George Chapman's Stoic-Christian Revenger Author(s): Ronald Broude Source: Studies in Philology, Vol. 70, No. 1 (Jan.

, 1973), pp. 51-61 Published by: University of North Carolina Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4173791 Accessed: 14/07/2009 07:15
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George Chapman's Stoic-Christian Revenger

By RONALD BROUDE

RITICS who have recognized in GeorgeChapman's Revenge of BussyD'Amboisthe highly personalsynthesisof Roman Stoicism and RenaissanceChristianitywhich preoccupied Chapmanfor much of his careerhave nevertheless had difficulty in reconciling this philosophy with the revengewhich, demanded by "Christian " ghostand carried Bussy's out by his " Senecal"brother, is evidentlyso centrala partof the play. Revenge,it has Clermont, been assumed, is consonant with neitherStoicnor Christian teaching, and the idea of a Stoic-Christian revengerhas thereforeseemed nothingless thana contradiction in terms.Actingon this assumption, some criticshave questioned the integrityof the play'sdesign, condemningthe vengeancetowards which the whole actionbuilds as a crudeexpedientwhich bringsthe tragedyto an arbitrary close and assailingthe protagonist as a character both undramatic and inconC

sistent.'

In part, confusionaboutthe meaningof Clermont's revengederivesfromthe tendencyto readChapman's seventeenth centuryplay

in twentieth century terms, to suppose that Stoicism meant to
' On Stoic and Christian elements in Chapman's thought, see R. H. Perkinson, "Nature and the Tragic Hero in Chapman's Bussy Plays," MLQ, III (1942), 263-85; J. Wieler, George Chapman (New York, 1949); and Ennis Rees, The Tragedies of George Chapman (Cambridge, Mass., 1954). Among critics who express reservations about Chapman's fusion of philosophy and drama in The Revenge are Janet Spens, "Chapman's Ethical Thought," Essays and Studies by

Membersof the English Association, XI

(1925),

150;

Una Ellis-Fermor, The

JacobeanDrama,4th ed, (Cambridge, I957), pp. 69-70; RobertOrnstein, The Moral Vision of Jacobean Tragedy (Madison, Wisc., I960), pp. 70, 74-5; and Ivring Ribner, Jacobean Tragedy (New York, 1962), p. 22.

5'

52

Revenger George Chapman'sStoic-Christian

Chapmanwhat it means to us and to take it for grantedthat in Chapman's what it is in ours. In Christianity day was essentially fact, neitherof theseassumptions is justified.Renaissance humanists found in the writingsof Seneca,Epictetus,and MarcusAureliusa viableandsatisfying of whichthemodern word"stoicism," philosophy with its connotations of fatalism,repression of emotion,and lifeless indifference to pleasure andpain,affords but a partial and misleading idea. Similarly,the Protestantism of Renaissance Englishmen was, in many ways, significantlydifferent from-and less "christian " than-that of theirtwentiethcenturydescendants. to what Contrary we might expect,vengeance, in its Renaissance sense of retribution, was not unconditionally either the Stoicism rejected of the Empire by or the Christianity of Jacobean to be sure,its place although, England, in each of these systemswas hedged about with qualifications. It maythusbe, then, thatto manyin the audience for which Chapman was writing,Clermont's revengewouldhave seemedneitherunStoic nor unChristian. Heir to a philosophical traditionborn in Athens three hundred yearsbeforeChrist,RomanStoicism is far fromthe monolithic body of thoughtit is sometimes imaginedto be. RomanStoic pronouncements on vengeance, complex and often mutually contradictory,reflect in their variety three centuries of Stoic thinking on the subject. In general, Roman Stoicism regardsvice as a product of misplaced values and poor judgement rather than as a distinct quality present in the universeor identifiablein a vicious man.2 Potential for virtuous action is rarely lacking in criminals,who may generally be reformed

if they can be broughtto see the errorof their ways. Punishment

is viewed as a means of effecting this reformation,of providing examples to deter potential malefactors,and, in extreme cases, of ensuring the security of society by removing a particularlydangerous reprobatefrom its midst.3 It is largely because punishment served
2 On Roman Stoic views concerning vice, see R. D. Hicks, Stoic and Epicurean (New York, I9iO), pp. 145 ff. and V. A. Amold, Roman Stoicism (Cambridge,

' Seneca, De Clementia, XXII.i. All quotationsfrom Seneca are from the Moral Essays I, Loeb ClassicalLib., tr. John Basore (London and New York, 1928).

