From Lytton Strachey's Elizabeth & Essex. Courtiers and politicians must be careful and try to control the impressions they make. Francis Bacon, the Earl of Essex's secretary, gives him some Machiavellian advice on how to control appearances and how to prevent "being read" disfavourably after his success in the war with Spain.
"noble Peer,
Great England's glory and the world's wide wonder,
Whose dreadful name through all Spain did thunder,
And Hercules two pillars standing near
Did make to quake and fear.
Fair branch of Honour, flower of Chivalry,
That fillest England with thy triumph's fame,
Joy have thou of thy noble victory!"
The prowess and person of Essex stand forth, lustrous and dazzling, before all eyes.
Yet there was one pair of eyes—and one only—that viewed the gorgeous spectacle without blinking. The cold viper-gaze of Francis Bacon, heedless of the magnificence of the exterior, pierced through to the inner quiddity of his patron's situation and saw there nothing but doubt and danger. With extraordinary courage and prfound wisdom he chose this very moment—the apex, so it seemed, of Essex's carreer—to lift his voice in warning and exhortation. In a long letter, composed with elaborate solicitude and displaying at once an exquisite appreciation of circumstances, a consummate acquaintance with the conditions of practical life, and a prescience that was almost superhuman, he explained to the Earl the difficulties of his position, the perils that the future held in store for him, and the course of conduct by which those perils might be avoided. Everything, it was obvious, hinged upon the Queen; but Bacon perceived that in this very fact lay, not the strength, but the weakness of Essex's situation. He had no doubt what Elizabeth's half-conscious thoughts must be.—"A man of a nature not to be ruled; that hath the advantage of my affection, and knoweth it; of an estate not grounded to his greatness; of a popular reputation; of a militar dependence." What might not come from these consicderations? "I demand," he wrote, whether there can be a more dangerous image than this represented to any monarch living, much more to a lady, and of her Majesty's apprehension?" It was essential that the whole of Essex's behaviour should be dominated by an effort to remove those suspicions from Elizabeth's mind. He was to take the utmost pains to show her that he was not "opinastre and unrulable"; he was "to take all occasions, to the Queen, to speak against popularity and popular courses vehemently and to tax it in all others"; above all, he was utterly to eschew any appearance of "militar dependence". "Herein," wrote Bacon, "I cannot sufficiently wonder at your Lordship's course . . . for her Majesty loveth peace. Next she loveth not charge. Thirdly, that kind of dependence maketh a suspected greatness." But there was more than that. Bacon clearly realised that Essex was not cut out to be a General; Cadiz, no doubt, had gone off well; but he distrusted these military excursions, and he urged the Earl to indulge in no more of them. There were rumours that he wished to be made the Master of the Ordnance; such thoughts were most unwise. Let him concentrate upon the Council; there he could control military matters without taking a hand in them; and, if he wished for a new office, let him choose one that was now vacant and was purely civilian in its character; let him ask the Queen to make him the Lord Privy Seal.
No advice could have been more brilliant or more pertinent. If Essex had followed it, how different would his history have been! But—such are the curious imprfections of the human intellect—while Bacon's understanding was absolute in some directions, in others it no less completely failed. With his wise and searching admonitions he mingled other counsel which was exactly calculated to defeat the end he had in view. Profound in everything but psychology, the actual steps which he urged Essex to take in order to preserve the Queen's favour were totally unfitted to the temperament of the Earl. Bacon wished his patron to behave with the Machiavellian calculation that was natural to his own mind. Essex was to enter into an elaborate course of flattery, dissimulation, and reserve. He was not in fact to imitate the subserviency of Leicester or Hatton—oh no!—but he was to take every opportunity of assuring Elizabeth that he followed these noblemen as patterns, "for I do not know a readier mean to make her Majesty think you are in your right way." He must be very careful of his looks. If, after a dispute, he agreed that the Queen was right, "a man must no read formality in your countenance." And "fourthly, your Lordship should never be without some particulars afoot, which you should seem to pursue with earnestness and affection, and then let them fall, upon taking knowledge of her Majesty's opposition and dislikke." He might, for instance, "pretend a journey to see your living and estate towards Wales," and, at the Queen's request, relinquish it. Even the "lightest sort of particulars" were by no means to be neglected—habits, apparel, wearings, gestures, and the like." As to "the impression of a popular reputation," that was "a good thing in itself," and besides "well governed, is one of the best flowers of your greatness both present and to come." It should be handed tenderly. "The only way is to quench it verbis and not rebus." The vehement speeches against popularity must be speeches and nothieng more. In reality, the Earl was not to dream of giving up his position as the people's favourite. "Go on in your honourable commonwealth courses as before."
Such counsels were either futile or dangerous. How was it possible that the frank impetuosity of Essex should ever bend itself to these crooked ways? Everyone knew—everyone, apparently, but Bacon—that the Earl was incapable of dissembling. "He can conceal nothing," said Henry Cuffe; "he carries his love and his hatred on his forehead." To such a temperament it was hard to say which was the most alien—the persistent practice of some profoundly calculated stratagem or the momentary trickery of petty cunning. "Apparel, wearings, gestures!" How vain to hope that Essex would ever attend to that kind of tiresome particularity! Essex, who was always in a hurry or a dream—Essex, who would sit at table unconscious of what he ate or drank, shovelling down the food, or stopping suddenly to fall into some long abstraction—Essex, who to save his time would have himself dressed among a crowd of friends and suitors, giving, as Henry Wotton says, "his legs, arms, and breast to his ordinary servants to button and dress him, with little heed, his head and fact ot his barber, his eyes to his letters, and ears to petitioners," and so, clad in he knew not what, a cloak hastily thrown about him, would pass out, with his odd long steps, and his head pushed forward, to the Queen.
And, when he reached her, suppose that then, by some miracle, he remembered the advice of Bacon, and attempted to put into practice one or other of the contrivances that his friend had suggested. what would happen? Was it not clear that his nature would assert itself in spite of all his efforts? —that what was really in his mind would appear under his inexpert pretences, and his bungling become obvious to the far from blind Elizabeth? Then indeed his last state would be worse than his first; his very honesty would display his falsehood; and in his attempt to allay suspicions that were baseless he would actually have given them a reality.
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