The Blazing World and Other Writings (Penguin Classics)

by Cavendish, Margaret

  Madam, said he, how do you like the rare beauty which your husband doth admire so much, that he is jealous of all that look on her, and would extinguish the sight of all men’s eyes but his own, and challenges all that make love to her, threatens ruin and murder to those that pretend to marry her.

  Answered she, if he be so enamoured, I shall not wonder that my beauty is thought dead, my embraces cold, my discourse dull, my company troublesome to him, since his delight is abroad: but, said she, I am well served, I was weary of my old husband, and wished him dead, that I might marry a young one; I abhorred his old age, that was wise and experienced; despised his grey hairs, that should be reverenced with respect[.] O the happiness I rejected that I might have enjoyed! For he admired my beauty, praised my wit, gave me my will, observed my humour, sought me pleasures, took care of my health, desired my love, [was] proud of my favours, my mirth was his music, my smiles were his Heaven, my frowns were his Hell; when this man thinks me a chain that enslaves him, a shipwreck wherein all his happiness is drowned, a famine to his hopes, a plague to his desires, a Hell to his designs, a devil to damn his fruitions.

  Nay certainly, said he, that woman is the happiest that marries an ancient man; for he adores her virtue more than her beauty, and his love continues; though her beauty is gone[,] he sets a price of worth upon the honour and reputation of his wife, uses her civilly, and gives her respect, as gallant men ought to do to a tender sex, which makes others to do the like; when a young man thinks it a gallantry, and a manly action, to use his wife rudely, and worse than his lackey, to command imperiously, to neglect despisingly, making her the drudge in his family, flinging words of disgrace upon her, making her with scorn the mirth and pastime in his idle and foolish discourse amongst his vain and base companions; when an ancient man makes his wife the queen of his family, his mistress in his courtship, his goddess in his discourse, giving her praise, applauding her actions, magnifying her nature; her safety is the god of his courage, her honour the world to his ambition, her pleasure his only industry, her maintenance the mark for his prudence, her delights are the compass by which he sails, her love is his voyage, her advice his oracle; and doing this, he doth honour to himself, by setting a considerable value upon what is his own; when youth regards not the temper of her disposition, slights her noble nature, grows weary of her person, condemns her counsels, and is afraid his neighbours should think his wife wiser than himself, which is the mark of a fool, and a disease most men have (being married young). But a man in years is solid in his counsels, sober in his actions, graceful in his behaviour, wise in his discourse, temperate in his life, and seems as nature hath made him, masculine. When a young man is rash in his counsels, desperate in his actions, wild in his behaviour, vain in his discourses, debauched in his life, and appears not like his sex, but effeminate.

  A fair forehead, and a smooth skin, a rosy cheek, and a ruby lip, wanton eyes, a flattering tongue are unmanly, appearing like women or boys, let them never be so valiant; and that appears, as if they would sooner suffer the whip, than handle the sword.

  Where an ancient man, every wrinkle is a trench made by time, wherein lies experience to secure the life from errors; and their eyes are like active soldiers, who bow and sink down by the over-heavy burdens of their spoils, which are several objects that the sight carries into the brain, and delivers to the understanding, as trophies, to hang up in the magazine of the memory. His white hairs are the flags of peace, that time hangs out on the walls of wisdom, that advice and counsel may come from and to safely. Nay, the very infirmities of age seem manly; his feeble legs look as if they had been over-tired with long marches, in seeking out his foes; and his palsy hands, or head, the one seems as if they had been so often used in beating of their enemies, and the other in watching them, as they knew not what rest meant.

  Sir, said the Duchess, you commend aged husbands, and dispraise young ones, with such rhetoric, as I wish the one, and hate the other; and in pursuit of my hate, I will cross my husband’s amours as much as I can.

  In the meantime, the Duke was gone to the old gentleman, the young Lady’s uncle.

  Which when the old man saw him enter, he started, as if he had seen an evil he desired to shun.

  Sir, said he, what unlucky occasion brought you into my house?

  First, repentance, answered the Duke, and then love; and lastly, my respect which I owe as a duty. My repentance begs a forgiveness, my love offers you my advice and good counsel, my respect forewarns you of dangers and troubles that may come by the marriage of your niece to the Viceroy.

  Why? What danger, said he, can come in marrying my niece to a wise, honourable, rich, and powerful man, and a man that loves and admires her, that honours and respects me?

  But, said the Duke, put the case he be a covetous, jealous, froward, ill natured, and base cowardly man, shall she be happy with him?

  But he is not so, said he.

  But, answered the Duke, if I can prove him so, will you marry her to him?

  Pray, said he, spare your proofs of him, since you cannot prove yourself an honest man.

  Sir, said the Duke, love makes me endure a reproach patiently, when it concerns the beloved: but though it endures a reproach, it cannot endure a rival.

  Why, said the old gentleman, I hope you do not challenge an interest in my niece.

  Yes, said the Duke, but I do, and will maintain that interest with the power of my life, and never will quit it till death; and if my ghost could fight for her, it should.