I91I),

pp. 330-56.

RonaldBroude

53

theseimportant functionsthat, as R. D. Hickshas noted, "the same Stoicswho demanded patienceunder wrong refusedto allow compassionand pardon,and stoutlyopposedany interference with the courseof justice by remission of penalty." 4 "No treatmentseems
5 harsh,"writes Seneca, "if its result is salutary." For a Stoic, the appropriateresponse to wrong depends on both the nature of the wrong and the way in which the wrong is perceived. A personalinjury-e. g., a blow or an insult-is to be endured with patience and equanimity. Such an injury is understood to result from an error in judgement on the part of the aggressor,wNllo is therefore more deserving of pity than anger.6 The wise man will not even regard such aggression as an injury, much less offer to reply to it. As MarcusAurelius, giving memorableform to a commonplace, remarks," The best way of avenging thyself is not to do like-

wise."7
On the other hand, felonies such as theft or murder, if perceived as threats to civil order or as acts of impiety, may, according to one line of argument, lay upon the public-spirited and pious citizen the duty to revenge them. Thus, in De Ira, which contains one of the most searching discussionsof vengeance among extant Stoic writings, Seneca accepts the necessity of the Stoic's meting out punishment, so long as he is motivatedby a sense of duty and a desire for justice:
" My father . . . is slain-I will avenge him, not because I grieve,

but because it is my duty."8 Emotions, warns Seneca, ought not to enter into the execution of vengeance, since they hinder the operationof reason, and thus open the way to possible injustice. Anger is especially dangerous, since it demands immediate action, while reason requires time to consider and reconsider:
"De Ira, I. vi. 2.
' Op. Cit., P. 146.

' Epictetus, Discourses, I. xviii; and Manual, 42. Citations are to the Loeb Classical Lib., ed. W. A. Oldfather (London and New York, 1928). 7VI. 6, Loeb Classical Lib., ed. C. R. Haines (London and New York, I9I6). Note also, however, Seneca, De Constantia Sapientis, xii.3: "'Why, if the wise man cannot receive either injury or insult, does he punish those who have offered them?' For he is not avenging himself, but punishing them." ' I. xii. 2. The Latin exsequar gives the sense of pursuing with intent to punish.

54

Revenger George Chapman'sStoic-Christian

Reason grants a hearing to both sides, then seeks to postpone action, even its own, in order that it may gain time to sift out the truth; but anger is precipitate. Reason wishes the decision it gives to be just; anger wishes the decision which it has given to seem the just decision.9

Finally,punishment, if called for, must be inflictedin a manner consistent with reasonandjustice. Excessive crueltyis to be avoided, as is any senseof personal satisfaction in causingpain to an enemy.'0 of suchdutiesas vengeance, thatone should Speaking Senecacautions "do all thatis worthy of a goodman" and "nothingthatis unworthy of a man.""The viewsdiscussed abovewereto be foundin worksreadilyavailableto Renaissance Englishmen.Thosewho hadnot readextensively in Cicero, Seneca,Plutarch, Epictetus, orMarcus Aurelius wereneverthelesslikely to encounterepigrammatic formulations of their ideas
in the florilegia, the popular quotation books in which the Stoic thinkers were amongthe mostfrequently cited classicalauthors.'2

