Amenities of Literature Part 60

[3] A letter from Dr. Jenkin, who was chaplain to Lord Weymouth, to Mr. Baker, Dec. 3, 1709:--"There is another rarity then to be sold, which is proffered to my lord--a Collection of Pamphlets, in number 30,000, bound in 2000 volumes. The collection was begun by Charles 1st in 1640, and continued to 1660. In a printed paper, where I saw this account, it is said the collectors refused 4000_l._ for them."--_Masters' Life of Rev. Thomas Baker_, p. 28.

[4] "Phoenix Britannicus,"--"Oldys' Dissertation upon Pamphlets," p.

556. Oldys drew up an account of these pamphlets from "The Memoirs of the Curious," published in 1701. He says, that the Collection was made by _Tomlinson, the bookseller_, and the Catalogue by Marmaduke Foster, the auctioneer; and relates a traditional story, that it is reported that Charles the First gave ten pounds for reading one of these pamphlets, at the owner's house in St. Paul's Churchyard. This collection was not commenced until Nov. 1640, and the king left London in Jan. 1642; during this time the collection could not be very numerous, nor would there be that difficulty in seeing a pamphlet as at the subsequent more distracted period. It is curious to trace the origin of traditionary tales; they often stand on a rickety foundation. We find that the king did borrow a pamphlet, but at a time when he could not hasten to St. Paul's Churchyard to read it; we may presume that the bookseller did not charge his majesty so disloyal a price as ten pounds for the perusal of a single pamphlet; he probably received only the king's approbation of his design, which doubtless was no slight stimulus to its completion.

[5] A Mr. Sisson, a druggist in Ludgate-street, who died in 1749; they then became the property of his relative; Miss Sisson, who seems gladly to have disburdened herself of this domestic grievance in 1761.--_Hollis' Memoirs_, p. 121.

THE OCEANA OF HARRINGTON.

The hardy paradoxes, not wholly without foundation, and the humiliating truths so mortifying to human nature, of the mighty "Leviathan," whose author was little disposed to flatter or to elevate his brothers,[1]

were opposed by an ideal government, more generous in its sympathies, and less obtrusive of brute force, or "the public sword," in the OCEANA of JAMES HARRINGTON.

Free from mere party motives of the Monarchist or the Commonwealth-man, for he gratified neither, Harrington was the greatest of political theorists; and his "political architecture," with all his "models of government, notional and practicable," still remains for us, and has not been overlooked by some framers of const.i.tutions.

The psychological history of HARRINGTON combines with his works. His was a thoughtful youth, like that of Sidney, of Milton, and Gray, which never needed correction, but rather kept those around him in awe. Among the usual studies of his age, it was an enterprise to have acquired the modern languages, as entering into an extensive plan of foreign travel, which the boy had already decided on. The death of his father before his legal age enabled him to realise this project. Political studies, however, had not yet occurred to him; and when he left England, he "knew no more of monarchy, anarchy, aristocracy, and democracy or oligarchy, than as hard words for which he was obliged to look into the dictionary."

In Holland, he first contemplated on the image of popular liberty, recent from the yoke of Spain; it was a young people rejoicing in the holiday of freedom. There he found a friend in the fugitive Queen of Bohemia: his uncle, Lord Harrington, had been the governor of that spirited princess. He pa.s.sed over into Denmark with the crownless elector, soliciting for that aid which no political prudence could afford. He resisted the seductions of those n.o.ble friends.h.i.+ps in pursuit of his great plan. He entered France, he loitered in Germany, and at length advanced into Italy. At Rome, he refused to bestow on his holiness the prostrate salutation, and when some Englishmen complained of their compatriot's stiffness to Charles the First, who reminded the young philosopher that he might have performed a courteous custom as to a temporal prince, the reply was happy--"having kissed his majesty's hand, he would always hold it beneath him to kiss any prince's toe."

