(Queenship and Power) Mary Villeponteaux (Auth.) - The Queen's Mercy - Gender and Judgment in Representations of Elizabeth I-Palgrave Macmillan US (2014)

QUEENSHIP AND POWER
Series Editors: Carole Levin and Charles Beem
This series brings together monographs, edited volumes, and textbooks from scholars
specializing in gender analysis, women’s studies, literary interpretation, and cultural,
political, constitutional, and diplomatic history. It aims to broaden our understanding of
the strategies that queens—both consorts and regnants, as well as female regents—pursued
in order to wield political power within the structures of male-dominant societies. In
addition to works describing European queenship, it also includes books on queenship
as it appeared in other parts of the world, such as East Asia, Sub-Saharan Africa, and
Islamic civilization.
Editorial Board
Linda Darling, University of Arizona (Ottoman Empire)

Theresa Earenfight, Seattle University (Spain)
Dorothy Ko, Barnard College (China)
Nancy Kollman, Stanford University (Russia)
John Thornton, Boston University (Africa and the Atlantic World)
John Watkins (France and Italy)
Published by Palgrave Macmillan
The Lioness Roared: The Problems of Female Rule in English History

By Charles Beem
Elizabeth of York
By Arlene Naylor Okerlund
Learned Queen: The Imperial Image of Elizabeth I

By Linda Shenk
High and Mighty Queens of Early Modern England: Realities and Representations
Edited by Carole Levin, Debra Barrett-Graves, and Jo Eldridge Carney
The Monstrous Regiment of Women: Female Rulers in Early Modern Europe

By Sharon L. Jansen
The Face of Queenship: Early Modern Representations of Elizabeth I

By Anna Riehl
Elizabeth I: The Voice of a Monarch

By Ilona Bell
Tudor Queenship: The Reigns of Mary and Elizabeth

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The Death of Elizabeth I: Remembering and Reconstructing the Virgin Queen

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Queenship and Voice in Medieval Northern Europe
By William Layher
The Foreign Relations of Elizabeth I

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Wicked Women of Tudor England: Queens, Aristocrats, Commoners

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AMonarchyofLetters:RoyalCorrespondenceandEnglishDiplomacyintheReignofElizabethI
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Three Medieval Queens: Queenship and the Crown in Fourteenth-Century England

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Mary I: Gender, Power, and Ceremony in the Reign of England’s First Queen
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The Last Plantagenet Consorts: Gender, Genre, and Historiography, 1440–1627

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Fairy Tale Queens: Representations of Early Modern Queenship

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Mother Queens and Princely Sons: Rogue Madonnas in the Age of Shakespeare
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The Name of a Queen: William Fleetwood’s Itinerarium ad Windsor

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Queenship in Medieval Europe

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The Queens Regnant of Navarre: Succession, Politics, and Partnership, 1274–1512

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QueenshipintheMediterranean:NegotiatingtheRoleoftheQueenintheMedieval
and Early Modern Eras
Edited by Elena Woodacre
The Queen’s Mercy: Gender and Judgment in Representations of Elizabeth I

By Mary Villeponteaux
THE QUEEN’S MERCY
GENDER AND JUDGMENT IN
REPRESENTA
TATIONS OF ELIZABETH I
Mary Villeponteaux
THE QUEEN’S MERCY
Copyright © Mary Villeponteaux, 2014.
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 2014 978-1-137-37174-4
All rights reserved.
First published in 2014 by
PALGRAVE MACMILLAN®
in the United States—a division of St. Martin’s Press LLC,
175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010.
Where this book is distributed in the UK, Europe and the rest of the world,
this is by Palgrave Macmillan, a division of Macmillan Publishers Limited,
registered in England, company number 785998, of Houndmills,
Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS.
Palgrave Macmillan is the global academic imprint of the above companies
and has companies and representatives throughout the world.
Palgrave® and Macmillan® are registered trademarks in the United States,
the United Kingdom, Europe and other countries.
ISBN 978-1-349-47577-3 ISBN 978-1-137-37175-1 (eBook)
DOI 10.1057/9781137371751
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Villeponteaux, Mary.
The queen’s mercy : gender and judgment in representations of
Elizabeth I / Mary Villeponteaux.—First edition.
pages cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1. Great Britain—Politics and government—1558–1603. 2. Great

Britain—History—Elizabeth, 1558-1603. 3. Elizabeth I, Queen of
England, 1533–1603. 4. Women—Political activity—Great Britain—
History—16th century. 5. Queens—Great Britain—Biography. 6. Mercy
in literature. 7. Clemency in literature. 8. Justice in literature. I. Title.
DA355.V55 2014
942.055—dc23 2014002963
A catalogue record of the book is available from the British Library.
Design by Newgen Knowledge Works (P) Ltd., Chennai, India.
First edition: July 2014
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
In memory of my parents,
AnneBellingerVilleponteauxandLorenzAimarVilleponteaux,Jr.
This page intentionally left blank
CONTENTS
Acknowledgments ix
Note on Texts xi
1 “By Nature Full of Mercy”: The Clemency of the Queen 1

2 “The Sacred Pledge of Peace and Clemencie”:
Elizabethan Mercy in The Faerie Queene 35
3 “Proud and Pitilesse”: Elizabethan Mercy and the
Sonnet Tradition 67
4 “A Goodly Musicke in Her Regiment”: Elusive Justice in
The Merchant of Venice 107
5 “Pardon Is Still the Nurse of Second Woe”: Measure for
Measure and the Transition from Elizabeth to James 133
6 “Good Queene, You Must Be Rul’d”: Feminine Mercy
in the Plays of Heywood and Dekker 157
Notes 175
Bibliography 207
Index 219
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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I
am grateful to the editors of Palgrave’s Queenship and Power
series, Carole Levin and Charles Beem, for their encouragement
and support of this project. Several of the ideas in this book were
first aired in papers I presented at meetings of the Queen Elizabeth I
Society. To the members of that group of erudite and congenial schol-
ars I owe a debt of thanks for valuable suggestions, stimulating dis-
cussions, and new insights about Queen Elizabeth and her culture.
Georgia Southern University helped me with a Scholarly Pursuit
Award that gave financial support for the summer of 2013; I am
grateful for that award as well as for the generosity of my department
chair, David Dudley, who gave me a course release during my final
semester of work on this book. Graduate student Collin Kimmons
assisted with the proofreading and formatting of quotations and
notes; I greatly appreciate her cheerful willingness to help.
The anonymous reader for Palgrave Macmillan and the reader
who revealed her identity, Linda Shenk, both offered excellent advice
that I very much appreciated. Their careful readings and suggestions
for revision helped me immeasurably. I would also like to thank my
colleague and friend Julia Griffin for her generous help in reading
chapters and offering knowledgeable and thoughtful suggestions.
Thanks also go to Larry Weiss, lawyer and Shakespearean, for his
commentsontheMeasureforMeasurechapterandmattersofequity.
I am grateful, too, for the friendship of my colleague Maria Magoula
Adamos, with whom I had several enlightening conversations about
the philosophy of forgiveness.
Part of Chapter Two was originally published in Spenser Studies 25
(2010) as “Dangerous Judgments: Elizabethan Mercy in The Faerie
Queene,” and is used with the permission of AMS Press. A version
of Chapter Four appeared as “‘A Goodly Musicke in Her Regiment’:
Elizabeth, Portia, and the Elusive Harmony of Justice” inExplorations
inRenaissanceCulture37.1(Summer2011):71–82,andisreprintedwith
permission of the South-Central Renaissance Conference. My spe-
cial thanks to Thomas Herron, editor of EIRC, and David Ramm,
editor-in-chief of AMS Press, for making the process of obtaining
x Acknowledgments
permission painless. The cover image, the title page of the 1569
Bishops’ Bible, is reproduced courtesy of the Houghton Library: call
number WKR 15.2.2, Houghton Library, Harvard University.
Finally, my greatest debt of gratitude is to my wonderful hus-
band, David Wheeler. Though his academic field is the eighteenth
century, he gamely read chapters and gave me helpful advice. More
important, he offered boundless support and encouragement while I
was working on this project.
NOTE ON TEXTS
A
ll quotations retain the spelling and punctuation found in the
edition cited, but u/v and i/j have been modernized through-
out, with one exception: quotations from The Faerie Queene
keep the spelling found in Hamilton’s edition.
CHAPTER 1
“BY NATURE FULL OF MERC

R Y”:
THE CLEMENCY OF THE QUEEN
I
nhisfamousdefenseofqueenship,AnHarboroweforTreweand
FaithfullSubjectes,JohnAylmervalorizesElizabeth’smercyas
one of the qualities that make her a perfectly virtuous woman.
“There is a mervelous mercy and no rigour, an exceding pacience, and
no desire of reveng in her.” In these terms Aylmer praises Elizabeth I
and disputes the claim of John Knox that a woman’s rule violates the
laws of God and nature.1 Throughout his treatise, Aylmer takes great
pains to depict Elizabeth in terms that his age considered ideally fem-
inine. For example, when he praises her learning, he couples his claims
about her knowledge with parallel claims about her modesty. Aylmer
quotes Elizabeth’s first schoolmaster: “I teach her wordes (quod he)
and she me things. I teache her the tongues to speake: and her mod-
est and maidenly life, teacheth me workes to do.” In this way, Aylmer
reassures his reader that despite her great learning, Elizabeth retains
idealized feminine virtues such as modesty, as well as a “marvelous
meeke stomacke.” 2 Similarly, he emphasizes her mercy, a virtue often
depicted as fundamentally feminine. After recounting Elizabeth’s
persecution during Mary’s reign, Aylmer insists that Elizabeth has no
desire to seek revenge, and in fact prays for her enemies:
Are not these great tokens thou good subject, of much mercy to fol-
low? Marke her comming in, and compare it with others. She com-
meth in lyke a lambe, and not lyke a Lyon, lyke a mother, and not lyke
a stepdam. She rusheth not in at the fyrst chop, to violate and breake
former lawes, to stirre her people to chaunge what they list, before
order be taken by lawe. She hangeth no man, she behedeth none. She
burneth none, spoileth none.3
Of course, Aylmer means to contrast Elizabeth with Mary Tudor,

but his focus on her clemency also contributes to his portrait of a
2 The Queen’s Mercy
“natural” woman and queen, who is “lyke a mother” in her patience

and mercy.
Aylmer seems to praise Elizabeth’s judgment when he describes
her as a monarch who follows divine guidance “by using correction
without severitie, by sekyng the loste with clemencie, by govern-
ing wisely without fury, with weying and judging withoute rash-
ness.””4 Yet elsewhere in this treatise, he registers serious distrust of
woman’s rule as well as a woman’s ability to make wise judgments.
In an earlier passage, Aylmer observes that a woman’s rule could do
less harm in England than in most countries because of England’s
mixed monarchy.5 Aylmer reassures his readers, “If she shuld judge in
capitall crimes: what daunger were there in her womannishe nature?
none at all. For the verdict is the 12 mennes, whiche passe uppon life
and deathe, and not hers.”6 Thus, in the course of a single treatise,
Elizabeth’s femininity is praised as a maternal wellspring of mercy
and denigrated as a “womannishe” nature that renders her unfit to
make independent judgments. The mercy expected to characterize
Elizabeth’s judgments is depicted as both desirable and disquieting.
This tension between veneration and suspicion of monarchical mercy,
particularly a queen’s mercy, is the subject of the present study.
The Queen’s Mercy y is the first book to study the image of Elizabeth
as a clement queen, and the first to consider how attitudes toward her
exercise of justice shaped literary representations of mercy.7 My anal-
ysis of Elizabeth’s image as a merciful queen is informed by studies of
her representation by scholars such as Louis Montrose, Susan Frye,
and Carole Levin. Louis Montrose’s work on the “shaping fantasies”
of Elizabethan culture makes us aware of the imaginative accom-
modations required by Elizabeth’s role as queen of a patriarchal cul-
ture.8SusanFrye’sbookElizabethI:TheCompetitionforRepresentation
draws our attention to the contested images of the queen and the
way Elizabeth’s subjects sometimes sought to construct her in con-
ventionally feminine terms in order to bolster their own authority.9
CaroleLevin’sHeart
s andStomachofaKing:ElizabethIandthePolitics
of Sex and Power examines the intersection of gender and politics in
Elizabeth’s rule and shows how representations of the queen in many
venues, including gossip and other popular forms, respond to tradi-
tional constructions of women.10 My understanding of the dynam-
ics of Elizabeth’s representation as a merciful queen owes a great
deal to these and other studies of what Louis Montrose has called
the Elizabethan “political imaginary,” a term that designates “the
images, tropes, and other verbal and iconic resources that provided
The Clemency of the Queen
n 3
a growing and changing matrix for the varied and sharply contested
processes of royal representation.”11 The construction of Elizabeth as
an icon of mercy was influenced by traditional ideas about women;
it was a process that changed over time in response to religious and
political pressures, and it was often contested.
Elizabethan culture—its literature, political and legal treatises,
religious writing, as well as visual representations—was engaged in
an ongoing conversation about the rightness and efficacy of clem-
ency. Controversy about mercy was generated not only by the pres-
ence of a woman on the throne but also by the Tudor program of
centralizing power in the hands of the monarchy. The decades of
Elizabeth’s reign witnessed a struggle over the site of legal power, a
struggle that encompassed both the role of equity and the Chancery
court in the English system of justice as well as the related question
about the monarch’s prerogative. Furthermore, zealous Protestants
were chronically unhappy with Elizabeth’s failure to support their
causes, which often involved prosecuting and punishing the enemies
of Protestantism, whether at home or abroad. At a moment when
political and religious factors produced a climate in which debates
about justice were inevitable, the presence of a queen on the throne
intensified questions about mercy and shaped the debate.
Mercy was a problematic concept even without the complications
of the monarch’s gender and the particular political and religious cir-
cumstances of Elizabeth’s reign. Monarchs have an obligation to be
merciful, according to Christian beliefs based on scripture: “Mercie
and trueth preserve the King: for his throne shalbe established with
mercie” (Proverbs 20:28).12 Yet, while mercy is regarded as an essen-
tial attribute of a Christian monarch, it is also a quality regarded
with suspicion in classical and Christian philosophy as well as in six-
x
teenth-century political discourse. For many writers the problem lies
in the relationship between mercy and its misguided counterpart,
pity. For instance, Seneca praises mercy but warns against pity, which
he describes as the product of a weak nature.13 In The City of God,
Augustine takes issue with this Stoic depiction of pity as a vice, but
he too distinguishes between the human emotion of pity and divine
mercy, which comes from God’s goodness. Acknowledging that pity
is “a kind of fellow-feeling in our own hearts,” Augustine argues that
such “passions” may nonetheless be virtuous if they are subordinated
to God; passions are not vices if they do not undermine a wise man’s
reason. Augustine stipulates that pity must be shown in such a way
that it does not encroach upon justice.14 Sixteenth-century political
theorists often attempt to make a similar distinction between the

