John Shelden and his table-talk

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Preface

To the younger class of readers at the present day John Selden is Httle more than a name. He is often spoken of, frequently quoted, but known to few. Like his great contemporary, Lord Bacon, for one that has read 'his w^orks a thousand have heard of his name. And precisely as Bacon is now known to most readers chiefly by his small volume of Essays, on w^hich he set least store, so is John Selden known, to those who read at all, by the short record of his Table- Talk^ of which he himself knew nothing. It not unfrequently happens that an author's fame rests chiefly on that work, or that part of his work, of which he himself thought little.

Now, as I feel convinced that John Selden, both as man and wTiter, ought to be better known, and that this knowledge is of the best and noblest, I have prepared this little work for those who know him only by name, or those who have no knowledge at all of him. As he lived and acted in an eventful period, and as his Table-Talk is one of those books which may be termed "the pre-

Preface

cious lifeblood of a master spirit," no man who wishes to know "the best that has been thought and said in the world" ought to be ignorant of it.

It is worth something to be able to listen to the table talk of a great man. Selden's talk, much of it, contains diamonds of thought set in the pure gold of common sense. And it will go hard if a knowledge of this man's life and character, together with his Talk, does not make a deep impression on the reader; it will go hard if some of these wise sayings and shrewd observations on men and events do not stick to him through life, and form a guide to action in those difficult and dangerous situations in which every man, more or less frequently, finds himself placed. I will guarantee that he who carefully peruses Selden's Table- Talk will lay it down a wiser* man than when he took it up.

So much for Selden. What the writer has added is only subsidiary and explanatory. The chapter on Table-Talk Books and that on Selden's Career are simply aids to a fuller comprehension and larger enjoyment of the Table-Talk ; and when this has been perused, the account of the wise old statesman's Closing Years will, it is hoped, cause

Preface

the reader to feel a personal, nay, an affectionate interest in the man himself.

As to the Table-Talk, nothing except a few passages on ecclesiastical matters, which are of little or no interest to modern readers, is omitted; so that the whole, as it stands, will, it is presumed, afford the reader a fair knowledge of the career, character, and conversation of this old English worthy, who, "though dead, yet speaketh," and who ought still to be listened to, especially by the descendants or the members of that race to

which he himself belonged. 5

Contents

I. Some Account of Bygone Table-Talk

Books o . . . . 9

II. The Career of John Selden - • - 35

II Selden 's Career

John Selden lived in the reigns of Elizabeth, James the First, Charles the First, and Cromwell (1584- 1659), and had not only a long, wide, and varied experience as scholar, writer, and statesman, but filled creditably various political and other important offices during this eventful period. Born of humble parents, in a hamlet on the coast of Sussex, young Selden after his first schooling determined to become a lawyer; and he soon found friends who sent him to Oxford, where he spent four years in hard study, and then came to the Inner Temple in London. Let me say here, for the benefit of the young reader, that this Inner Temple is one of the four Inns of Court — colleges in the metropolis where barristers and students of law resi*de while pursuing their professional studies. It is the joint property of two bodies, called the Honorable Societies of the Inner Temple and of the Middle Temple, who are the private proprietors of the build- 35 ings, and who exercise general supervision over the whole legal fraternity.

Here Selden made the acquaintance of several eminent men in his own profession, who were of considerable use to him in his mental development. An old chronicler tells us that ''it was the constant and almost daily habit of these great traders in learning to bring in their acquisitions in a common stock by natural communication [that is, by conversation] ; whereby each of them became, in a great measure, the participant and common possessor of each other's learning and knowledge."

A band of generous and noble-hearted fellows truly. Young Selden could not have had better associates; and I have no doubt he learned quite as much from them as he did from his professors at Oxford. For such companionship is often, as in the case of Goethe at Strasburg and Leipsic, the prime spring of a great man's intellectual development.

This age, the age of Shakespeare, has been

well termed the ''social age," or the "age of

conversation," in which men learned by

"natural communication" better than they

could have learned by any other means. The

students of this age did not read so much, 36 but they conversed more than those of our day, and that is how that unconscious learning was instilled into them which gave them that large power of utterance, that gift of good English speech, which is so characteristic of the writers and speakers of the Elizabethan age.

So it was here, while residing in the Temple, that Selden's learning began to attract attention; and it was probably through the friends he made here that he became acquainted with many of the literary celebrities of the day. For, according to Mr. Singer, one of his biographers, Selden appears to have become a member of the Mermaid Tavern Club, established by Sir Walter Raleigh, where those famous ''wit combats" between Shakespeare and Ben Jonson took place, and where the wits and poets of the day ''most did congregate." This Tavern gathering was probably the first of those English literary and social clubs which have since become so famous and so common, not only in England, but in America; and it is evident that Selden, being himself a good talker, loved to participate in the meetings of such a club, where not only wit and humor, but sound sense and extensive knowledge,

were often displayed.