Our future political theorist was deeply struck in his admiration of the aristocratic government of Venice, which he conceived to be the most perfect and durable government hitherto planned by the wit of man. Such was the prevalent notion throughout Europe concerning a government existing in secrecy and mystery! In Italy, he found Politics, Literature and Art, and provided himself with a rich store of Italian books, especially on political topics. Machiavelli with him was "the prince of Politicians;" but he has opened his great work with the name of another Italian, "Janotti (Giannotti), the most excellent describer of the Commonwealth of Venice." Giannotti is a name which, though it has not shared the celebrity of Machiavelli, seems to have been that of a more practical politician, for Giannotti at length obtained that honourable secretarys.h.i.+p of Florence, the loss of which, it is said, so deeply mortified the lofty spirit of his greater rival, that the ill.u.s.trious ex-secretary died of grief, which his philosophy should have quieted.

Harrington returned home an accomplished cavalier; but the commonwealth of Holland, the aristocracy of Venice, the absolute monarchy of France, imperial Germany, and what else he had contemplated in the northern courts, must have furnished to his thoughtful mind the elements of his theory of politics.

He returned home to the privacy of his studies, refusing any public employment; but that he kept up an intercourse with the court, appears by his personal acquaintance with the king. Many years form a blank in his life; once indeed he had made an ineffectual attempt to enter parliament, but failed, though his sentiments were well known in favour of popular government. It is probable, that in that unhappy period, when persons and events were alike of so mixed and ambiguous a character, our philosopher could not sympathize with the clash of temporary pa.s.sions.

When the king was to be conveyed from Newcastle in 1646, Harrington was chosen to attend his person as "a gentleman well known to the king before, and who had never engaged with any party whatever." He was then in his thirty-fifth year.

This appointment of Harrington was agreeable to the king. Charles found in Harrington the character he well knew how to appreciate. He conversed on books, and pictures, and foreign affairs, and found a ripe scholar, a travelled mind, and a genius overflowing with strange speculative notions. Their conversations were free; Harrington did not conceal his predilection for commonwealth inst.i.tutions, at which the king was impatient. Neither could bring the other to his own side, for each was fixed in taking opposite views; the one looking to the advantages of monarchy, and the other to those of a republic. The only subject they could differ on, never interrupted their affections; the theoretical commonwealth-man, and the practical monarch, in their daily intercourse, found that they had a heart for each other.

In Charles the First, Harrington discovered a personage unlike the distorted image which political pa.s.sions had long held out. In adversity the softened prince seemed only to be "the man of sorrows." On one occasion Harrington vindicated the king's conduct, and urged that the royal concessions were satisfactory. This strong personal attachment to Charles alarmed the party in power. Harrington was ordered away. He subsequently visited the king when at St. James's, and was present at the awful act of the decapitation. Charles presented Harrington with a last memorial. Aubrey, who knew Harrington, may tell the rest of his story. "Mr. Harrington was on the scaffold with the king when he was beheaded; and I have ofttimes heard him speak of King Charles the First with the greatest zeal and pa.s.sion imaginable; and that his death gave him so great grief, that he contracted a disease by it; that never anything did go so near to him."

The agony of that terrible day afflicted Harrington with a malady from which he was never afterwards freed; a profound melancholy preyed upon his spirits; he withdrew into utter seclusion, not to mourn, but to despond. His friends were alarmed at a hermit's melancholy; some imagined that his affection for the king had deranged his intellect; others ascribed his seclusion to mere discontent with the times.

To rid himself of friendly importunities, and to evince that his mind was not deranged, whatever might be his feelings, he confided to his circle that he had long been occupied in the study of civil government, to invent an art which should prevent the disorders of a state. It was his opinion that "a government is not of so accidental or arbitrary inst.i.tution as people imagine; for in society there are natural causes producing their necessary effects as well as in the earth or the air."