An even wider range of views on vengeancethan characterizes Stoic thoughtis to be found in the writingsof Renaissance Englishmen, for whom revengewas a subjectof lively controversy."3 The ambivalence and inconsistency which markRenaissance Englishattitudestowards revengeis in largepartattributable to the changesin religious,political,legal, and social institutions which accompanied England's emergence fromthe MiddleAges. The Tudor campaign " havingprovedonly moderately against"private revenge successful, the firstStuart's effortsto suppress duelling,bloodfeuds, and other time-honored formsof extra-legal retaliation met with stoutresistance
Ibid., I. xviii. I. Ibid., I. vi; and De Clementia,passim. "De Ira, I. xii. 2. 12 On the availabilityof Stoic works in the Renaissance,see Wieler, pp. 172-5. On the relative popularity of Classical authors in florilegia, see Bertram Cohon, Seneca's Tragedies in Florilegia and Elizabethan Drama (unpublished dissertation, Columbia University, x960), II5-69. 13 On Renaissance attitudes towards revenge, see L. B. Campbell, "Theories of Revenge in RenaissanceEngland," MP, XXVIII (193I), 28I-96; Fredson Bowers, Elizabethan Revenge Tragedy (Princeton, I940), pp. 3-40; Mary Mroz, Divine Vengeance (Washington, D. C., 1941), passim; and Eleanor Prosser, Hamlet and Revenge (Stanford, I967), pp. 3-73.
9
10

RonaldBroude

55

on the part of many Englishmen(particularly those of Chapman's Bacon's generation)for whom vengeancewas not Mr. Prosecutor "wild justice" but rather a sacred dutyimpliedby the lawsof nature, man, and God. Contrary to the view oftenencountered scholars amongElizabethan today,Renaissance Protestantism did not repudiate the "eye for an eye" ethic of the Pentateuch.Murderwas regarded as an offense againstGod, a violationof Divine Law, the penaltyfor which was clearlyset forthin Genesis9:6: "Whoso sheddethman'sblood,by man shall his blood be shed." This verse,by no means abrogated admonition to "resistnot evil,"had been cited by Luther by Christ's as the authority upon which all civil govemment, past and present,
rested."4

Orthodox Tudor-Stuart theorysaw the implementation of Divine Law as God'sprerogative, and hence, as Lily B. Campbellhas obRenaissance werelikelyto regard served, Englishmen all vengeance as divine vengeance,visitedby God either directlyor throughhuman these agentswere the king and the magistrates, agents."5 Ordinarily, who claimedto be God'sdeputieson earth,"ordained," as Paul had
explained in Romans I3, for the enforcement of His laws. Failure on the part of king and magistrates to punish malefactors was a seriousmatter,for unrevenged crime threatenednot only civil order but, ultimately, the harmonyof the entire universe. When, therefore, through either his own clevernessor the negligence of the authorities, a criminal managed to elude punishment, God was expected to intervene to ensure that justice was done. In such cases, He often selected a "private man" to be the instrument of His vengeance. Sometimes this man might himself be a criminal; sometimes in the process of taking revenge he might become one. On the question of when, if ever, a private individual might take vengeance without himself assuming guilt, opinion in RenaissanceEngland was sharply
" Lectureson Genesis" in the AmericanEdition of Luther'sWorks, ed. Pelikan and Poellot (St. Louis, Mo., I960), pp. 139-42, and Part I of Temporal Authority,
14

Works, XLV, ed. Schindel and Brandt (Philadelphia, I962), passim, but especially p. i02. These statements and the tradition they represent are not mentioned by the scholars cited in note 13 above. 15Op. cit., pp. 282 ff.