Among the members of this club was Michael Drayton, with whom Selden became to a certain extent a colaborer; for he wrote the notes to Drayton's chief work, the 'Toly-Olbion," which notes are said to display great learning and wide research. And with another member, Ben Jonson, we know that he stood on the most familiar terms; for he borrowed books from Jonson, wrote complimentary verses for some of his works, and repeatedly speaks of the learned dramatist as his "beloved friend." When Ben Jonson was released from prison, where he had been confined for a time for some fancied insult, in one of his plays, to King James L, a banquet was given in honor of his deliverance, at which Selden was present, and where he doubtless showed his appreciation of his friend and his joy at his release from ''durance vile." Selden had also won the esteem and friendship of such solid men as Camden, Usher, Sir Robert Cotton, and Sir Henry Spelman. Unhappily, we find no mention of his acquaintance with Shakespeare (him, the greatest of them all, nobody seems to have known), although we find that, in later years, he was associated with Lord Bacon in preparing classical costumes

for a masque to be played before the king.

So that Seidell's personal acquaintance embraced not only the ablest lawyers and statesmen and the most gifted divines and scholars, but also the best wits and poets of the day. It is evident, as we shall see by and by, that he valued and cultivated the friendship of such men as among the most precious things in life.

Nor did he himself fall behind them in knowledge and ability; for he subsequently greatly distinguished himself by his knowledge and capacity as a jurist and statesman, as an expounder of international law, of national jurisprudence, of ancient custom and usage, and as a writer on legal, ecclesiastical, and political history.

A/[eanwhile years passed and times changed. Elizabeth and James were dead; and Charles the First, with his obstinate character and despotic notions of kingly government, was on the throne. Now began that tremendous struggle between king and parliament which fills so many pages in English history and which ended so gloriously for the people. Selden was in Parliament ; and though by no means a republican, he was decidedly liberal in his views, and an opponent of the king in all his arbitrary and tyrannical measures. So that in 1629 he 39 was, with five other members, thrown into the Tower, where he remained till 1633. His noble and eminent colleague, Sir John Eliot, died there, a martyr to liberty; but John Selden was not to be so easily crushed. He went bravely to work at his literary studies; relieved the tedium of the time by hard work with his pen ; and finally emerged, hale and hearty, with one or two new works, ready for the press, under his arm.

Selden was a constitutional lawyer and legislator. Whatever was according to the Constitution he favored; whatever was not, he opposed. When the king endeavored to levy taxes without the consent of Parliament, he opposed him; when he established the Star Chamber proceedings, he opposed him; but when the Puritans wished to dethrone him, he opposed them. Although he would limit the power of the king, he would neither dethrone him nor abolish the monarchy. Whatever was reasonable, he favored ; whatever was not, he opposed. You will see this in the Talks. He was not against the bishops as such, but he was opposed to their acting as legislators. He was emphatically a reasoning, thinking, welldisposed man, who favored whatever had

worked well so far, and opposed whatever 40 seemed to be of a dangerous character in the way of innovation.

In 1640 Selden had the high honor of being chosen to represent Oxford in Padiament; and here, by his great learning and ability and by the moderation of his counsels, he gained not only the esteem of his own party, the Conservative, but that of the other, the Puritan; for the leaders of the Puritan party as wxll as those of the Conservative frequently consulted him on points of law and on parliamentary practice. This is the famous Long Parliament, which makes such a figure in English history, and which passed laws and ordinances more radical perhaps than those passed by any other English Parliament that ever sat. Here Selden, though strongly favoring true reforms, acted rather as a wise guide and counselor than as a partisan leader ; for he stood on the law and Constitution of England, and would not depart from either on any account. He was equally opposed to the sweeping and radical changes of the Roundheads and the arbitrary and illegal measures of the Royalists ; he would neither dethrone the king nor agree to his despotic measures, but counseled patience, endurance, and toleration — acting and speaking, in both instances, with 41 that calmness and moderation, that firmness and abihty which ever distinguished him. 'Ill poh'tics," says Mr. Singer, ''Selden was ever inclined to moderation; and, leagued with a few true lovers of their country, he pursued a temperate and thoughtful course, as became a legislator and patriot." Other writers bear similar testimony to his moderation and wisdom. "He appeared in the great National Council," says a modern English writer, "not so much as the representative of the contemporary inhabitants of a particular city, as of all the people in past and present ages; concerning whom and whose institutions he was deemed to know whatever was to be known, and to be able to furnish whatever, within so vast a retrospect, was of a nature to give light and authority to statesmen in the decision of questions arising in a doubtful and hazardous state of the national affairs."