The pa.s.sionless sage was so discriminately just, that he declared that "our late troubles were not wholly to be ascribed to the misgovernment of the prince, nor to the stubbornness of the people; but to the nature of certain changes which had happened to the nation." He then, for their curious admiration, disclosed the perfect model of a commonwealth in his "OCEANA."

OCEANA, or England, was the model of "a free state;" a political "equality" was its basis; equality to be guarded by a number of devices.

Harrington laid the foundation of politics, on the principle that _empire follows the balance of property_, whether lodged in one, in a few, or in many. Toland a.s.serts that this was as n.o.ble a discovery as that of the circulation of the blood, of printing, gunpowder, or the compa.s.s, or optic gla.s.ses; the Newtonian gravity had not then been established, or, doubtless, it had been enumerated.

To preserve the political equality, there were to be "balances" in dominion and in property. An agrarian law, by its distributions suitable to the rank of the individual, and which were never to be enlarged nor diminished, would prevent any man, or any party, overpowering the people by their possessions. All those states in Europe which were the remains of Gothic dominion, were thrown into internal conflicts by their "overbalances." The overbalance of one man was tyranny; of a few, was oligarchy; of the many, was rebellion, or anarchy.[2] The perpetual s.h.i.+fting of their "balances" had produced all their disturbances. He traced this history in extinct governments, as well as in our own. So refined were his political optics, that he discerned when our kings had broken Magna Charta some thirty times; and during the reign of Charles the First, he a.s.serts that these "balances" had been altered nine times.

The "balance of property" being the foundation of the commonwealth, the superstructure was raised of magistracy. Magistracy was to proceed by "rotation," and to be settled by the "ballot." The senate was to be elected by the purity of suffrage, which was to be found in the balloting-box. And in this rotatory government, the third part of the senate would be wheeled out at their fixed terms. The senate by these self-purgations would renovate its youth; and the sovereign authority, by this unceasing movement, would act in its perpetual integrity.

In this equal commonwealth no party can be at variance with, or gain ground upon another; and as there can be no factions, so neither will there be any seditions; because the people are without the power or the interest to raise commotions; they would be as likely to throw themselves into the sea as to disturb the state. It is one of his political axioms, that where the public interest governs, it is a government of laws; but where a private interest, it is a government of men, and not of laws.

HARRINGTON was no admirer of a mixed monarchy; his political logic includes some important truths. "In a mixed monarchy, the n.o.bility sometimes imposing chains on the king or domineering over the people, the king is either oppressing the people without control, or contending with the n.o.bility, as their protectors; and the people are frequently in arms against both king and n.o.bles, till at last one of the three estates becomes master of the other two, or till they so mutually weaken one another, that either they fall a prey to some more potent government, or naturally grow into a commonwealth--therefore mixed monarchy is not a perfect government; but if no such parties can possibly exist in OCEANA, then it is the most equal, perfect, and immortal commonwealth. _Quod erat demonstrandum._"

The "equality" of Harrington, however, was not fas.h.i.+oned to any vulgar notions of a levelling democracy. He maintained the distinctions of orders in society. The great founder of a commonwealth was first a _gentleman_, from Moses downwards; though, he says, "there be great divines, poets, lawyers, great men in all professions, the genius of a great politician is peculiar to _the genius of a gentleman_." And further, "An army may as well consist of soldiers without officers, or of officers without soldiers, as a commonwealth (especially such an one as is capable of greatness) consist of a people without gentry, or of a gentry without a people."

A work of such original invention, replete with the most curious developments of all former political inst.i.tutions, of which the author proposed to resume the advantages and to supply the deficiencies, from the ancient commonwealth of Moses to the recent republic of the Hollanders, and moreover throwing out some novel general views of our own national history, formed a volume opportune to engage public attention. It was enlivened by the pleasing form of a romance, where, in the council of the legislators, the debaters plead for their favourite form of government with infinite spirit.

