Chapter IV: Part 4

About the year 1613 Kepler quitted Prague, after a residence of eleven years, to assume a professorship in the University of Linz. The year preceding his departure saw him involved in great domestic distress. Want of money, sickness, the occupation of the city by a turbulent army, the death of his wife and of the son whom he best loved, these, he says to a correspondent, “were reasons enough why I should have overlooked not only your letter, but even astronomy itself.” His first marriage, contracted early in life, had not been a happy one: but he resolved on a second venture, and no less than eleven ladies were successively the objects of his thoughts. After rejecting, or being rejected, by the whole number, he at last settled on her who stood fifth in the list; a woman of humble station, but, according to his own account, possessed of qualities likely to wear well in a poor man’s house. He employed the judgment and the mediation of his friends largely in this delicate matter: and in a letter to the Baron Strahlendorf, he has given a full and amusing account of the process of his courtships, and the qualifications of the ladies among whom his judgment wavered. He proposed to one lady whom he had not seen for six years, and was rejected: on paying her a visit soon after, he found, to his great relief, that she had not a single pleasing point about her. Another was too proud of her birth; another too old; another married a more ardent lover, while Kepler was speculating whether he would take her or not; and a fifth punished the indecision which he had shown towards others by alternations of consent and denial, until after a three months’ courtship, the longest in the list, he gave her up in despair.

Kepler did not long hold his professorship at Linz. Some religious opinions relative to the doctrine of transubstantiation gave offence to the Roman Catholic party, and he was excommunicated. In 1617 he received an invitation to fill the chair of mathematics at Bologna: this however he declined, pleading his German origin and predilections, and his German habits of freedom in speech and manners, which he thought likely to expose him to persecution or reproach in Italy. In 1618 he published his Epitome of the Copernican system, a summary of his philosophical opinions, drawn up in the form of question and answer. In 1619 appeared his celebrated work ‘Harmonice Mundi,’ dedicated to King James I. of England; a book strongly illustrative of the peculiarities of Kepler’s mind, combining the accuracy of geometric science with the wildest metaphysical doctrines, and visionary theories of celestial influences. The two first books are almost strictly geometrical; the third treats of music; for the fourth and fifth, we take refuge from explaining their subjects in transcribing the author’s exposition of their contents. “The fourth, metaphysical, psychological, and astrological, on the mental essence of harmonies, and of their kinds in the world, especially on the harmony of rays emanating on the earth from the heavenly bodies, and on their effect in nature, and on the sublunary and human soul; the fifth, astronomical and metaphysical, on the very exquisite harmonies of the celestial motions, and the origin of the eccentricities in harmonious proportions.” This work, however, is remarkable for containing amid the varied extravagances of its two last books, the third of Kepler’s Laws, namely, that the squares of the periods of the planets’ revolution vary as the cubes of their distances from the sun; a discovery in which he exulted with no measured joy. “It is now eighteen months since I got the first glimpse of light, three months since the dawn, very few days since the unveiled sun, most admirable to gaze upon, burst out upon me. Nothing holds me; I will indulge in my sacred fury; I will triumph over mankind by the honest confession that I have stolen the golden vases of the Egyptians, to build up a tabernacle for my God far away from the confines of Egypt. If you forgive me, I rejoice; if you are angry, I can bear it: the die is cast, the book is written; to be read either now or by posterity, I care not which: it may well wait a century for a reader, as God has waited six thousand years for an observer.”

The substance of Kepler’s astrological opinions is contained in this work. It is remarkable that one whose candour and good faith are so conspicuous, one so intent on correcting his various theories by observation and experience, should have given in to this now generally rejected system of imposture and credulity; nay should profess to have been forced to adopt it from direct and positive observations. “A most unfailing experience (as far as can be hoped in natural phenomena), of the excitement of sublunary nature by the conjunctions and aspects of the planets, has instructed and compelled my unwilling belief.” At the same time he professed through life a supreme contempt for the common herd of nativity casters, and claimed to be the creator of a “new and most true philosophy, a tender plant which, like all other novelties, ought to be carefully nursed and cherished.” His plant was rooted in the sand, and it has perished; nor is it important to explain the fine-spun differences by which his own astrological belief was separated from another not more baseless. Poor through life, he relieved his ever recurring wants by astrological calculations: and he enjoyed considerable reputation in this line, and received ample remuneration for his predictions. It was principally as astrologers that both Tycho Brahe and Kepler were valued by the Emperor Rudolph: and it was in the same capacity that the latter was afterwards entertained by Wallenstein. One circumstance may suggest a doubt whether his predictions were always scrupulously honest. From the year 1617 to 1620, he published an annual Ephemeris, concerning which he writes thus: “In order to pay the expense of the Ephemeris for these two years, I have also written a _vile prophesying almanac_, which is hardly more respectable than begging; unless it be because it saves the Emperor’s credit, who abandons me entirely, and, with all his frequent and recent orders in council, would suffer me to perish with hunger.” Poverty is a hard task-master; yet Kepler should not have condescended to become the Francis Moore of his day.

