as clinking cans with a " Hey for Cavaliers ! Ho
for Cavaliers ! " He never fought for the King's
cause — though he fought a duel in Paris with a
French lord who took Charles's name in vain, and
killed his man too. His role was always the in-
tellectual one. He conspired for the cause — chiefly,
I think, out of personal friendship, and because he
held it to be the cause of his Church. He was not
a virulent politician; and on the question of divine
right the orthodox Cavaliers must have felt him to
be very unsound indeed.
The era of Parliaments had now come, and Digby
was to feel it. He was summoned to the bar of the
House as a Popish recusant. Charles was ordered to
banish him and Montague from his councils and his
presence ; and their examination continued at inter-
vals till the middle of 1 642. The Queen interceded
for Digby with much warmth, but she was a dan-
gerous friend; and in the same year Montague and
he were sent to prison. I have heard a tradition
that Crosby Hall was for a time his comfortable
jail, but can find no corroboration of this. The
serjeant-at-arms confined him for a brief space at
The Three Tuns, near Charing Cross, " where his
conversation made the prison a place of delight" to
his fellows. Later, at Winchester House, South-
wark, where he remained in honourable confine-
ment for two years, he was busy with writing and
experimenting — to preserve him from "a languish-
ing and rusting leisure." Two pamphlets, both of
them hasty improvisations, one a philosophic com-
mentary on a certain stanza of the Faerie Queen,
xxvi INTRODUCTIO,'Mi
the other, his well-known Observations on the^Religio
Medici,' are but mere bubbles of this seething activ-
ity, given over mostly to the preparation of his Two
Treatises, « Of the Body," and " Of the Soul," pub-
lished later in Paris, and to experiments on glass-
makingr.
Many efforts were made for his release, the most
efficacious by the Queen of France. It should have
been the Dowager Marie de Medicis,in memory of
her hot flame for him when he was a youth ; but
though she may have initiated the appeal, she died
before his release, which he seems to have owed to
Anne of Austria's good services. Freedom meant
banishment, but this sentence he did not take very
seriously. In these years he was continually going
and coming between France and England, now
warned by Parliament, now tolerated, now ban-
ished,again daring return,and escapingfrom the net.
"I can compare him to nothing but to a great fish
that we catch and let go again; but still he will come
to the bait," said Selden of him in his Table-Talk.
Exile in Paris provided fresh opportunity for
scientific study, though his connection with the
English Catholic malcontents, andhis services to the
Queen Henrietta Maria, who now made him her
Chancellor, absorbed much of his time. When the
Cause needed him, the Cavalier broke away from
philosophy ; and in 1645 ^^ ^^^ °^^ ^°^ Rome, at
the bidding of the Queen, to beg money for her
schemes. With all his address, diplomacy was not
among the chief of his talents. With high person-
ages he took a high tone. Innocent X gave 10,000
INTRODUCTIODj^ xxvii
Page 8
Presented as published in 1910. Historical recipes may not meet modern food-safety standards. Cook from the modern interpretation, not the original instructions.
AI-modernized reading of the original text
as clinking cans with a " Hey for Cavaliers ! Ho for Cavaliers ! " He never fought for the King's cause — though he fought a duel in Paris with a French lord who took Charles's name in vain, and killed his man too. His role was always the intellectual one. He conspired for the cause — chiefly, I think, out of personal friendship, and because he held it to be the cause of his Church. He was not a virulent politician; and on the question of divine right the orthodox Cavaliers must have felt him to be very unsound indeed.
The era of Parliaments had now come, and Digby was to feel it. He was summoned to the bar of the House as a Popish recusant. Charles was ordered to banish him and Montague from his councils and his presence ; and their examination continued at intervals till the middle of 1 642. The Queen interceded for Digby with much warmth, but she was a dangerous friend; and in the same year Montague and he were sent to prison. I have heard a tradition that Crosby Hall was for a time his comfortable jail, but can find no corroboration of this. The serjeant-at-arms confined him for a brief space at The Three Tuns, near Charing Cross, " where his conversation made the prison a place of delight" to his fellows. Later, at Winchester House, Southwark, where he remained in honourable confinement for two years, he was busy with writing and experimenting — to preserve him from "a languishing and rusting leisure." Two pamphlets, both of them hasty improvisations, one a philosophic commentary on a certain stanza of the Faerie Queen,
xxvi INTRODUCTION
the other, his well-known Observations on the 'Religio Medici,' are but mere bubbles of this seething activity, given over mostly to the preparation of his Two Treatises, « Of the Body," and " Of the Soul," published later in Paris, and to experiments on glassmaking.
Many efforts were made for his release, the most efficacious by the Queen of France. It should have been the Dowager Marie de Medicis,in memory of her hot flame for him when he was a youth ; but though she may have initiated the appeal, she died before his release, which he seems to have owed to Anne of Austria's good services. Freedom meant banishment, but this sentence he did not take very seriously. In these years he was continually going and coming between France and England, now warned by Parliament, now tolerated, now banished,again daring return,and escaping from the net. "I can compare him to nothing but to a great fish that we catch and let go again; but still he will come to the bait," said Selden of him in his Table-Talk.
Exile in Paris provided fresh opportunity for scientific study, though his connection with the English Catholic malcontents, andhis services to the Queen Henrietta Maria, who now made him her Chancellor, absorbed much of his time. When the Cause needed him, the Cavalier broke away from philosophy ; and in 1645 ^^ ^^^ °^^ ^°^ Rome, at the bidding of the Queen, to beg money for her schemes. With all his address, diplomacy was not among the chief of his talents. With high personages he took a high tone. Innocent X gave 10,000
INTRODUCTION xxvii