mercy appropriate for a prince and the inappropriate clemency that
might be a product of human weakness. For example, Elyot in The
Governour devotes a chapter to the importance of mercy but near the
end asserts that mercy must always be “joyned with reason” if it is not
to degenerate into that “sickenesse of the mynd” that he calls “vaine
pitie.”15 Nevertheless, despite such attempts to differentiate between
mercy and pity, the distinction between the two erodes during this
period. It is not unusual to find writers using the terms interchange-
ably,asdoesLipsiusinhisSixe
s BookesofPolitickesorCivilDoctrine:
“It is profitable for a good, and gracious Prince, sometimes to passe
the limites of equitie, to shew his clemencie, were it but in regard of
mercie, & pitie, to which all other vertues do in honor give place.”16
Mercy is a contested concept in the sixteenth century: while some
writers take pains to separate virtuous mercy from emotional pity,
others, like Lipsius, ignore this distinction, and increasingly the two
terms, mercy and pity, are treated as though they are synonymous.
If mercy and pity are considered one and the same, then mercy is
regarded as springing from human passions. Political writers often
voice strong concern about the impact the passions can have on gov- v
ernance, and argue that mercy, despite being a Christian virtue, can
weaken the commonwealth because it is a product of human emo-
tion. Religious and political tradition demands that mercy be vener-
ated, but more often than not, early modern writers who ostensibly
revere mercy are much more fervent in blaming clemency than they
are in praising forgiveness. For example, Elyot not only tries to dis-
tinguish between princely mercy and weak pity; he also registers his
suspicion of clemency in his own age by stating that “at this daye
the more parte of men be disseased” with the “sicknesse” that is
pity.17 Yet, monarchical mercy—the virtue that Shakespeare’s Portia
describes as “enshrined in the hearts of kings”—can never be com-
pletely dismissed because of its importance in Christian tradition.
Even those who are the most suspicious of the deleterious effects
of too much mercy at play in the governance of the commonwealth
do not reject it outright. Jacques Hurault omits discussion of mercy
almostentirelyinhisPoliticke,Moral,andMartialDiscourses,buteven
while warning that clemency “is a kind of consenting to the sin, when
it is willingly permitted to goe unpunished,” he feels compelled to
acknowledge the common understanding that rulers should be mer-
ciful, and rather grudgingly states, “I know well it will be said, that a
prince ought to be mercifull, and I deny it not.”18
n 5
InThe Prince, Machiavelli offers a similarly ambivalent account of

mercy, but for him, the value of mercy has nothing to do with its being
a Christian virtue. Rather, Machiavelli regards a merciful reputation
as beneficial to a monarch’s public image, but detrimental if it goes
too far. “Every prince should prefer to be considered merciful rather
than cruel, yet he should be careful not to mismanage this clemency
of his.”19 For Machiavelli, a virtuous image can help the prince, but
vice—if it is a vice that might help save the state—is often preferable
to virtue. Thus, if cruelty might bring order and unity to the state,
then cruelty should be practiced. “No prince should mind being called
cruel for what he does to keep his subjects united and loyal; he may
make examples of a very few, but he will be more merciful in reality
than those who, in their tender-heartedness, allow disturbances to
occur, with their attendant murders and lootings.”20 It is in this chap-
ter that Machiavelli raises the famous question, “Whether it is better
to be loved or feared.” He answers that, although every prince would
like to be both, it is safer to be feared than to be loved. Machiavelli
implies that a merciful prince will be more greatly loved than a cruel
one, an idea that Elizabeth clearly embraced. But Machiavelli also
insists that the people’s love is fickle; their fear gives better assur-
ance of their support—thus cruelty can be salutary to the security
of the ruler. However, Machiavelli implicitly genders his prince as
masculine in this particular discussion; for instance, he says that the
most important time for a prince to display cruelty is when he leads
an army in wartime; without a reputation for cruelty, he cannot hope
to control his men.21 This example is not one that would be meaning-
ful for Elizabeth; and as we shall see, when a woman has a reputation
for cruelty, early modern culture condemns her as monstrous.
That a prince truly should be merciful is a tenet of Christian
belief; outside of a Christian framework, Machiavelli still recom-
mends that the prince seem merciful, if possible. Indeed, it is a com-
monplace in classical thought that a merciful ruler wins the loyalty
and support of his subjects. As Seneca says in De Clementia, “Mercy,
then, makes rulers not only more honored, but safer.” The merciful
ruler is secure on the throne because by mercy he earns the people’s
loyalty: the king “who is inclined to the milder course even if it would
profit him to punish . . . such a one the whole state loves, defends,
and reveres.”22 In sixteenth-century England, monarchical mercy
was not regarded only as a Christian virtue; it was also understood
in these practical terms, as a means of displaying and consolidating
power. K. J. Kesselring has argued that Tudor monarchs deliberately
reduced the common law courts’ power to pardon in order to have

a monopoly on public displays of clemency designed to enhance
their authority, and expanded and consolidated the royal pardon
along with the power of the royal courts in an effort to increase the
power of the crown.23 And while she does not think that the mon-
arch’s power to pardon was ever seriously questioned or challenged
during this period, the larger question of the monarch’s prerogative
was indeed debated during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries,
partly in terms of the concept of equity.
Equity is a concept often invoked in the Renaissance. Its most fre-
quentlycitedsourceis Aristotle’sNicomacheanEthics,whichexplains
equity as correcting the law in order to bring about greater justice.
According to Aristotle, equity is “a rectification of law where law is
defective because of its generality.” Equity is a “special kind of Justice,
not a different quality altogether.”24 But Renaissance uses of the term
“equity” do not limit it to an aspect of law. Mark Fortier argues that
early modern England was a “culture of equity,” meaning that equity
was a key idea in general currency, invoked in the discourse of not only
law, but also politics, religion, and poetry.25 Equity is often equated
with mercy: “the rigour of the Law is tempered with the sweetness of
Equity, which is nothing more but Mercie qualifying the sharpness
of Justice,” says one writer.26 But the term “equity” is capacious in the
Renaissance: it could also mean flexibility, or fairness, or righteous
severity, or equality. In early modern England, equity was associ-
ated with the Court of Chancery, known as the “court of the king’s
conscience” because of its origin in subjects’ pleas to the king to
rectify injustices they had suffered in the common law courts, pleas
that were funneled through the Lord Chancellor. Chancery Court
was supposed to complement the common law courts by ruling on
cases where application of the letter of the law would not render true
justice. Though Chancery Court may not have been, in actuality, a
vehicle of royal authority and the king’s unencumbered power, it was
often represented that way in early modern England. The equity of
Chancery Court was closely associated with royal prerogative, and
there were many sixteenth- and seventeenth-century writers who
opposed placing equitable prerogative over the law. The conflict
between the prerogative court and the common law court came to
a head after James’s accession but was brewing during the reign of
Elizabeth. Though the equity practiced by Chancery Court was not
necessarily an expression of absolutism or of mercy, it was associated
with both of these concepts.
n 7
Thus in early modern England, the proper role of mercy in gov- v

ernance was contested. The practice of the royal pardon and the
activity of the “court of the king’s conscience” could both be under-
stood as expanding the power of the crown and reducing the power
of the Parliament and the common law courts. Actual expressions
of monarchical mercy were often criticized and could easily be dis-
missed as the products of emotional frailty rather than rational vir-
tue. And this was especially true of a queen’s mercy because of the
early modern belief that women were ruled by their passions.
Gendered Mercy
Many contemporary discussions of clemency associate this qual-
ity with women. In his treatise on the emotions, The Passions of the
Minde in Generall, Thomas Wright states categorically that women
are more merciful than men: “Women, by nature, are enclined
more to mercie and pitie than men, because the tendernesse of their
complexion moveth them more to compassion.”27 Many writers
suggest that compassion and tenderness come naturally to women
because of their physical softness. For instance, The Ladies Dictionary
lists “Compassion and a Merciful Disposition” as a virtue of the
female sex:
This chiefly should reign in the lovely tender breasts of the female sex,
made for the seats of mercy and commiseration. They being made of
the softest mould, ought to be most pliant and yielding to the impres-
sion of pity and compassion.28
Feminine beauty is another “natural” attribute of women that

promises tenderness; as Donne claims that he said to his “profane
mistresses,” beauty should signify a woman’s readiness to feel pity:
“Beauty, of pity, foulness only is / A sign of rigour” (Sonnet 13).29 In
these examples, pity and compassion are attractive feminine quali-
ties. But compassion is often attributed to women not because of
feminine virtue but because of feminine weakness.
Even a strong advocate of clemency like Lipsius, who calls it “the
other light” (along with justice) and argues that clemency carries more
“grace and comelinesse” in a king or prince than in any other person,
nonetheless warns against its excess in these terms: “For without dis-
cretion it [clemencie] should be too much effeminatenesse, and leni-
tie, and vice rather then vertue.”30
This “effeminatenesse” is a pliability and lack of emotional

restraint often attributed to women. Women are supposedly more
subject to their passions than are men, a quality that makes them
suggestible and easily moved. Thomas Wright, for example, who
ascribes compassion to a woman’s tender disposition, suggests that
this compassionate tendency allows women to be manipulated much
more easily than are men. Describing a preacher in Italy whose ora-
torical power was such that he could readily move his audience from
tears to laughter, Wright comments that this gifted speaker knew
“the Art of moving the affections of those auditors, and besides
that, the most part were women that heard him (whose passions are
most vehement and mutable) therefore he might have perswaded
them what hee listed.”31 Those who opposed female rule frequently
expressed exactly this concern: that a woman’s judgment cannot be
trusted because women are so easily swayed by passions and so lack- k
ing in reason.
It was a commonplace of Renaissance thought that women by
nature lacked the capacity to rule.32 One aspect of women’s nature
that purportedly made them unfit for sovereignty was their subjection
to their passions. Humanist educator Juan Vives limited a woman’s
realm to her home, telling her that she was forbidden by wise men to
rule or govern. Addressing a woman, he says, “You attempte to drawe
all thynge after your fantasye without discretion.”33 Sharon L. Jansen
has pointed out that this famous passage was not actually written
by Vives but inserted by his English translator, Richard Hyrde.34
Nevertheless, the sentiment is true to Vives, who frequently charac-
terizes women as unreasonable and passion driven. As he says, “the
man resembleth the reason, and the woman the body: Now reason
ought to rule and the body to obey.”35 Theodora Jankowski identi-
fies this idea as a subtext in the work of many Renaissance political
theorists: reason should rule the prince; men are rational and women
emotional; therefore the possibility of a “female prince” is excluded.
Jankowski also finds that some Elizabethan dramas that depicted
queens privileged the body natural (and hence, the passions of the
queens) over their political identities.36 Paige Martin Reynolds offers
a nuanced analysis of representations of Elizabeth’s judgment, argu-
ing that the queen’s frequent references to judgment and her own
impartiality “indicate her self-consciousness about this aspect of
sovereignty.”37 Reynolds’s reading of George Peele’s Araygnement of
Paris reveals a text that reinforces limits on Elizabeth’s sovereignty
by making her the subject rather than the arbiter of judgment. The
n 9
present study will narrow the focus on the queen’s judgment to rep-
resentations of her mercy, which sometimes do raise questions about
the efficacy of women’s rule by suggesting that a woman’s judgment
is determined by her “womanish pity.”
Given that women’s supposedly merciful dispositions could be
regarded as a sign of feminine weakness, it is somewhat surprising
that depictions of Queen Elizabeth as a loving and merciful mon-
arch abound during her reign. Traditionally all rulers are expected
to show mercy and are praised for their mercy, but in the case of
Elizabeth I, this aspect of the monarchical image received special
emphasis. Why did contemporary representations of the queen so
often highlight her clemency? And why did Elizabeth herself fre-
quently stress her own clement nature? The long-standing tradition
of locating mercy in iconic female figures such as the Virgin Mary, as
well as earthly queens and mothers, may be part of the reason.
Helen Hackett suggests that the celebration of Elizabeth’s mercy
may have owed something to the Cult of the Virgin Mary. While
she challenges blanket assertions that the “Cult of Elizabeth” filled
a gap left when Protestantism tried to eradicate Roman Catholic
Mariolatry, Hackett does explore the way that certain elements of
Queen Elizabeth’s representation, including her images as a merciful
mediatrix and tender mother, are traditionally associated with the
Virgin Mary. As Dante describes her, she sits in heaven grieving for
sinners, and “her compassion breaks Heaven’s stern decree.”38 Marina
Warner’s analysis of Marian imagery shows how these two images,
mother and mediatrix, were often in fact conflated, sometimes quite
starkly, as in the medieval iconography Warner discusses in which
Mary bares her breast before Christ and in one case says, “Because
of the milk I gave you, have mercy on them.”39 Paul Strohm, in his
analysis of medieval queens as intercessors, also finds a connection
between maternity and mercy: he analyzes a fourteenth-century
account of the intercession of Queen Philippa on behalf of the bur-
ghers of Calais and finds a strong emphasis on Philippa’s maternity in
the description of her self-abasement at the feet of Edward III, where
her advanced state of pregnancy is repeatedly mentioned.40 Hackett
asserts that both of these traditional, Marian images—mother and
intercessor—were used as “safely” feminine ways of praising Queen
Elizabeth: “Mercy and grace were virtues that could comfortably be
identified with a female monarch without suggesting either that she
was inadequate as a ruler, or that she was unnaturally mannish.””41
While significant critical attention has been paid to the maternal
imagery adopted by and projected onto Queen Elizabeth, her image

as a wellspring of mercy—with merciful intercessor being one aspect
of this idea—has not been the subject of any extended consideration.
It may be that the association of mercy with femininity, the Virgin
Mary, and motherhood is enough to explain why the image of a mer-
ciful Queen Elizabeth was so popular, and apparently so desirable
to Elizabeth herself. And there is also a long historical tradition of
queens as merciful intercessors that should be considered.
Christine Coch has shown that Elizabeth adopted motherhood
as part of her self-representation early in her reign.42 In explaining
Elizabeth’s depiction of herself as “mother of my country,” Coch sug-
gests that motherhood was almost the only “positive paradigm for
public power” that patriarchal sixteenth-century society conceded
to women.43 However, I would add that the role of intercessor was
another such potentially powerful stance. Certainly both Elizabeth
and her predecessor, Mary I, inherited a long tradition of queens as
merciful intercessors, a tradition suggested by the medieval adage,
“If the king is law, the queen is mercy.””44 This could provide another
explanation for the pervasive depiction of Elizabeth as a merciful
monarch: not only is it a safely feminine role because of its attribu-
tion to the Virgin Mary and its frequent conjunction with mother-
hood, but actual queens traditionally were expected to be merciful
and to sue the monarch for mercy on behalf of their subjects.
Though queens were often figured as intercessors, the question
of how this image of queenship was perceived still remains. Is the
queen-as-merciful-intercessor formula one that preserves patriar-
chal authority? Or does intercession confer power on the interceder?
It has been argued that the role of intercessor actually serves to cir-
cumscribe rather than enhance queenly power: scholars generally
agree that emphasis on the medieval queen’s role as intercessor grew
as the institutional basis for queenly power shrank. Lois Huneycutt
says that “as the possibility for direct exercise of power became
more remote, writers began to stress the queen’s duty to use the less
direct, but no less potent, means of persuasion and intercession.””45
Yet not everyone would agree that the role of intercessor confers the
same power as that enjoyed by queens before the twelfth century.
Paul Strohm argues that earlier medieval queens, though they had
access to the role of mediatrix, emphasized more powerful roles such
as royal counselor, mistress of the households, and property owner.
According to his analysis, the role of mediatrix limits a queen’s
power and is often a marginalized position that serves to buttress
n 11
kingly authority by casting the queen not as a joint ruler but as a

