A Literary History of the English People Part 58

The literature of the time corroborates the testimony of doc.u.ments exhumed from ancient muniment rooms. It gives an impression of a wealthier nation than formerly, counting more free men, with a more extensive trade. The number of books on courtesy, etiquette, good breeding, good cooking, politeness, with an injunction not to take "always" the whole of the best morsel,[863] is a sign of these improvements. The letters of the Paston family are another.[864] In spite of all the mentions made in these letters of violent and barbarous deeds; though in them we see Margaret Paston and her twelve defenders put to flight by an enemy of the family, and Sir John Paston besieged in his castle of Caister by the duke of Norfolk, a mult.i.tude of details give something of a modern character to this collection, the oldest series of private English letters we possess.

In spite of aristocratic alliances, these people think and write like worthy citizens, economical, practical and careful. During her husband's absence, Margaret Paston keeps him informed of all that goes on, she looks after his property, renews leases, collects rents. Reading her letters one seems to see her home as neat and clean as a Dutch house. If a disaster occurs, instead of wasting her time in lamentations, she repairs it to the best of her ability and takes precautions for the future. She loves her husband, and may be believed when, knowing him to be ill, she writes: "I would ye were at home, if it were your ease, and your sore might be as well looked to here as it is where ye be, now liefer than a gown though it were of scarlet."[865] John Paston, shut in the Fleet prison, where he makes the acquaintance of Lord Henry Percy, for prisons were then a place where the best society met, sends Margaret playful verses to amuse her:

My lord Persy and all this house, Recommend them to yow, dogge catte and mowse, And wysshe ye had be here stille, For they sey ye are a good gille.

The old and new times are no longer so far apart; in such a prison, Fielding and Sheridan would not have felt out of place.[866]

Books of advice to travellers, itineraries or guides to foreign parts,[867] vocabularies, dictionaries, and grammars,[868] commercial guides, the "Libelle of Englyshe Polycye,"[869] are also signs of the times. This last doc.u.ment is a characteristic one; it is a sort of consular report in verse, very similar (the verses excepted) to thousands of consular reports with which "Livres Jaunes" and "Blue Books" have since been filled. The author points out for each country the goods to be imported and exported, and the guileful practices to be feared in foreign parts; he insists on the necessity of England's having a strong navy, and exaggerates the maritime power of rival countries, so that Parliament may vote the necessary supplies. England should be the first on the sea, and able to impose "pease by auctorite." She should establish herself more firmly at Calais; only the word Calais would be altered now and replaced by Gibraltar, Malta, Cyprus, or the Cape. The author enumerates the products of Prussia, Flanders, France, Spain, Portugal, Genoa, &c.; he has even information on the subject of Iceland, and its great cod-fish trade. He wishes for a spirited colonial policy; it is not yet a question of India, but only of Ireland; at any price "the wylde Iryshe" must be conquered.

He dwells at length on the misdeeds of the wicked Malouins, who are stopped by nothing, obey no one, and are protected by the innumerable rocks of their bays, amidst which they alone know the pa.s.sages.

Conclusion:

Kepte (keep) than the see about in specialle Whiche of England is the rounde walle; As thoughe England were lykened to a cite, And the walle enviroun were the see; Keep than the see that is the walle of Englond, And then is Englond kepte by G.o.ddes sonde.

The anxious injunctions scattered in the "Libelle" must not be taken, any more than Parliamentary speeches of later date, as implying that the nation had no confidence in itself. The instinct of nationality, formerly so vague, has grown from year to year since the Conquest: the English are now proud of everything English; they are proud of their navy, in spite of its defects; of their army, in spite of the reverses it suffered; of the wealth of the Commons; they even boast of their robbers. Anything one does should be well done; if they have thieves, these thieves will prove the best in the world. The testimony of Sir John Fortescue, knight, Lord Chief Justice, and Chancellor of England, who must have known about the thieves, is decisive on this point. He writes, in English prose, a treatise on absolute and limited monarchy[870]; admiration for his country breaks out on every page. It is the time of the Two Roses, but it matters little with him; like many others in his day, he does not pay while writing much attention to the Roses. England is the best governed country in the world; it has the best laws; the king can do nothing unless his people consent. In this manner a just balance is maintained: "Our Comons be riche, and therfor they gave to their kyng, at sum tymys quinsimes and dismes, and often tymys other grete subsydyes.... This might thay not have done, if they had ben empoveryshyd by their kyng, as the Comons of Fraunce." Fortescue puts forth a theory often confirmed since then: if the Commons rebel sometimes, it is not the pride of wealth that makes them, but tyranny; for, were they poor, revolts would be far more frequent: "If thay be not poer, thay will never aryse, but if their prince so leve Justice, that he gyve hymself al to tyrannye." It is true that the Commons of France do not rebel (Louis XI. then reigned at Plessis-lez-Tours); Fortescue is shocked at that, and remonstrates against their "lacke of harte."