In 1620, Kepler was strongly urged by Sir Henry Wotton, then ambassador to Venice, to take refuge in England from the difficulties which beset him. This invitation was not open to the objections which had deterred him from accepting an appointment in Italy: but love of his native land prevailed to make him decline it also. He continued to weary the Imperial Government with solicitations for money to defray the expense of the Rudolphine Tables, which were not printed until 1627. These were the first calculated on the supposition of elliptic orbits, and contain, besides tables of the sun and planets, logarithmic and other tables to facilitate calculation, the places of one thousand stars as determined by Tycho, and a table of refractions. Similar tables of the planetary motions had been constructed by Ptolemy, and reproduced with alterations in the thirteenth century under the direction of Alphonso, King of Castile. Others, called the Prussian Tables, had been calculated after the discoveries of Copernicus, by two of that great astronomer’s pupils. All these, however, were superseded in consequence of the observations of Tycho Brahe, observations far more accurate than had ever before been made: and for the publication of the Rudolphine Tables alone, which for a long time continued unsurpassed in exactness, the name of Kepler would deserve honourable remembrance.

Kepler was the first of the Germans to appreciate and use Napier’s invention of logarithms: and he himself calculated and published a series, under the title ‘Chilias Logarithmorum,’ in 1624. Not long after the Rudolphine Tables were printed, he received permission from the Emperor Ferdinand to attach himself to the celebrated Wallenstein, a firm believer in the science of divination by the stars. In him Kepler found a more munificent patron than he had yet enjoyed; and by his influence he was appointed to a professorship at the University of Rostock, in the Duchy of Mecklenburgh. But the niggardliness of the Imperial Court, which kept him starving through life, was in some sense the cause of his death. He had claims on it to the amount of eight thousand crowns, which he took a journey to Ratisbon to enforce, but without success. Fatigue or disappointment brought on a fever which put an end to his life in November, 1630, in his 59th year. A plain stone, with a simple inscription, marked his grave in St. Peter’s church-yard, in that city. Within seventy paces of it, a marble monument has been erected to him in the Botanic Garden, by a late Bishop of Constance. He left a wife and numerous family ill provided for. His voluminous manuscripts are now deposited in the Imperial Library of St. Petersburg. Only one volume of letters, in folio, has been published from them; and out of these the chief materials for his biography have been extracted.

SIR MATTHEW HALE.

Matthew Hale was born on the 1st of November, 1609, at Alderley, a small village situated in Gloucestershire, about two miles from Wotton-under-Edge. His father, Robert Hale, was a barrister of Lincoln’s Inn, and his mother, whose maiden name was Poyntz, belonged to an ancient and respectable family which had resided for several generations at Iron Acton. Hale’s father is represented to have been a man of such scrupulous delicacy of conscience, that he abandoned his profession, because he thought that some things, of ordinary practice in the law, were inconsistent with that literal and precise observance of truth which he conceived to be the duty of a Christian. “He gave over his practice,” says Burnet, in his Life of Hale, “because he could not understand the reason of giving colour in pleadings, which, as he thought, was to tell a lie.”

_Engraved by J. W. Cook._

HALE.

_From an original Picture in the Library
of Lincolns Inn._

Under the Superintendance of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful
Knowledge.

_London, Published by Charles Knight, Ludgate Street, & Pall Mall
East._
]

Hale had the misfortune to lose both his parents very early in life, his mother dying before he was three years old, and his father before he had attained his fifth year. Under the direction of his father’s will he was committed to the care of a near relation, Anthony Kingscote, Esq., of Kingscote in Gloucestershire. This gentleman, being inclined to the religious doctrines and discipline of the Puritans, placed him in a school belonging to that party; and, intending to educate him for a clergyman, entered him in 1626, at Magdalen Hall in Oxford. The strictness and formality of his early education seem to have inclined him to run into the opposite extreme at the university, when he became to a certain extent his own master. He is said to have been very fond at this time of theatrical amusements, and of fencing, and other martial exercises; and giving up the design of becoming a divine, he at one time determined to pass over into the Netherlands, and to enlist as a volunteer in the army of the Prince of Orange. An accidental circumstance diverted him from this resolution. He became involved in a lawsuit with a gentleman in Gloucestershire, who laid claim to part of his paternal estate; and his guardian, being a man of retired habits, was unwilling to undertake the task of personally superintending the proceedings on his behalf. It became necessary therefore that Hale, though then only twenty years old, should leave the university and repair to London for the purpose of arranging his defence. His professional adviser on this occasion was Serjeant Glanville, a learned and distinguished lawyer; who, being struck by the clearness of his young client’s understanding, and by his peculiar aptitude of mind for the study of the law, prevailed upon him to abandon his military project, and to enter himself at one of the Inns of Court with the view of being called to the bar. He accordingly became a member of the society of Lincoln’s Inn in Michaelmas term 1629, and immediately applied himself with unusual assiduity to professional studies. At this period of his life, he is said to have read for several years at the rate of sixteen hours a day.

