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CHAPTER XIV.

The History of the World.

ALEGH'S discourses about the marriages of the Prince of Wales and the Lady Elizabeth show with what interest and attention he followed the politics of the day, and made himself completely master of them. He seems to have interested himself more in foreign politics than in the religious questions which occupied people's minds at home. Perhaps it was because he did not take up with zeal the side either of the Puritans or the Episcopalians that he was so generally credited with being an unbeliever in religion. In his writings he shows himself a sincerely religious man; but in the state of religious feeling at the time no place was allowed to the tolerant man-every one was forced to be a partisan.

Ralegh's political knowledge is shown in other tracts besides those about the marriages. One, Touching a War with Spain, is chiefly concerned with his favourite theme, the weakness of the Spanish monarchy. Maxims of State and the Cabinet Council, two treatises on statecraft, are

interesting as showing the influence which the study of Machiavelli's writings had had upon him. Though he repeatedly disclaims Machiavelli's conclusions, we cannot fail to see how he had gained in acuteness and political wisdom from the study of the writings of that largeminded political theorist. The Maxims of State is particularly interesting from this point of view, and is full of pithy and pointed sayings; others of his tracts are concerned with questions relating to the navy and shipbuilding. But Ralegh in prison could hardly follow the course which English politics were taking. Parliament was becoming a very different thing from what he had known it to be in the days of Elizabeth. He had no idea of the hostile feelings with which James and his Parliament regarded one another. In a treatise called A Discourse on the Prerogative of Parliament, published in 1615, he discussed the King's financial proceedings, and bade him improve his position by leaving off all his unpopular ways of raising money, and casting himself upon the love of his subjects. James could not stand criticism of his government. It is true that Ralegh threw all the blame upon the evil councillors whom he thought had misled the King; but James knew, if Ralegh did not, how entirely all that had happened was his own doing. If Ralegh had better understood the position of affairs he would never have hoped to gain favour by sending this treatise to the King.

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Writing political tracts however was not Ralegh's main occupation in the Tower. He had thrown himself heart and soul into study, and had conceived the ambitious design of writing a history of the world. He had grasped the idea of the unity of history, and wishing to write a history of his own country, thought that it could not be rightly comprehended unless it were prefaced by a history of the whole world. Men were beginning at this time really to interest themselves in historical study. The early chroniclers had contented themselves with repeating the facts of early history, as others had told them before, without any attempt at arrangement or criticism, and had then passed on to tell the events which had happened in their own lifetime. A change was now beginning, and England possessed a few real and careful students of history, who, following the example of learned men on the Continent, were trying to master their subject and produce thoughtful and accurate works.

Chief among these was William Camden, who passed his life first as second master, and afterwards as head master, of Westminster School. He was a real scholar and student, and the fame of his learning reached to the Continent, and brought him into connexion with foreign scholars. In 1640 he published his first great work, the Reliquæ Britannica, in which he described the countries. of England, Ireland, and Scotland. Respect for his learning and the purity of his life made Burleigh

fix upon him as the man most fitted to write an account of the reign of Elizabeth. He gave him for this purpose a large number of state papers; and eighteen years afterwards, in 1615, Camden published his Annals of England during the Reign of Elizabeth. The book was written in Latin, but was translated soon after. It is written with as much impartiality as can be expected from a historian of his own times, and is a valuable contribution to our knowledge of those days.

Students were also beginning to interest themselves in the history of other countries besides their own. In 1610 a General History of the Turks appeared, by Richard Knolles, who had been a fellow of Lincoln College, Oxford. He wrote in English, with spirit and vigour, and told the story of the growth of the Turkish Empire, from the first appearance of the Turks in Europe down to his own times.

All over Europe the enthusiasm for study, for learning for its own sake, was advancing. Men like Isaac Casaubon in France, and the Scaligers in Belgium, devoted themselves to the study of classical authors, with a view of obtaining correct texts. In England scholars like Sir Robert Cotton were busy collecting literary materials, which had been scattered by the dissolution of the monasteries, that others might make use of them. In 1602 Sir Thomas Bodley had conferred an inestimable boon upon students by the foundation in Oxford of that great library which has since been known

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by his name. Amongst the questions which men then studied, there were many that seem to us absurd and worthless. They busied themselves with points of rabbinical lore, with the exact position of the garden of Eden, with the wanderings of Cain, with discussions as to the spot on which the Ark rested. Long dissertations on points such as these tend to make the first portions of Ralegh's History of the World wearisome reading. The story advances so slowly, the questions discussed are so entirely wanting in interest to the modern reader, that neither beauty of style nor the presence here and there of deep and thoughtful sayings, can make it attractive reading. Ralegh was aided, particularly in the scriptural part of his history, by other learned men. He was in continual intercourse with the scholars of his time. Chief amongst those who helped him was one Dr. Robert Burhill, a learned clergyman. We find him also writing to Sir Robert Cotton for the loan of books and manuscripts.

To us the interest of the book does not rest upon this kind of learning, though it is another sign of the wonderful many-sidedness of Ralegh, that he who shone so in active life as soldier, sailor, and statesman, should have been able when in prison to throw himself into study of this occult kind. It was late in life for him to undertake a work on so large a scale; and it is no wonder that the book was never finished. The six volumes which exist only bring the history