own mind by defying the Conquerour And here Sir I confess he has driven me upon one of the tenderest points in the world which is the speaking concerning the fame of a great Man while he is living But I entreat you to lay before your eyes the many powerfull arguments by which I am mov'd at least to give a true testimony though not a long elogie concerning him My Lord Chancellor is a man through whose hands the greatest part of all the publique and private businesses of our Countrey do passâ— And it will be most dishonourable for us to suffer his name to be revil'd in this manner while he is scarce at leisure to look to its defence himself by reason of his eternal Labors for the publique Justice and Safety And besides this Sir I can for my own particular allege another motive of nearer concernment For I am to consider my self as a Member of the Royal Society and the Vniversity of Oxford and the Earl of Clarendon as Protector of one them and Chancellor of the other These Sir are some of his true Titles however Monsieur de Sorbiere is pleas'd to pass them over and give him worse in their stead First of all he says that he is a Presbyterian At this ridiculous scandall I assure you Sir I am not much griev'd I was to tell you true in a terrible affright when I read what he reports that almost all the City of London are Presbyterians But now this passage has compos'd my mind again For it is like to be a very exact computation which he has made of that Sect when the first man that he names for a Presbyterian is my Lord Chancellor He next tells us that he is a man of the Law a shamefull disgrace the Lord Chancellor of Englandâ— whose Office it is to govern and moderate the Law is a Lawyer As if I should endeavour to lessen the credit of Monsieur de Vaubrun and prove him unfit to be Governour of Philippe Ville and Colonel of Light-horse by objecting that he is a Souldier or of Monsieur de Sorbiere to be Historiographer Royal by saying that he is skill'd in Historie But he is a Lawyer and Statesman at once Can this be any more disparagement to him then it is to the whole Body of Lawyers in France who in all times have manag'd the greatest Imployments of that State Could he not have recollected before he writ this that Monsieur de Segnier the present Chancellor of France is a Gentleman of the Long Robe You see Sir what a good Satyrist we have here got who would undertake to abuse an English Statesman with such an argument which must at the same time reflect as much upon his own Countreymen his chief Friends and Patronsâ— to whom he directs his Speech But the worst is still behind My Lord Chancellor is utterly ignorant of the Belles Lettres This accusation is as decent as all the former He dislikes our Carriers for not bâ—ing Courtly our Souldiers for not putting off their Hatts well our Bishops for their Gravity and our States-men for not being Grammarians and Criticks But I will prove to him by his own confession that My Lord Chancellor deserves not this reprehension and that he is a man skillful in all Polite Learning He himself allows him to be a great Politician and a very Eloquent Man I have obtain'd Sir what I desir'd You see how easy it is to justify the Earl of Clarendon seeing the very man that vilifies him does at the same time gainsay himself and suggest to me his prayses without my interposing any word in his commendation If we should graunt that a man may chance to be a great dealer in Politicks without understanding any thing else which yâ—t nothing but Monsieur de Sorbiereâ—s own example in this place can perswade us to be possible yet how can he be thought to attain to a perfect Eloquence without any skill in the Civil Arts Where now is his Polite Learning whence did he fetch this Idea of Eloquence Let him produce his Notes out of Aristotle Tully Quintilian Seneca or any of the Rhetoricians of Antiquity And then let him tell me whether they do not all with one voyce consent that an Orator must of necessity be acquainted with all sorts of useful knowledg But because he is so free in his reproof of my Lord Chancellors unskillfulness in the Belles Lettres I pray Sir what signs has this great Aristarchus himself given of his own proficience in them Where do we find in him any footsteps of the True Spirit of the Grecian or Roman Wit What reason have we to envy his judgment in the Classical Authors when all the proof that he has given in this Book of his being conversant in them are only three or four pedantical Quotations of which the chief is Os Homini sublime dedit Thus farr Sir in reply to him But more is to be added concerning the Honourable Person of whom he speaks in such mean terms My Lord Chancellor is a Gentleman of a very antient Family of which Mr Cambden makes mention in his Britannia His Education and first years were spent in a strict familiarity with many of the most Famous Men not only of that Age but perhaps of any other of whom to pass by some Reverend and Learned Church-men that are living it is enough to name Mr Chillingsworth and the Lord Falkland His first application to the Affairs of his Countrey was in a time wherein extraordinary fidelity and sufficience were requir'd His Services to the late King were requited by the committing of many eminent Businesses to his management and