Some people might say that there are a great many thieves in England.

They are numerous, Fortescue confesses, there is no doubt as to that; but the country finds in them one more cause to be proud: "It hath ben often seen in Englond that three or four thefes, for povertie hath sett upon seven or eight true men and robbyd them al." The thieves of France are incapable of such admirable boldness. On this account "it is right seld that French men be hangyd for robberye," says Fortescue, who had never, judging by the way he talks, pa.s.sed by Montfaucon, nor come across poor Villon; "thay have no hertys to do so terryble an acte.

There be therfor mo men hangyd in Englonde in a yere for robberye and manslaughter than their be hangid in Fraunce for such cause of crime in seven yers."[871] As a judge, Fortescue hangs the thieves; as an Englishman he admires their performances: the national robber is superior to all others. An engraving in _Punch_ represents a London drunkard carried off by two policemen; the street boys make comments: "They couldn't take my Father up like that," says one of them, "it takes six Policemen to run him in!" If this boy ever becomes Chief Justice, he will write, in the same spirit, another treatise like Fortescue's.

Thus is popularised in that century the art of prose; the uses made of it are not unprecedented, but they are far more frequent. This is one more sign that the nation settles and concentrates; does not stand on tiptoe, but sits comfortably. Previous examples are followed; there are schools of prose writers as of poets. Bishop Pec.o.c.k employs Wyclif's irony to defend what Wyclif had attacked; pilgrimages, friars, the possessions of the clergy, the statues and paintings in churches.[872]

His forcible eloquence is embittered by sarcasms; he continues a tradition, dear to the English race, and one which, constantly renewed, will come down to Swift and to the humourists of the eighteenth century. Boiling over with pa.s.sion, he does his best to speak coldly and without moving a finger. Wyclif wants everything to be found in the Bible, and forbids pilgrimages, which are not spoken of in it. But then, says Pec.o.c.k, we are greatly puzzled, for how should we dare to wear breeches, which the Bible does not mention either? How justify the use of clocks to know the hour? And with great seriousness, in a calm voice, he discusses the question: "For though in eeldist daies, and though in Scripture, mensioun is maad of orologis, schewing the houris of the dai bi the schadew maad bi the sunne in a cercle, certis nevere, save in late daies, was eny clok telling the houris of the dai and nyht bi peise and bi stroke; and open it is that noughwhere in holi scripture is expresse mensioun made of eny suche." Where does the Bible say that it should be translated into English?[873] In the same tone of voice Wyclif had pointed out, in the preceding century, the abuses of the Church; in the same tone of voice the author of "Gulliver" will point out, three centuries later, the happy use that might be made of Irish children as butcher's meat.

The thing to be remembered for the moment is that the number of prose-writers increases. They write more abundantly than formerly; they translate old treatises; they unveil the mysteries of hunting, fishing, and heraldry; they compose chronicles; they rid the language of its stiffness. To this contributes Sir Thomas Malory, with his compilation called "Morte d'Arthur," in which he includes the whole cycle of Britain. The work was published by Caxton, the first English printer, who was also a prose-writer.[874] They even write on love; prose now retaliates upon verse, and trespa.s.ses on the domains of poetry.[875]

The diminished importance of the n.o.bles and of the feudal aristocracy, the increased importance of the citizens and of the working cla.s.s, bring the various elements of the nation nearer to each other, and this fact will have a considerable effect on literature: the day will come when the same author can address the whole audience and write for the whole nation. In a hundred years it will be necessary to take into consideration the judgment of the English people, both "high men" and "low men," on intellectual things; there will stand in the pit a mob whose declared tastes and exigences will cause the most stubborn of the Elizabethan poets to yield. Ben Jonson will be less cla.s.sic and more English than he would have liked to be; he intended to introduce a chorus into his tragedy of "Seja.n.u.s"; the fear of the pit prevented him; he grumbles, but submits.[876] The thrift and the toil of the English peasant and craftsman in the fifteenth century had thus an unexpected influence on literature: they contributed to form an audience for Shakespeare.

