HEREDITARY CHARACTERISTICS

OF THE

NORMAN AND PLANTAGENET KINGS

OF ENGLAND.

BY MRS. HANKIN.

April 8th, 1881.

WHEN William, Duke of Normandy invaded England, a king was emphatically the first man in the nation; it was a position containing boundless possibilities of glory and success, and fathomless chances of failure. If a modern king is a quiet, judicious, respectable man, we are quite satisfied with him; but in those old days a king had to stand so high above his fellows, as to become to them the central figure in the nation, and a king who was worthy the name, with this strength, required a moral elevation of character which should raise him above the dangerous isolation of the position. Without strength, a king became a tool in the hands of Baronial factions-without the moral sense he was an irresponsible despot. In the character of our Norman and Plantagenet kings, born as they appear to have been, to suit a difficult political exigency, we find-with two or three exceptions-the same strongly marked hereditary tendencies, sometimes modified by circumstances, checked by principle, or neutralized by admixture with some fresh element but nearly always containing energy, earnestness and strength of purpose.

Founders of Dynasties must of necessity be strong men, and in William I., founder of our Norman line, we find this quality, forming as it were, the key note to his whole career. He was not only a strong man, but he had the most stedfast faith in his own

strength; he knew exactly what he intended to do and he was absolutely certain of his power to do it. His overmastering force of will was such that it could compel other men to have faith in his schemes against their private judgment, and could win over to his side the fittest ally, the wisest councillor, whom, while he trusted he never leant upon, or made absolutely essential to his success. When he invaded England he seemed over-matched on all hands. In Harold he found energy and talent nearly equal to his own, and the outraged patriotism of a nation was in arms to oppose him. And yet, even there, his all-compelling will had in some mysterious manner won over not only his adventurous neighbours, but the moral sense of all Europe to uphold his cause. With Papal banner and Papal blessing he, under the guise of a just avenger of perjury, triumphed over his rival and made of Hastings only an episode in a career of conquest. The great man of any particular age is he, who most plainly sees its evils and can best suggest a remedy for them. In an epoch, just emerging from barbarism the special requisite is order. William grasped this necessity, and in a very limited sphere of action, so welded together the disjointed earldoms of Saxon England as to form a compact kingdom able to dominate the world. Perhaps the secret of the Conqueror's almost invariable success was that even his most open acts of violence were generally underlaid by the probability of some resulting good. His will, lawless, as on first consideration its workings seem to have been, was really restrained within definite limits, and although these appear to have been mainly instinctive and not the result of principle, their existence is sufficient to raise his stern rule above the lawless despotism of his successor.

When the dying Conqueror in his last fervent words commended the rule of his conquered kingdom to his second son William, it was not only because Rufus was his favourite child, but because he felt that his nature in many respects resembled his own. With the careless, indolent Robert, the Conqueror had absolutely no sympathy. Henry was cold and ungenial, but William had been to his father a faithful son-he was known to possess bravery, ability and energy-alloyed as it might seem to a partial Father

only by youthful recklessness and impetuosity. The vices of the second Norman king grew with his growth and strengthened with his strength, till they became not merely exaggerations but burlesques of his Father's attributes. His whole nature seemed to want the stern bonds of necessity and was never firmly drawn together; wanting some sort of moral definiteness it was strong, with a sort of unruly brutal strength which was utterly powerless for good. Actions which in the Father appear to be violent means to a good end, appear in the son as the natural outbreaks of an undisciplined mind. Rufus was as well able as his father before him to hold subject races in obedience; he could coerce Scotland, check Wales and hold Normandy. But we always miss in him the underlying moral purpose which enabled the first Norman king to evolve order out of conquest. The original germs of both characters appear to have been identical and the ultimate outcome to have been determined more by circumstances of growth and surroundings than by any inherent difference. To the Norman Duke-cradled amid misfortune and menaced from the first by perpetual dangers-self-control was an imperious necessity born of the instinct of self-preservation. Rufus was from childhood the flattered denizen of a royal court and he could afford to fling selfcontrol to the winds and to expend his restless energy on every reckless impulse which the folly of the moment suggested. Allowing personal ambition to be his guide, and permitting 'self' to become the representative of a principle, he reduced to a mere legalised system of oppression the judicial fabric raised by the Conqueror with skill and care. He laid bare with reckless hand just those weak points in his father's administration, which had left Church or State at the mercy of a lawless king. He used his power over the Church as an extortioner, over the local courts as a tyrant, till the name of king, respected, if feared, in the Father, became, when linked with that of the son, a thing to be hated and despised.