by a very high share in his Majesties Favour of which there are indelible proofs in many places of that Excellent Prince's Letters Under him he was Chancellor of the Exchequer Privy Counsellor and design'd Secretary of State Since that time hâ— was Extraordinary Embassador into Spain and attended his present Master in his Misfortunes which was undoubtedly the most glorious Scene of Honour in the world By these several degrees of Great Imployments he ascended to that illustrious Station which he now enjoyes And as for the Qualifications of his Minde if it be needfull to adde any thing to the Votes of the Royal Society and the Vniversity of Oxford I will declare that of all the men of great worth who have possess'd that High Office since Learning and the Civill Arts came amongst us there was never any man that has so much resembled Sir Thomas More and the Lord Bacon in their several Excellencies as the Earl of Clarendon There might Sir much more be answer'd against all his false Insinuations concerning the Political Condition of England But I have seen a Book of Monsieur de Sorbiere's Discourses and Letters whereof many were written to the late Cardinal Mazarini and they are so full of gross flatteries that they have wholly turn'd my stomach from speaking any more of
with the same Objects and so they make the Doctrine of the Scene to be more lively and diverting then the precepts of Philosophers or the grave delight of Heroick Poetry which the French Tragedies do resemble Nor is it sufficient to object against this that it is undecent to thrust in men of mean condition amongst the actions of Princes For why should that misbecome the Stage which is always found to be acted on the True Theatre of the World There being no Court which only consists of Kings and Queens and Counsellors of State Upon these accounts Sir in my weak judgment the French Drama ought to give place to the English in the Tragical and lofty part of it And now having obtain'd this I suppose they will of their own accord resigne the other excellence and confess that we have far exceeded them in the representation of different Humors The Truth is the French have alwaies seem'd almost asham'd of the true Comedy making it not much more then the subject of their Farses whereas the English Stage has so much abounded with it that perhaps there is scarce any sort of extravagance of which the minds of men are capable but they have in some measure express'd It is in Comedies and not in Solemn Histories that the English use to relate the Speeches of Waggoners of Fencers and of Common Souldiers And this I dare assure Monsieur de Sorbiere that if he had understood our Language he might have seen himself in all his shapes as a vain Traveller an empty Politician an insolent Pedant and an idle pretender to Learning But though he was not in a condition of taking advice from our Stage for the correcting of his own Vices yet methinks he might thereby have rectify'd his judgment about ours he might well have concluded that the English temper is not so universally heavy and dumpish when he beheld their Theatres to be the gayest and merriest in Europe Concerning the English Eloquence he bravely declares that all their Sermons in the Pulpit and Pleadings at the Bar consist of nothing but mean pedantry The censure is bold especially from a man that was so far from understanding our language that he scarce knew Whether we move our lips or no when we speak But to shew him that we can better judge of Monsieur de Sorbier's Eloquence I must tell him that the Muses and Parnassus are almost whip't out of our very Scholes That there are many hundreds of Lawyers and Preachers in England who have long known how to contemn such delicacies of his stile I will only give one instance for all I believe he could scarce have Brib'd any Scriveners Clerk to describe Hatfield as he has done and so to conclude That the Fishes in the Ponds did often leap out of the water into the air to behold and to delight themselves with the beauties of that place I will not attempt to defend the Ornaments or the Copiousnesse of our Language against one that is utterly ignorant of it But to shew how plentifull it is I will only repeat an observation which the Earl of Clarendon has made That there is scarce any Language in the world which can properly signify one English expression and that is Good Nature Though Monsieur de Sorbiere will not allow the Noble Author of this Note to have any skill in Grammar Learning Yet he must pardon me if I still believe the observation to be true At least I assure you Sir that after all my search I cannot find any one word in his Book which might incline me to think otherwise But I will be content to lay the whole authority of his judgement in matters of Wit and Elegance upon what he sayes concerning the English Books He affirms That they are only impudent thefts out of others without citing their Authors and that they contain nothing but ill Rhapsodies of matter worse put together And here Sir I will for once do him a courtesie I will suppose him not to have taken this one character of us from the Soldier the Zealander the Puritans or the Rabble of the Streets I will grant he might have taken an ill conceit of our writings before he came over from the usuall