IV.

The new times are preparing, in still another manner; the G.o.ds are to come down from Olympus and dwell once more among men.

While the ancient literature is dying out, another is growing which is to replace it in France, but which will continue it, transformed and rejuvenated, in England. Rome and Athens will give England a signal, not laws; but this signal is an important one; happy the nations who have heard it; it was the signal for awakening.

In that Italy visited by Chaucer in the fourteenth century, the pa.s.sion for antiquity goes on increasing; the Latins no longer suffice, the Greeks must be known. Petrarch worshipped a ma.n.u.script of Homer, but it was for him a dumb fetish: the fetish has now become a G.o.d, and utters oracles that all the world understands. The city of the Greek emperors is still standing, and there letters shine with a last l.u.s.tre. While the foe is at its gates, it rectifies its grammars, goes back to origins, rejects new words, and revives the ancient language of Demosthenes.

Never had the town of Constantine been more Greek than on the eve of its destruction.[877] The fame of its rhetoricians is spread abroad; men come from Italy to hear John Argyropoulos, the Chrysoloras, the famous Chrysococces, deacon of St. Sophia and chief Saccellary.

But the fatal hour is at hand, the era of the Crusades is over; an irresistible ebb has set in; Christendom draws back in its turn. No longer is it necessary to go to Jerusalem to battle against the infidel; he is found at Nicopolis and Kossovo. The ill.u.s.trious towns of the Greek world fall one after the other, and the exiled grammarians seek shelter with the literate tyrants of Italy, bringing with them their ma.n.u.scripts. Some, like Theodore Gaza, have been driven from Thessalonica, and teach at Mantua and at Sienna; others left after the fall of Trebizond.

On the throne of the Paleologues sits Constantine XII., Draga.s.ses. Brusa is no longer the capital of the Turks; they have left far behind them the town of the green mosques, of the great platanes and tombs of the caliphs, they have crossed the Bosphorus and are established at Salonica, Sophia, Philippopolis. Adrianople is their capital for the time being; Mahomet II. commands them. Opposite the "Castle of Asia,"

Anatoli Hissar, he has built on the Bosphorus the "Castle of Europe,"

Roumel Hissar, with rose-coloured towers; he is master of both sh.o.r.es.

He approaches nearer to the town, and draws up his troops under the wall facing Europe; he has a hundred and thirty cannon; he opens fire on the 11th of April, 1453. On the 28th of May, the Turks take up their positions for the onset; whilst in Byzantium a long procession of priests and monks, carrying the wood of the true cross, miraculous statues and relics of saints, wends its way for the last time. The a.s.sault begins at two o'clock in the morning; part of a wall, near the gate of St. Roma.n.u.s, falls in; the "Cercoporta" gate is taken. The struggle goes on in the heart of the town; the emperor is killed; the basilica erected by Justinian to Divine Wisdom, St. Sophia, which was in the morning filled with a praying mult.i.tude, contains now only corpses.

The smoke of an immense fire rises under the sky.

All that could flee exiled themselves; the Greeks flocked to Italy. Out of the plundered libraries came a number of ma.n.u.scripts, with which Nicholas V. and Bessarion enriched Rome and Venice. The result of the disaster was, for intellectual Europe, a new impulse given to cla.s.sic studies.

With the glare of the fire was mingled a light as of dawn; its rays were to illuminate Italy and France, and, further towards the North, England also.

FOOTNOTES:

[826] I try, repeatedly says Stephen Hawes,

To followe the trace and all the perfitnes Of my maister Lydgate.

"The Historie of Graund Amoure and La Bell Pucle, called the Pastime of Plesure, contayning the Knowledge of the Seven Sciences and the Course of Man's life in this Worlde," London, 1554, 4to, curious woodcuts (reprinted by the Percy Society, 1845, 8vo; the quotation above, p. 2).

It is an allegory of unendurable dulness, in which Graund Amoure (love of knowledge apparently) visits Science in the Tower of Doctrine, then Grammar, &c. Hawes lived under Henry VII.

[827] On the fabliaux introduced into England, see above, p. 225; the greater number of them are found in Hazlitt: "Remains of the early popular Poetry of England," London, 1864, 4 vols. One of the best, "The Wright's Chaste Wife," written in English, about 1462, by Adam de Cobsam, has been published by the Early English Text Society, ed.