It Is certain that Selden, by his learning, moderation, and sound sense, exercised a restraining influence on the more radical leaders of that revolutionary period; it is certain that he helped to temper their zeal, which, without his influence, would have caused them to go beyond proper limits in

their efforts at reform. So that, had it not 42 been for him, and some others Hke him, this Barebones ParHament might have gone as far as the Sans Culottes National Assembly of France, and ruined everything in the way of good government. One of the fanatics in this Parliament proposed, for instance, the burning of the records in the Tower, as useless memorials, which Selden, by an eloquent and convincing speech, prevented; and another proposed the restriction and spoliation of the two great universities, Oxford and Cambridge, as useless and aristocratic institutions, which the same strong speaker, by an unanswerable argument and a moving appeal to the reason and common sense of his colleagues, also prevented. Fortunate it was that there were men in that Parliament capable of listening to reason and sound sense; else the revolution of 1640 might have presented in English history a spectacle quite as appalling as that of 1789 in the history of France.

Mr. Matthew Arnold, while trying to show that the Puritans, whatever other good qualities they possessed, had no love of beauty, says : 'Tet us go to facts. Charles the First, who, with all his faults, had the just idea that art and letters are great civilizers, made, as you know, a famous collec- 43 tion of pictures — our first National Gallery. It was, I suppose, the best collection at that time north of the Alps. It contained nine Raphaels, eleven Correggios, and twentyeight Titians. What became of that collection? The journals of the House of Commons will tell you. There you may see the Puritan Parliament disposing of this Whitehall or York House collection as follows: 'Ordered, that all such pictures and statues there as are without any superstition, shall be forthwith sold. . . . Ordered, that all such pictures there as have the representation of the Second Person in Trinity (Christ) upon them, shall be forthwith burnt. Ordered, that all such pictures there as have the representation of the Virgin Mary upon them, shall be forthwith burnt.' ''

Selden, it appears, was powerless to prevent this piece of vandalism; but it shows what kind of men he had to contend with. Few men, I imagine, ever found themselves among such uncongenial colleagues as Selden did in this Puritan Parliament ; and it is no wonder he was strongly opposed to many of their measures.

The course which Selden recommends in religion he probably followed also in politics: *'Be sure you keep to what is settled, 44 and then you may flourish on your various lections." Instead of tearing things up by the roots, and creating general disorder, he endeavored to maintain the restrictions of the Constitution, and to modify and improve the existing laws and institutions to suit the time; in other words, he tried to make the settled things work satisfactorily, without detriment to individual liberty, and without disturbing the peace and prosperity of the country.

Although he opposed the king in his illegal and unconstitutional measures, he would not deprive him of all power, nor deprive him of his rightful authority, but strove to make him walk within constitutional limits. In this endeavor, however, he failed; for the king would not listen to anything of the kind ; nor would his adherents. Besides, his majesty's word could not be depended on; he made promises to the Parliament which he never did and never intended to keep; so a change of dynasty seemed absolutely necessary, and it came. Cromwell and his party were triumphant, and the king and his party were overthrown. I cannot help feeling, however, that the company that gathered round Selden was of a

nobler character, animated by purer motives, 45 and inspired by greater and higher wisdom, than that which gathered round Cromwell, who surrounded himself by men of a violent and fanatical character. Had Charles and his family been banished the kingdom, and allowed to work out his foolish notions abroad, the English republic would probably have lasted longer than it did, and the king would never have been venerated and worshiped as a martyr, as he afterward was. (and is) by many thousands of Englishmen.

Selden saw clearly that the clergy and the laity could not, in the making of laws, work well together ; hence his strong opposition to the bishops' sitting in Parliament, to the collection of tithes, and to other ecclesiastical abuses of the time. But he would not, like the Roundheads, have the bishops or the Church or the monarchy altogether abolished ; he was not an enemy either to the Church or to the monarchy, but simply to abuses in the same; he strove, by every means in his power, to restrain both the Church and the king within their proper spheres, and to make them work according to the spirit and intention of the laws of England. Thus his views satisfied neither party, and he consequently succeeded in

making many enemies in both. 46

To show how sharply he turned the edge of the logic of the Roundheads against themselves, one or two examples will suffice. When Alderman Pennington rose, in the House of Commons, and said: "Mr. Speaker, there are so many clamors against such and such of the prelates, that we shall never be quiet till we have no more bishops," Mr. Selden rose and desired the House to observe "what grievous complaints there were for high misdemeanors against such and such of the aldermen ; and therefore, by a parity of reasoning, it is my humble motion that we have no more aldermen."