During his residence as a student in Lincoln’s Inn, an incident occurred which recalled a certain seriousness of demeanour, for which he had been remarkable as a boy, and gave birth to that profound piety which in after-life was a marked feature in his character. Being engaged with several other young students at a tavern in the neighbourhood of London, one of his companions drank to such excess that he fell suddenly from his chair in a kind of fit, and for some time seemed to be dead. After assisting the rest of the party to restore the young man to his senses, in which they at length succeeded, though he still remained in a state of great danger, Hale, who was deeply impressed with the circumstance, retired into another room, and falling upon his knees prayed earnestly to God that his friend’s life might be spared; and solemnly vowed that he would never again be a party to similar excess, nor encourage intemperance by drinking a health again as long as he lived. His companion recovered, and to the end of life Hale scrupulously kept his vow. This was afterwards a source of much inconvenience to him, when the reign of licentiousness commenced, upon the restoration of Charles II.; and drinking the King’s health to intoxication was considered as one of the tests of loyalty in politics, and of orthodoxy in religion.

His rapid proficiency in legal studies not only justified and confirmed the good opinion which had been formed of him by his early friend and patron, Serjeant Glanville, but also introduced him to the favourable notice of several of the most distinguished lawyers of that day. Noy, the Attorney-General, who some years afterwards devised the odious scheme of ship-money, and who, while he is called by Lord Clarendon “a morose and proud man,” is also represented by him as an “able and learned lawyer,” took particular notice of Hale, and advised and assisted him in his studies. At this time also he became intimate with Selden, who, though much older than himself, honoured him with his patronage and friendship. He was induced by the advice and example of this great man to extend his reading beyond the contracted sphere of his professional studies, to enlarge and strengthen his reasoning powers by philosophical inquiries, and to store his mind with a variety of general knowledge. The variety of his pursuits at this period of life was remarkable: anatomy, physiology, and divinity formed part only of his extensive course of reading; and by his subsequent writings it is made manifest that his knowledge of these subjects was by no means superficial.

The exact period at which Hale was called to the bar is not given by any of his biographers; and in consequence of the non-arrangement of the earlier records at Lincoln’s Inn, it cannot be readily ascertained. It is probable however that he commenced the actual practice of his profession about the year 1636. It is plain that he very soon attained considerable reputation in it, from his having been employed in most of the celebrated trials arising out of the troubles consequent on the meeting of Parliament in 1640. His prudence and political moderation, together with his great legal and constitutional knowledge, pointed him out as a valuable advocate for such of the court party as were brought to public trial. Bishop Burnet says that he was assigned as counsel for Lord Strafford, in 1640. This does not appear from the reports of that trial, nor is it on record that he was expressly assigned as Strafford’s counsel by the House of Lords: but he may have been privately retained by that nobleman to assist in preparing his defence. In 1643 however he was expressly appointed by both Houses of Parliament as counsel for Archbishop Laud: and the argument of Mr. Herne, the senior counsel, an elaborate and lucid piece of legal reasoning, is said, but on no certain authority, to have been drawn up by Hale. In 1647 he was appointed one of the counsel for the Eleven members: and he is said to have been afterwards retained for the defence of Charles I. in the High Court of Justice: but as the King refused to own the jurisdiction of the tribunal, his counsel took no public part in the proceedings. He was also retained after the King’s death by the Duke of Hamilton, when brought to trial for treason, in taking up arms against the Parliament. Burnet mentions other instances, but these are enough to prove his high reputation for fidelity and courage, as well as learning.

In the year 1643 Hale took the covenant as prescribed by the Parliament, and appeared more than once with other laymen in the assembly of divines. In 1651 he took the “Engagement to be faithful and true to the Commonwealth without a King and House of Lords,” which, as Mr. Justice Foster observes, “in the sense of those who imposed it, was plainly an engagement for abolishing kingly government, or at least for supporting the abolition of it.” In consequence of his compliance in this respect he was allowed to practise at the bar, and was shortly afterwards appointed a member of the commission for considering of the reformation of the law. The precise part taken by Hale in the deliberations of that body cannot now be ascertained; and indeed there are no records of the mode in which they conducted their inquiries, and, with a few exceptions, no details of the specific measures of reform introduced by them. A comparison, however, of the machinery of courts of justice during the reign of Charles I., and their practice and general conduct during the Commonwealth, and immediately after the Restoration, will afford convincing proofs that during the interregnum improvements of great importance were effected; improvements which must have been devised, matured, and carried into execution by minds of no common wisdom, devoted to the subject with extraordinary industry and reflection.

It was unquestionably with the view of restoring a respect for the administration of justice, which had been wholly lost during the reign of Charles I., and giving popularity and moral strength to his own government, that Cromwell determined to place such men as Hale on the benches of the different courts. Hale however had at first many scruples concerning the propriety of acting under a commission from an usurper; and it was not without much hesitation, that he at length yielded to the importunity of Cromwell and the urgent advice and entreaties of his friends; who, thinking it no small security to the nation to have a man of his integrity and high character on the bench, spared no pains to satisfy his conscientious scruples. He was made a serjeant, and raised to the bench of the Court of Common Pleas in January, 1653–4.