The publication of "Oceana" was, however, long r.e.t.a.r.ded; first, by the honesty of our sage, and, secondly, by the influence of two very opposite parties equally alarmed. Harrington was anxious that his proselytes should debate his opinions, and even partially promulgate them in their pamphlets, before he ventured to publish them. What he ably elucidated they faithfully repeated: the consequence of this indiscretion was, that the novelty had lost its gloss; and, when finally his great discovery of empire following the balance of property appeared, the author was reproached for its obviousness. Every great principle appears obvious when once ascertained. The vague rumours that had spread that a new model of government was about to appear, made the Cromwellites and the cavaliers alike alert in their opposition; the bashaws of the great sultan, the new lords and major-generals of the Protector, sate uneasy in their usurped seats; the cavaliers, who knew Harrington's predisposition for republican inst.i.tutions, loudly remonstrated. The author was compelled to send his papers to the printers by stealth and by s.n.a.t.c.hes, dispersing them among different presses. The first edition of "Oceana" exhibits a strange appearance, in a confusion of all sorts of types and characters--black letter, Italian and Roman, accompanied by an unparalleled "List of Errors of the Press,"

being several folio pages with double columns! The author has even marked the lacerations of his panting and hunted volume from "a spaniel questing who hath sprung my book out of one press into two other." The myrmidons of Oliver hunted down their game from press to press, and at length pounced on their prey, and, with a Pyrrhic triumph, bore it to Whitehall.

All solicitations of the author to retrieve his endeared volume proved fruitless; in despair he ventured on a singular expedient. Lady Claypole, the daughter of the Protector, studied to be exceedingly gracious, and to play the princess. Unacquainted with her ladys.h.i.+p, Harrington requested an audience; waiting in the antechamber, her little daughter soon attracted his attention; carrying her in his arms, he entered the presence-chamber, and declared that he had a design to steal the young lady--not from love, but for revenge.

"Have I injured you?"

"Not at all! but your father has stolen my child, and then you would have interceded for its restoration."

The parable of the parental author was easily explained; the pleasing manners of the elegant cavalier, which were not commonly seen in the new court of the protectorate, doubtless a.s.sisted the pet.i.tioner with the recent princess of the revolution. "Are you sure," she earnestly inquired, "that your book contains nothing against my father's government?"

"It is a political romance! to be dedicated to your father, and the first copy to be opened by yourself."

Lady Claypole conceived there could not be any treason in a romance. She persuaded Oliver to look it over himself; the Protector, who there found himself as "the Lord Archon of Oceana," and probably with his sharp judgment deeming the whole a "romance," returned it, drily observing, that "the power which he had got by the sword he would not quit for a little paper-shot:" but he added, with his accustomed sanctimonious policy, that "he as little approved as the gentleman of the government of a _single person_, but that he had been compelled to take the office of High-Constable to preserve the peace among all parties who could never agree among themselves."

"Oceana" was published at a crisis when the people were still to be enchanted by the name of "Commonwealth," though they began to think that they had been mistaken in their choice, since their grievances had been heavier than under the old monarchy which they had dissolved. Harrington familiarly compared their present unquiet state to that of a company of puppy-dogs cramped up in a bag, when finding themselves ill at ease for want of room, every one of them bites the tail or the foot of his neighbour, supposing that to be the source of his misery. To such a restless people, a continual change of rulers on the rotatory system seemed a great relief; any worse than their present masters they would not suppose. "The Rota" of Harrington became so popular, that a club was established bearing its name; and they held their debates every evening with doors open for auditors or orators.

This political club was the resort of the finest geniuses of the age, many of whom have left their eminent names in our history and our literature. The members sat at a circular table--the table of ancient knighthood and modern equality, which left a pa.s.sage open within its circuit to have their coffee delivered hot without any interruption to the speaker or "the state of the nation." A contemporary a.s.sures us that these debates were more ingenious and spirited than he had ever heard, and that those in parliament were flat to them. Every decision how affairs should be carried was left to the balloting-box--"a box in which there is no cogging," observes the master-genius of "the Rota."