When certain sectarian ministers presented a remonstrance to Parliament respecting Church government, the debate proceeded upon the right of bishops to suspend the inferior clergy from the" performance of their ministerial duties. In opposition to this right. Sir H. Grimstone employed the following logic : "That bishops are jure divino (of divine institution) is a question; that archbishops are not jiii^e divino is out of question; now that bishops, who are questioned whether jure divino or not, or archbishops, who out of question are not jure divino, should suspend ministers, who are jure divino, I leave to be considered." 4 47

To which Selden thus replied : 'That the Convocation [an assembly of clergy and laity, called by the Crown or the Parliament, to form or revise the laws and liturgy of the Church] is jure divino is a question; that Parliaments are not jure divino is out of question; that religion is jure divino there is no question. Now, sir, that the Convocation, which is questionable whether jure divino or not, and Parliaments, which out of question are not jure divino, should meddle with religion, which, questionless, is jure divino, I leave to your consideration."

Sir H. Grimstone, pursuing his argument, observed "that archbishops are not bishops." To which Selden replied : ''That is not otherwise true than that judges are no lawyers, and aldermen no citizens."

In a synod of divines and laymen, assembled at Westminster in 1643 ''to settle the grievances and the liturgy of the Church of England," Mr. Selden was a member; and when, as Sir John Birkenhead reports, "the Commons tired him with their new laws, these brethren [of the synod] refreshed him with their mad gospel. They were graveled lately between Jerusalem and Jericho; they knew not the distance between these two

places ; one cried twenty miles ; another ten ; 48 then it was concluded seven, for this reason, that fish zms brought from Jericho to Jerusalem market. Whereupon Mr. Selden smiled, and said, 'Perhaps the fish was salt fish;' and so stopped their mouths."

Whitelock, the historian, speaking of this Assembly, says : "Selden spoke admirably, and confuted them in their own learning. Sometimes, when they had cited a text of Scripture to prove their assertion, he would tell them, 'Perhaps in your little pocketbibles with gilt leaves (which they would often pull out and read) the translation may be thus and thus, but the Greek or Hebrew signifies thus or thus;' and so would silence them."

Thus it will be seen that Selden, in wit as well as in learning and argument, was more than a match for his opponents. He would not, however, go far enough, on either side, to please either party; and probably it was well he did not, for there were plenty of others ready to go all lengths, to suit their purpose ; so that a restraining hand was salutary and needful on these zealots.

Although Selden stood firmly, on general principles, for king, lords, and commons, and was ever inclined to be liberal and progressive in legislative enactments, it is not sur- 49 prising to find that, when Charles was overthrown, he was not in favor of his execution, nor of the abohtion of the monarchy, nor of the demoHtion of the Church. He saw that this would be the ruin not only of many good things, but of many good people, whom he esteemed and loved. It was during this critical period that he endeavored to save, and did save, many of his loyal friends and supporters from utter ruin and disgrace, and acted as a pacificator and mediator in the midst of the triumphant party. One of these, as we shall see, was Archbishop Usher, the famous Irish prelate. But when Cromwell requested him to answer the Eikon Basilikc — the king's defense of himself, as written by one of his bishops — Selden declined the task, and doubtless thereby lost much favor in the eyes of the powerful Protector. This was too radical a piece of work for him; he could not undertake it with a good conscience or wath proper self-respect ; so the work was given to a more thoroughgoing reformer, a true republican as well as a poet, John Milton, who put his whole heart and soul into it, and produced that masterpiece of political controversy, Eikonoklastes, which was read by all Europe, and which produced a profound impression wherever it 50 was read. This work was, like that to which it was an answer, written in Latin; since it was intended for all the learned and governing heads in Europe, with whom Latin was in those days a universal accomplishment. And when it is remembered that Milton was Cromwell's Latin secretary — for all the foreign despatches were, at that time and long afterward, written in Latin — it will be evident that Cromwell had not far to seek nor long to wait for a defender who could perform the task to his entire satisfaction. The reader who is familiar with the life of Milton will remember that the poet had at one time contemplated writing his great epic. Paradise Lost, in Latin, which it was well he did not attempt, for no man can write so well in a foreign language as he can in his own.

