out of parts selected from both. They seem to
hold some of the Romish rites and doctrines in high respect. They treat the vow
of celibacy, for example, so tempting, and, in later times, so common a subject
for ribaldry, with mysterious reverence. Almost every member of a religious
order whom they introduce is a holy and venerable man. We remember in their
plays nothing resembling the coarse ridicule with which the Catholic religion
and its ministers were assailed, two generations later, by dramatists who wished
to please the multitude. We remember no Friar Dominic, no Father Foigard, among
the characters drawn by those great poets. The scene at the close of the Knight
of Malta might have been written by a fervent Catholic. Massinger shows a great
fondness for ecclesiastics of the Romish Church, and has even gone so far as to
bring a virtuous and interesting Jesuit on the stage. Ford, in that fine play
which it is painful to read and scarcely decent to name, assigns a highly
creditable part to the Friar. The partiality of Shakespeare for Friars is well
known. In Hamlet, the Ghost complains that he died without extreme unction, and,
in defiance of the article which condemns the doctrine of purgatory, declares
that he is
"Confined to fast in fires, Till the foul crimes, done in his days of nature,
Are burnt and purged away."
These lines, we suspect, would have raised a tremendous storm In the theatre at
any time during the reign of Charles the Second. They were clearly not written
by a zealous Protestant, or for zealous Protestants. Yet the author of King John
and Henry the Eighth was surely no friend to papal supremacy.
There is, we think, only one solution of the phenomena which we find in the
history and in the drama of that age. The religion of the English was a mixed
religion, like that of the Samaritan settlers, described in the second book of
Kings, who "feared the Lord, and served their graven images"; like that of the
Judaizing Christians who blended the ceremonies and doctrines of the synagogue
with those of the church; like that of the Mexican Indians, who, during many
generations after the subjugation of their race, continued to unite with the
rites learned from their conquerors the worship of the grotesque idols which had
been adored by Montezuma and Guatemozin.
These feelings were not confined to the populace. Elizabeth herself was by no
means exempt from them. A crucifix, with wax-lights burning round it, stood in
her private chapel. She always spoke with disgust and anger of the marriage of
priests. "I was in horror," says Archbishop Parker, "to hear such words to come
from her mild nature and Christian learned conscience, as she spoke concerning
God's holy ordinance and institution of matrimony." Burleigh prevailed on her to
connive at the marriages of churchmen. But she would only connive; and the
children sprung from such marriages were illegitimate till the accession of
James the First.
That which is, as we have said, the great stain on the character of Burleigh is
also the great stain on the character of Elizabeth. Being herself an
Adiaphorist, having no scruple about conforming to the Romish Church when
conformity was necessary to her own safety, retaining to the last moment of her
life a fondness for much of the doctrine and much of the ceremonial of that
church, yet she subjected that church to a persecution even more odious than the
persecution with which her sister had harassed the Protestants. We say more
odious. For Mary had at least the plea of fanaticism. She did nothing for her
religion which she was not prepared to suffer for it. She had held it firmly
under persecution. She fully believed it to be essential to salvation. If she
burned the bodies of her subjects, it was in order to rescue their souls.
Elizabeth had no such pretext. In opinion, she was little more than half a
Protestant. She had professed, when it suited her, to be wholly a Catholic.
There is an excuse, a wretched excuse, for the massacres of Piedmont and the
Autos da fe of Spain. But what can be said in defense of a ruler who is at once
indifferent and intolerant?
If the great Queen, whose memory is still held in just veneration by Englishmen,
had possessed sufficient virtue and sufficient enlargement of mind to adopt
those principles which More, wiser in speculation than in action, had avowed in
the preceding generation, and by which the excellent L'Hospital regulated his
conduct in her own time, how different would be the color of the whole history
of the last two hundred and fifty years! She had the happiest opportunity ever
vouchsafed to any sovereign of establishing perfect freedom of conscience
throughout her dominions, without danger to her government, without scandal to
any large party among her subjects. The nation, as it was clearly ready to
profess either religion, would, beyond all doubt, have been ready to tolerate
both. Unhappily for her own glory and for the public peace, she adopted a policy
from the effects of which the empire is still suffering. The yoke of the
Established Church was pressed down on the people till they would bear it no
longer. Then a reaction came. Another reaction followed. To the tyranny of the
establishment succeeded the tumultuous conflict of sects, infuriated by manifold
wrongs, and drunk with unwonted freedom. To the conflict of sects succeeded
again the cruel domination of one persecuting church. At length oppression put
off its most horrible form, and took a milder aspect. The penal laws which had
been framed for the protection of the established church were abolished. But
exclusions and disabilities still remained. These exclusions and disabilities,
after having generated the most fearful discontents, after having rendered all
government in one part of the kingdom impossible, after having brought the state
to the very brink of ruin, have, in our times, been removed, but, though removed
have left behind them a rankling which may last for many years. It is melancholy
to think with what case Elizabeth might have united all conflicting sects under
the shelter of the same impartial laws and the same paternal throne, and thus
have placed the nation in the same situation, as far as the rights of conscience
are concerned, in which we at last stand, after all the heart-burnings, the
persecutions, the conspiracies, the seditions, the revolutions, the judicial
murders, the civil wars, of ten generations.