humble supplicant.46 Strohm’s analysis of Queen Philippa’s interces-
sion with her husband Edward III, mentioned above, highlights her
humility, weakness, marginalization, and another quality that I will
consider more fully later: her emotional identification with others’
suffering.47
But even this long-standing tradition of representing queens as
merciful intercessors should not be dismissed as unambiguously
“safe,” or as necessarily subordinating women to patriarchal author-
ity. Just as Christine Coch and Mary Beth Rose have shown that
even maternal authority was sometimes constructed as threatening
in the Elizabethan age, so too the power of the queenly intercessor in
the Middle Ages could be seen as subversive.48 Strohm gives as exam-
ples some mediating queens who enhance their authority by adding
the purveyance of wise advice to their role as intercessor. Strohm
claims that these sage counselors (such as Richard II’s queen, Anne
of Bohemia) diverge from “those Marian mediatrices whose actions
are grounded in a capacity for condolence.””49 John Carmi Parsons
makes a parallel point about interceding medieval queens when he
shows how some of them used that role to create networks of obliga-
tion that could bind subjects to the queen’s service even in future
generations.50 Certainly one could argue that successful intercession
confers power on the intercessor, and as many scholars have pointed
out, there is nothing inherently feminine about intercession: male
courtiers and advisors to kings often play that role. Furthermore,
even representations of the Virgin Mary as an intercessor do not
always cast her as a humble supplicant. Warner shows that the medi-
eval figure of a merciful Mary often seems rather amoral, flying in
the face of justice to save sinners who trust in her. Mary, in medieval
tradition, can subvert heavenly justice, as suggested by iconography
analyzed by Catherine Oakes in which Mary interferes—sometimes
quite vigorously—with the weighing of souls in the scales of justice
in order to save the sinners, despite the heaviness of their sins. Oakes
notes that this iconography flourished in England from the four-
teenth century to the Reformation.51 Of course, Protestants objected
to the implicit claim that Mary exerted such authority.
Thus even this traditional role—queen as merciful, Marian
intercessor—may be perceived from opposing viewpoints, as weak or
powerful, serving to enforce or to undermine women’s subordination
to masculine authority. In this study of queenly mercy in early mod-
ern English culture, I find that representations of a queen’s mercy
are similarly ambivalent. To imagine Elizabeth as a tender, merciful

queen might be to idealize her as the perfect Christian monarch and
Renaissance woman, and such a portrayal may also resonate with the
old image of the Virgin Mary. Or, such a depiction may suggest the
queen’s weakness: she is vulnerable to emotion and foolishly led by
her “womanish pity” instead of her reason. If Elizabeth is depicted as
a mediatrix between her people and God, along the lines of medieval
queens consort who interceded between the people and the King,
then perhaps this serves to position her as subordinate and reduce
people’s sense of her power. Or the queen’s clemency may be one
important aspect of her power, because her mercy binds subjects to
her in obligation and service and increases her popular support. The
quality of mercy is the subject of disagreement already in this age;
when a reigning queen exercises mercy, or is portrayed as merciful,
the subject is even more complicated by her gender.
Cultural images and expectations for women contributed to the
insistence by Elizabeth as well as her people that she was an excep-
tionally merciful monarch. One further aspect of that image that
should be explored is its opposite: the figure of the cruel queen.
Probably the most ubiquitous label for an unpopular queen in the
sixteenth century was “Jezebel.” Readers today sometimes assume
that when a woman is labeled a Jezebel, she is being accused of sexual
impropriety.52 However, as we examine the application of this label,
what becomes clear is that a Jezebel, in the sixteenth-century dis-
course of opponents of women’s rule, connotes not whoredom (in
its obvious sense) but rather the wickedness of a woman ruler, with
special attention to her cruelty. Elizabeth wanted to avoid accusa-
tions of Jezebeldom almost as much as she welcomed praise for her
clemency.
It is John Knox who provides the earliest instance cited in the
OED of the term “Jezebel” when, in his 1558First
8 Blast of the Trumpet
Against the Monstrous Regiment of Women, he uses it to describe
the “mischievous Marys”—Mary Stuart, and also Mary of Guise,
Scotland’s regent, but primarily Mary Tudor, whose reign is the main
focus of Monstrous Regiment. t 53 Not only Knox but also others such
as Christopher Goodman, Thomas Becon, and Anthony Gilby used
the label Jezebel to vilify Mary I.54 Jezebel is a popular example of a
“bad woman” in early modern discourse; she is mentioned in several
of the literary attacks on women that proliferated during the six- x
teenth and early seventeenth centuries in England.55 What did the
biblical Jezebel represent for these writers?
n 13
Goodman calls Mary a Jezebel in order to emphasize her crime

of subjecting England to the power of Spain as well as her cruelty.
The biblical Jezebel was herself a foreigner, a Phoenician who mar-
ried the Hebrew king Ahab and exerted a strong influence over him:
by following Jezebel in the worship of Baal, Ahab is said to have done
“worse in the sight of the Lord then all that were before him” (1 Kings
16:30–31). All of these writers find a parallel between Mary’s institu-
tion of Roman Catholicism and Jezebel’s worship of Baal. Ahab and
Jezebel’s reign is also marked by persecutions and abuses of power;
thus, Goodman refers to Mary as an “unlawful Governesse, wicked
Jesabel,” who is “suffred to raigne over us in Goddes furie,” and whose
rule is “contrarie to nature.””56 Immediately, he refers to those who
support this “Jesabel” as ones who “most wickedlie betrayed Christe,
their countrie, and them selves . . . to become slaves to a strange and
foren nation, the prowde Spaniards.””57 Goodman goes on to excori-
ate Mary’s counselors and justices for their impiety, failure to defend
true religion, and especially the violence and cruelty to which they
subject the English. Goodman later emphasizes these corresponding
crimes of false religion and cruelty when he again refers to Mary as
Jezebel:
And the counterfeyte Christians this day, which everie where (but
especiallie in our miserable countrie) imprison, famishe, murther,
hange, and burne their owne countriemen, and deare children of
God, at the commandement of furious Jesabel, and her false Priestes
and Prophetes.58
God condemns them as “blasphemers, idolaters, and cruell mur-

therers,” according to Goodman, summing up the qualities of Mary
that are reflected in Jezebel: the persecution of true religion, and
the practice of cruel violence upon the people. In the first Book of
Kings, these are precisely the crimes of Jezebel, who not only brings
false gods to the Israelites but also persecutes Yahweh’s prophets.
Her feud with Elijah is the heart of Jezebel’s story: she “slewe the
Prophetes of the Lord,” inciting Elijah to arrange a contest between
himself and Jezebel’s prophets, at the end of which he kills the
prophets of Baal (1 Kings 18:13–40). When Ahab brings this news to
Jezebel, she sends Elijah a message that she will make his life “like
one of their lives by tomorrow this time” (1 Kings 19:2). Gilby’s use
of the Jezebel label is similar to Goodman’s, and though Gilby only
once directly names Mary a Jezebel, he invests the name with the
same meanings Goodman did: England “murthereth the sainctes, it

mainteineth Baals prophetes by the commaundement of Jesabel.”59
Similarly, Becon emphasizes Mary’s heretical religion through a ref- f
erence to Jezebel, saying that the histories of Queen Jesabel, Queen
Athalia, and “such like” show that queens are for the most part
“wicked, ungodly, supersticious, and given to idolatry.”60 Obviously
Elizabeth was aware of these excoriations of her half sister as a mon-
strous Jezebel, and I would suggest that she was careful to try and
avoid becoming the target of similar accusations.
John Knox, in his infamous tract, frequently alludes to Jezebel in a
way that voices specific complaints about the rule of Mary I. A read-
ing of hisMonstrous Regimentshowst clearly that, for him, the name
“Jezebel” connotes “the monstruous empire of a cruell woman.”61 Of
course, Knox’s overall purpose in this treatise is to demonstrate that
woman’s rule is, as he frequently asserts, “contumelie to God, a thing
most contrarious to his reveled will and approved ordinance.”62 Thus,
often when calling Mary a Jezebel, Knox focuses on the unnatural-
ness of the exercise of authority by a woman:
The insolent joy, the bonefiers and banketing, which were in London
and elsewhere in England, when that cursed Jesabell was proclaimed
quene, did witnesse to my hart, that men were becomen more then
enraged. For els howe coulde they so have rejoyced at their own con-
fusion and certein destruction? For what man was there of so base
judgment (supposing that he had any light of God) who did not see
the erecting of that monstre, to be the overthrowe of true religion,
and the assured destruction of England, and of ancient liberties
thereof?63
The passage emphasizes how monstrous female rule is, how perverse
it is for men to rejoice in such a monarchy, and also, correspondingly,
how this unnatural gynecocracy has resulted in the overthrow of
true religion. Like Goodman and Gilby, Knox alludes to the bibli-
cal Jezebel’s enmity toward Yahweh and his prophets. In the queens
of his age, according to Knox, one finds “the spirit of Jesabel and
Athalia, under them we finde the simple people oppressed, the true
religion extinguished, and the blood of Christes membres most cru-
ellie shed.”64
But in Knox’s treatise, even more prominent than the association
of Jezebel with religious oppression is the association of Jezebel with
cruelty. Almost without exception, Knox uses the label Jezebel to
characterize Mary as cruel and her reign as bloody. Predicting God’s
n 15
vengeance on the “mischievous Marys,” Knox asserts that both

Jezebel and Athalia were “convicted in their cankered consciences,
to acknowledge that the murther, that they had committed . . . [was]
repugnant to justice.”65 He closes his treatise with the assurance that
“the day of vengeance, which shall apprehend that horrible monstre
Jesabel of England, and suche as maintein her monstruous crueltie,
is alredie apointed in the counsel of the Eternall.”66 For Knox, the
biblical Jezebel is an emblem of cruelty, and he will state repeatedly
that Mary is cruel and her reign tyrannous. “The devil,” says Knox,
“doth reign over suche tyrannes,” not God.67 Knox’s reiteration of
the theme of tyrannical cruelty resonates with an interesting gloss
in the Geneva Bible (written by Marian exiles of whom Knox was
one). In I Kings, when Ahab wants to buy Naboth’s vineyard and
Naboth will not relinquish it, Jezebel tells her husband that she
will arrange for him to have his desire. Jezebel uses trickery to have
Naboth accused of blasphemy he did not commit; he is then stoned
to death, and Ahab gets his vineyard. The gloss on this episode in the
Geneva Bible reads: “This example of monstrous crueltie the holy
Gost leaveth to us to the intent that we shulde abhorre all tyrannie,
and specially in them, whome nature & kinde shulde move to be
pitiful and inclined to mercie.”68 This revealing interpretation sug-
gests another way of understanding the nature of the “monstrosity”
that Mary and Jezebel share: both are tyrants, and because they are
women their tyranny is particularly abhorrent, since as women they
should by nature be merciful rather than cruel.69
Literary evidence also suggests that the cruel woman is a power-
fully negative cultural image. For example, in Shakespeare’s plays,
cruel women are repeatedly characterized as monstrous, their lack
of pity a violation of nature itself. Regan and Goneril, the heart-
less daughters of Lear, are characterized as “unnatural hags” (II.
iv.278).70 Though Lear wants to believe them to be of “tender-hefted
nature,” daughters who will follow “the offices of nature,” he must
finally describe them as monstrously bestial, “serpent-like,” “wolv-
ish” (II.iv.171, 178, 161; also I.iv.308). In a telling moment, Cornwall’s
servant says that if Regan lives to old age and meets a natural death,
“women will all turn monsters,” suggesting not only that a cruel
woman like Regan is a monster but also that other women might
choose a similar transformation if this behavior is not punished
(III.vii.102). Another example is the excessive cruelty of Tamora in
Titus Andronicus, who incites her sons to murder Bassianus and also
to rape and kill Lavinia. When Lavinia begs the queen to “show a
woman’s pity” and kill her on the spot rather than allow Demetrius
and Choron to assault her first, Tamora replies, “I know not what
it means,” signaling the complete lack of pity that characterizes her
as not a woman but a tiger (II.iii.147, 157). When Tamora announces
her intention to be “pitiless,” Lavinia cries, “No grace? No wom-
anhood? Ah, beastly creature, / The blot and enemy to our general
name!” (II.iii. 162, 182–83). Like Cornwall’s servant, Lavinia suggests
that one counterexample to the “rule” of feminine tenderness calls
into question feminine nature itself. The most vivid Shakespearean
example of feminine cruelty is Lady Macbeth, whose invocation
of the spirits makes explicit the idea that a pitiless woman vio-
lates nature. Her famous plea, “Unsex me here,” proposes that the
absence of femininity is a precondition for the act of murder; unable
to harbor both femininity and cruelty simultaneously, she must be
“unsexed” if she is to be filled from top to bottom with “direst cru-
elty,” as she desires (I.v.41–43).
Shakespeare’s examples of cruel women are all monarchs. The
recurring image of the cruel queen suggests that women in power were
thought likely to become cruel, an idea stated outright in Gosynhyll’s
ScholehouseforWomen,oneoftheearliestandmostfamousoftheanti-
woman texts in the sixteenth- and seventeenth-century controversy.
Gosynhyll uses Jezebel and Herodias as examples of women’s cruelty
but quickly expands his claim to encompass all women:
Recorde, the wycked Jesabell,

Which would have slayne good Helyas [Elijah]
Recorde also of the gospell
The wife of Phylyp Herodyas
Which through her doughter, brought to pas
That Herode her graunted, or that they wiste
To give her the heed of John Baptyst
Thus were them selfe, may lytle do
As in regard of corporall might
Of cruelness they rest not so
But stere theyr husbandes, for to fight.
Gosynhyll goes on to elaborate this final point: women’s physi-

cal weakness does not impede their cruelty. If necessary, they
will use others (as Herodias used Herod) to enact their evil deeds.
Furthermore, when women gain power, they are merciless: though
they are “weake and feble . . . of body,” yet “the upper hande, yf they
ones get,” they will be “malyvolente” and “without pyte.”71 This claim
n 17
is echoed by Spenser in Book V of The Faerie Queene, when, describ-

ing the Amazon queen Radigund, he says, “Such is the crueltie of
womenkynd, / When they have shaken off the shamefast band, /
With which wise Nature did them strongly bynd, / T’obay the heasts
of man’s well ruling hand” (V.v.25.1–4).72 However, Spenser is not
suggesting that women are naturally cruel and therefore must be
restrained by men, but rather that women in “unnatural” positions—
that is, free of masculine rule—will act unnaturally in other ways as
well. Should a woman prove unnatural by assuming authority, fur-
ther monstrous behavior might follow.73
The Problem with Elizabeth’s Mercy