Some writers have sneered at Selden as the Erasmus of the English political reformation; but those who speak in this way have no real knowledge of the time, nor of the true merits of either Erasmus or Selden. Both men performed a great educational work for their age; and because Erasmus could not go as far as Luther, nor Selden as far as Cromwell, no judicious or well-informed critic can blame either. Both had great merits, great learning, and great talents 51 of their own, which they used for their country and kind as best they could ; and because they did not use their talents and their learning in precisely the same w^ay in which others did, or in furthering precisely the same objects, surely this is no reason for condemning their actions altogether.

Though Selden could not approve of all the acts of the Cromwellians, he was ever the determined enemy of misgovernment, of tyranny, of sectarian bigotry, and of wrong in every shape. Had he had his way, the Puritans would never have been persecuted, nor the Presbyterians oppressed and tortured, nor the people taxed without their consent. We must never forget that Selden was one of the prosecutors of the infamous Duke of Buckingham, one of the defenders of the patriotic Hampden, one of the original framers of the memorable Petition of Right, which is a corner stone of English political liberty. Selden's speech in support of this Petition is characterized as an unanswerable argument; and when we consider the important and far-reaching results of that Petition, it is probably not too much to say that every free man, both in England and America, owes him a debt of gratitude

for his efforts in the cause of liberty.

So much for Selden as a man and legislator; now for his character as a writer and talker. His influence as a legislator, which was great in his own day, has extended down to ours, and his influence as a talker, which was great in his lifetime, and has been considerable since his death, will extend probably far into the future. Had he not been a good as well as a great man he would never have commanded the respect and influence he did command; nor do I think that any man, however great his abilities, can command a wide and beneficial influence without being at the same time a good man. ''A corrupt tree cannot bring forth good fruit;" "neither do men gather grapes of thorns, nor figs of thistles." Dean Swift, it is true, is still read; his marvelous style, rare genius, and brilliant wit will ever command attention; but who has ever felt himself uplifted or edified by anything written by Dean Swift? The most touching lesson taught by this unhappy man is that afforded by his melancholy and unhappy life.

Lord Clarendon, who, though generally opposed to Selden in politics, remained his lifelong friend (a circumstance highly creditable to the character of both men), thus describes him : ''Mr. Selden was a per- 53 son whom no character can flatter, or transmit in any expression equal to his merit and virtue. He was of such stupendous learning in all kinds and in all languages, that a man would have thought he had been entirely conversant among books, and had never spent an hour but in reading and writing; yet his humanity, courtesy, and affability were such, that he would have been thought to have been bred in the best courts, but that his good nature, charity, delight in doing good, and in communicating all he knew exceeded that breeding. His style, in all his writings, seems harsh and sometimes obscure, which is not wholly to be attributed to the abstruse subjects of which he commonly treated, but to a little undervaluing of style, and to too much propensity to the language of antiquity; but in his conversation he zvas the most clear discourser, and had the best facidty of making hard things easy, and of presenting them clearly to the understanding, of any man that hath been knozvn." This criticism is certainly justified by a comparison of his writings with his talk. But of this presently.

''By a vote of the House of Commons, November 8, 1643," says Mr. Singer, ''Selden was appointed Keeper of the Records in 54 the Tower — an office for which he was pecuharly fitted, and which probably furnished him with an excuse for gradually withdrawing from the political vortex, where he found himself almost alone in his position as a moderator. Yet upon important occasions he was still to be found at his post, as long as he thought he could be useful."

This office he seems to have resigned in 1645, i-ipon the passing of the Self-Denying Ordinance ; and he appears after this period to have devoted himself almost entirely to literary pursuits and learned researches. We find him occasionally assisting ecclesiastical and other friends who had fallen into disfavor with the government, and aiding all efforts to advance learning and literature; but otherwise he seems to have devoted himself to his books, living quietly in the household of the Duchess of Kent, where he often met and entertained his friends, and where he died in 1654. I shall, after we have made some acquaintance with his Table Talk, give some details of his closing years, which will, I think, be read with more interest when we have become a little better acquainted with

the spirit and thought of the man.

III

Origin of the Table-Talk — Secret of ITS Popularity — Parallel between Selden and Johnson ,

Selden's Table Talk was taken down by the Rev. Richard Milward, who had been his amanuensis and daily companion for over twenty years, and who declared that "the sense and notion" of the Talk are "wholly his," and "most of the words." The work was not published till nine years after the death of the compiler (1689), which was thirty-five years after the death of the author. It is recognized as an authentic record, confirmed by the evidence of the work itself and by the testimony of those who knew Selden personally. To Milward, who was the only man among Selden's numerous friends who had the good sense and the ability to make some record of his conversation, the world owes a debt of gratitude, and his name should be held in kindly remembrance by all