CHAPTER VIII. DOMESTIC. HE strange fascination exerted by More, which has made THE even the foes of his religion speak of him both reverently and affectionately, is probably due to the beautiful details of his domestic life that have been handed down to us, rather than to his wit or literary excellence. Had he been all that he was in life and death, with one only exception-an ecclesiastic, instead of a father of a family-he would have been still great, amiable, and holy, but Macaulay would probably not have selected him as "a choice specimen of human wisdom and virtue," in stating his paradoxes about transubstantiation. Thus the very circumstances, by which in his own eyes More was placed on a lower level than his unmarried and consecrated fellow-martyrs, have raised him to a higher estimation in the minds of modern Englishmen; the "worldly wretch," as he called himself, who had twice gone to earthly nuptials, is preferred to the "blessed fathers" of the Charterhouse, whom More admired "going like bridegrooms to their (heavenly) marriage". Yet, while holding with the Church of all ages, that it is a more blessed state to remain unmarried for the kingdom of heaven's sake, we may nevertheless, and for that very reason, admire all the more a married man and a father, to whom family ties were no impediment, whose heart remained undivided and altogether God's, and who equalled on the scaffold both the constancy and the joy of his venerable fellow-sufferers; and we may thank God for giving to us in both states of life, examples, variously attractive yet equally admirable, of the power of His grace. SECTION I. THE FAMILY. We owe to Erasmus more than one beautiful picture of More's domestic life, and I will translate his words without abridgment or interruption, reserving the details that have come to us from other sources until we have looked carefully at his masterly sketch. The letter to Ulrich von Hutten, which has been frequently quoted, was written on the 23rd July, 1519. At that time More had been eight or nine years married to his second wife, who had given him no children, but had been as a mother to his four children by his first wife. He was forty-one years old, his eldest child thirteen. A few months after the death of Jane Colt he had married, against the advice of his friends, a widow named Alice Middleton, neither young nor handsome-nec bella nec puella, as More would sometimes say laughingly to Erasmus; “but an active and vigilant housewife, with whom," continues his friend, "he lives as pleasantly and sweetly as if she had all the charms of youth. You will scarcely find a husband who, by authority or severity, has gained such ready compliance as More by playful flattery. What, indeed, would he not obtain, when he has prevailed on a woman already getting old, by no means of a pliable disposition, and intent on domestic affairs, to learn to play the harp, the lute, the monochord, and the flute (cithara, testudine, monochordo, tibiis), and by the appointment of her husband to devote to this task a fixed time every day? * With the same address he guides his whole household, in which there are no disturbances or strife. If such arise he immediately appeases it and sets all right again, never conceiving enmity * More's friend Pace tells us that More played duets with his wife: Sicut Morus meus didicit pulsare tibias cum conjuge (De Fructu, etc., P. 35). himself nor making an enemy. Indeed, there seems to be a kind of fateful happiness in this house, so that no one has lived in it without rising to higher fortune; no member of it has ever incurred any stain on his reputation. You will scarcely find any who live in such harmony with a mother as does Thomas More with his step-mother, for his father had married again, and the son was as affectionate towards her as to his own mother. Quite recently he has married a third wife, and More swears he never knew a better woman. Towards his parents and his children and his sisters his love is never intrusive or exacting, while he omits nothing that can show his sincere attachment." Two years later, towards the end of the year 1521, Erasmus returns to the same subject in a letter to Budée, a very learned French statesman, and a married man like More. "If More had the means he would be a great Mæcenas of learning. He has helped the learned even when he himself was in debt. Nor does he adorn letters merely by his own learning or his partiality for learned men, for he has reared his whole family in excellent studies-a new example, but one which is likely to be much imitated, unless I am mistaken, so successful has it been. He has three daughters, of whom the eldest, Margaret, is married to a young man who is wealthy (beato), of excellent and modest character, and not unacquainted with literature. More has been careful to have all his children, from their earliest years, thoroughly imbued, first with chaste and holy morals, and then with polite letters. He has taken into his family another girl, and adopted her as companion to his daughters. He has a step-daughter of rare beauty and talent, who has been some years married to a young man not unlearned, and of a most amiable character. He has a son by his first wife, the youngest of his children, about thirteen years old.* Here the memory of Erasmus is defective, though he says "plus minus". Young John More could not be over eleven in the autumn of 1521. "A year ago it occurred to More to send me a specimen of their progress in study. He bade them all write to me, each one without any help, neither the subject being suggested nor the language corrected; for when they offered their papers to their father for correction, he affected to be displeased with the bad writing, and made them copy out their letters more neatly and accurately. When they had done so, he closed the letters and sent them to me without changing a syllable. Believe me, dear Budée, I never was more surprised; there was nothing whatever either silly or girlish in what was said, and the style was such that you could feel they were making daily progress. This amiable circle, with the two husbands,* all live in his house. In that house you will find no one idle, no one busied in feminine trifles. Titus Livius is ever in their hands. They have advanced so far that they can read such authors and understand them without a translation, unless there occurs some such word as would perhaps perplex myself. His wife, who excels in good sense and experience rather than in learning, governs the little company with wonderful tact, assigning to each a task, and requiring its performance, allowing no one to be idle or to be occupied in trifles. "You complain occasionally in your letters to me that philology + has got a bad name through you, since it has both injured your health and made you poorer. But More manages to be well spoken of by all and in all respects; and he avers that he is indebted to literature both for better health, for the favour and affection he meets with from his excellent prince, as well as from his own countrymen and foreigners, for an increase of wealth, for becoming more agreeable both to himself and his friends, more useful to his country and his relatives, more fitted for the life at court, and intercourse with nobles, as well as for all society and social life, and lastly, more dear to * Duobus sponsis; I will discuss the meaning of this word presently. + Budée was a scholar and antiquarian. His great work, De Asse, had already been published. * heaven. Formerly learning had a bad name, since it seemed to deprive its votaries of common sense. Well, no journey, no business, however prolonged or arduous, makes More lay aside his books; yet you will find no one who is so companionable a man at all times, and to every class, so ready to render service, so affable, so lively in conversation, or who knows so well how to unite solid prudence with sweetness of manners. Hence it has come to pass that, whereas a short time since, love of literature was held to be useless either for practical or ornamental purposes, now there is scarcely a nobleman who considers his children worthy of his ancestors unless they are educated in good letters. Even in kings a great part of their royal splendour is seen to be wanting where there is little acquaintance with literature."+ We may now go back and consider the various personages mentioned in these letters. And first his wife, the step-mother of his children. Cresacre More writes: "I have heard it reported he wooed her for a friend of his, not once thinking to have her himself, but she wisely answering him 'that he might speed if he would speak in his own behalf,' telling his friend what she had said unto him, with his good liking he married her, and did that which otherwise he would never have thought to have done". None of More's contemporaries mentions this story, and though I cannot disprove it, it seems to me to have been invented to match the second courtship with the first, and to explain what might seem a somewhat ill-assorted marriage. Yet, if More sought the benefit of his children rather than himself, he appears to have made an excellent choice, and so philosophical was his mind and happy his disposition that he lived with her as pleasantly, if not as affectionately, as if they had been drawn together by similarity of tastes and character. She was seven years his senior, as we know from the inscrip * Omnibus omnium horarum homo. + Epist. 605. |