Thus a regnant queen in the sixteenth century inherited a complicated
and contradictory series of assumptions about her nature, her ability
to judge, and her mercy. Women are assumed to be compassionate
by nature, but their merciful natures are alternately celebrated and
derided. That women are supposedly ruled by their passions means
that their ability to judge is mistrusted and their mercy suspected
of being merely weak-minded, emotional pity. Nevertheless, there is
a strong cultural tradition of positive associations between women
and mercy: from the intercessions of the Blessed Virgin to those of
medieval queens, the virtuous woman who tempers harsh judgments
with her compassionate mercy is a common and revered image. Yet
the opposite image also exists: the specter of the cruel Jezebel haunts
Elizabethan culture. Cruel women are considered monstrously
unnatural, and powerful women, it is hinted, are likely to be cruel.
A queen would surely have to tread carefully; her severe judgments
might brand her a cruel and tyrannous Jezebel, but her clement judg-
ments might easily be dismissed as products of womanish pity.
Indeed, despite Elizabeth’s reputation as a superbly educated and
wise monarch, her ability to judge properly does seem to have been
doubted because of her gender. As we have seen, even that apolo-
gist for woman’s rule and supporter of Elizabeth, John Aylmer, dis-
courages the idea of a queen as absolute ruler precisely because of
his belief that a woman is not capable of judging offenses “accord-
ing to her wisdom.” When Queen Elizabeth was reluctant to enact a
harsh penalty, her councilors were likely to attribute this clemency
to feminine weakness. Writing to Lord Burghley about the delay in
executing the Duke of Norfolk in 1572—a delay on the queen’s part,
discussed below, that sparked complaints about her clemency—Lord
Hunsdon bewails the danger to the kingdom and to Elizabeth her-

self caused by this heedlessness. He predicts the ruin of the com-
monwealth and the subversion of true religion, should Elizabeth
be killed. “And if by her negligence or womanish pity these things
happen, what she hath to answer for to God she herself knows.”74
Despite having stated a few sentences earlier—perhaps with a tinge
of sarcasm—that “the whole world knows her [Elizabeth] to be wise,”
Hunsdon is ready to attribute what he perceives as an unconscionable
and dangerous delay in executing justice to the queen’s “womanish”
disposition, specifically a tendency toward pity.
Many Elizabethan men, like John Aylmer, assumed that female
rule needed a corrective: male counsel. In his treatise defending
Elizabeth’s queenship, as we have seen, Aylmer both lauds Elizabeth’s
mildness that promises she will judge without harshness, and also
hints that, as a woman, she will need male guidance. In another
rather remarkable passage, Aylmer asserts the innate tenderness of
a woman’s nature, in the case not of Elizabeth but of Mary Tudor.
Aylmer claims that Mary herself cannot have been responsible for
the cruelties and injustices of her reign. Why not? Because she was
a woman:
The late Quene Mary, who bearinge, and wearing, a womans hart,
coulde not (I thincke) have used such rigoure and extremitie, in
imprysoning, banishinge, rackinge, hanginge, drawinge, hedding,
burninge, flesinge, and fleainge withal manner of extremitie.75
The cardinal, bishops, and churchmen who “bewitched” her are to

blame, according to Aylmer. The parenthetical “I thincke” speaks
volumes about Aylmer’s uncertain footing at this moment: treading
carefully as he traverses the topic of Queen Elizabeth’s sister’s reign,
Aylmer nonetheless clearly asserts the belief that a woman’s heart is
by nature tender and merciful rather than rigorous and cruel. His
remark also implies that because she was a woman she was vulnerable
to the manipulations of the men around her. This passage suggests
how a woman’s tenderness, her inclination to feel pity, could be rep-
resented as simultaneously praiseworthy and problematic: according
to Aylmer, Mary’s feminine tenderness renders her both innocent of
her reign’s cruelties but also less powerful because she is a woman,
subject to—“bewitched by”—the powerful men who surrounded her.
The assumption of Aylmer and others was that Elizabeth, by con-
trast, would be surrounded by godly men, who would provide proper
n 19
guidance. This led to a struggle during Elizabeth’s reign between the

ideology of mixed monarchy, in which the queen rules through her
male councilors, and a more absolutist ideology that places authority
in the person of the monarch herself. 76 Assumptions about a woman’s
inability to make sound independent judgments bred this conflict.
Elizabeth herself seems to have cherished her reputation for
mercy. As William Cecil observed, “The Queens Majesty hath been
alwaies a merciful Lady, and by mercy she hath taken more harm
then by justice, and yet she thinks that she is more beloved in doing
her self harm.” Cecil wrote these words to Francis Walsingham on
January 23, 1571/72, expressing his frustration over the queen’s delay
in executing the Duke of Norfolk for his part in the Ridolfi Plot.77 It
had been thought that the Duke would be executed in January, soon
after his trial, but the queen delayed. She waffled over the death war-
rant, signing it on February 9 and then rescinding it, at which point
Burghley again wrote to Walsingham: “I cannot write you what is
the inward cause of the stay of the Duke of Norfolks death.” After
describing Elizabeth’s vacillations, he closes: “Gods Will be fulfilled,
and aid her Majestie to doe her self good.”78 Elizabeth’s desire to
show mercy in particular cases was sometimes a source of tension for
her councilors, and the delay in executing Norfolk foreshadowed the
much more violent crisis that emerged in the 1580s concerning the
Queen of Scots. Furthermore, Cecil explains the queen’s clemency,
which he regards as excessive, in terms of her own desire to be loved
by her people.
Elizabeth’s assertion of mutual love between herself and her
people became a hallmark of her reign. Judith Richards traces the
gradual emergence of love as a metaphor for the monarch/subject
relationship during the sixteenth century, and finds that Elizabeth’s
frequent insistence on this mutual love was partly a result of her
uncertain hold on the throne at the start of her reign.79 As she said
in the famous speech at Tilbury, “I have placed my chiefest strength
and safeguard in the loyal hearts and goodwill of my subjects.”80 That
the queen believed in the sustaining power of her people’s love seems
borne out by a conversation recounted by Sir John Harington. He
reports that Elizabeth praised his wife for the way she maintained
her husband’s affection by constantly persuading him of her love for
him. The queen went on to say, “After suche sorte do I keepe the
good wyll of all my husbandes, my good people; for if they did not
reste assurede of some special love towarde them, they woud not
readily yeilde me such goode obedience.”81 Thus Cecil’s claim that
by acting mercifully Elizabeth believed she would be more beloved

has serious implications, if she felt that her people’s obedience—and
thus the stability of her throne—was predicated on their affection for
her. This belief contradicts Machiavelli’s assertion that fear, rather
than love, guarantees the prince’s hold on his throne. But as we have
seen, Machiavelli’s recommendation that a prince should show cru-
elty seems more apt for a male monarch, given that his leadership
of the army is the example given by Machiavelli. Did Elizabeth’s
insistence that she ruled by love weaken her? According to an anony- y
mous Member of Parliament who wrote a letter of advice to another
Member in 1581, the people’s disposition “to love her Majesty, being
so good a one, does so far exceed the fear of her, being a woman and
so merciful, that her lovingest means doth make them most obse-
quious.”82 This intriguing assertion points in two directions: toward
Elizabeth’s powerful hold on her people’s affections as well as her
perceived weakness because of her gender and concomitant mercy.
The main thrust of this writer’s argument is similarly two-sided;
he concludes by recommending that the mutual affection between
queen and Parliament be nourished, but as Neale points out, he ear-
lier promised that the House of Parliament would be most “obsequi-
ous” if granted maximum liberty. Thus the question of the degree of
authority achieved by the queen through her rhetoric of mutual love
remains unanswered: Is her power undermined by a Parliament that
claims to obey her because of mutual affection but also, as the writer
hints, fears her so little that they could make their own “liberty” a
condition for their obedience? As we shall see, struggles between
queen and Parliament were often over fundamentally religious issues
in which Elizabeth’s supposedly feminine mercy—an aspect of her
image as a loving and beloved queen—played an important part.
This image of Elizabeth as a merciful and beloved queen was
promulgated early in her reign. Richard Mulcaster’s account of
Elizabeth’s progress through the city of London before her corona-
tion is a veritable manifesto for the idea of reciprocal love between the
new queen and her people. Elizabeth’s mercy is an important aspect
of the persona that both Mulcaster in his account and the people of
London in their pageants ascribe to Elizabeth. For example, the third
pageant presented to the queen is based on the eight Beatitudes in
Matthew’s gospel; a child reads verses that explain that the Queen
has been blessed with all of these qualities, among them meekness of
spirit, mildness, a hunger for justice, and mercy. As did Aylmer, the
Londoners who created this pageant emphasize that Elizabeth has
n 21
remained merciful despite having been treated unmercifully in the

past, crediting her with “mercy shown, not felt.”83 Mulcaster portrays
the queen as embodying the mercy that the people have attributed
to her: when she encounters children from a school for poor boys, the
queen “did cast up her eyes to heaven, as who should say, ‘I here see
this merciful work toward the poor, whom I must in the midst of my
royalty needs remember.’”84 She then hears an oration by one of the
students, in which she is told that the pupils have no doubt “of the
mercy of the Queen’s most gracious clemency.” Mulcaster’s Passage
ofOurMostDreadSovereignLady,QueenElizabethwas h publisheddurr-
ing the first year of Elizabeth’s reign and, like Aylmer’s Harborowe,
constructs an image of the queen as gracious, mild, and merciful, an
image that can be understood as an important part of the rhetoric of
mutual love that sustained Elizabeth’s reign.85
Christine Coch suggests another possible reason for the centrality
of this idea of mutual love: it can be seen as part of Elizabeth’s role as
tender and affectionate mother, one that allowed Elizabeth to frame
her authority in a socially understandable and acceptable way. The
claim of mutual love between Elizabeth-as-mother and her subjects/
children serves to redefine “political exigencies as acts of generosity,”
allowing the queen to exercise authority in the name of motherly
love.86 Indeed, Elizabeth often accompanied authoritarian actions
with claims of femininity; as part of this strategy, she would invoke
both her “natural” tenderness and her history of clemency as she
simultaneously laid down the law. A good example is her 1570 proc-
lamation on the suppression of the Northern Rebellion, designed to
be read aloud by curates. Here Elizabeth enters into a lengthy discus-
sion of her “natural Disposition” to have her subjects obey her out of
love rather than fear and reminds them of her clement behavior in
the past; she also claims a personal tendency to kindness rather than
harshness. All this is a preface to her announcement of the measures
used to suppress the rebellion: “Notwithstanding this our natural
and private Dulcenes [sweetness], yet we have not . . . neglected to
our Power the due and derect Administration of Justice for the sup-
pressing of Malefactors.”87 To say that Elizabeth’s power to suppress
the rebellion was not neglected is something of an understatement—
her response to this uprising was surprisingly harsh and punitive.
But the queen frames the announcement that the rebels are being
suppressed and punished with assertions of her own historical and
personal tendency toward mercy, which she repeatedly describes as
“natural.”
The theatricality of Elizabeth’s regime and the care with which she
deployed her image have been discussed by many scholars, and the
queen’s—and her councilors’—frequent assertions of her great mercy
are part of this image. Elizabeth’s proclamation about the executions
following the Northern Rebellion may suggest another reason she so
ardently desired to be thought merciful: the political realities of her
rule were at times brutal, and by promoting an image of herself as
merciful, she hoped to circumvent a reputation for cruelty.
Elizabeth’s concern about public opinion included a desire to dis-
tance herself not only from brutality in her own reign, but in the reign
preceding hers. Having inherited a kingdom recently torn by religious
strife, Elizabeth wished to establish herself as a Protestant “Prince of
Peace” and thus distinguish her reign from the violent reign of the
Roman Catholic Mary Tudor. In his study of Tudor iconography, John
King demonstrates how Elizabeth’s image as a Protestant ruler was
fashioned. One of the images he analyzes is the allegorical title page
introduced in the 1569 edition of the Bishops’ Bible. This portrait of
Elizabeth (pictured on the cover of this book) shows the queen as the
summation of the four virtues depicted in the corners of the wood-
cut. These are the classical cardinal virtues of Justice, Prudence, and
Fortitude, but instead of Temperance, the expected fourth virtue,
Mercy sits on the queen’s left side. Though the figures of Justice and
Mercy are acting together to crown the Queen, Mercy’s preeminence
is indicated by the Bible she holds in her hand.88 The substitution of
Mercy for Temperance may be part of the portrait’s Protestant ideol-
ogy: Elizabeth’s mercy and the peace that resulted distinguish her
reign from Mary’s. Thus, the image of a merciful queen may be an
important aspect of Elizabeth’s Protestant identity because it estab-
lishes not only what she is, but what she is not.
But Protestants who initially regarded Elizabeth as their cham-
pion became increasingly dissatisfied with her stance on causes and
situations important to them.89 At her accession, many of her godly
subjects had seen in their queen the promise of a new King David
who might lead England in the establishment of true religion on
earth. Elizabeth’s clemency was praised in contrast to Mary’s sever-
ity, but Elizabeth’s mercy also contributed to her image as a heroine
of international Protestantism. In her analysis of the 1569 Christian
PrayersandMeditationsattributedtoQueenElizabeth,LindaShenk
comments that the prayers composed in French present Elizabeth
as a refuge and protector of French Protestants. The queen’s com-
passion for the suffering of persecuted Christians is emphasized; the
n 23
French prayers “connect Elizabeth’s tranquil, divinely endorsed gov- v