Soon after he became a judge he was returned to Cromwell’s first Parliament of five months, as one of the knights of the shire for the county of Gloucester, but he does not appear to have taken a very active part in the proceedings of that assembly. Burnet says that “he, with a great many others, came to parliaments, more out of a design to hinder mischief than to do much good.” On one occasion, however, he did a service to his country, for which all subsequent generations have reason to be grateful, by opposing the proposition of a party of frantic enthusiasts to destroy the records in the Tower and other depositories, as remnants of feudality and barbarism. Hale displayed the folly, injustice, and mischief of this proposition with such authority and clearness of argument, that he carried the opinions of all reasonable members with him; and in the end those who had introduced the measure were well satisfied to withdraw it. That his political opinions at this time were not republican, is evident from a motion introduced by him, that the legislative authority should be affirmed to be in the Parliament, and an individual with powers limited by the Parliament; but that the military power should for the present remain with the Protector. He had no seat in the second Parliament of the Protectorate, called in 1656; but when a new Parliament was summoned upon the death of Cromwell in January, 1658–9, he represented the University of Oxford.

His judicial conduct during the Commonwealth is represented by contemporaries of all parties as scrupulously just, and nobly independent. Several instances are related of his resolute refusal to submit the free administration of the law to the arbitrary dictation of the Protector. On one occasion of this kind, which occurred on the circuit, a jury had been packed by express directions from Cromwell. Hale discharged the jury on discovering this circumstance, and refused to try the cause. When he returned to London, the Protector severely reprimanded him, telling him that “he was not fit to be a judge;” to which Hale only replied that “it was very true.”

It appears that at this period, he, in common with several other judges, had strong objections to being employed by Cromwell as commissioners on the trial of persons taken in open resistance to his authority. After the suppression of the feeble and ineffectual rebellion in 1655, in which the unfortunate Colonel Penruddock, with many other gentlemen of rank and distinction, appeared in arms for the King in the western counties, a special commission issued for the trial of the offenders at Exeter, in which Hale’s name was inserted. He happened to be spending the Lent vacation at his house at Alderley, to which place an express was sent to require his attendance; but he plainly refused to go, excusing himself on the ground that four terms and two circuits in the year were a sufficient devotion of his time to his judicial duties, and that the intervals were already too small for the arrangement of his private affairs; “but,” says Burnet, “if he had been urged to it, he would not have been afraid of speaking more clearly.”

He continued to occupy his place as a judge of the Common Pleas until the death of the Protector; but when a new commission from Richard Cromwell was offered to him, he declined to receive it: and though strongly urged by other judges, as well as his personal friends, to accept the office on patriotic grounds, he firmly adhered to his first resolution, saying that “he could act no longer under such authority.”

In the year 1660 Hale was again returned by his native county of Gloucester to serve in the Parliament, or Convention, by which Charles II. was recalled. On the discussion of the means by which this event should be brought about, Hale proposed that a committee should be appointed to look into the propositions and concessions offered by Charles I. during the war, particularly at the treaty of Newport, from whence they might form reasonable conditions to be sent over to the King. The motion was successfully opposed by Monk, who urged the danger which might arise, in the present state of the army and the nation, if any delay should occur in the immediate settlement of the government. “This,” says Burnet, “was echoed with such a shout over the House, that the motion was no longer insisted on.” It can hardly be doubted that most of the destructive errors of the reign of Charles II. would have been spared, if express restrictions had been imposed upon him before he was permitted to assume the reins of government. On the other hand it has been justly said, that the time was critical; that at that precise moment the army and the nation, equally weary of the scenes of confusion and misrule which had succeeded to Richard Cromwell’s abdication, agreed upon the proposed scheme; but that if delay had been interposed, and if debates had arisen in Parliament, the dormant spirit of party would in all probability have been awakened, the opportunity would have been lost, and the restoration might after all have been prevented. These arguments, when urged by Monk to those who were suffering under a pressing evil, and had only a prospective and contingent danger before them, were plausible and convincing; but to those in after times who have marked the actual consequences of recalling the King without expressly limiting and defining his authority, as displayed in the miserable and disgraceful events of his “wicked, turbulent, and sanguinary reign,” and in the necessary occurrence of another revolution within thirty years from the Restoration, it will probably appear that our ancestors paid rather too dearly on that occasion for the advantages of an immediate settlement of the nation.