judgement which the Southern wits of the world are wont to passe on the wit of all Northern Countries 'T is true indeed I think the French and the Italians would scarce be so unneighbourly as to assert that all our Authors are Theivish Pedants That is Monsieur de Sorbier's own addition but yet they generally agree that there is scarce anything of late written that is worth looking upon but in their own Languages The Italians did at first indeavour to have it thought that all matters of Elegance had never yet pass'd over the Alps but being soon overwhelm'd by Number they were content to admit the French and the Spaniards into some share of the hoâ—nour But they all three still maintain this united opinion that all wit is to be sought for no where but amongst themselves It is their establish'd Rule that good sence has alwayes kept neer the warm Sun and scarce ever yet dar'd to come farther then the forty ninth degree Northward This Sir is a pretty imagination of theirs to think they have confin'd all Art to a Geographicall Circle and to fancy that it is there so charm'd as not to be able to go out of the bounds which they have set it It were certainly an easy and a pleasant work to confute this arrogant conception by particular examples It might quickly be shewn that England Germany Holland nay even Denmark and Scotland have produc'd veâ—y many men who may justly come into competition with the best of these Southern wits in the Advancement of the true Arts of life in all the works of solid reason nay even in the lighter studies of ornament and humanity And to speak particularly of England there might be a whole Volume compos'd in comparing the Chastity the newnesse the vigour of many of our English Fancies with the corrupt and the swelling Metaphors wherewith some of our Neighbors who most admire themselves do still adorn their Books But this Sir will require a larger discourse then I intend to bestow on Monsieur de Sorbiere I am able to dispatch him in â—ewer wordsâ— For I wonder how of all men living it could enter into his thoughts To condemn in grosse the English Writings when the best course that he has taken to make himself consider'd as a writer was the Translation of an English Author But I beg your leave Sir that I may briefly add That in the first Restoration of Learning the English began to write well as soon as any the Italians only excepted and that if we may ghesse by what we see of the Italians at this day the English have continued to write well longer then they Sir Thomas Moore was contemporary with Erasmus and though he was a man of
Crime It is but just that there should be so great a distance if our Clergymen that have Pluralities make their Grooms supply their Cures In this part of his Character he certainly Sir mistook the Country and intended this for some other Kingdom in Europe where he had also miss'd of a Medall It is a sign that he is as little acquainted with his own Church as he is with ours or else he would never have objected to us our Pluralities which are infinitely fewer and more confin'd amongst us he would never have ventur'd to upbraid us with the Ignorance of our Parish Priests lest we should have provok'd the whole Church of Rome to a comparison In breif Sir our Slaves do not serve at our Altars and I will also add that our Cheif Spiritual Dignities are not intayl'd upon Families nor possess'd by Children In all the Parishes of England I dare challenge not onely him that is a Stranger but the most bitter Enemies to our Discipline to shew me Twenty Pulpits that are fill'd with men who have not spent their Youth in Studies to prepare them and who have not the Authority of Holy Orders That He has presum'd to call our Publique Solemn Prayers only a Morsel or a Scrap of a Liturgy I do not much wonder For he that has long made his own Religion his Cook as one of our Poets expresses it may well be thought irreligious enough to take a Metaphor for ours from a Kitchin But besides this he asserts that the Introduction of the English Liturgy into Scotland was the cause of the shedding of all the Blood in the three Nations This Speech might have well fitted the mouth of Bradshaw or the Pen of Ireton For it lays all the guilt of so much Slaughter on the most Innocent and most merciful Prince that ever wore a Crown by whose special care an Uniformity of Worship was attempted in that Kingdome But to give him better light and to let him see that there were other Causes of our Miseries in one of these three Countries at least I would fain have him ask this Question of the Pope's Legat that was in Ireland whether the horrible Irish Massacre was committed for no other reason but only out of a tender Brotherly sense of the Yoke which was laid by the Common-Prayer on the Scotchmen's Consciences He tells us that it is an ordinary thing with our Bishops to exercise their Ecclesiastical Censures upon frivolous accounts But methinks he might have remembred that it was not probable they should seek out any trifling occasions of excommunication when by his own confession they have so many weighty Provocations if that be true that the whole Nation neglects their Discipline But Sir you know it is apparent to all indifferent Men that the Bishops have been most remarkably moderate in their