ernance with her ability to exercise and extend her compassionate
rule to other nations.” Elizabeth prays to God for true compassion
and the grace to be a true nurse of the people.90 However, this image
of the compassionate queen became tarnished when Elizabeth
proved much less zealous in protecting and promoting Protestants
than many had hoped. In fact, her compassion became a cause for
complaint rather than celebration. During the late 1560s, 70s, and
80s, a number of admonitions were aimed at Elizabeth that focused
on her reluctance to punish appropriately those who threaten the
true church. Domestically the queen was much more frequently sub-
jected to criticism for her leniency and demands for greater rigor than
she was to claims that her policies were too harsh. Particular events
and struggles that were important to fervent Protestants precipi-
tated the loudest calls for rigor: the Northern uprising, the situation
in Ireland, and the demand for church reform that was particularly
strong in the early decades of her reign. Ironically, many of the same
subjects who initially praised Queen Elizabeth for her mildness soon
turned to chastising her for her clemency.
TheoriginaleditionofJohnFoxe’sActesandMonuments(1563)pro-
vides a good example of early acclaim for the merciful new queen.
Foxe praises Elizabeth’s clemency and its result: relief from the per-
secution that occurred under Mary. In his dedication to Elizabeth in
the 1563 book, Foxe compares her to the Emperor Constantine, who
accepted Christianity and stopped the persecution of Christians:
“At length the Lord sent this mild Constantinus, to cease bloud, to
staye persecution, to refreshe his people.” Foxe emphasizes not only
God’s “pitifull grace” that rescues his persecuted people, but also
the pity and mildness of the ruler who is God’s means of rescue; like
Constantine, Elizabeth is praised for her mercy: “What mekenesse
and clemencie was in that noble and great Emperour, which is and
hathe not beene greater in you?”91 But by the time of the next edi-
tionoftheActesandMonuments,Foxe’spointofviewhaschanged.He
still dedicates the 1570 book to Elizabeth, but now the comparison
to Constantine is gone, as is the praise of the queen for meekness
and clemency in her treatment of her people. The new dedication
suggests instead that she has a responsibility to punish sin. “God’s
greate mercies and judgements in preserving his Church” are now
detailed by Foxe not solely in terms of bringing peace and rescuing
the persecuted. Now Foxe lists a number of other manifestations of
God’s mercies, including “Idolatry punished, blasphemy plagued,
contempt of Gods holy name and Religion revenged, murder with

murder rewarded, Adulterers and wedlocke breakers destroyed,
perjuries, extortions, covetous oppressions, and fraudulent counsels
come to naught, with other excellent workes of the Lord.”92 Like
many of Elizabeth’s more fervently Protestant subjects, by the end
of the 1560s, Foxe apparently believed that the queen needed, not
praise for her clemency, but exhortations to punish.93
Criticism of the queen for her leniency is an essential part of the
era’s most sensational sermon: Edward Dering’s 1569/70 drubbing
of the queen for her failure to support radical Protestant reforms.94
Sometimes called the “Unruly Heifer” sermon because of an unflat-
tering comparison of the queen to Jeremiah’s “untamed and unruly
heifer,” this sermon proved hugely popular in print.95 Dering’s text
(Psalms 78:70) is about God’s elevation of David, and David’s conse-
quent duty to feed the people of Jacob. The sermon’s opening reiter-
ates the theme of God’s great mercies shown to David, to Israel, and
to the Queen. Dering explains how mercy displayed by the powerful
serves to bind inferiors:
Nothing maketh so trusty the bondservant, as to remember he hath

a gentle Maister. Nothing maketh the subject more faithful unto his
Prince, then to feele by good experience his Princes clemency.96
Like Seneca and other classical authorities, Dering advocates clem-

ency not only as a spiritual ideal but also as a profitable practice,
since masters and princes can win their inferiors’ loyalty by treat-
ing them gently and mercifully. But Dering’s sermon follows a dif- f
ferent course from the one this passage leads us to expect. Having
praised the practice of clemency and reminded Elizabeth of God’s
mercy to her, Dering might logically conclude that the queen should
show mercy to her subjects in imitation of God. After all, this is
exactly Portia’s argument in her famous “quality of mercy” speech in
MerchantofVenicewhensheremindsShylockthatourexpectationof
God’s mercy teaches us that we, too, should be merciful. Similarly,
Isabel in Measure for Measure says to Angelo: “How would you be / If
He, which is the top of judgment, should / But judge you as you are?
Oh, think on that, / And mercy then will breathe within your lips”
(II.ii.75–78). But Dering is not advocating mercy; rather, he is repri-
manding the queen for leniency. His message is that, because God
has shown mercy to Elizabeth, in return she must forcefully defend
her people against false religion. His sermon explicitly criticizes the
n 25
queen for being too mild when confronting sin. He tells her that
worldly peace is not enough and lectures her about a prince’s duty to
chastise and punish. “The true Israelite . . . commeth with violence to
clayme the kyngdome of heaven,” he proclaims, and later warns, “Let
not the Princesse deceave her selfe, the spirite of God doeth not pos-
sesse her hart, if she heare dayly lyinge and blasphemous swearing,
and see the peoples ignoraunce, and yet leave all unpunished.”97
The intense fear of Catholic threats to the Protestant Church
of England is one reason why some of her subjects chastised their
queen for leaving “all unpunished.” Anxieties about the succession,
about Spain and foreign policy, about Ireland, about Mary Stuart: all
of these have the Catholic-Protestant conflict at heart. But doubts
about a woman’s ability to rule also resulted in a readiness to perceive
Elizabeth as foolishly lenient, even in situations where in reality she
showed very little mercy.
The Northern Rebellion provides a striking example of the way
public perception of the queen’s clemency far exceeded reality.
Elizabeth was surprisingly harsh with the Northern Catholic rebels,
demanding executions despite pleas from local officials and those in
her service. K. J. Kesselring, in the first book-length study of this
rebellion, demonstrates that on a number of occasions, Elizabeth was
asked either to refrain from taking action, or even to pardon outright
the rebels. Repeatedly the Queen refused. In a letter to Elizabeth
dated November 15, 1569, the Earl of Sussex, her lieutenant in the
North, suggests that she pardon the earls and their followers and call
the earls to court as a way of dismantling the rebellion. According
to Kesselring, Sussex “urged the pragmatic use of mercy as a tool
of statecraft,” arguing that “all the wisest Protestants” agree: “You
should offer mercy before you try the sword.”98 The letter Elizabeth
wrote in response reveals not a tender and clement heart, but rather
a harsh and unforgiving stance toward the rebels. She begins by
addressing Sussex’s concern that the troops under his command may
be seduced by the rebellion and prove faithless. Elizabeth suggests
that Sussex should do his best to intercept anyone trying to spread
mutiny among the troops and speedily execute “two or three of
them, to make an Example of Terror to others of their Nature and
Qualitie.” Having shown herself an advocate, in this case, of terror
rather than clemency, Elizabeth goes on to reject Sussex’s proposed
pardon, though she understands well its potential benefit, as she
debates “on the one Syde, what may be hoped for, by granting Pardon
unto the Earles and theyr Partakers; and on the other, what may be
doubted of by hazarding of Battayle against desperat Men.”99 She

emphasizes her own history of clemency, and just as she did in her
response to the crisis over Mary Stuart and her later proclamation on
the suppression of the rebellion, Elizabeth makes much of her own
merciful nature:
And truly as we have byn allwayes of our awne Nature inclined to

Mercie, and have shewed and contynued the same from the fyrst
Begyning of our Reigne; (Peradventure in farther Degree then might
well stande with the Suretie of our Estate and Person:) Yet in a Matter
that toucheth us so nere, we can in no wyse fynd it convenient to grant
Pardon or other shewe of Favor unto those, that doo not humblie and
earnestly sue for the same; yea, and though they sholde so sue for it,
yet we doubt not but you can consider, that it standeth not with our
Honor, to pardon the Earles and theyr principall Adherents withowt
farther Deliberation by us.100
This passage illuminates not just Elizabeth’s insistence that her own
nature is merciful, an insistence that I argue is motivated by her cul-
ture’s abhorrence of the “unnatural” cruel woman. These lines also
suggest the depth of the queen’s reluctance to pardon, in this case.
She has heard and she understands the practical benefit of offering
a pardon. Issuing a pardon early in a rebellion to all those who will
put down their arms is a time-honored way of stopping an uprising;
as Kesselring notes, the offer of clemency was used by Elizabeth’s
predecessors, Mary I and Henry VIII, to good effect in dousing the
flames of rebellion. But even the prospect of avoiding the hazard
of open conflict with “desperate men” does not sway her. She feels
that her own honor is at stake, and even after hinting that a show
of humility on the part of the Earls might convince her, she seems
to retract that idea, saying that even if they sue for her pardon, she
would have to deliberate more before she could agree.
The rebels finally took action on November 29 and took the town
of Hartlepool, and then later Barnard Castle. But when the bulk of
the southern army arrived in mid-December, the rebellion quickly
collapsed. Kesselring observes that
in the weeks following the collapse of the rebellion in England,

Elizabeth’s agents exacted harsh retribution, far more deadly than
that after the Pilgrimage of Grace or most other past English rebel-
lions. . . . Certainly, lenience was lacking in the early weeks of 1570.
Unlike previous rebels, the 1569 rebels had surrendered on the field
n 27
without negotiations for mercy. The only pardon in effect was that
given on November 19, which had offered a few days grace to those
who would abandon their protest and return to their homes. Anyone
who had persisted in rebellion past November 22 faced the full danger
of the laws and the crown’s determination to provide plentiful exam-
ples of the dangers of dissent.101
Sir George Bowes, the provost marshall, went from town to town
during the month of January staging executions and eventually,
according to his own estimate, he put to death around 600, a huge
number when one considers that there were probably only 6,000 reb-
els in arms. Kesselring makes it clear that all this bloodshed was at
Elizabeth’s behest; according to her account, Sussex at one point in
January urged Bowes to speed up the pace of killing since the queen
was becoming impatient. Bowes asked Sussex to persuade the queen
to offer a pardon, but she held back for a while more, until finally on
February 18 she decided to proclaim a pardon for the humbler sort.102
The truly remarkable aspect of this story is that, despite her unfor-
giving and harsh response to the Northern Rebellion, the queen was
accused of foolish clemency by some. Dering’s “Unruly Heifer” ser-
mon dates from this period, as does a sermon by Thomas Drant, who
preached before the queen in January 1569/70—at the very time the
mass executions were taking place—and lectured her on the need for
severity. Drant refers explicitly to the “Northern rebels,” asserting
that gentle correction will not suffice: “Correct a wise man with a
nodde, & a foole with a clobbe. If these Northern rebels had had any
sober witte in their head, by this time so many noddes, and so many
nots, would have stayed them.” Drant implies that the “nods and
nots” have been the queen’s policy and have failed. Harsh punish-
ment is needed: “It must be a clobbe, or it must be an hatchet, or it
must be an halter.”103 According to Drant, Queen Elizabeth has been
far too lenient:
David destroyed all Gods enemies: her Majestie hath destroyed none
of Gods enemies. David did it in the morning of his kingdome: it is
now farreforth dayes since her Majestie began to raigne, and yet it is
undone.104
Despite the queen’s quick and lethal response to the uprising, Drant
still accuses her of negligence; he implies, not surprisingly, that wom-
anish tenderness is to blame. Interestingly, Drant also suggests that
the queen’s vanity is at fault. He accuses her of listening to those who
“tel the Prince commonly, that shee hath a goodly amiable name for
mildnesse, and that now to draw the sword in this sort, were the losse
of that commendation.”105 This sermon provides further evidence
that Elizabeth cherished her “name for mildnesse” despite objec-
tions from some that she was too mild; the sermon also suggests that
the tendency to characterize women as weak and irrational could
lead to serious misperceptions of the queen, opening her to charges
of indulgence even when she was in reality quite severe. Perception
is everything, as Elizabeth well knew: she might punish harshly and
be accused of foolish leniency, or mercifully forgive and be accused
of cruel tyranny. The actions and words of all public figures are sub-
ject to constant interpretation by the community, of course, but I
would argue that when the monarch is female, assumptions about
women play a large role in shaping the monarch’s image. In the case
of a response such as Drant’s to the Northern Rebellion, it seems
that assumptions about feminine tenderness (and perhaps vanity as
well) skew his understanding of events.
Thus Elizabeth’s reputation—for mercy or cruelty—might bear
little relationship to the realities of her reign, and depending on the
audience, she might be interpreted as either harsh or lax. But extremes
often prevailed. Catholics from within and without England were
ready to affix the “Jezebel” label to Elizabeth, describing her as cruel
and merciless in her policies, prompting defenses of Elizabeth and
perhaps strengthening the queen’s determination to be represented
as merciful.106
Since, as we have seen, the powerful and cruel woman—the
female tyrant or Jezebel—was such a fraught image during this time,
it is unsurprising that Elizabeth displayed particular sensitivity
about accusations of tyranny. When news of Mary Stuart’s execu-
tion reached Scotland, an outpouring of anger repeatedly character-
ized Elizabeth as a Jezebel. On the day of Mary’s funeral, a poem
“Concerning the Parricides of the Jezebel of England” was posted
on the cathedral door; it was followed by fifty or more poems of this
sort published across Europe for the next two years. Described by
James E. Phillips as the de Jezebelis poems, these works attempted
to arouse Catholic Europe against England. Their central theme is
“the charge that Elizabeth, in executing Mary, revealed herself as an
English Jezebel.” The poems included attacks on Elizabeth’s ances-
try and sexual morality, and focused on Elizabeth’s personal respon-
sibility for Mary’s death and her “motiveless and malicious cruelty
n 29
toward the Scottish Queen.”107 Elizabeth anticipated such libels as

she tried to decide her course of action in 1586. Her speech before
Parliament in November of that year as she responded to their peti-
tion urging Mary’s execution sounds as though it could be a direct
response to the accusation of “Jezebeldom.” Elizabeth predicts that
she will be labeled a tyrant if the Scottish Queen is executed. She
responds to those “good fellows abroad” who have published books
and pamphlets against her and her government, “giving me for an
alms (I thank them for it) to be a tyrant, t that from which always my
nature above all things hath most abhorred” (emphases mine).108 The
language of this statement recalls the Geneva Bible gloss on Jezebel,
which exhorts us to “abhor” the tyranny of those whose “natures”
should incline them to mercy. Tellingly, Elizabeth vehemently pro-
tests the accusation not simply of tyranny, but more specifically
the accusation that she has a tyrannical nature. She emphasizes her
tendency toward mercy rather than cruelty: “But to clear myself of
that fault [tyranny], this I may justly say: I have pardoned many trai-
tors and rebels, and besides I well remember half a score treasons
which have been either covered or slightly examined or let slip and
passed over, so that mine actions have not been such as should pro-
cure me the name of tyrant.”109 Mercy and tenderness, then, are the
qualities in Elizabeth’s nature that would cause her to abhor tyranny
above all things. Indeed, since the criticism Elizabeth most often
received from her own councilors was that she was too merciful, it
seems especially ironic that she reveals such a fear of being labeled a
tyrant in this speech to her Parliament; most of them, after all, were
frustrated by her resistance to the idea of executing Mary. This is a
speech made in answer to a petition that she allow the execution, but
rather than defending her reluctance to permit it, she spends more
time defending herself from the charges of tyranny that she antici-
pates should she permit it.
Elizabeth’s cherished reputation for mercy was obviously threat-
ened by the crisis. She conveyed her awareness that monarchy is the-
ater in her assertion that “we princes . . . are set on stages in the sight
and view of all the world.” That she made this famous statement in the
context of the crisis over Mary suggests her own sense of vulnerabil-
ity as she renders a difficult judgment while the whole world watches
the performance.110 As A. N. McLaren explains, even after Elizabeth
accepted the necessity of Mary’s death, she hoped for a private solu-
tion in opposition to her councilors, who insisted that Mary’s trial
and execution should be public.111 Her sensitivity about how her per-
formance might be interpreted is evident in a later speech, made at a
time when Parliament was poised for Mary’s execution:
If any there live so wicked of nature to suppose that I prolonged this

time only pro forma, to the intent to make a show of clemency, thereby
to set my praises to the wire-drawers to lengthen them the more: they
do me so great a wrong as they can hardly recompense.112
In another version of this speech, Elizabeth suggests that some will

think she prolonged her decision in order to seek “the more to be
commended for clemency and gentleness of nature” and that her
delay “proceeded from a vainglorious mind.”113 Both versions of the
speech reveal her fear that her reluctance to execute Mary will be
interpreted as theatrical instead of genuine; she is aware of criticisms
such as Thomas Drant’s that interpret her leniency as a product of
her vanity, her desire to be commended for gentleness and clem-
ency. Whether Elizabeth’s reluctance to prosecute Mary was genu-
ine or indeed theatrical, we do not know; certainly she attempted
to distance herself from Mary’s fate for obvious reasons, including
the way her reputation might suffer.114 Her sense of vulnerability
emerges when she talks about how “narrowly” her “actions are like to
be sifted and finely scanned by some good fellows abroad,” and her
fear of being accused of unnatural cruelty is reflected in the passage,
discussed above, when she protests against the pamphlets and books
that have characterized her as a tyrant.115
Elizabeth’s desire to stress her natural clemency and deny accu-
sations of tyranny reverberates through this speech, as does her
concern about how such accusations will reflect on her as a woman.
She goes on to give a lengthy justification of her rule in which she
carefully identifies herself as a just Christian monarch, the oppo-
site of a tyrant. 116 Elizabeth explains that she has dedicated herself
from the beginning to true religion and desired from God that he
grant her the wisdom to rule rightly, saying, “I have had always care
to do as Augustus Caesar, who being moved to offense, before he
attempted anything was willed to say over the alphabet.”117 Janel
Mueller has noted that in this speech, Elizabeth claims three of
Plato’s four political virtues—justice, temperance, and wisdom—
when she says, “I sought to learn what things were most fit for a king
to have, and I found them to be four, namely, justice, temper, magna-
nimity, and judgment.”118 However, she omits courage, substituting
n 31
“magnanimity” instead. Mueller suggests that the crisis over Mary