Immediately after the restoration of the King in May, 1668, Lord Clarendon, being appointed Lord Chancellor, sought to give strength and stability to the new government, by carefully providing for the due administration of justice. With this view, he placed men distinguished for their learning and high judicial character upon the benches of the different courts. Amongst other eminent lawyers, who had forsaken their profession during the latter period of the Commonwealth, he determined to recall Hale from his retirement, and offered him the appointment of Lord Chief Baron. But it was not without great difficulty that Hale was induced to return to the labours of public life. A curious original paper containing his “reasons why he desired to be spared from any place of public employment,” was published some years ago by Mr. Hargrave, in the preface to his collection of law tracts. Amongst these reasons, which were stated with the characteristic simplicity of this great man, he urged “the smallness of his estate, being not above £500 per annum, six children unprovided for, and a debt of £1000 lying upon him; that he was not so well able to endure travel and pains as formerly; that his constitution of body required some ease and relaxation; and that he had of late time declined the study of the law, and principally applied himself to other studies, now more easy, grateful, and seasonable for him.” He alludes also to two “infirmities, which make him unfit for that employment, first, an aversion to the pomp and grandeur necessarily incident to it; and secondly, too much pity, clemency, and tenderness in cases of life, which might prove an unserviceable temper.” “But if,” he concludes, “after all this, there must be a necessity of undertaking an employment, I desire that it may be in such a court and way as may be most suitable to my course of studies and education, and that it may be the lowest place that may be, to avoid envy. One of his Majesty’s counsel in ordinary, or at most, the place of a puisne judge in the Common Pleas, would suit me best.” His scruples were however eventually overcome, and on the 7th of November, 1660, he accepted the appointment of Lord Chief Baron: Lord Clarendon saying as he delivered his commission to him that “if the King could have found an honester and fitter man for that employment he would not have advanced him to it; and that he had therefore preferred him, because he knew no other who deserved it so well.” Shortly afterwards he reluctantly received the honour of knighthood.

The trials of the regicides took place in the October immediately preceding his appointment, and his name appears among the commissioners on that occasion. There is however no reason to suppose that he was actually present; his name is not mentioned in any of the reports, either as interfering in the proceedings themselves, or assisting at the previous consultations of the judges; and it can hardly be doubted but that, if he had taken a part in the trials, he would have been included with Sir Orlando Bridgeman and several others in the bitter remarks made by Ludlow on their conduct in this respect. It has been the invariable practice from very early times to the present day, to include the twelve judges in all commissions of Oyer and Terminer, for London and Middlesex; and as, at the time of the trials in question, only eight judges had been appointed, it is probable that Hale and the other three judges elect were named in the commission, though their patents were not made out till the following term, in order to preserve as nearly as possible the ancient form.

Sir Matthew Hale held the office of Lord Chief Baron till the year 1671; and during that period greatly raised the character of the court in which he presided, by his unwearied patience and industry, the mildness of his manners, and the inflexible integrity of his judicial conduct. His impartiality in deciding cases in the Exchequer where the interests of the Crown were concerned, is admitted even by Roger North, who elsewhere charges him with holding “demagogical principles,” and with the “foible of leaning towards the popular.” “I have heard Lord Guilford say,” says this agreeable but partial writer, “that while Hale was Chief Baron of the Exchequer, by means of his great learning, even against his inclination, he did the Crown more justice in that court, than any others in his place had done with all their good-will and less knowledge.”

Whilst he was Chief Baron he was called upon to preside at the trial of two unhappy women who were indicted at the Assizes at Bury St. Edmunds, in the year 1665, for the crime of witchcraft. The Chief Baron is reported to have told the jury that, “he made no doubt at all that there were such creatures as witches,” and the women were found guilty and afterwards executed. The conduct of Hale on this occasion has been the subject of much sarcastic animadversion. It might be said in reply, that the report of the case in the State Trials is of no authority whatever; but supposing it to be accurate, it would be unjust and unreasonable to impute to Sir Matthew Hale as personal superstition or prejudice, a mere participation in the prevailing and almost universal belief of the times in which he lived. The majority of his contemporaries, even among persons of education and refinement, were firm believers in witchcraft; and though Lord Guilford rejected this belief, Roger North admits that he dared not to avow his infidelity in this respect in public, as it would have exposed him to the imputation of irreligion. Numerous instances might be given to show the general prevalence at that time of this stupid and ignorant superstition; and therefore the opinion of Hale on this subject does not appear to be a proof of peculiar weakness or credulity.

On the occurrence of the great fire of London in 1666, an act of parliament passed containing directions and arrangements for rebuilding the city. By a clause in this statute, the judges were authorized to sit singly to decide on the amount of compensation due to persons, whose premises were taken by the corporation in furtherance of the intended improvements. Sir Matthew Hale applied himself with his usual diligence and patience to the discharge of this laborious and extrajudicial duty. “He was,” says Baxter, “the great instrument for rebuilding London; for it was he that was the constant judge, who for nothing followed the work, and by his prudence and justice removed a multitude of great impediments.”

In the year 1671, upon the death of Sir John Kelyng, Chief Justice of the Court of King’s Bench, Sir Matthew Hale was removed from the Exchequer to succeed him. The particular circumstances which caused his elevation to this laborious and responsible situation at a time when his growing infirmities induced him to seek a total retirement from public life, are not recorded by any of his biographers. For four years after he became Chief Justice he regularly attended to the duties of his court, and his name appears in all the reported cases in the Court of King’s Bench, until the close of the year 1675. About that time he was attacked by an inflammation of the diaphragm, a painful and languishing disease, from which he constantly predicted that he should not recover. It produced so entire a prostration of strength, that he was unable to walk up Westminster Hall to his court without being supported by his servants. “He resolved,” says Baxter, “that the place should not be a burden to him, nor he to it,” and therefore made an earnest application to the Lord Keeper Finch for his dismission. This being delayed for some time, and finding himself totally unequal to the toil of business, he at length, in February 1676, tendered the surrender of his patent personally to the King, who received it graciously and kindly, and promised to continue his pension during his life.