In his successor Henry I., a general resemblance to the conqueror's character is still traceable, although diverging this time. to contrary extremes. Rufus had allowed bravery to run into

recklessness, and self confidence to degenerate into impiety. But his brother, Henry, was remarkable rather for an excess of self restraint; even his better self was restrained. The caution which often tempered the conqueror's boldest designs, was exaggerated into a suspicious carefulness, by which his ablest projects were often warped. Nothing more surely paralyses the action than opposition from immediate relatives; and it may be that the desperate struggle which Henry had waged with his brothers (both determined to deprive him of his possessions) gave a morbid bias to his nature. While William I. struggled out of a lonely, menaced youth to defy fortune successfully-his son Henry, aggrieved concerning his inheritance and oppressed by his brother, contracted a suspiciousness of nature and accustomed himself to an excess of caution, which made his policy appear but a contracted imitation of the conqueror's wider measures. William chose those ministers who could most fitly serve him; Henry those whom he could best serve, and therefore, as he supposed, best attach to his service. William flung aside the Pope's demand for homage with a flat refusal. Henry involved himself in a network of Papal negotiations on the subject of investiture and yet left the matter but half decided. It was his nature hardly ever to act on a first impulse, and his hesitating wisdom, over-elaborated by excessive caution, often occasioned worse difficulties than he had striven to avert. To sum up: William I. was a strong man, who had faith in his own powers and could compel others to a belief in them. William II. was rudely conscious of his own strength, but was without faith in his kind and was utterly careless as to the effect of his actions on others. Henry I. was a strong man who by half doubting himself and entirely doubting the rest of the world, cramped his powers and weakened the significance of his policy to posterity.

In the next king-Stephen-we find for the first time since the Conquest a new type of character. Even the faults of William and his sons are those which seem to be specially the attributes of kings. In Stephen we are carried quite out of the region of those stout and earnest men "whose actions make history." He had

been reared in the purple-was brave, knightly and generous, but had nothing kingly about him. His failings and his virtues were those of a noble or baron, not of a king. His concessions, his fitful attempts at repression, his desire to secure personal popularity, his rashness, his magnanimity, would have been natural in a landowner, who had annexed some body else's estate and was anxious to win the confidence of his tenants, but were utterly at variance with that kingly selfishness which is compelled to take a general view of a nation's requirements but may not stoop to consult the tastes of the individual. Never at any time was England worse governed than under this kindly, courteous, brave, usurper, who had not in him the strength to ignore the weakness of his claims, or the dignity to uphold them. Stephen failed from first to last to gain the respect of his subjects though he ceaselessly endeavoured to win their approval. He was indulgent and repressive by turns as he passed on the waves of civil strife from one phase of mental disquietude to another, till, having alienated all his friends and aggravated all his foes, he died at last in his prime, glad enough we may well suppose to relinquish the stolen goods which had never brought him either happiness or fortune, and to deliver his heavy sceptre into a stronger hand.

In Henry II., descended from William I. through the female line, we might expect to meet, as we did in Stephen, another abrupt divergence from the old stock. This first of the Plantagenets possessed, however, many points of resemblance to his grandfather and his great grandfather. He had all the weight and power of his Norman ancestors together with a fiery impetuosity and infinite quickness of perception derived from the house of Anjou. These fresh attributes made him the very man for the emergency in which he was called to the throne. The vacillation and weakness of Stephen's rule were swept aside by him with the impetuosity of a whirlwind. Without a thought of conciliation or delay the Barons were checked, the mercenaries dismissed, the executive restored, the guilty punished, the oppressed protected, and this by no slow and gradual process of reform, but in a wild continuous burst of energy, which seemed to paralyse opposition. The policies of