Furnivall, 1865, with a supplement by Mr. Clouston, 1886; it is the old story of the honest woman, who dismisses her would-be lovers after having made fun of them. That story figures in the "Gesta Romanorum," in the "Arabian Nights," in the collection of Barbazan (story of Constant du Hamel). It has furnished Ma.s.singer with the subject of his play, "The Picture," and Musset with that of "la Quenouille de Barberine."--On the romances of chivalry, see above, pp. 219 ff. A great number of rhymed versions of these romances are of the fifteenth century.--Ex. of pious works in verse, of the same century: Th. Brampton, "Pharaphrase on the seven penitential psalms, 1414," Percy Society, 1842; Mirk, "Duties of a Parish Priest," ed. Peac.o.c.k, E.E.T.S., 1868, written about 1450; Capgrave (1394-1464), "Life of St. Katharine," ed. Horstmann and Furnivall, E.E.T.S., 1893 (various other edifying works by the same); many specimens of the same kind are unpublished.--Ex. of chronicles: Andrew de Wyntoun, "Orygynal Cronykil of Scotland," finished, about 1424, ed. Laing, Edinburgh, 1872 ff., 3 vols. 8vo; Hardyng (1378-1465?), "Chronicle in metre," London, 1543, 8vo. Hardyng sold for a large price, to the brave Talbot, who knew little about palaeography, spurious charters establishing England's sovereignty over Scotland; those charters exist at the Record Office, the fraud was proved by Palgrave.

All these chronicles are in "rym dogerel."

[828] "The Story of Thebes," by Lydgate (below p. 499); "The Tale of Beryn," with a prologue, where are related in a lively manner the adventures of the pilgrims in Canterbury and their visit to the cathedral (ed. Furnivall and Stone, Chaucer Society, 1876-87, 8vo); Henryson adds a canto to "Troilus" (below p. 507). Other poems are so much in the style of Chaucer that they were long attributed to him: "The Court of Love"; "The Flower and the Leaf"; "The Isle of Ladies, or Chaucer's Dream," &c. They are found in the Morris edition of Chaucer's works. All these poems are of the fifteenth century.

[829] Born about 1370, at Lydgate, near Newmarket; sojourned in Paris in 1426, died in 1446, or soon after. Concerning the chronological order of his works, and his versification, see "Lydgate's Temple of Glas," ed. J.

Schick, Early English Text Society, 1891, Introduction. His "Troy Book"

is of 1412-20; his "Story of Thebes," of 1420-22; his translation of Deguileville, of 1426-30; his "Fall of Princes" was written about 1430.

[830] He gave an English version of the famous story called in French, "Le Lai de l'Oiselet" (ed. G. Paris, 1884): "The Chorle and the Byrde."

[831] Ex. his picturesque "London Lickpenny."

[832] Same idea as in Villon; refrain:

All stant in chaunge like a mydsomer rose,

Halliwell, "Selections from Lydgate," 1840, p. 25.

[833] "Lydgate's aesop.u.b.ersetzung," ed. Sauerstein; "Anglia," 1866, p. 1; eight fables. He excuses himself:

Have me excused, I was born in Lydegate, Of Tullius gardyn I entrid nat the gate. (p. 2.)

[834]

O ye maysters, that cast shal yowre looke Upon this dyte made in wordis playne, Remembre sothely that I the refreyn tooke Of hym that was in makyng soverayne, My maister, Chaucier, chief poete of Bretayne.

Halliwell, "Selections from ... Lydgate," 1840, p. 128. Similar praise in the "Serpent of Division" (in prose). See L. Toulmin Smith, "Gorboduc," Heilbronn, 1883, p. xxi.

[835] The British Museum possesses a splendid copy of it (Royal 18 D ii., with miniatures of the time of the Renaissance, see above, p. 303).

The E.E.T.S. is preparing, 1894, an edition of it; there exist previous ones, the first of which is of 1500, "Here begynneth ... the Storye of Thebes," London, 4to.

[836] "Lydgate's Temple of Glas," ed. J. Schick, 1891, 8vo, Early English Text Society.

[837] First edition: "Here begynnethe the boke calledde John Bochas, descrivinge the Falle of Princes." [1494], folio.

[838]

Myn hand gan tremble, my penne I felte quake ...