Read Online Early Modern England 1485-1714: A Narrative History by Robert Bucholz, Newton Key - Free Book Online
Authors: Robert Bucholz, Newton Key
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earls, who followed viscounts, etc., all in strict order of creation. And, of course, within every family, noble or common, there was a ranking:
Father
Mother
Male children, eldest to youngest Female children, eldest to youngest
As this indicates, the Chain implied a hierarchy of genders as well as of classes: traditional theology dating back to Aristotle defined “the female” as “a misbegotten male.” 12 Traditional humoral medicine saw women as colder and moister than men, making them weaker, less rational, more emotional. Under both the Chain and English common law, a woman’s status was a direct extension of that of the male to whom she was most closely related: if a woman’s father was of gentle status, she was gentle too. Upon marriage she took the status of her husband. If he died and she remarried, then she assumed her new husband’s rank. A widow who remained in that status was an anomaly in a society which did not know what to do with a woman who was independent of male control.
An even more important feature of the Chain was that the top rank in every subdivision was analogous to the top rank of every other subdivision – and of the Chain itself. That is, the father in the family, the king in the kingdom (and, of course, the professor in the classroom!) were analogous to God in the universe. They represented him; they wielded his authority; they were the unquestioned heads of their respective links and spheres of activity within the Chain.
Clearly, English people in 1485 were obsessed with order. Their fondest desire was, apparently, to account for every speck of matter in the universe and place it in a hierarchy. Equally, their greatest fear was that order would break down. It should be understood that this was a Chain, not a ladder. No one could move up or down, for that would imply imperfection in God’s plan. A fern cannot become an oak; a codfish cannot become a whale; a mother cannot be a father; nor should a husbandman try to become a peer – and, of course, no one could aspire to be king but the divinely appointed, anointed, and acknowledged heir of the previous king. To rise or fall in this society was to rebel against the Chain, against order – and, thus, against God.
Indeed, for any creature to attack its superiors in the Chain – for example, for a son to strike a father or for a subject to compass rebellion against the king – was tantamount to Lucifer’s infamous revolt against his Creator. To do so was to disrupt the delicate balance of the universe, as, a century later, Shakespeare has one of his characters imply in Troilus and Cressida:
The heavens themselves, the planets, and this centre,
Observe degree, priority, and place,
Insisture, course, proportion, season, form,
Office and custom, in all line of order: …
… but when the planets,
In evil mixture, to disorder wander,
What plagues, and what portents, what mutiny,
What raging of the sea, shaking of earth,
Commotion in the winds, frights, changes, horrors,
Divert and crack, rend and deracinate
The unity and married calm of states
Quite from their fixture!
Shakespeare refers here to the common contemporary belief in astrology, the notion that changes in the heavenly bodies can affect order upon earth. In the next few lines, he moves from the celestial level to the earthly:
O! when degree is shak’d,
Which is the ladder to all high designs,
The enterprise is sick. How could communities,
Degrees in schools and brotherhoods in cities,
Peaceful commerce from dividable shores,
The primogenitive and due of birth,
Prerogative of age, crowns, sceptres, laurels,
But by degree, stand in authentic place?
Take but degree away, untune that string,
And, hark, what discord follows!
What discord?
Strength should be the lord of imbecility,
And the rude son should strike his father dead.
Force should be right; or, rather, right and wrong
Between whose endless jar justice resides –
Should lose their names and so should justice too.
(
Father
Mother
Male children, eldest to youngest Female children, eldest to youngest
As this indicates, the Chain implied a hierarchy of genders as well as of classes: traditional theology dating back to Aristotle defined “the female” as “a misbegotten male.” 12 Traditional humoral medicine saw women as colder and moister than men, making them weaker, less rational, more emotional. Under both the Chain and English common law, a woman’s status was a direct extension of that of the male to whom she was most closely related: if a woman’s father was of gentle status, she was gentle too. Upon marriage she took the status of her husband. If he died and she remarried, then she assumed her new husband’s rank. A widow who remained in that status was an anomaly in a society which did not know what to do with a woman who was independent of male control.
An even more important feature of the Chain was that the top rank in every subdivision was analogous to the top rank of every other subdivision – and of the Chain itself. That is, the father in the family, the king in the kingdom (and, of course, the professor in the classroom!) were analogous to God in the universe. They represented him; they wielded his authority; they were the unquestioned heads of their respective links and spheres of activity within the Chain.
Clearly, English people in 1485 were obsessed with order. Their fondest desire was, apparently, to account for every speck of matter in the universe and place it in a hierarchy. Equally, their greatest fear was that order would break down. It should be understood that this was a Chain, not a ladder. No one could move up or down, for that would imply imperfection in God’s plan. A fern cannot become an oak; a codfish cannot become a whale; a mother cannot be a father; nor should a husbandman try to become a peer – and, of course, no one could aspire to be king but the divinely appointed, anointed, and acknowledged heir of the previous king. To rise or fall in this society was to rebel against the Chain, against order – and, thus, against God.
Indeed, for any creature to attack its superiors in the Chain – for example, for a son to strike a father or for a subject to compass rebellion against the king – was tantamount to Lucifer’s infamous revolt against his Creator. To do so was to disrupt the delicate balance of the universe, as, a century later, Shakespeare has one of his characters imply in Troilus and Cressida:
The heavens themselves, the planets, and this centre,
Observe degree, priority, and place,
Insisture, course, proportion, season, form,
Office and custom, in all line of order: …
… but when the planets,
In evil mixture, to disorder wander,
What plagues, and what portents, what mutiny,
What raging of the sea, shaking of earth,
Commotion in the winds, frights, changes, horrors,
Divert and crack, rend and deracinate
The unity and married calm of states
Quite from their fixture!
Shakespeare refers here to the common contemporary belief in astrology, the notion that changes in the heavenly bodies can affect order upon earth. In the next few lines, he moves from the celestial level to the earthly:
O! when degree is shak’d,
Which is the ladder to all high designs,
The enterprise is sick. How could communities,
Degrees in schools and brotherhoods in cities,
Peaceful commerce from dividable shores,
The primogenitive and due of birth,
Prerogative of age, crowns, sceptres, laurels,
But by degree, stand in authentic place?
Take but degree away, untune that string,
And, hark, what discord follows!
What discord?
Strength should be the lord of imbecility,
And the rude son should strike his father dead.
Force should be right; or, rather, right and wrong
Between whose endless jar justice resides –
Should lose their names and so should justice too.
(
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