Visitations and that the Punishments which have been inflicted on the Obstinate have for the most part proceeded from the Temporal Sword and not the Spiritual But because he here quarrels at the Absoluteness of our Bishop's power I leave him to be answer'd by the whole Clergy of the Church of Rome who ought to be alarm'd by this For if ours shal be reputed so Tyrannical what will they be eâ—teem'd whose Jurisdiction is so much larger He goes on to deâ—ame our Bishops He says they have imbezled the Church Lands to make their own Families Rich. This Sir is an Objection which though it was at first manag'd against them with great Clamour by the common Enemies of the King and the Church yet now upon a calmer consideration of things it has universally lost its credit even in those places where he says the English take Tobacco half the day together from whence he acknowledges that he had a good part of his Relations The first murmurs against them were rais'd because they receiv'd altogether some part of that which was their due for twenty years before But the Envy of that was quickly scatter'd when it was manifest how many publique and Generous works they have promoted Besides the first Fruits and Tenths and above all the Subsidies which have swept away a good part of their gains they have compounded with a very great Number of the Purchasers they have increas'd the Vicaredges in their Gift to Fourscore Pounds a year they have indow'd Alms-Houses and Colleges they have built Chappels they have repaired the Episcopal Palaces and Cathedrals which were generally gone to Ruine they have redeem'd at once all the English that were Slaves at Algiers and that too I dare assure him without any intent to make Curats of them The Account which he gives of their letting Leases is most ridiculous There is no man amongst them that lets a Lease for thirty years The Reserv'd Rent is that which was always the standing Revenue of the Church Nor ought this Custom to be Objected against the Church of England It is the same course which is taken in France and most other parts of Christendom Nay to go farther the letting of Church Leases is a business whose Regulation was brought about since the time that the Church of Rome divided from us Before Queen Elizabeth's reign the Churchmen had a power of Farming out their Lands not only for Thirty but for Ninety Nine years It was Shee that first confin'd the Term to One and Twenty and so it still remains He ought not therefore to reckon this practice as our disgrace when the good order that is now us'd about it is the peculiar honour that belongs to the English Reformation But to Conclude if no Man fears Simony in England then there is no man that is affrighted with punishment For our Laws are as strict against it and as severely executed as any where else However if it were true which is far from being so that we Simoniacally imploy the Church estate to Secular uses yet this sounds very ill from that Layman's Pen who when he writ this Voyage was maintain'd out of the Ecclesiastical Revenue This Sir was Monsieur de Sorbiere's Case And the first Office of a Churchman that ever he perform'd was in this Book where He devoutly prays to God to make Mr. Hobbs a Roman Catholique Which if his prayers can obtain from Heaven he deserves not only to be made a Priest or Bishop but even a Saint too For this will be a far greater Miracle then any of those for which many have been Canoniz'd And now Sir can you require any greater signs of Monsieur de Sorbier's Sincerity in his Religion He has accus'd of Simony the most Incorrupt of Pride the Humblest of Rapacity the most Innocent of Ignorance the most Learned of false Doctrine the most Primitive of ill Discipline the most Decent Church under Heaven And when nothing else could be said he even upbraids it with its Submission and Obedience To shew that he is as ill a Disciple of Mr. Hobbes's whom he pretends to admire as he is of the Apostles
Chairs about it some Benches behind that are bare the hindermost higher then the first the President sits in a Chair with Arms his back to the Chimny holding a wooden Hammer in his hand wherewith he sometimes knocks the Table to make silence Can you Sir indure to read all this stuff with any patience I suffer'd his Tittle Tattle upon Rochester Bridg upon the Eternal greeness of the Fields of Kent upon the Walls of Lincolns-Inn-Fields on the Guild-Hall on the Rancks of Trees in Morefields and many more such pretty Philosophical Discourses But is not this a shameful signe of his weakness that he has insisted so long on such mean circumstances while he was describing a subject that might have yielded him so much noble matter for his Pen And when the Royal Society it self is so careful that such ceremonies should be just no more then what are necessary to avoyd confusion What other Language should he have us'd then this if he had been to inform the World of his own Schole at Orange Just so he should have proceeded He should first have declar'd whether the Room were Hung or Wainscotted Next whether the Master sate with his back towards the Window or the Chimny then how many Seats there were for the Boys to sit upon at last he should have drawn himself in a majestick Chair his Ferula in his hand and the poor Scholars trembling