56

George Chapman'sStoic-ChristianRevenger

A good case could be madefor the pnvilege of the "redivided.16 vengerof blood"(the next of kin of a murder victim), whose duty wasdefined by the Bible(Numbers35:I9), andwho couldtherefore be considered as much "ordained"by God as any commissioned magistrate.17The duellist might likewise claim to be a guilt-free agentof divineretribution, sinceduelswereoftenregarded as "directed by the secretwill of God,"theiroutcomes being "the executions 18 of His hiddenjudgements." It was understood that Providence, operatingin ways often incomprehensible to mortals, employing portents, apparent coincidences, and variousminormiracles,arranged the pattem of events which culminatedin the criminal's downfall.19 Although rarelyreferred to explicitly savein worksof an overtlydidactic nature,the operation of Providence is generally assumed in Renaissance Englishtreatments of crimeand punishment; as recentscholarship has shown,the concept of retribution effectedis centralto the meaning Providentially of such revengeplays as The SpanishTragedyand Hamlet.20
16 See, for example, ChristopherGoodman, How Superior Powers Ought to be Obeyed ([Geneva?], 1558), p. I9o: "It is not only praiseworthyin all, but required of all . . . [to see the judgementsof God's laws] executed upon all manner of persons. . . . And if that be not done by the aid and consent of the Superiors, it is lawful for the people, yea, it is their duty to do it themselves . . . having the word of God for their warrant . . . and by the same charged to cast forth all evil from them." On circumstanceswhich might justify private men's taking revenge, see Bowers, p. 36; on Chapman'sview that God may select extraordinary men to act as agents of divine vengeance, see Rees, p. 6, who cites Chapman's Hymnus in Noctem. 17 The privilege of the revenger of blood was strengthenedby the provisionsin Elizabethanlaw favoring initiation of prosecutionby a murder victim's next of kin (see Francis Bacon, "The Use of the Law," Works, ed. Spedding et al [London, I859], VII, 453), and by the belief, discussed by Bowers (p. 39), that the son oc a murderedman could not succeed to his inheritance before he had avenged his father. 8 Vincentio Saviolo, Vincentio Saviolo His Practice (London, 1595), Sig. C2v. " On Providenceand divine vengeance, see H. H. Adams, English Domestic or Homiletic Tragedy (New York, 1943), p. i8. 20 On The Spanish Tragedy, see Ernst de Chickera, " Divine Justice and Private Revenge in The Spanish Tragedy," MLR, LVII (I962), on Titus 228-32; Andronicus, see my article, " Goth and Roman in Titus Andronicus,"Shakespeare Studies, VI (1970), 32; on Hamlet, see S. F. Johnson, " The Regeneration of Hamlet," SQ, III (1952), I87-207; on The Atheist's Tragedy, see Irving Ribner's Introductionto the Revels Plays edition (Cambridge, I964).

RonaldBroude

57

Chapman's portrayal of Clermont draws on bothStoicandChristian doctrine. In accordance with Stoic teaching, Clermont'srevenge, notablyfree fromvindictiveness and personal malice,has as its ends justice and the reformation of the criminal. When, realizingthat retribution is at hand, Montsurry changesfrom a base cowardto a worthyadversary, Clermont is prepared to be reconciled with him. When Montsurry shows himself magnanimous enough to forgive Clermonthis death, Clermontacknowledges the completeness of
Montsurry'sregeneration, asserting that his noble end "makes full amends and more" for his earlier faults. Insofar as possible, Clermont seeks to pursue vengeance guided by reason and unswayed by passion. He explicitly rejects the option of ignoble revenge as inconsistent with reason (" Shall we equal be / With villains? Is that your reason?" [III, ii, 98-9] 21), and he chooses single combat as the most honorable way of discharging his obligation to his brother. He expressesregret for his single impulsive act, his vow to avenge Bussy, made in the heat of the moment, without sufficient time for deliberation (11. IO9-I2), and he refuses to be moved to prematureaction by anger (" Nor can we call it virtue that proceeds/ From vicious fury" [11. I08-9]). Intent on pursuing the right course, Clermont considers arguments for and against Bussy's revenge: he turns over the possibility that he has only imagined the appearance of his brother's ghost (11. i iO-i i), and he wonders whether Bussy's death may not be more a private than a public matter (11. I I5-6). Perhapshis chief reason for hesitating is his fear, never stated explicitly but implied by his paraphrasesof Epictetus (III, iv, 66-75; IV, i, I37-57; IV, v, 4-13), that in attemptingto avenge Bussy he may overreachhimself, and so do more harm than good. The mischief of which a sincere but impulsive man is capable when, trusting to his own virtiu,he exceeds the limits of his power is suggested by the Guise. The notoriousMassacreaffordsa grim example of the sort of excesses to which zealots of the Guise's stamp can be prone. Dangerous to others, such men may prove equally so to themselves: it is, after all, the Guise's generous but ill-advised interces21Quotations from The Revenge are from T. M. Parrott'sedition of Chapman's Tragedies (London, i9i0).