Stuart caused Elizabeth to retreat from a position implied in many
of her earlier speeches: that her gender is irrelevant to her rule, that
as a woman she can embody the same virtues as a king, including
that of courage. Now, in her distress, she backs away from represent-
ing herself as a courageous, masculine ruler, with the potential for
violence that image might imply.119 Instead, she adamantly genders
herself feminine when she imagines how she will be represented in
the wake of Mary’s death, expressing her grief “that by me it should
be said hereafter, a maiden queen hath been the death of a prince, her
kinswoman.”120
The case of Mary, Queen of Scots, produced not only accusations
of tyranny after Mary’s death, but also the most direct attacks on
Elizabeth’s mercy seen during her reign. The queen’s reluctance to
allow Mary’s trial and later her execution resulted in impassioned
rhetoric along the lines of Job Throckmorton’s speech during the
1586 Parliament, in which he recalled Elizabeth’s 1572 veto of a
Parliamentary bill against the Queen of Scots:
Oh! but mercy, you will say, is a commendable thing and well beseem-
ing the seat of a Prince. Very true, indeed: but how long? Till it bring
justice in contempt, and the state of the Church and Commonwealth
in danger? . . . And what got her Majesty, I pray you, by this her lenity?
Even as much as commonly one shall get by saving a thief from the
gallows: a heap of treasons and conspiracies. . . . It is now high time for
her Majesty, I trow, to beware of lenitives and to fall to corrosives.121
Mercy’s meaning is contested here, as it so often is in the rhetoric of

the period. No one wants to be guilty of disparaging the Christian
virtue of mercy, so even as he lambasts Queen Elizabeth’s leniency,
Throckmorton has to acknowledge that mercy is “commendable”
and especially appropriate to a prince.
These conflicting representations of Elizabeth’s mercy—her
own insistence on her natural disposition toward clemency and
her apparent belief that merciful behavior would secure her throne
versus the various public representations of her mercy as foolish
and dangerous—can be fruitfully understood in the context of the
emerging public sphere in Elizabethan England. The queen was
obviously concerned about public perception of and reaction to her
decisions. But speeches, published tracts, and sermons urging sever-
ity and chastising Elizabeth for “womanish pity” might also be seen
as attempts to shape public opinion. Peter Lake and Steven Pincus

have argued that we can see the emergence of a public sphere during
Elizabeth’s reign. Building on Jurgen Habermas’s theory of the four
phases of the public sphere—the ancient, the medieval, the bour-
geois, and the degraded or transformed—Lake and Pincus alter that
chronology to introduce what they call “a post-Reformation period
and mode of political manoeuvre and public politics.”122 They argue
that Elizabeth’s reign was the formative period for this mode, and
they discuss attempts from within and without Elizabeth’s regime to
mobilize various publics in order “to induce the Queen to take actions
that she did not wish to do, or to prevent her from doing things that
she wanted to do.” 123 This study adds a more pointed consideration
of the role played by the monarch’s gender in the development of
public spheres during Elizabeth’s reign. Not only was there increased
emphasis on counsel and the obligations of godly citizens of the com-
monwealth, a notion that is linked to the queen’s gender, since she
was thought to need special guidance from godly men because she
was a woman. We should also take notice of the way Elizabeth’s gen-
der is used to shape public response to her judgment. For example,
when members of Elizabeth’s Privy Council and their agents sought
to turn public opinion against Mary Stuart and pressure the queen
to execute her, they called upon gendered notions of the queen’s
excessive mercy to criticize her forbearance. In an anonymous pam-
phlet published in 1571,, Salutem in Christo, the author outlines Mary’s
responsibility for the Northern Rebellion and describes a con-
spiracy in which Mary would be freed from prison and proclaimed
Queen of England and Scotland, with the aid of Spain. While he
never directly blames Elizabeth for the danger of Mary’s continuing
presence, he does remark that the Queen is “voyd of a revenginge
nature (as in all Ages hath so appeared that some sorte of wyse men
have noated it a faulte for a Prince).”124 The same quality—absence
of vengefulness—that Aylmer invoked as a sign of both Elizabeth’s
perfect feminine virtue and her fitness to rule is deployed in order
to suggest her mishandling of Mary’s case. Peter Lake identifies this
and other pamphlets written about Mary as emanating from coun-
cilors who worked through surrogates to try and shape public opin-
ion; it was “a whispering campaign designed to tar both Norfolk and
Mary with the brush of foreign conspiracy and treason and to force
the queen’s hand.”125 The queen’s “nature,” with implications of her
femininity, is cited and criticized as one way of manipulating public
opinion.126
n 33
Literary representations of mercy, and particularly Elizabeth’s

mercy, participate in constructing and debating the image of the
merciful queen. In The Faerie Queene, Spenser is deeply concerned
with questions of mercy, equity, justice, and judgment. Chapter Two
is a study of the ambivalent representations of mercy in The Faerie
Queene. Throughout the poem, Spenser reveres Elizabeth’s mercy as
an aspect of her royal image even as he criticizes mercy as a policy.
Other kinds of literary representation provide different points of
view on a queen’s mercy. The third chapter of this book examines
the idea of mercy in Elizabethan love poetry, arguing that the lover’s
typical pleas for the lady’s pity take on political dimensions in poetry
written with Queen Elizabeth in mind as a potential reader. Though
the poet-lover typically pleads for the lady’s mercy, sonnet sequences
by Sidney, Daniel, and Spenser also warn against mercy and indi-
cate its dangerous consequences. Chapter Four is an extended read-
ing of Merchant of Venice that focuses on questions of religion and
their effect on tensions surrounding Queen Elizabeth’s mercy, and
the idea of mercy as performance that Shakespeare also addresses
in Henry V. Merchant t contains, in the figure of Portia, Shakespeare’s
most complex representation of Elizabeth, and the play engages the
paradoxical demands upon the queen for mercy and rigor. Chapter
Five examines Measure for Measure, arguing that the play responds
to the transition between Elizabeth and James with particular focus
on the expected differences between them in matters of justice and
judgment.MeasureforMeasureraisesquestionsabouttheefficacyof
mercy, as well as the role of publicity and public discourse in a sov- v
ereign’s execution of justice. The final chapter focuses on posthu-
mous representations of Elizabeth’s mercy: Heywood’s If You Know
NotMeYouKnowNobodyand y Dekker’sWhoreofBabylon.Inboth
plays, the queen’s vulnerable feminine tenderness is restrained by
male counsel. Protestant playwrights in the years immediately fol-
lowing Elizabeth’s reign recuperate her “womanish pity” as a virtue:
her mercy contributes to her status as Protestant icon, and any risk
posed by her excessive clemency is neutralized by the interventions
of the godly men who surround her.
CHAPTER 2
“THE SAC
A RED PLEDGE OF PEAC
A E
AND CLEMENCIE”: ELIZABETHAN
MERC
R Y IN The Faerie Queene
M
ercy and its close kin, pity, make numerous appearances
in The Faerie Queene: many a fallen knight or distressed
lady pleads for mercy in the course of the story; virtu-
ous characters frequently feel compassion for others, and the narrator
sometimes describes his own intense feelings of pity as he observes
the plight of victimized women. The virtue of mercy is personified
in two allegorical figures: Mercy in Book I’s House of Holiness and
Mercilla in Book V. Like most qualities explored in The Faerie Queene,
mercy and pity are complex and nuanced, making Spenser’s treatment
of them at times seem contradictory: he shows both the efficacy and
the danger of human acts of mercy; he characterizes pity as both a
sign of nobility and a fatal weakness. As always in The Faerie Queene,
context is important. Mercy means one thing in the context of holi-
ness and something different in the context of justice. But through-
outThe Faerie Queene, Spenser’s exploration of earthly mercy reflects
many of the issues discussed in Chapter One: the concern that mercy
renders the giver vulnerable, and the anxiety that a queen’s mercy,
though the hallmark of a Christian monarch, might be an expression
of effeminate weakness; the Protestant demand for more rigor, espe-
cially in matters of religion; the desire to praise mercy as a Christian
virtue and avoid offending a queen who cherishes her reputation for
clemency; and finally, the tension over whether a corporate masculine
entity or the person of the female sovereign should be empowered to
pardon or to punish. These and other questions about mercy com-
plicate their representation in the poem, and though generalizations
about mercy in The Faerie Queene should be offered with caution, it
does seem that human mercy and pity are rarely if ever wholly posi-
tive; even depictions of the most praiseworthy compassion are often
juxtaposed with moments in which pity is manipulated, abused, and

dangerous.
InEpicRomance:HomertoMilton, n ColinBurrowanalyzessympa-
thy in the epic tradition, offering an extended critical consideration
of pity in The Faerie Queene. In his chapter on Spenser, he examines
several instances in the poem where the impulse to pity is resisted,
emphasizing the way Spenser adopts and revises epic tradition in
order to circumscribe sympathy but also affirm a vision of life. Thus,
Guyon may reject his pitiful instincts and destroy the Bower of Bliss,
but Spenser counters that destructive impulse by providing visionary
moments such as the Garden of Adonis. Burrow’s discussion of The
Faerie Queene is most valuable in its analysis of Spenser’s treatment
of his sources: Ovid, Virgil, Ariosto, and Tasso. Elizabethan politi-
cal culture is not his main concern, though he fruitfully explores
the connection between pity and tyranny. Despite the importance
of acknowledging this connection, I am not convinced that, as
Burrow suggests, Spenser’s main objection to monarchical clemency
derives from a fear that a charismatic and clement monarch exacts
a kind of servitude from her subjects—that queenly bounty, includ-
ing clemency, might be an aspect of tyranny. Spenser’s objection to
Elizabeth’s clemency has more to do with the political and religious
results of what his culture was inclined to regard as feminine weak- k
ness. Burrow alludes briefly to the specific political context in which
Spenser wrote; he reads Spenser’s rejection of both pity and rigid vir-
ginity as a response to Elizabeth’s mode of supremacy, though his
analysis of the queen’s authority is strangely contradictory: within a
single paragraph, he refers to her expressions of pity as both strategi-
cally deployed and willfully random.1 While he asserts that Spenser
resists Elizabeth’s image as a clement queen, Burrow does not con-
sider her gender as a factor in the production of her image or in the
way Spenser and other writers represent her clemency. To his valuable
analysis of pity in The Faerie Queene should be added a consideration
of gender as well as religion; further, as I will try to demonstrate, the
context of each book of The Faerie Queene must be considered, for
each new context alters Spenser’s portrayal of mercy in telling ways.
Book I, the Legend of Holiness, presents the most straightfor-
ward account of mercy and pity found in The Faerie Queene. The rela-
tively simple depiction of mercy in this book makes sense given the
book’s central virtue; in Book I, mercy is a crucial requirement for
the Red Cross Knight’s salvation. After the knight has experienced
true repentance, Una brings him to Charissa—Charity—a maternal
n The Faerie Queene
Elizabethan Mercy in 37
figure who nurses and cares for “a multitude of babes” (I.x.31.1).2 Mercy
is closely associated with Charity; she is summoned by Charissa to
help the Red Cross Knight. Like Charissa, Mercy is associated with
childbirth and the care of children. Hamilton notes that her title of
“Matrone” specifically suggests one who has knowledge of childbirth,
and her attitude toward the knight is overtly maternal: she leads him
by the hand and “held him fast, and firmely did vpbeare, / As carefull
Nourse her child from falling oft does reare” (I.x.35.8–9). Though
the gender of allegorical figures is not necessarily meaningful, in the
case of Charissa and Mercy, Spenser emphasizes their femininity by
placing them in the traditional woman’s roles of mother and nurse,
suggesting the long-standing connection between women and mercy
discussed in Chapter One. Mercy here is an aspect of man’s salvation
and presented in a positive light; while in that sense this is a straight-
forward passage, it is nonetheless controversial because of the appar-
ently anti-Calvinist dogma at work here. Does the figure “Mercy”
represent God’s mercy or human mercy? The maternal figure Mercy
leads the Red Cross Knight to the seven beadsmen, who represent
the corporal acts of mercy featured in Roman Catholic doctrine;
their presence in the House of Holiness certainly seems to suggest
the efficacy of works in man’s salvation.3 Thus even in a strictly reli-
gious context, in an allegory of salvation, mercy inspires controversy.
Even if Spenser is claiming that human acts of mercy aid in man’s
salvation, the ultimate source of that mercy in the House of Holiness
is divine. Mercy the nurse, who seems to represent divine mercy, as
well as human acts of mercy in the House of Holiness are all virtuous
and necessary components of salvation.
The only other character in The Faerie Queene who directly repre-
sents mercy is Book V’s Mercilla, the queen of mercy. But in Book V,
mercy is presented in the context of Justice rather than Holiness, so
“mercy” does not mean God’s mercy to humanity, but rather human
expressions of mercy in the context of the pursuit of justice in human
society. Though monarchical mercy was traditionally regarded as a
reflection of the monarch’s position as God’s earthly representative,
the difference between Spenser’s characterizations of Mercy in the
House of Holiness and Mercilla in the Legend of Justice highlights
the divine nature of the former and the problematic nature of the
latter. Even in the Legend of Holiness, when Spenser portrays acts
of mercy outside of the House of Holiness that are clearly human
rather than divine, they are complicated and ambiguous in a way that
heavenly mercy is not.
Book I initially seems to commend human acts of mercy and feel-

ings of pity; virtuous characters show compassion and evil ones are
merciless. Thus Sans Loy, an evil “Saracen,” rejects Una’s pleas for
mercy after he unseats the knight he thinks is Red Cross, nor does
his “stony hart” heed her “piteous plaints” as he seizes her and carries
her away (I.iii.44. 2–3). By contrast, when the heroic Arthur meets the
desolate lady, he listens sympathetically to her story and puts himself
at her service. The satyrs’ pity for Una suggests that such compassion
might be natural: when they come upon her in the forest,
They in compassion of her tender youth,