This "balloting" and the principle of "rotation" were hateful to the parliamentarians; for, as we are told, "they were cursed tyrants, in love with their power, and this was death to them." HENRY NEVILLE, the author of "Plato Redivivus," the constant a.s.sociate of Harrington, and who, Hobbes (alluding to the "Oceana") said, "had a finger in the pye,"

had the boldness to propose the system of "rotation" to the House, warning them that, if they did not accept that model of government, they would shortly fall into ruins. In their then ticklish condition, the House had the decency to return their thanks, and the intrepidity to keep their places.

This perfectioned model of a government, when opened for the inspection of mankind, exhibited a glorious framework; but it seemed questionable whether this political clockwork or intellectual mechanism could perform its exact librations, depending on a number of "balances" to preserve its nice equilibrium; and whether it could last for perpetuity by that "rotatory" motion by wheels which were never to cease. Some objected, that the author in the science of politics had been fascinated, as some in mechanics, who imagined that they had discovered "the perpetual motion." But this objection the constructor of this "political architecture" indignantly rejected. He knew that the capacity of matter can only work as long as it lasts, and therefore there can be no perpetual motion; but "the mathematician must not take G.o.d to be such as he is. The equal commonwealth is built up by the understandings of the people. Now the people never die--they are not brute matter. This movement of theirs comes from the hands of the Eternal Mover, even G.o.d himself."

This romance of politics has been p.r.o.nounced by a high authority as "one of the boasts of English literature;" and the philosophic Hume has even ventured to p.r.o.nounce the work as "the _only valuable model of a commonwealth_ that has yet been offered to the public." Perhaps the historian would pa.s.s it off as "the only valuable one," from a conviction that it was perfectly harmless. It is worthy of remark, that when, in 1688, a grand _auto da fe_ was performed by the university of Oxford on certain political works--when they condemned to the flames Baxter's "Holy Commonwealth," written against Harrington's "Heathen Commonwealth," as Baxter calls "Oceana," with Hobbes, and Milton, and others--no one proposed this condign punishment to the manes of Harrington, considering, no doubt, that a romance was too impracticable as a political system. Yet the republican party has always held to "Oceana" as their text-book; and it was with this view that TOLAND edited this great work, and, in his life of Milton, has declared "Oceana" to be an unrivalled model of a commonwealth, for its _practicableness_, _equality_, and completeness; and once HOLLIS, during the fervour of founding a republic in Corsica, recommended by public advertis.e.m.e.nt "Oceana" as the most perfect model of a free government.

"OCEANA" has perpetuated a thoughtful politician's dreams. But are there no realities in dreams? Even in dreaming, a great artist often combines conceptions too fugitive, too mysterious, too beauteous, for his palpable canvas. And thus the fanciful pictures of our philosophical politician were the results of his deep and varied studies in the ancient and modern writings on the science of politics--from Aristotle to Machiavel, from Machiavel to Hobbes. His pages are studded with axioms of policy, and impress us by many an enduring truth. His style is not always polished, and is sometimes perplexed; but no writer has exceeded him in the felicity and boldness of his phrases; and his pen, though busied on higher matters, sparkles with imagery and ill.u.s.tration.

That a mind so sagacious and even predictive as was that of Harrington's in the uncertainty of human events should be led away by theoretical fallacies, is an useful example for political speculators.[3] Constantly he extols the dark mysterious dominion of aristocratic Venice, "being a commonwealth having no causes of dissolution." He dwells on "the rotation of its senate," and its prompt, remedial, concealed power. "It is immortal in its nature; and to this day she stands with one thousand years of tranquillity on her back: notwithstanding," he thoughtfully adds, "that this government consists of men not without sin."

