Literary character of men of genius : drawn from their own feelings and confessions / by Isaac Disraeli.
- Isaac D'Israeli
- Date:
- [1881?]
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: Literary character of men of genius : drawn from their own feelings and confessions / by Isaac Disraeli. Source: Wellcome Collection.
446/488 page 426
![diicinp; lines which j'cflect the mind of their author. I find in a MS. these couplets^ whieli condense an impressive thought on a favourite subject:— Crownes have their corapasse, length of dales their date, Ti-iuinphs their torahes, Felicitie her fate ; Of more than earth, can earth make none partaker ; But knowledge makes the king most like his Alaker. * These are among the elevated conceptions the king had formed of the character of a sovereign, and the feeling was ever present in his mind. James has preserved an anecdote of lleniy VIII., in commenting on it, which serves our ])Ui7)ose:— “ It was strange,” said James I., “ to look into the life of Henry VIII., how like an epicure he lived! Henry once asked, whetlier he might bo saved ? He was answered, ‘ That ho had no cause to fear, liaving lived so mighty a king.’ ‘ Jlut, oh 1’ said he, ‘ 1 have lived too like a king.’ He should rather have said, not like a king—for the office of a king is to do justice and equity; but he only served his sensuality, like a beast.” Henry VII. was the favourite character of James I.; and it was to gratify the king that Lord Bacon wrote the life of this wise and prudent monarch. It is remarkable of James T., that ho never mentioned the name of Elizabeth without some e.vpressive epithet of reverence; such as, “ The late queen of famous memorya cii’cumstance not common among kings, w ho do not like to remind the world of the reputation of a great predecessor. But it suited the generous temper of that man to extol the greatness he admired, whose philosophic toleration was often known to have pardoned the libel on himself for the redeeming virtue of its epigram. In his for- giving temper, James I. would call such eliusions “ the super- fiuities of idle brains.” “THE BOOK OF SPOETS.” But while the mild government of tliis monarch has been covered with the political odium of arbitrary power, he has also incurred a religious one, from his desi^ of rendering the Sabbath a day for the poor alike of devotion and eirjoyment, hitherto praetised in England, as it is still thi'oughout • “Harl. MSS.,” 6824.](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b24851590_0446.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