And wonder of her beautie souerayne
Are wonne with pitty and vnwonted ruth. (I.vi.12.5–7)
Their “ruth” is “unwonted,” that is, unaccustomed. They have not

been taught to react compassionately but do so spontaneously. 4
However, the satyrs’ response, laudable on the surface, raises ques-
tions, since their compassion for Una leads to idolatry: the line that
follows the report of their “unwonted ruth” describes how they pros-
trate themselves to Una and “kisse her feete”; later we are told that
the satyrs “made her th’Image of Idolatryes” (I.vi.12.9 and 19.7). The
episode has been interpreted in a number of different ways, though
always there is the general sense that the satyrs reflect some natural
human inclination toward God even if one has not been taught what
Spenser and his audience would regard as religious truth. Early criti-
cal commentary onThe Faerie Queene often identified the satyrs with
various non-Christian groups (those encountering Christianity for
the first time, or Jews, or believers in folklore or myth). 5 More recent
readings usually locate the “salvage nation” closer to home: the satyrs
might represent the Irish or the uneducated English masses whose
understanding of reformed religion was, according to some views,
still imperfect.6 But one might also understand the satyrs more tra-
ditionally as emblematic of the passions. This interpretation of the
satyrs seems at first glance to be irrelevant to the episode: as Todd
Butler comments, their adoration of Una is surprisingly chaste, given
that the Elizabethans usually associated satyrs with lust.7 Yet, though
these satyrs do not display the traditional sexual passion that their
counterparts in Book III do, they are still identified with a kind of
passion: the emotion of pity moves them, or more specifically their
compassion, the ability to experience another person’s emotion. Is
this emotional empathy good or bad? The satyrs’ emotional reaction
n The Faerie Queene
to Una is both praiseworthy and dangerous: critics often assume that

their compassion is part of the “natural” inclination toward good-
ness and God, which Spenser seems to be representing here. But the
satyrs’ pity for Una does not ultimately lead them toward God but
toward idolatry; their tendency to experience compassion is part of a
larger portrayal of the satyrs as simple, ignorant beings.
Thus, compassion for feminine suffering may be a sign of virtue,
but Spenser also hints that such emotional responses are character-
istic of the lower orders, who, by the same token, tend to worship
idolatrously rather than properly. Book I also shows how compassion
can be manipulated so as to allow evil—specifically the evil of false
religion—to thrive. In a recent essay, Jennifer Rust has read the story
of Una and the satyrs as both criticizing the retrograde idolizing ten-
dencies of the “salvage,” as well as shadowing the way Elizabethan
political culture has grafted the old Mariology onto reverence for
the queen. Rust also suggests that Una’s vulnerability to “idolatrous
framing” bespeaks the poem’s larger unease with the image of femi-
nine authority, and feminine images in general, which so often in
Spenser turn out to be “false shows.”8 InThe Faerie Queene, the image
of the victimized woman is often revealed to be one of the false femi-
nine images that Rust mentions; Spenser several times shows that
the pity inspired by distressed women can endanger the man who
feels it.
The narrator of Book I voices his own intense pity for Una’s plight
in what is the first of several such passages in The Faerie Queene that
express his emotional response to women’s suffering:
Nought is there vnder heau’ns wide hollownesse,

That moues more deare compassion of mind,
Then beautie brought t’vnworthie wretchednesse
Through enuies snares or fortunes freakes vnkind.
I, whether lately through her brightnesse blynd,
Or through alleageance and fast fealty,
Which I do owe vnto all womankynd,
Feele my hart perst with so great agony,
When such I see, that all for pitty I could dy. (I.iii.1)
Several aspects of this opening to canto iii are noteworthy. For one,
the narrator, in sharing the distress of Una, truly exemplifies the
meaning of compassion, the empathic experience of others’ emo-
tions: what Montaigne refers to as “co-suffering.”9 The speaker’s pity
pierces his heart with such agony that he feels he could die; the emo-
tion described is so acute that the narrator seems in greater danger
than is Una. The threat of death-by-pity is raised again in Book II,
where Guyon’s great compassion for Amavia indicates a tendency
to emotional extremism that must eventually be corrected. At this
point in Book I, we can only wonder how to understand the narra-
tor’s heart-piercing agony: Is such compassion desirable or exces-
sively emotional?
Another noteworthy aspect of this passage is the narrator’s
emphasis on gender: not just any human suffering, but the suffering
of feminine beauty elicits this intense pity, and he speculates that his
reaction emerges from his debt to womankind, which suggests that
masculine suffering would not elicit the same pity. Again, compas-
sion is associated with women, though now women inspire this emo-
tional response in others rather than feeling it themselves. Further,
the narrator’s rhetoric of “fast fealty” to womankind suggests the
code of chivalry, so perhaps one function of his protestation of pity
is to elevate him socially: like a chivalric, questing knight, the narra-
tor has sworn fealty to ladies, the weak, and the innocent. Kathleen
Williams suggests that, in these passages, the narrator is reflecting
the likely response of the simplest reader.10 If this passage is meant
to reflect an unsophisticated, even natural response to human suf- f
fering, then the narrator shares that natural impulse with the satyrs.
Perhaps the connection is intended, because his lament for Una is
followed directly by a similar incident, the story of the savage lion’s
compassionate response to her “wronged innocence.” Thus narrative
pity for Una may characterize the speaker as “gentle,” or it may char-
acterize the emotion of pity itself as not only natural but also unso-
phisticated, or even ignorant. The question of pity’s relationship to
social standing has been raised though not answered; it is a question
to which Spenser will return in Book VI.
Though the narrative response of pity for Una may elevate the
narrator or valorize pity itself, the passage when read in the con-
text of the previous canto also contains a submerged warning about
pity. For when the narrator expresses chivalric compassion for a dis-
tressed lady, he echoes the emotions that the Red Cross Knight has
just experienced in canto ii. After Sans Foy is killed, his companion,
Duessa, flees; when Red Cross catches her, she cries “Mercy mercy
Sir vouchsafe to show / On silly Dame, subiect to hard mischaunce”
(I.ii.21.2–3). In terms similar to those used to express the narrator’s
feelings for the desolate Una, the Red Cross Knight responds to the
n The Faerie Queene
apparently desolate Duessa and her plea for mercy: her plight “did
much emmoue his stout heroicke heart,” just as the narrator depicts
himself as “moved” by compassion when he regards Una (I.ii.21.6).
Duessa’s pitiful lament is of course theatrical rather than genuine.
She plays the part of the desolate dame to perfection, “melting in
tears” as she tells Red Cross about her abduction by Sans Foy:
In this sad plight, friendlesse, vnfortunate,

Now miserable I Fidessa dwell,
Crauing of you in pitty of my state,
To doe none ill, if please ye not doe well. (I.ii.26.1–4)
Red Cross responds to “Fidessa” just as the narrator responds to

Una: “He in great passion al this while did dwell,” just as the nar-
rator describes how his heart is “empassioned so deepe” for pity of
Una (I.ii.26.5 and I.iii.2.1). Red Cross’s response to Duessa/Fidessa
introduces a theme that runs through the entire poem: the emo-
tion of pity can render one vulnerable, and pity can be manipulated
and misdirected. The knight’s allegiance to Duessa wreaks his utter
downfall, and it begins with her plea for mercy, to which he responds
as chivalric knights are supposed to respond: he feels compassion,
attraction, and a sense of duty toward her. The narrator’s response
to Una, whose plight is real and who deserves the pity he feels for
her, nonetheless must be read in the context of this parallel moment
when Red Cross, through a similarly passionate pity, falls under the
spell of a witch. Spenser structures the Legend of Holiness around
the parallel figures of Una and Duessa in part to show the difficulty
of distinguishing good from evil, so perhaps the parallel responses of
the knight and the narrator could be seen as simply part of the book’s
overall pattern. Specifically, these two female figures represent false
religion (Duessa, the daughter of the West, Rome) and right religion
(Una, the one truth). The two pitying responses we see, one based on
a false show and one based on real distress, suggest how the claims
of false religion can engage people’s hearts and emotions. When we
read Duessa as figuring Mary Stuart, Roman Catholic competitor
for Elizabeth’s throne, the pity men feel for Duessa takes on his-
torical resonance. Guyon almost makes the same mistake of pitying
Duessa in Book II, and in Book V that pity almost deflects punish-
ment from this avatar of Mary, Queen of Scots. But the object of pity
need not be Duessa/Mary Stuart to render pity problematic in The
Faerie Queene. Throughout subsequent books, Spenser continues to
present apparently positive depictions of mercy that he undermines

through juxtaposition and irony.
Spenser’sLegendofTemperanceinvestigatesthenatureandeffectsof
the passions, so mercy must be understood in the context of temper-
ance rather than holiness. Book II provides a submerged analysis of
the dangers of pity and compassion using the same kind of juxtaposi-
tion that we saw in Book I, but in Book II the critique of compassion
directly implicates Queen Elizabeth, though it is carefully distanced
from her. For example, Guyon describes Gloriana, Elizabeth’s
acknowledged avatar, in a passage that reflects Elizabeth’s image as
a clement queen. This passage is one of the most elaborate depic-
tions of the eponymous Fairy Queen, and it emphasizes her mercy.
When Guyon is asked by Medina to explain his quest, the Knight of
Temperance praises Gloriana in these terms:
Great and most glorious virgin Queene aliue,

That with her soueraigne powre, and scepter shene
All Faery lond does peaceably sustene.
In widest Ocean she her throne does reare,
That ouer all the earth it may be seene;
As morning Sunne her beames dispredden cleare,
And in her face faire peace, and mercy doth appeare. (II.ii.40.3–9)
This stanza identifies Queen Elizabeth with Peace and Mercy, the
daughters of God who defend humanity against the charges of Truth
and Justice.11 Further, the description proclaims not only Elizabeth’s
merciful disposition but also her reputation for mercy: Gloriana’s
throne may be seen “ouer all the earth” and her fair face, reflecting
peace and mercy, shines over the world like the sun. Two stanzas later,
Guyon will again describe Gloriana with the announcement that her
mercy is not just local but global: his queen is one whose “glory is in
gracious deeds” and who “ioyes / Throughout the world her mercy to
maintaine” (II.ii.43.6–7). These lines suggest that Elizabeth is a bea-
con for Protestants on the continent; her compassion was sometimes
invoked early in her reign to suggest that she would provide a refuge
for persecuted Protestants abroad.12
Despite this traditional praise of Elizabeth as a Prince of Peace and
merciful Christian monarch, the action of Book II nowhere praises
the efficacy of human mercy, if by mercy we mean clemency or for-
giveness.13 Gloriana’s mercy is praised in the abstract, but human
mercy and the pity and compassion that might inspire merciful
n The Faerie Queene
behavior are identified as futile or even dangerous in Book II. Just

a few stanzas before Guyon praises Gloriana’s mercy and peace, we
see Medina try to bring peace to the brawling knights Huddibras
and Sans Loy, who are fighting each other and then turn on Guyon
as well. Spenser emphasizes Medina’s pity as she runs among them
“with her tresses torne, / And naked brest, in pitty of their harmes”
beseeching them in emotional terms (“by the womb, which them
had born”) to cease (II.ii.27.2–5). Medina’s naked breast recalls the
traditional association of women’s breasts with women’s tender emo-
tions.14 Yet Medina’s pity and the resulting emotional appeal seem
to have little effect except to incite her sisters, Elissa and Perissa,
to shout her down and urge the knights to more violence. It is when
Medina applies “pitthy words and counsell sad” that she finally gets
results; the knights suppress their “fury mad” and “hearken to the
sober speaches, which she spoke” (II.ii.28.5–9). Thus, canto ii of
Book II not only offers praise of mercy and peace in the form of an
encomium to Gloriana but also demonstrates peace being obtained
not through an emotional display of pity but through “pitthy words”
and sober speeches.
Both pity and peace are satirized in an episode parallel to this one,
when in canto vi Phaedria runs between two combatants, Guyon and
Cymochles. Just as Medina intervened “in pitty of their harmes,”
Phaedria beseeches the knights:
How can
Your cruell eyes endure so pitteous sight,
To shed your liues on ground? (II.vi.32.5–7)
She begs them to find a place for pity in their “yron brestes” and seek
peace instead of war. Of course, the peace she has in mind is the
“louely peace, and gentle amity” found “in Amours”; she asserts that
Mars is Cupidoes frend,

And is for Venus loues renowmed more,
Then all his wars and spoiles. (II.vi.35.3–9)
In this episode, pity acts to lure knights into idleness and passivity;
certainly this is true for Cymochles, who remains on Phaedria’s island
where he has been spending his time slumbering in an “idle dreme”
(II.vi.27.2). After Guyon and Cymochles yield to Phaedria’s pleas,
the narrator comments, “Such is the might / Of courteous clemency
in gentle hart” (II.vi.36.5–6). This assertion is rendered ironic when

we recall that it is Phaedria who has been urging clemency. Pity and
clemency are represented here as potentially emasculating and ener-
vating, capable of derailing the proper activity of knighthood.
Though Guyon escapes the idleness that Phaedria terms “peace”
in canto vi, he is vulnerable throughout Book II to the emotion of
pity. Guyon’s “great pittie” for Duessa, whom he sees in her disguise
as a “virgin cleene” assaulted by a lewd knight, almost leads him to
attack Red Cross (II.i.10.4 and 14.3). His next encounter, with the
dying Amavia, ironically underscores the Knight of Temperance’s
intemperance as he allows his compassion to overpower him:
Tell then O Lady tell, what fatall priefe