A single day of treason sufficed to terminate this immortal commonwealth of Venice, with all its "ballotings" and "its rotations," and its hidden and horrible dictature, where sate the council of "Three" in their dark conclave, like the sister-fates, the arbiters of every soul in Venice.

Alas for that folly of the wise, who, in the delusion of a theory, to support the edifice of imagination disguise the truths which might shake it! The advocate of a free state, he who pretends to draw sovereignty from the hands of a people, is the perpetual eulogist of the most refined tyranny that ever swayed the destiny of a people. Spirit of Harrington! meditate in thy sepulchral city, motionless and naked as she lies, there to correct so many pa.s.sages of admiration which spread their illusion in thy "OCEANA!"

Harrington was equally fallible on the strength of his political axiom, "that the balance of power depends on that of property;" applying it to his own critical period, he p.r.o.nounced that it was impossible ever to re-establish monarchy among English commonwealth-men. Property had changed possessors; it could never revert to its former owners. Four years after "Oceana" was published, and "the Rota Club" was still illumining the nation, the commonwealth returned to monarchy by a beck, and without a word!

Theoretical politicians too often omit in their artificial constructions, and their moral calculations, something more prompt to act in the conduct of men than even their interests--the stirring pa.s.sions of ambition, of faction, and the vacillations of "the sovereign people," now maddening for a republic, now rus.h.i.+ng into a monarchy, "tumbling and tossing upon their bed of sickness."

When the Restoration arrived, however it may have deranged the system, it seems not to have disturbed the systematiser. He observed, that "the king comes in; if he calls a parliament of the cavaliers on our great estates, let them sit seven years, and they will all turn commonwealth-men." He retained in all its force his master-pa.s.sion of ideal politics. He now decided to reduce "Oceana" into plain axioms, divested of tedious argumentation, and formal demonstration, adapted to the most vulgar capacities. He was easily induced to offer some immediate instructions for the king's service. A paper was first shown to some of the courtiers, who suspected treason in any scheme where their particular interests were not at all consulted. One morning, when Harrington was busily engaged, with all his aphorisms lying loose on a table before him, suddenly entered Sir William Poulteney, and other officers, to seize on the philosopher and the philosophy "for treasonable designs and practices." As they were huddling together the scattered members of the "Oceanic" mind, the innocent philosopher, innocent of treason, begged the favour of "st.i.tching them together"

before they were taken to Whitehall. The derangement of his system appeared to him more dreadful than seeing himself hurried to the Tower.

Harrington had kept up his intimacy with old friends, among whom were many commonwealth-men, from Major Wildman, an intriguing Cromwellite, down to the notorious Barebones, on whom he declared, however, that he had only called, "at his shop" thrice in his life. He was now involved in a pretended plot, which the Chancellor himself, though furnished with accounts of the meetings of certain parties, declared that he could make nothing of. A speculative politician was a very suspicious person in the days of restoration. Harrington, a.s.suredly, was no plotter. Our philosopher contrived to send his sisters his examination before his relative Lord Lauderdale and others, curious for its topics of discussion, and the poignancy of the dialogue. I cannot pa.s.s by one singular pa.s.sage.

"You charge me with being eminent in principles contrary to the king's government, and the laws of this nation. Some, my lord, say, that I, being a private man, have been so mad as to meddle with politics; what had a private man to do with government? My lord, there is not any _public_ person, not any _magistrate_ that has written in politics, worth a b.u.t.ton. All they that have been excellent in this way have been private men, as private men as myself. There is Plato, there is Aristotle, there is Livy, there is Machiavel. My lord, I can sum up Aristotle's politics in a very few words; he says there is the barbarous monarchy, such a one where the people have no votes in making the laws; he says there is the heroic monarchy, such a one where the people have their votes in making the laws; and then he says there is democracy, and affirms that a man cannot be said to have liberty but in a democracy only."

My Lord Lauderdale, who thus far had been very attentive, at this showed some impatience.