for fear at every rap on the Table But all this is still pardonable he has been utterly mistaken in the report of their main design There are two things that they have most industriously avoided which he attributes to them the one is a dividing into parties and Sects and the other a reliance upon Books for their intelligence of Nature He first says that they are not all guided by the authority of Gassendus or Des Cartes but that the Mathematicians are for Des Cartes and the Men of General Learning for Gassendus Whereas neither of these two Men bear any sway amongst them they are never nam'd there as Dictators over men's Reasons nor is there any extraordinary reference to their judgments He also asserts that the Royal Society has appointed Lodgings and establish'd four thousand Livres a year upon two Professors who shall read to them out of Authors and that they have begun a Library for that purpose Whereas they have as yet no Library but only a Repository for their Instruments and Rarities they never intend a Professorian Philosophy but declare against it with Books they meddle not farther then to see what Experiments have been try'd before their Revenue they designe for Operators and not for Lecturers I now pass over to his chief delight the Belles Lettres of the English He grants our Stage to be handsom the Musick tolerable better I suppose then that of the Polack Gentleman But yet he says that our Poets laugh at the Rules of Time and Place that all our Playes contain the Actions of Five and Twenty years that we Marry a Prince in the First Act and bring in his Son fighting in the Second and his Grand-child in the Third But here Sir he has committed a greater disorder of time then that whereof he accuses our Stage For he has confounded the Reign of King Charles the Second with that of Q. Elizabeth 'T is true about an hundred years ago the English Poets were not very exact in such decencies But no more then were the Dramatists of any other Countries The English themselves did laugh away such absurdities as soon as any and for these last Fifty years our Stage has been as Regular in those Circumstances as the best in Europe Seeing he thinks â—iâ— to upbraid our present Poets with the errors of which their predecessors were guilty so long since I might as justly impuâ—e the â—ile absurdities that are to be found in Amâ—dis de Gaul â—o Monsieur de Corneille de Scudery de Chapelaine de â—oiture and the rest of the â—amous Modern French Wits He next blames the meanness of the Humors which we represent And here because he has thrust this occasion upon me I will venture to make a short comparison between the French Dramatical Poetry and ours I doubt not Sir but I may do this with the leave of that witty Nation For as long as I do not presume to slander their manners from which you see I have carefully forborn I hope they will allow me to examine that which is but a matter of Wit and delight I will not enter into open defiance of them upon Monsieur de Sorbiere's account but I intreat them to permit me only to try a civill Turnament with them in his War of Letters I will therefore make no scruple to maintain that the English Plays ought to be preferr'd before the French And to prove this I will not insist on an argument which is plain to any observer that the greatest part of their most excellent pieces have been taken from the Spaniard whereas the English have for the most part trodden in new ways of Invention From hence I will not draw much advantage though it may â—erve to balance that which he afterwards says of our Books that they are generally stoln out of other Authors But I will fetch the grounds of my persuasion from the very nature and use of the Stage it self It is beyond all dispute that the true intention of such Representations is to give to mankind a Picture of themselves and thereby to make Virtue belov'd Vice abhor'd and the little irregularities of mens tempers call'd humors expos'd to laughter The Two first of these are the proper subjects of Tragedy and Trage-Comedy And in these I will first try to shew why our way ought to be preferr'd before theirs The French for the most part take only one or two Great Men and chiefly insist on some one remarkable accident of their Story To this end they admit no more Persons then will barely serve to adorn that And they manage all in Rhythme with long Speeches almost in the way of Dialogues in making high Ideas of Honor and in speaking Noble things The English on the other side make their chief Plot to consist of a greater variety of Actions and besides the main design add many other little contrivances By this means their Scenes are shorter their Stage fuller many more Persons of different Humors are introduc'd And in carrying on of this they generally do only confine themselves to blanck Verse This is the difference And hence the English have these advantages By the liberty of Prose they render their Speech and Pronuntiation more natural and are never put to make a contention between the Rhythm and the Sence By their underplots they often change the minds of their Spectators which is a mighty Benefit seeing one of the greatest Arts of Wit and persuasion is the right ordering of Digressions By their full Stage they prevent men's being continually tyr'd