  Heaven bless my niece, said the old gentleman: what is your design against her? Is it not enough to fling a disgrace of neglect on her, but you must ruin all her good fortunes? Is your malice so inveterate against my family, that you strive to pull it up by the roots, to cast it into the ditch of oblivion, or to fling it on the dunghill of scorn?

  Said the Duke, my design is to make her happy, if I can, to oppose all those that hinder her felicity, disturbing the content and peace of her mind, for she cannot love this man; besides, he disclaims her, and vows never to marry her.

  Sir, said the gentleman, I desire you to depart from my house, for you are a plague to me, and bring an evil infection.

  Sir, said the Duke, I will not go out of your house, nor depart from you, until you have granted my request.

  Why, said the gentleman, you will not threaten me?

  No, said the Duke, I do petition you.

  Said the gentleman, if you have any quarrel to me, I shall answer it with my sword in my hand; for though I have lost some strength with my years, yet I have not lost my courage; and when my limbs can fight no longer, the heat of my spirits shall consume you; besides, an honourable death I far prefer before a baffled life.

  Sir, said he, I come not to move your anger, but your pity, for the sorrows I am in, for the injuries I have done you; and if you will be pleased to take me into your favour, and assist me, by giving my wife, your niece, leave to claim the laws of marriage and right to me, all my life shall be studious to return gratitude, duty, and service.

  Yes, answered he, to divulge her disgrace, declaring your neglect in an open court, and to make myself a knave to break my promise.

  Sir, said the Duke, your disgrace by me is not so much as you apprehend; but it will be a great disgrace when it is known the Viceroy refuses her, as I can show you his hand to it; and if he deserts your niece, you are absolved of your promise made to him; and to let you know this is a truth, I say here is his hand.

  The whilst the old gentleman was reading the papers, the Viceroy comes in.

  O Sir, said he, you are timely come; is this your hand, says he?

  Yes, answered the Viceroy.

  And do you think it is honourably done, said the gentleman?

  Why, said the Viceroy, would you have me marry another man’s wife[?]

  Well, said the old gentleman, when your Viceroyship is out, as it is almost, I will give you my answer; till then, fare you well.

  But the Duke went to the youn
g Lady, and told her the progress he had had with her uncle, and his anger to the Viceroy.

  But after the old gentleman’s passion was abated towards the Duke, by his humble submission, and the passion inflamed towards the Viceroy, he hearkened to the lawsuit, being most persuaded by his niece’s affection, which he perceived was unalterably placed upon the Duke. And at last, advising all three together, they though it fit, since the parties must plead their own cause, to conceal their agreements, and to cover it by the Duke’s seeming dissent, lest he should be convicted as a breaker of the known laws, and so be liable to punishment, either by the hazard of his own life, or the price of a great fine.

  But after friends were made of all sides, the lawsuit was declared, which was a business of discourse to all the kingdom, and the place of judicature a meeting for all curious, inquisitive, and busiless people.

  When the day of hearing was come, there was a bar set out, where the Duke and the two ladies stood; and after all the judges were set, the young Lady thus spake.

  Grave Fathers, and most equal Judges,

  I come here to plead for right, undecked with eloquence, but truth needs no rhetoric, so that my cause will justify itself: but if my cause were foul, it were not pencilled words could make it seem so fair, as to delude your understanding eye.

  Besides, your Justice is so wise, as to fortify her forts with fortitude, to fill her magazine with temperance, to victual it with patience, to set sentinels of prudence, that falsehood might not surprise it, nor bribery corrupt it, nor fear starve it, nor pity undermine it, nor partiality blow it up; so that all right causes here are safe and secured from the enemies of injury and wrong. Wherefore, most reverend Fathers, if you will but hear my cause, you cannot but grant my suit.

  Whereupon the judges bid her declare her cause.

  Then thus it is.

  I was married to this Prince; ’tis true, I was but young in years when I did knit that wedlock knot; and though a child, yet since my vows were holy, which I made by virtue and religion, I am bound to seal that sacred bond with constancy, now I am come to years of knowing of good from evil.

  I am not only bound, most pious Judges, to keep my vow, in being chastely his, as long as he shall live, but to require him by the law, as a right of inheritance belonging to me, and only me, so long as I shall live, without a sharer or co-partner: so that this lady, which lays a claim, and challenges him as being her’s, can have no right to him, and therefore no law can plead for her; for should you cast aside your canon law,13 most pious Judges, and judge it by the common law,14 my suit must needs be granted, if Justice deals out right, and gives to truth her own; for should an heir, young, before he comes to years, run on the lender’s score, though the lender had no law to plead against nonage,15 yet if his nature be so just to seal the bonds he made in nonage, when he comes to full years, he makes his former act good, and fixes the law to a just grant, giving no room for cozenage16 to play a part, nor falsehood to appear. The like is my cause, most grave Fathers, for my friends chose me a husband, made a bond of matrimony, sealed it with the ceremony of the church, only they wanted my years of consent, which I, by an approvement, now set as my handwriting.