On his retirement from office, he occupied at first a house at Acton which he had taken from Richard Baxter, who says “it was one of the meanest houses he had ever lived in; in that house,” he adds, “he liveth contentedly, without any pomp, and without costly or troublesome retinue of visitors, but not without charity to the poor; he continueth the study of mathematics and physics still as his great delight. It is not the least of my pleasure that I have lived some years in his more than ordinary love and friendship, and that we are now waiting which shall be first in heaven; whither he saith he is going with full content and acquiescence in the will of a gracious God, and doubts not but we shall shortly live together.” Not long before his death he removed from Acton to his own house at Alderley, intending to die there; and having a few days before gone to the parish church-yard and chosen his grave, he sunk under a united attack of asthma and dropsy, on Christmas-day, 1676.

The judicial character of Sir Matthew Hale was without reproach. His profound knowledge of the law rendered him an object of universal respect to the profession; whilst his patience, conciliatory manners, and rigid impartiality engaged the good opinion of all classes of men. As a proof of this, it is said that as he successively removed from the Court of Common Pleas to the Exchequer, and from thence to the King’s Bench, the mass of business always followed him; so that the court in which he presided was constantly the favourite one with counsel, attorneys, and parties. Perhaps indeed no judge has ever been so generally and unobjectionably popular. His address was copious and impressive, but at times slow and embarrassed: Baxter says “he was a man of no quick utterance, and often hesitant; but spake with great reason.” This account of his mode of speaking is confirmed by Roger North, who adds, however, that “his stop for a word by the produce always paid for the delay; and on some occasions he would utter sentences heroic.” His reputation as a legal and constitutional writer is in no degree inferior to his character as a judge. From the time it was published to the present day, his history of the Pleas of the Crown has always been considered as a book of the highest authority, and is referred to in courts of justice with as great confidence and respect as the formal records of judicial opinions. His Treatises on the Jurisdiction of the Lords’ House of Parliament, and on Maritime Law, which were first published by Mr. Hargrave more than a century after Sir Matthew Hale’s death, are works of first-rate excellence as legal arguments, and are invaluable as repositories of the learning of centuries, which the industry and research of the author had collected.

After his retirement from public life, he wrote his great work called ‘The primitive Origination of Mankind, considered and examined according to the light of nature.’ Various opinions have been formed upon the merits of this treatise. Roger North depreciates the substance of the book, but commends its style; while Bishop Burnet and Dr. Birch greatly praise its learning and force of reasoning.

Sir Matthew Hale was twice married. By his first wife, who was a daughter of Sir Henry Moore of Faley in Berkshire, he had ten children, most of whom turned out ill. His second wife, according to Roger North, was “his own servant maid;” and Baxter says, “some made it a scandal, but his wisdom chose it for his convenience, that in his age he married a woman of no estate, to be to him as a nurse.” Hale gives her a high character in his will, as “a most dutiful, faithful, and loving wife,” making her one of his executors, and intrusting her with the education of his grand-children. He bequeathed his collection of manuscripts, which he says had cost him much industry and expense, to the Society of Lincoln’s Inn, in whose library they are carefully preserved.

The published biographies of Hale are extremely imperfect, none of them containing a particular account of his personal history and character. Bishop Burnet’s Life is the most generally known, and, though far too panegyrical and partial, is perhaps the most complete; it has been closely followed by most of his subsequent biographers. In Baxter’s Appendix to the Life of Hale, and in his account of his own Life, the reader will find some interesting details respecting his domestic and personal habits; and Roger North’s Life of Lord Guilford contains many amusing, though ill-natured and sarcastic anecdotes of this admirable judge.

_Engraved by J. Thomson._

FRANKLIN.

_From an original Picture by J. A. Duplesis in the possession of M.
Barnet
Consul General for the United States of America at Paris._

Under the Superintendance of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful
Knowledge.

_London, Published by Charles Knight, Ludgate Street, & Pall Mall
East._
]

FRANKLIN.

Benjamin Franklin was born at Boston in New England, January 6, 1706. His father was a non-conformist, who had emigrated in 1682, and followed the trade of a tallow-chandler. Benjamin was one of the youngest of fourteen children, and, being intended for the ministry, was sent for a year to the Boston Grammar School; after which, poverty compelled his father to remove him, at ten years old, to assist in his business. The boy disliked this occupation so much, that he was bound apprentice to an elder brother, who was just established at Boston as a printer. Though but twelve years of age, he soon learnt all his brother could teach him; but the harsh treatment he met with, which he says first inspired him with a hatred for tyranny, made him resolve to emancipate himself on the first opportunity. All his leisure time was spent in reading; and having exhausted his small stock of books, he resorted to a singular expedient to supply himself with more. Having been attracted by a treatise on the advantages of a vegetable diet, he determined to adopt it, and offered to provide for himself, on condition of receiving half the weekly sum expended on his board. His brother willingly consented; and by living entirely on vegetables he contrived to save half his pittance to gratify his voracious appetite for reading. He continued the practice for several years, and attributes to it his habitual temperance and indifference to the delicacies of the table.