58

George Chapman'sStoic-Christian Revenger

sionon behalfof the unjustlyaccused Clermont thatbringsthe pusillanimous deathas the mostexpedient Henryto see the Guise's means of protecting his own crown. The StoicalClermontis by principle opposedto such ill-considered conduct: his atttude is summedup in the adviceofferedto the Guise as the latter tries to chart his politicalfuture:
Make not your forwardspirit in virtue'sright A propertyfor vice, by thrusting on Further than all your powers can fetch you off. It is enough, your will is infinite To all things virtuous and religious, Which, within limits kept, may without danger Let virtue some good from your graces gather. (V, i, 70-6)

a practical codeof behavior, Essentially concerned morewith proper conductthan final causes,Clermont's Stoicismdoes not providea moralframework of cosmicdimensions in termsof which Bussy's deathmaybe defined.Such a moralframework is invoked by Bussy's ghost,who speaksfor the Justice
whose almighty word Measures the bloody acts of impious men With equal penance, who in th' act itself Includes th' infliction, which like chained shot Batter together still; though as the thunder Seems, by men's duller hearing than their sight, To break a great time after lightning forth, Yet both at one time tear the labouring cloud, So men think penance of their ills is slow, Though th' ill and penance still together go. (V, i,

5-I4)

The justicedescribed by Bussyand presentedas the "proportion" upon which the worldstandsis not, as has been suggested,"2 inconsistentwith tenetsaccepted by Renaissance Protestantism. Working from the premisethat every transgression of law must be answered with appropriate punishment, Bussyassertsthe existenceof a force which, actingin ways that sometimes seem slow to men, nevertheless ensuresthat no crimefails to be followedby retribution. It is the negligence of France's Kingin upholdingthis justicethat
22

(Toronto,I966), p.

See, for example, Bowers, p. 146; and Milar MacLure, George Chapman
131.

RonaldBroude

59

providesthe context for the action of The Revenge. Mistakenly thanvirtuous of poweras moreworthwhile viewingthe exercise living, Henry has becomea tyrantand, "morefearfulof the good than of the bad,"seeks to destroythe virtue which his weaknesssees as a Christian absolutes threatto his rule. Ambitious courtiers, forsaking humortheir king, pawningtheir integrity for pragmatic relativism, for what they cynicallycall the "public good." Thus Maillardcan himselffor the King (IV, i, arguethat thereis no sin in forswearing of the ideaof providential 45-50), while Baligny,in a profane parody necessity,can claim that, just as each man, being a part of God's submit to whateversufferingGod universe,must uncomplainingly mayimposeon him for the goodof the whole,so each subject,being must acceptwithoutmurmur a partof the commonweal, any wrong the Kingmaydo him for the goodof the royalestate(II, i, 34-56).23 to pervert of thisreadiness God'slawsin the interests Symbolic of court intrigueis Bussy'sslaying,defined,at least for the purposes of this madeparallel play,as "murther with law,"a political expedient hypofor adultery.24 critically passedoff as punishment Next of kin to Bussy,and one of the few spiritsuntouchedby of the Frenchcourt,Clermont seemsa likelycandidate the corruption the law redeem to betrayed by Henry. Bussy's ghost'sforeknowledge of Clermont's partin his revenge(V, iii, 46-55) and Clermont's own of being the " man in fate" (V, v, io6) suggestthat Clerawareness of supernatural monthas been selectedto be the instrument powers. must be made to re-examine However,beforehe can act, Clermont on reasonand to contemplate the possibility his Stoicdependence of actionin a worldmovedby powerswhoseways are beyondthe ken of human understanding.Bussy'sghost attemptsto force such a
23

24 The objection, first raised by Boas in his Introduction to the BeHes Lettres

For a perceptiveanalysis of Henry's court, see Omstein, pp. 70 ff.

p. xli, that Bussy's affair edition of Bussy and The Revenge (London, I905), with Tamyra justified his slaying in Bussy, seems to me not altogether relevant. Chapman reconceived both setting and characters for The Revenge-witness the changes in the Guise and Henry. For the later play, we are, I think, meant to accept Bussy's death as a political act, to decry Montsurry's preference for an ambush rather than a challenge, and to understand the punishment-for-adultery argument as only partially appropriate,an example of the sort of whitewashing the Guise foresees will follow his assassination.