  Say the judges, what says the Duke? Then the Duke thus spake.

  I confess, I was contracted to this lady by all the sacred and most binding ceremonies of the church, but not with a free consent of mind; but being forced by duty to my father, who did not only command, but threatened me with his curse, he being then upon his deathbed, and I being afraid of a dying father’s curses, yielded to those actions which my affections and free will renounced; and after my father was dead, placing my affections upon another lady, married her, thinking myself not liable to the former contract, by reason the former contract was but of six years of age, whose nonage I thought was a warrantable cancel from the engagement.

  Most upright Judges,

  My nonage of years is not a sufficient bail to set him free, he being then of full age; nor can his fear of offending his parents, or his loving duty towards them, be a casting plea against me; his duty will not discharge his perjury, nor his fear could be no warrant to do a wrong; and if a fool by promise binds his life to inconveniencies, the laws that wise men made, must force him to keep it. And if a knave, by private and self-ends, doth make a promise, just laws must make him keep it.

  And if a coward make a promise through distracted fear, laws that carry more terrors, than the broken promise, profit, will make him keep it.

  But a wise, just, generous spirit will make no promise, but what he can, and durst, and will perform.

  But say a promise should pass through an ignorant zeal, and seeming good, yet a right honourable and noble mind will stick so fast to its engagement, that nothing shall hew them asunder; for a promise must neither be broken upon suspicion, nor false construction, nor enticing persuasions, nor threatening ruins, but it must be maintained with life, and kept by death, unless the promise[s] carry more malignity in the keeping them, than the breaking of them.

  I say not this to condemn the Duke, though I cannot applaud his secondary action concerning marriage; I know he is too noble to cancel that bond his conscience sealed before high Heaven, where angels stood as witnesses; nor can he make another contract until he is free from me; so that his vows to this lady were rather complemental, and love’s feignings, than really true, or so authentical to last; he built affections on a wrong foundation, or rather castles in the air, as lovers use to do, which vanish soon away; for where right is not, truth cannot be; wherefore she can claim no lawful marriage, unless he were a free man, not bound before; and he cannot be free, unless he hath my consent, which I will never give.

  Then the other lady spake.

  Noble Judges,

  This crafty, flattering, dissembling child lays a claim to my husband, who no way deserves him, she being of a low birth, and of too mean a breeding to be his wife; neither hath she any right to him in the law, she being too young to make a free choice, and to give a free consent. Besides, he doth disavow the act, by confessing the disagreeing thereto in his mind; and if she was to give a lawful consent, and his consent was seeming, not real, as being forced thereunto, it could not be a firm contract; wherefore, I beseech you, cast her suit from the bar, since it is of no validity.

  Just Judges, answered she,

  What though he secretly disliked of that act he made? Yet humane justice sentences not the thoughts, but acts; wherefore those words that plead his thoughts, ought to be waived as useless, and from the bar of justice cast aside.

  And now, most upright Judges, I must entreat your favour and your leave to answer this lady, whose passions have flung disgraces on me, which I, without the breach of incivility, may throw them off with scorn, if you allow me so to do.

  Said the Judges, we shall not countenance any disgrace, unless we knew it were a punishment for crimes; wherefore speak freely.

  Why then, to answer to this lady, that I am meanly both. ’Tis true, I came not from nobility, but I can draw a line of pedigree five hundred years in length from the root of merit, from whence gentility doth spring. This honour cannot be degraded by the displeasure of princes, it holds not the fee-simple from the crown,17 for time is the patron of gentility, and the older it groweth, the more beautiful it appears; and having such a father and mother as merit and time, gentry is fit and equal match for any, were they the rulers of the whole world.

  And whereas she says, most patient Judges, I am a false dissembling child[:] I answer, as to my childhood, it is true, I am young, and inexperienced, a child in understanding, as in years; but to be young, I hope it is no crime: but if it be, ’twas made by nature, not by me. And for dissembling, I have not had time enough to practice much deceit; my youth will witness for me, it is an art, not an inbred nature, and must be studied with pains, and watched with observation, before any can be master thereof. And I hope this assembly is so just, as not to impute my innocent simplicity to a subtle, crafty, or a deceivi
ng glass, to show the mind’s false face, making that fair, which in itself is foul. And whereas she says, I have been meanly bred, ’tis true, honoured Judges, I have been humbly bred, taught to obey superiors, and to reverence old age; to receive reproofs with thanks, to listen to wise instructions, to learn honest principles, to housewife time, making use of every minute; to be thrifty of my words, to be careful of my actions, to be modest in my behaviour, to be chaste in my thoughts, to be pious in my devotions, to be charitable to the distressed, to be courteous to inferiors, to be civil to strangers; for the truth is, I was not bred with splendrous vanities, nor learnt the pomp and pride of courts; I am ignorant of their factions, envies, and back-bitings, I know not the sound of their flattering tongues, I am unacquainted with their smiling faces, I have not wit to perceive their false hearts, my judgement is too young and too weak to fathom their deep and dangerous designs.