Some time before this the elder Franklin had set up a newspaper, the second ever published in America, which eventually gave Benjamin a pretext for breaking through the trammels of his apprenticeship. In consequence of some remarks which gave offence to the provincial authorities, the former was imprisoned under a warrant from the Speaker of the Assembly; and his discharge was accompanied with an order, that “James Franklin should no longer print the New England Courant.” In this dilemma the brothers agreed that it should be printed for the future in Benjamin’s name; and to avoid the censure that might fall on the elder as printing it by his apprentice, the old indenture was cancelled, and a new one signed which was to be kept secret; but fresh disputes arising, Benjamin took advantage of the transaction to assert his freedom, presuming that his brother would not dare to produce the secret articles. Expostulation was vain; but the brother took care to spread such reports as prevented him from getting employment at Boston. He determined therefore to go elsewhere; and, having sold his books to raise a little money, he set off without the knowledge of his friends, and wandered by way of New York to Philadelphia, where he found himself at seventeen with a single dollar in his pocket, friendless and unknown. He succeeded, however, at last in procuring employment with a printer of the name of Keimer, with whom he remained seven months. By some accident he was thrown in the way of the Governor, Sir William Keith, who promised to be of service to him in his business, if he could persuade his father to establish him in Philadelphia. His father, however, refused to advance any money, thinking him too young to be established in a concern of his own. He therefore once more engaged himself with Keimer, and remained with him a year and a half.

The favour of the Governor, who promised him introductions and a letter of credit, led Franklin to undertake a voyage to England, with a view of improving himself in his trade, and procuring a set of types. But he was severely disappointed, when, at the end of the voyage, upon applying to the Captain who carried the Governor’s despatches, he learnt that there were no letters for him, and that Governor Keith was one of that large class of persons who are more ready to excite expectations than to fulfil them. He soon however got employment, and, with frugality, contrived to maintain both himself and his friend Ralph, who had accompanied him to England on a literary speculation, which, after many failures in verse and prose, procured him at last a nook in the Dunciad, and a pension from the Prince of Wales, whose cause he had espoused in print against George II.

During his voyage he attracted the notice of a merchant named Denham, who, again meeting him in London, became fond of him, and engaged his services as a clerk. After remaining a year and a half in London, he returned with Mr. Denham to Philadelphia. During this voyage he drew up a scheme for self-examination, and several prudent rules for the guidance of his future conduct, to which he steadily adhered through life. Indeed the remarkable success of most of his undertakings may be traced in a great measure to this faculty of profiting early by the lessons of experience, and abiding rigorously by a resolution once made.

He had scarcely returned half a year when his patron died, leaving him again on the world at the age of twenty-one. But he had now acquired so much skill in his business, that he was gladly received at advanced wages into Keimer’s printing-house.

About this time he set on foot a club, called “The Junto,” consisting of twelve persons of his own age, most of whom proved eminent men in after-life. This association had much influence on his fortunes, particularly when, having quarrelled with Keimer, he was induced to establish himself in partnership with a fellow-journeyman named Meredith, and needed both interest and money. By 1729 he had saved enough to buy out his partner, and make himself sole proprietor of the printing-house. In the following year he married a young woman named Reade, to whom he had been attached before he went to England.

In 1732 he began to publish ‘Poor Richard’s Almanack.’ It was interspersed with many prudential maxims, which were printed with additions, in a collected form, in 1757, and have been translated into many languages. The annual sale of this Almanack reached 10,000 copies, and, as it was continued for twenty-five years, was very profitable to the author.

In 1736 he was appointed Clerk to the Assembly of Pennsylvania, and obtained their printing. The next year he was made Deputy Postmaster, and introduced so many judicious reforms into his department, that it began to bring in a considerable revenue, though up to that time it had before barely paid its own expenses. He also carried into effect many improvements at Philadelphia, as his credit with his fellow-townsmen increased; invariably taking care to introduce them as “the idea of a few friends,” or “the plan of some public spirited persons,” thus avoiding the odium which attaches to the corrector of abuses, and eventually securing the credit of having made useful suggestions. In these schemes he was well seconded by the “Junto.” Some of them were—Institutions for watching, paving, and lighting the city; the Union Fire Company, still, we believe, in useful operation; a Philosophical Society; an Academy for Education, now grown up into the University of Pennsylvania; and the City Hospital. But many of these improvements were brought forward at a later period; for until 1748, when he took a partner, his time was almost exclusively occupied in his printing-office.

Being now, comparatively, a man of leisure, he devoted more attention to philosophical pursuits and to public business, for which his fellow-citizens began to find his habits and talents exceedingly well suited. He became, in succession, magistrate, alderman, and member of the Assembly; and nothing of importance was transacted without his assistance or advice.

The first public mission in which he was engaged, was to a tribe of Indians in 1750, which was successful. In 1753 he was appointed Postmaster-General, with a salary of £300 a year.

The next year he produced a plan for the union of the American Provinces, for mutual defence against an apprehended invasion by the French from the Canada frontier. This seems to have been the first time that such an idea was broached; and, as he was fond of saying, like all good motions it was kept alive, though not carried into effect at the time.