6o

GeorgeChapman's Stoic-Christian Revenger

re-examination, and arguingfrom the premisethat observation of Christian law "standsupon faith, abovethe powerof reason"(V, i,
23), he challenges his brotlher's Epictetan caution:
Your mind (you say) kept in your flesh's bounds, Shows that man's will must rul'd be by his power: When (by true doctrine) you are taught to live Rather without the body than within, And rather to your God still than yourself.

To live to God, maintains Bussy, is to imitate him in

perfecting that justice That makes the world last, which proportion is Of punishment and wreak for every wrong.

Hence, Clermontis urged to

use the means thou hast to right The wrong I suffer'd. VVhatcorruptedlaw Leaves unperform'din kings, do thou supply, And be above them all in dignity. (11. 82-99)25

Colored by Bussy's fiery spirit and penchant for hyperbole, these speeches are not meant to be accepted uncritically. Rather, they provide a useful correctivefor Clermont's Stoic reticence, and help to move him towardsthe revenge which brings with it a more complete understandingof the justice whose agent he is. Only after he has dischargedhis obligation to his slain brotheris Clermont preparedto accept Montsurry'sdeath as a "just revenge" (V, v, I26) and to consider the possibilitythat the events he has experienced may have been directedby supernaturalforces similarto-and possibly identical with-Christian Providence (11. 129-32). The final scene, in which Clermont is called upon to respond to the deaths of Bussy and the Guise-both great-spirited men whose integrity sets them apart from their politic contemporaries, both victims of political intrigue, treacherouslyslain in ambushes-suggests the golden mean which reconciles Epictetus' warnings against overreaching oneself with the Christian duty to defend God's laws. The wise and virtuous man is not called upon to reform the world, but merely to do his part in upholding the justice which sustains both
2 This speech echoes in both thought and phrasing Chapman's Euthymiae Raptus, 11.373f. (Bartlett's edition of Chapman's Poems).

RonaldBroude

6i

societyand the universe. By avengingBussy,Clermontassertshis allegianceto this justice, and refuses to condone by inaction the casuistic relativism responsible for France's decay. Clermont is rightly repelled,however,at the prospectof avengingthe Guise. Such a project,involvingregicide,would constitute an impiouschallengeto the divinely established political order. He thereforechooses the Stoic alternative to existencein a worldhe cannotbetter,and ends his life with his own hand. Dedication to Sir ThomasHoward, his frequentmoralChapman's izing, and the generaltone of The Revengehave led some criticsto as the personification of Chapman's discussClermont Stoic-Christian ideals.While thisposition requires qualification-as Clermont himself is aware,he is far fromperfectin the practice of his philosophy (III,
iv, II

f; V,

i,

I56 ff.)-Chapman certainly has taken pains to set his

fromotherrevengers of the Elizabethan protagonist apart andJacobean themselves for tardiness stage. Hieronimoand Hamlet reproach in fearslest he mayact too quickly.Titus andAntonio Clermont acting; Clermontstrives to give vent to their feelings in epic outbursts; of the trialshe faces. Hoffman maintainhis composure regardless that they sink to the and Vindicipursuerevengeso unscrupulously level of the villains they punish;Clermontrefusesto set aside his scruples,and ends by both chastisingand reformingMontsurry. is emphasized adherence to Stoic-Christian (Clermont's principles by of his impetuous, who the presence amorally vengefulsister,Charlotte, or human-to her revenge.) forall obstacles-moral professes contempt failureto criticalconfusionhas resultedfrom Clermont's Ironically, the aroused with whom conformto expectations by very revengers he was meantto contrast.Viewedwithin the contextof Chapman's is bothphilosophicalClermont's Christian Stoicism, however, revenge and dramatically effective. ly consistent
New York, N. Y.