This is the dark side of her character. Yet she surely was a great woman. Of all
the sovereigns who exercised a power which was seemingly absolute, but which in
fact depended for support on the love and confidence of their subjects, she was
by far the most illustrious. It has often been alleged as an excuse for the
misgovernment of her successors that they only followed her example, that
precedents might be found in the transactions of her reign for persecuting the
Puritans, for levying money without the sanction of the House of Commons, for
confining men without bringing them to trial, for interfering with the liberty
of parliamentary debate. All this may be true. But it is no good plea for her
successors; and for this plain reason, that they were her successors. She
governed one generation, they governed another; and between the two generations
there was almost as little in common as between the people of two different
countries. It was not by looking at the particular measures which Elizabeth had
adopted, but by looking at the great general principles of her government, that
those who followed her were likely to learn the art of managing untractable
subjects. If, instead of searching the records of her reign for precedents which
might seem to vindicate the mutilation of Prynne and the imprisonment of Eliot,
the Stuarts had attempted to discover the fundamental rules which guided her
conduct in all her dealings with her people, they would have perceived that
their policy was then most unlike to hers, when to a superficial observer it
would have seemed most to resemble hers. Firm, haughty, sometimes unjust and
cruel, in her proceedings towards individuals or towards small parties, she
avoided with care, or retracted with speed, every measure which seemed likely to
alienate the great mass of the people. She gained more honor and more love by
the manner in which she repaired her errors than she would have gained by never
committing errors. If such a man as Charles the First had been in her place when
the whole nation was crying out against the monopolies, he would have refused
all redress. He would have dissolved the Parliament, and imprisoned the most
popular members. He would have called another Parliament. He would have given
some vague and delusive promises of relief in return for subsidies. When
entreated to fulfill his promises, he would have again dissolved the Parliament,
and again imprisoned his leading opponents. The country would have become more
agitated than before. The next House of Commons would have been more
unmanageable than that which preceded it. The tyrant would have agreed to all
that the nation demanded. He would have solemnly ratified an act abolishing
monopolies for ever. He would have received a large supply in return for this
concession; and within half a year new patents, more oppressive than those which
had been cancelled, would have been issued by scores. Such was the policy which
brought the heir of a long line of kings, in early youth the darling of his
countrymen, to a prison and a scaffold.
Elizabeth, before the House of Commons could address her, took out of their
mouths the words which they were about to utter in the name of the nation. Her
promises went beyond their desires. Her performance followed close upon her
promise. She did not treat the nation as an adverse party, as a party which had
an interest opposed to hers, as a party to which she was to grant as few
advantages as possible, and from which she was to extort as much money as
possible. Her benefits were given, not sold; and, when once given, they were
never withdrawn. She gave them too with a frankness, an effusion of heart, a
princely dignity, a motherly tenderness, which enhanced their value. They were
received by the sturdy country gentlemen who had come up to Westminster full of
resentment, with tears of joy, and shouts of "God save the Queen." Charles the
First gave up half the prerogatives of his crown to the Commons; and the Commons
sent him in return the Grand Remonstrance.
We had intended to say something concerning that illustrious group of which
Elizabeth is the central figure, that group which the last of the bards saw in
vision from the top of Snowdon, encircling the Virgin Queen,
"Many a baron bold, And gorgeous dames and statesmen old In bearded majesty."
We had intended to say something concerning the dexterous Walsingham, the
impetuous Oxford, the graceful Sackville, the all-accomplished Sydney;
concerning Essex, the ornament of the court and of the camp, the model of
chivalry, the munificent patron of genius, whom great virtues, great courage,
great talents, the favor of his sovereign, the love of his countrymen, all that
seemed to ensure a happy and glorious life, led to an early and an ignominious
death, concerning Raleigh, the soldier, the sailor, the scholar, the courtier,
the orator, the poet, the historian, the philosopher, whom we picture to
ourselves, sometimes reviewing the Queen's guard, sometimes giving chase to a
Spanish galleon, then answering the chiefs of the country party in the House of
Commons, then again murmuring one of his sweet love-songs too near the ears of
her Highness's maids of honor, and soon after poring over the Talmud, or
collating Polybius with Livy. We had intended also to say something concerning
the literature of that splendid period, and especially concerning those two
incomparable men, the Prince of Poets, and the Prince of Philosophers, who have
made the Elizabethan age a more glorious and important era in the history of the
human mind than the age of Pericles, of Augustus, or of Leo. But subjects so
vast require a space far larger than we can at present afford. We therefore stop
here, fearing that, if we proceed, our article may swell to a bulk exceeding
that of all other reviews, as much as Dr. Nares's book exceeds the bulk of all
other histories.
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