Pennsylvania was then ruled by an Assembly elected annually, and a Governor appointed by the descendants of William Penn, who resided in England, and were the feudal lords of the soil. This anomalous kind of government naturally led to misunderstandings, which were among the causes that mainly contributed to alienate the affections of the provinces from the mother country. The Proprietaries, as they were called, laid claim to immunity from taxation, upon grounds which the Assembly refused to admit; and the Governor and his officers taking part with the Proprietaries, to whom they were indebted for their appointments, a controversy grew up, which was never entirely disposed of while the connexion with Great Britain subsisted. In this dispute Franklin took an active share, and sided with the opposition, rejecting frequent overtures from the government; with which, however, he continued to keep on good terms, never losing sight of the duty of a citizen, in supporting the authority of the laws, and defending the state against its foreign and domestic enemies by his writings and example. In following this course on various occasions, especially that of the French invasion from Canada, he not only warmly exerted himself in person, but advanced a good deal of money, which, to the disgrace of the British Government, was never wholly repaid.

In 1757 he was appointed to manage the controversy with the Proprietaries in England. Thither he accordingly repaired after some vexatious delays, and proceeded in the object of his mission with his accustomed energy; and though he met with many obstacles, his efforts were at length successful, and the Penns gave up their claim to be exempt from contributing to the burdens of the state. But they still held the power of appointing the Governor, which the Province wished to be transferred to the Crown, and the dispute was afterwards renewed. The conduct of Franklin in this affair gained him so much credit in America, that he received the additional appointments of Agent for Maryland, Massachusetts, and Georgia, each of which provinces had grievances of its own requiring redress.

During this absence in England, Franklin was presented by the Universities of St. Andrew’s and Oxford with the degree of D.C.L., and took his place as Fellow of the Royal Society, which honour, with many similar distinctions, had been conferred upon him some years before for his discoveries in electricity. The chief of these were, the identity of electricity with lightning, and the mode of protecting buildings by pointed metallic conductors. The simplification which he effected in the theory of electricity, by showing how all the phenomena are explicable by the hypothesis of a single electric fluid, forms a remarkable example of philosophical generalization, and a lasting monument of its author’s genius[3]. He was also consulted on American affairs by Lord Chatham, who, by his advice, as it is believed, withdrew a part of the British force then acting with the King of Prussia, and directed it with so much secrecy and success against Canada, that the French had no intelligence of the danger of the province till they heard of its irretrievable loss.

Footnote 3:

See the Library of Useful Knowledge—Treatise on Electricity, § 48, &c.

In the summer of 1762 he returned to Philadelphia, where he received public thanks, and a grant of £5000 for his services. His popularity was such, that he had been re-elected annually to the Assembly, and he immediately resumed the active part which he had formerly taken in its proceedings.

Among other projects for reform, that relating to the appointment of Governor, which the Proprietaries seem to have exercised with very little regard to the public interest, gave rise to much stormy discussion during the next two years. Franklin’s share in it procured him many enemies, who succeeded in preventing his election in 1764. Yet, a strong petition to the Crown on the subject having been disregarded, he was a second time appointed agent for enforcing the views of the Assembly upon the authorities in England. When there, he by no means limited his exertions to this narrow point: minor dissensions were now merging in the final struggle for national independence, to which the passing of the Grenville Stamp Act in 1763 gave the immediate impulse. Franklin reprobated this tax as arbitrary and illegal, when it was first reported to the Assembly; and his writings in the papers against it with his examination in Parliament, are thought to have contributed much to its repeal under the Rockingham administration, in 1766.

In this and the three next years he paid several visits to the Continent, where he was received with much distinction. He began already to record his observations upon the part the different powers would be likely to take in case of a rupture between England and her colonies: an event which a thorough knowledge of the temper of both led him, even thus early, to contemplate as by no means improbable. The closure of the port of Boston in 1773, and the quartering of troops in the town, filled up the measure of discontent. Franklin was then agent for three provinces besides Pennsylvania; and their remonstrances, which he lost no opportunity of forcing on the attention of the English public as well as the Government, found in him a most efficient supporter. At length, finding all his efforts to bring about a reconciliation entirely fruitless, and having met with much misconstruction and personal indignity at the hands of successive administrations, he resigned his agencies and set sail for Philadelphia, where he arrived in the spring of 1775, after an absence of eleven years.

In the preceding autumn a Congress of delegates from the Assemblies of all the provinces, the idea of which seems to have originated with Franklin, had met at Philadelphia; and their first act was to sign a Declaration of Rights, which had been transmitted to Franklin and the other agents for presentation. The day after his return he was himself elected to serve in this Congress for Pennsylvania, and was intrusted with the management of several important negotiations. In the mean time collisions had taken place between the troops at Boston and the inhabitants, which led to the actions of Lexington and Bunker’s Hill. These events quickened the deliberations of the Congress; and after one more fruitless petition for redress, the Declaration of Independence was published, July 4, 1776, and warlike preparations were actively commenced. The English Ministry now sent out Lord Howe, with full powers to concede every thing but absolute independence; but as the Commissioners appointed to confer with him, of whom Franklin was one, were instructed to treat upon no other terms, the negotiation abruptly terminated.