Deny it to a king? Then happy low, lie down! SHAKESPEARE "King Henry IV.," Part II. 1. Boor, in addition. 2. Low, the lowly persons of humble station. BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH OF LORD EDWARD HYDE, Earl of Clarendon, was born at Dinton, in Throughout the civil wars between Charles I. and his Parliament, he served the royal cause with zeal and devotion. After the death of Charles I., Edward Hyde shared the exile of Charles II. and upon the Restoration received many rewards and dignities, among others, the title of Earl of Clarendon ; but he was afterwards disgraced and banished. His chief literary work is a "History of the Great Rebellion," as he termed the great and successful struggle for English liberty; and from that history the following extract is taken. THE CHARACTER AND DEATH OF LORD FALKLAND. LUCIUS CARY, Viscount Falkland, was born in the year 1610, and was slain at the battle of Newbury, 1644. During the civil war he embraced the king's part, but would countenance no underhand proceedings, and was deeply distressed at the sight of the evils that menaced 1 his country, the contemplation of which quite broke his spirits. Lord Falkland possessed one of those characters of rare excellence, that win the respect and esteem of men of all ranks, ages, and political opinions. For our knowledge of this fine character we are chiefly indebted to his friend and contemporary2 Lord Clarendon, who thus writes of him : In this unhappy battle (of Newbury) was slain the Lord Viscount Falkland, a person of such prodigious parts of learning and knowledge, of that inimitable 3 sweetness and delight in conversation, of so flowing and obliging a humanity and goodness to mankind, and of that primitive simplicity and integrity of life, that if there were no other brand upon this odious and accursed civil war than that single loss, it must be most infamous and execrable to all posterity. Before this Parliament, his condition of life was so happy, that it was hardly capable of improvement. Before he came to be twenty years of age, he was master of a noble fortune; which descended to him through the gift of a grandfather, without passing through his father or mother, who were then both alive. His education for some years had been in Ireland, where his father was Lord-Deputy, so that when he returned into England, to the possession of his fortune, he was unentangled with any acquaintance or friends, which usually grow up by the custom of conversation, and therefore was free to make a pure election of his company, which he chose by other rules than were prescribed to the young nobility of that time. And it cannot be denied, though he admitted some few to his friendship for the agreeableness of their natures, and their undoubted affection for him, that his familiarity and friendship, for the most part, was with men of eminent and sublime parts, and of untouched reputation in point of integrity. : He had a courage of the most clear and keen temper, and so far from fear, that he seemed not without some appetite of danger; and therefore, upon any occasion of action, he always engaged his person in those troops which he thought, by the forwardness of the commanders, to be most like to be farthest engaged and in all such encounters, he had about him an extraordinary cheerfulness, without at all affecting the execution that usually attended them, in which he took no delight, but took pains to prevent it, where it was not by resistance made necessary; insomuch that at Edgehill, when the enemy was routed, he was like to have incurred great peril by interposing to save those who had thrown away their arms, and against whom, it may be, others were more fierce for their having thrown them away; so that a man might think he came into the field chiefly out of curiosity to see the face of danger, and charity to prevent the shedding of blood. From the entrance into this unnatural war, his natural cheerfulness and vivacity grew clouded, and a kind of sadness and dejection of spirit stole upon him which he had never been used to; yet, being one of those who believed, that one battle would end all differences, and that there would be so great a victory on the one side that the other would be compelled to submit to any conditions from the victor (which supposition and conclusion generally sank into the minds of most men, and prevented the looking after many advantages, that might then have been laid hold of), he resisted those indispositions. 5 But after the furious resolution of the two Houses not to admit any treaty for peace, those indispositions, which had before touched him, grew into a perfect habit of uncheerfulness, and he, who had been. so exactly easy and affable to all men, that his face and countenance was always present and vacant to his com pany, and held any cloudiness or less pleasantness of the visage a kind of rudeness or incivility, became, on a sudden, less communicable, and thence very sad, pale, and exceedingly affected with the spleen." In his clothes and habit, which he had minded before with more neatness, and industry, and expense, than is usual to so great a soul, he was now not only incurious, but too negligent; and in his reception of suitors, and the necessary or casual addresses to his place, so quick, and sharp, and severe, that there wanted not some men (strangers to his nature and disposition) who believed him proud and imperious-faults from which no mortal man was ever more free. When there was any overture or hope of peace, he would be more erect and vigorous, and exceedingly solicitous to press anything, which he thought might promote it; and, sitting among his friends, would with a shrill and sad accent utter the word, Peace, peace; and would passionately profess, "that the very agony of the war, and the view of the calamities and desolation the kingdom did and must endure, took his sleep from him, and would shortly break his heart." This made some think, or pretend to think, "that he was so much enamoured of peace, that he would have been glad the King should have bought it at any price," which was a most unreasonable calumny. As if a man that was himself most punctual and precise in every circumstance that might reflect upon conscience or honour, could have wished the King to have committed a trespass against either. And yet this senseless scandal made some impression upon him, or at least he used it for an excuse of the daringness of his spirit; for at the siege before. Gloucester, when his friend passionately reprehended 8 him for exposing his person unnecessarily to danger (for he delighted to visit the trenches and nearest approaches, and discover what the enemy did), as being so much beside the duty of his place, that it might be understood rather to be against it, he would say merrily, "that his office could not take away the privilege of his age, and that a secretary in war might be present at the greatest secret in danger," but withal alleged seriously, that it concerned him more to be active in enterprises of hazard than most men, that all might see that his impatience for peace proceeded not from pusillanimity 10 or fear to adventure his own person. In the morning before the battle, as always upon action, he was very cheerful, and put himself in the front rank of the Lord Byron's regiment, then advancing upon the enemy, who had lined the hedges on both sides with musketeers; from whence he was shot with a musket in the lower part of the body, and in the instant, falling from his horse; his corpse was not found till the next morning, till when there was some hope that he might have been a prisoner, though his nearest friends, who knew his temper, received small comfort from that imagination. Thus fell that incomparable 11 young man, in the four-and-thirtieth year of his age, having so much dispatched the true business of life, that the eldest rarely attain to that immense knowledge, and the youngest enter not into the world with more innocency. Whosoever leads such a life needs be the less anxious upon how short a warning it is taken from him. "The Great Rebellion," by LORD CLARENDON. 1. MENACED, threatened. 2. CONTEMPORARY, one who lives at the same time with another. (Lat. con, together; tempus, time.) 3. INIMITABLE, surpassingly excellent; that which cannot be imitated. 4. EXECRABLE, accursed; lit., excluded from what is sacred. (Lat. ex, from; sacer, sacred.) |