Shakespeare and the Lonely Dragon

SHAKESPEARE AND THE LONELY DRAGON MILLAR MACLuRE THE Renaissance politician was the executivc, not the ideologue; the man in politics, not the man of politics. Biography was the popular political breviary, and North's justification of his Plutarch was the voice of one wise in his generation: "All other learning is private, fitter for Universities then cities, fuller of contemplacion than experience, more commendable in the students themselves, than profitable unto others. Whereas stories are fit for every place, reache to all persons, serve for all tymes, teache the living, revive the dead, so farre excelling all other bookes, as it is bctter to see learning in noble mens lives, then to reade it in Philosophers writings.'" Theoretical knowledge has its place, but men are not ruled by theories. The best statement of this is to be found in the first book of Utopia, put with perspicuity and a minimum of irony: "That is it whiche I mente" (quod he), "when I said philosophie hadde no place among kinges." uIn dede" (quod I), "this schole philosophie hath not; whiche thinketh all thinges mete for every place. But there is an other philosophie more civile, whiche knoweth as ye wolde saye her owne stage, and thereafter orderinge and behavinge herselfe in the playe that she hathe in hande, playethe her parte accordinglie with comlines, utteringe nothinge oute of due ordre and fassian. And this is the philosophie that you muste use. Orels, whiles a commodie of Plautu5 is playinge, and the vile bondemen skoffinge and trifflinge among them selves, if you shoulde sodenlie come upon the stage in a philosophers apparrell, and reherse oute of Octavia the place wherin Seneca disputeth with Nero; had it not bene better for you to have played the donune persone, then by rehersinge that, which served nother for the time nor place, to have made suche a tragicall comedie or gallimaufry? For by bringinge in other stuffe that nothinge apperteineth to the presente matter, you muste nedes marre and pervert the play that is in hande, thoughe the stuffe that you bringe be muche better.. .. uSo the case stondeth in a common wealthe; and so it is in the consultations of Kinges and princes. If evill opinions and naughty persuasions can not be utterly and quite pluckede oute of their hartes; if you can not even as you wold remedie vices, whiche use and custome hath confirmed; yet for this cause you must not leave and forsake the common wealthe; you must not forsake the shippe in a tempeste, because you can not rule and kepe downe the windes. No, nor you muste not laboure to drive into their heads newe and straunge informations, whiche you knowe well shalbe nothinge regarded with them that be of cleane contrary mindes. But you muste with a crafty wile and a subtell traine IPlutarch's Lives 0/ the Noble Grecians and Romans Englished by Sir Thomas North (London, 1895), I, 7. 109 Vol. XXIV, no. 2, Jan., 1955 110 UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO QUARTERLY studie and endevoure your selfe, as muche as in you liethe, to handle the matter wittilie and handsomlie for the purpose; and that whiche you can not turne to good, so to ordre that it be not very badde. For it is not possible for all thinges to be well, onles all men were good: which I thinke wi! not be yet this good many yeares."2 This is one of the most perceptive and illuminating analyses of the art of politics ever set down by an Englishman- art, not "political science," which is "fitter for universities then cities." The enlightened man must live, says More, in two worlds, in his own idealistic utopia where he may exercise his theories without let or hindrance, and on the stage of affairs where the most important thing is to preserve decorum, to make the best and most fitting use of the materials at hand. He who undertakes the government of man must learn the art of temporization, the middle wisdom which partakes of but cannot achieve perfection. Like an actor he necessarily commits his self to some important alteration. The autonomous idealist must surrender his selfhood to...