Hath with so huge misfortune you opprest:
That I may cast to compas your reliefe,
Or die with you in sorrow, and partake your griefe. (II.i.48.6–9)
Like the narrator regarding Una’s plight in Book I, Guyon experi-

ences compassion, or “co-suffering,” and as in Book I, such extreme
compassion is risky: the idea that Guyon might partake of Amavia’s
grief to the point of death underlines the danger of too much com-
passion. And when Amavia herself dies a few stanzas later, though
Guyon does not die with her, he “could vneath / From teares abstayne”
and “for griefe his hart did grate” (II.i.56.5–6). As A. C. Hamilton
points out, Guyon is “much given to pity that leads to ‘woman-
ish teares’” until the final canto in which he displays “rigour pitti-
lesse.”15 Spenser highlights the irony of Guyon’s emotional response
to Amavia’s plight when, in the midst of his own emotional display,
Guyon blames Amavia’s suicide on her lack of temperance: “When
raging passion with fierce tyranny / Robs reason of her dew regalitie”
(II.i.57.4–5).
Guyon’s susceptibility to the emotion of pity is obviously a motif
in Book II, and will be corrected in the final canto by his “piti-
lesse” destruction of the Bower of Bliss. Gerald Morgan argues that
Spenser is warning that “pity is no more than a passion” and must be
tempered by rationality and linked to justice in order to become the
virtue, mercy.16 However, it seems that Spenser makes very little if
any distinction between pity and mercy in Book II, and no human
act that is called merciful in Book II has any positive consequences,
nor does Morgan identify any. For example, in canto v, merciful acts
along with expressions of remorse and pity all work in concert to
n The Faerie Queene
create chaos. Two acts of mercy—Guyon’s mercy on Pyrochles and

his merciful release of Occasion and Furor at Pyrochles’ request—
lead to renewed violence. When the defeated Pyrochles begs Guyon
for mercy in canto v, few readers would blame Guyon when he tem-
pers his passion and releases Pyrochles. Nevertheless, later events
call for a reevaluation of Guyon’s mercy at this point in the narrative.
First of all, Pyrochles shows no remorse. He blames his downfall on
“fortunes doome” and as soon as he is released begins to grind his
teeth “for great disdeigne” (II.v.12.8 and 14.3). Second, Guyon places
no conditions upon the release of Pyrochles. He reminds Pyrochles
that he owes allegiance to “him, that giues thee life and liberty,” but
in fact Pyrochles will show no such allegiance to Guyon and will
even try to strip him of his armor while Guyon lies in a faint in canto
viii (II.v.13.6). Furthermore, the release of Pyrochles leads directly
to another act of mercy, the release of Furor and Occasion, which
has dire consequences. Pyrochles demands their release, eliciting a
peculiar reaction from the Knight of Temperance:
Thereat Sir Guyon n smylde, And is that all

(Said he) that thee so sore displeased hath?
Great mercy sure, for to enlarge a thrall,
Whose freedom shall thee turne to greatest scath. (II.v.18.1–4)
Is Guyon’s smile ironic? The reader certainly finds it ironic that

Guyon has, only moments earlier, shown the “great mercy” to release
Pyrochles, an act that will soon turn to Guyon’s “greatest scath.” As
he did in the first canto when he commented on Amavia’s lack of
temperance, Guyon lectures on a failing that he himself displays.
Harm will soon come to Guyon, and Pyrochles too will suffer as a
result of what this canto clearly terms “mercy”: Furor and Occasion
when released turn on Pyrochles and Guyon, and while they have no
success with Guyon, Pyrochles is soon being battered and dragged
through the dirt and mire by Furor. Guyon’s response to Pyrochles’s
suffering is another clear instance of an emotional, pitying response
that must be corrected. While Guyon is “greatly moued” by
Pyrochles’s plight, the Palmer has to stop him from “yielding pitifull
redresse” (II.v.24.1–4). The Palmer’s intervention makes it obvious
that this passage is a warning against emotional pity: “Deare sonne,
thy causelesse ruth represse, / Ne let thy stout hart melt in pitty
vayne” (II.v.24.5–6). But the canto, taken in its entirety, seems to
warn not just against the emotional response to another’s misfortune
that would melt one’s heart, but also against acts of mercy that might
at first glance appear to be magnanimous. Just as Elizabeth’s coun-
cilors warn that more harm than good will result from her apparently
gracious acts of mercy, Spenser suggests that the mercy offered to
a fallen foe can lead to more violence and suffering. Not only does
Guyon suffer because he spared Pyrochles, Pyrochles also suffers.
We see him attacked, beaten, and dragged through the dirt in this
canto; in his next appearance at the end of canto vi, Pyrochles is liter-
ally burning (he describes himself as “most wretched man aliue” and
tries to drown himself); finally, when he and Cymochles try to attack
Guyon and want to despoil his “corpse” in canto viii, Arthur inter-
venes and ultimately kills Pyrochles. Neither Guyon nor Pyrochles
in any way benefits from Guyon’s mercy in canto v.
Arthur’s battle with Pyrochles in canto viii also forces us to
reevaluate Guyon’s earlier act of mercy. Arthur has the “Paynim”
down, just as Guyon did in canto v. Arthur too is reluctant to take
Pyrochles’s life. But rather than freely releasing the knight, Arthur
makes demands:
Yet if thou wilt renounce thy miscreaunce,

And my trew liegeman yield thy selfe for ay,
Life will I graunt thee for thy valiaunce,
And all thy wrongs will wipe out of my souenaunce. (II.viii.51.6–9)
Not surprisingly, Pyrochles refuses disdainfully. In a moment that

foreshadows Mercilla’s condemnation of Duessa, Arthur beheads
Pyrochles between the lines; there is no direct narration of the act:
“His shining Helmet he gan soone vnlace, / And left his headlesse
body bleeding all the place” (II.viii.52.8–9). Arthur is angry, yet also
regretful: “Wroth was the Prince, and sory yet withall” (II.viii.52.5).
Like Mercilla, who weeps for Duessa yet also allows her execution,
Arthur does not let his sorrow prevent him from eschewing mercy
and acting decisively and punitively.
The final episode of Book II, in which Guyon razes the Bower of
Bliss without pity, is not surprising in the context of this book’s repre-
sentation not only of pity but also of mercy. Guyon’s final temptation
to pity occurs as he and the Palmer are crossing the sea to Acrasia’s
island and they see and hear a maiden wailing in “great sorrow and sad
agony,” and calling for succor (II.xii.27.6–9). Just as we might expect
the code of chivalry to approve a knight’s mercy to his defeated foe,
here we might expect the code of chivalry to demand that a knight
n The Faerie Queene
come to the aid of a distressed maiden. But no: the Palmer warns
Guyon (again) against “foolish pitty” and we are reminded of the way
that the Red Cross Knight’s chivalrous compassion for Fidessa/Duessa
led to his downfall in Book I (II.xii.29.2). The Legend of Temperance
represents not only heart-melting, tear-producing pity as danger-
ous but also warns against merciful acts that seem rational and even
noble. Arthur’s beheading of the unrepentant Pyrochles and Guyon’s
destruction, “with rigour pittilesse,” of Acrasia’ Bower, are apparently
considered acts of temperance (II.xii.83.2). Yet these knights act in
the service of Gloriana, who is persistently associated with mercy:
“Far reach her mercies,” proclaims Arthur in canto ix (4.8).
Book II embodies a paradox: mercy is praised and attributed to
Queen Elizabeth as one of the chief glories of her reign; yet the events
of Book II repeatedly characterize both pity and mercy as dangerous
and even destructive, and temperance is defined as rigor rather than
some golden mean between excessive clemency and harsh punish-
ment. Book V reflects the same tension between the praise of mercy
in the abstract and the rejection of mercy in the actual. Arthegall,
the Knight of Justice, allows pity to disarm and ultimately enslave
him, and Britomart must set things right by the use of violent pun-
ishment. Mercilla is represented as the queen of mercy, but like
Britomart enacts punishment rather than forgiveness; furthermore,
the portrayal of Mercilla herself positions her against a corporate
masculine body and suggests that judgment is a dangerous business
for a woman. Mercilla’s position, simultaneously exalted and hidden,
reminds us not only of the danger of clemency but the danger inher-
ent in any judgment made by a queen, who may, like Elizabeth, be
vilified no matter what she does.
Book V opens with a proem that names Arthegall as the instru-
ment of Elizabeth’s justice, if we understand the “Dread Souerayne
Goddesse” of the proem’s final stanza to be Spenser’s queen.
Arthegall’s encounters with various forms of injustice in the Book’s
first few cantos are easily won: with the help of Talus, the Knight of
Justice rapidly doles out rigorous justice to Sanglier, Munera, and the
Giant with the scales. It is only in his encounter with the Amazon
Radigund that Arthegall stumbles, and his downfall is specifically
attributed to the pity inspired by the sight of Radigund’s face:
At sight thereof his cruell minded hart

Empierced was with pittifull regard,
That his sharpe sword he threw from him apart. (V.v.13.1–3)
As he casts aside his sword and stands “with emptie hands all weap-
onlesse,” Arthegall is unmanned by the “ruth” that has “mollifie[d]”
his hard heart and cruel hand (V.v. 14.2 and 13.5–6). The knight’s cat-
astrophic experience of pity for a heartless—but beautiful—foe may
be read as the culmination of the pattern that was established with
the Red Cross Knight’s mistaken compassion for Duessa in Book I.
Arthegall’s pity stands in sharp contrast to the cruelty of Radigund,
which the narrative repeatedly emphasizes: she renews her “former
cruelnesse” as soon as she wakes from her swoon, and her actions
are described as “outrage mercilesse” as she continues to attack an
adversary who refuses to fight back (V.v.14.4–7). Of course, once he
becomes Radigund’s thrall, Arthegall’s emasculation, suggested by
the loss of his sword, is literal:
Then tooke the Amazon this noble knight,

Left to her will by his own wilfull blame,
And caused him to be disarmed quight,
Of all the ornaments of knightly name,
With which whylome he gotten had great fame,
In stead whereof she made him to be dight
In womans weedes, that is to manhood shame,
And put before his lap a napron white,
In stead of Curiets and bases fit for fight. (V.v.20)
This episode underscores the two extremes often attributed to femi-

ninity in Spenser’s age. Radigund is cruel in a way characterized as
specifically feminine; it is the cruelty expected of unnatural women,
who have “shaken off the shamefast band / With which wise Nature
did them strongly bynd” (V.v.25.2–3). On the other hand, when Justice,
that is, Arthegall, allows pity to rule, Justice/Arthegall is completely
feminized: this is the “effeminate pity” that so many authors warn
about.
It takes a woman to straighten out this feminine perversion of jus-
tice. Britomart, often understood as an avatar of Queen Elizabeth,
rides to the rescue, but her intervention is carefully presented so as to
venerate her as an emblem of equity while simultaneously praising her
rigor. Britomart’s mysterious encounter with the idol in Isis Church
has been variously interpreted, but one aspect of this experience is
quite clear: the crocodile who threatens and then seduces her in her
vision is identified by Isis’s priests as her lover, Arthegall, who is “like
to Osyris in all iust endeuer” (V.vii.22.5). In her dream, Britomart
becomes Isis herself; her “Moon-like Mitre” changes to a “Crowne
n The Faerie Queene
of gold,” like that of Isis (V.vii.13.6) and she mates with the croco-
dile, whom the priests identify as Osiris: “For that same Crocodile
Osyris is” (V.vii.22.6). Initially, Britomart controls the crocodile by
beating it back when it threatens her, which parallels the idol Isis’s
suppression of the crocodile. According to the priests, Isis’s stance
shows that “clemence oft in things amis, / Restraines those sterne
behests, and cruell doomes of his” (V.vii.22.8–9). Positioned as Isis,
Britomart thus represents the clemency that restrains severe justice.
We have been told that Isis “in her person cunningly did shade /
That part of Iustice, which is Equity” (V.vii.3.3–4). Just as Book II
elevates the image of Gloriana as a merciful queen, Book V invites
us to see Britomart as a goddess of equity, defined as “clemence” in
this particular passage and often understood as a form of mercy in
the Renaissance.
In reality, equity does not necessarily equate to or result in mercy.
Most simply, equity means making exceptions to the strict inter-
pretation of a law in order to achieve a truly just end. Nevertheless,
equity was often equated with mercy in early modern thought. So
an apparent contradiction informs Book V: if Isis Church and the
Court of Mercilla are the two iconographic centers of the book and
both represent equity—usually aligned with mercy—then why is the
execution of justice in this book so merciless?17 Some critics have
attempted to explain equity in Book V as rigor rather than mercy:
it has been argued that equity here is the restraint not of cruelty but
of too much leniency.18 Indeed, if the point of equity is to produce
a truly just result, then equity does not necessarily mean softening
the law’s strictness; it could mean being more severe than the law
demands. However, this version of equity is not indicated by the
definition offered in the Isis Church episode: we are told that the
figure of Isis shows that clemency “restraines” the “cruell doomes”
of Osiris (V.vii.22.8–9). Yet the vision that associates Britomart with
Isis, and thus establishes Britomart as one who would restrain the
“cruell doomes” of justice, is followed immediately by her fight with
Radigund, where Britomart acts as a punitive, merciless agent of jus-
tice. This contradiction echoes the one found in Book II: Gloriana is
praised for her mercy in the abstract at the same time that the narra-
tive repeatedly shows the dangers of mercy in the actual. A queen’s
mercy must be lauded for all the reasons detailed above: tenderness is
a desirable feminine quality; mercy is traditionally expected of mon-
archs and especially of queens; a queen who is not tenderly merciful
runs the risk of being labeled monstrous. As a figure of Elizabeth,
Britomart should be understood symbolically, even mystically,

to embody the equity that is associated with clemency. But when
Britomart beheads Radigund, she enacts the kind of harsh punish-
ment that many of Eizabeth’s subjects deemed necessary. However, at
the moment when Britomart shows the least mercy, she also destroys
the specter of the monstrous and cruel queen, rejecting the label of
Jezebel even as she embraces the need for severity.
Andrew Majeske reads this episode as evoking a particular version
of equity: a Greek tradition, based on Aristotle, that Majeske argues
was one of two strands of classical thought that informed Renaissance
ideas about equity, the second being the Roman idea of aequitas.19
According to Majeske, Britomart-as-Isis suggests the Greek tradi-
tion, which depicted epieikeia as a slow, flexible, and above all secret
deliberation that intervenes between the law and particular cases.
Majeske argues that Spenser genders this brand of equity feminine,
in contrast to the masculine, Roman equity that would enforce laws
equally and evenly, eliminating any need to take particular circum-
stances into account. He asserts that Britomart’s vision in Isis Church
persuades her to give up her public authority to Arthegall and, like
Isis, work behind the scenes to “exercise the controlling power of
equity over Arthegall.”20 Since there is no indication that Britomart,
once she reestablishes the rule of men in Radegone, ever makes any
effort to control Arthegall, I am not convinced by this argument.21
However, Majeske’s depiction of the Greek epieikeia as a slow, secret
process that might be criticized as unstable and dilatory does coin-
cide interestingly with the way Queen Elizabeth’s deliberations were
sometimes depicted. Though Majeske says that he has found no evi-
dence associating equity more closely with queens than with kings, if
we remember that equity is popularly—if incorrectly—understood as
a form of mercy, then indeed, there is a long history of representing
queens as the conduits of mercy who intercede with kings to mollify
their stern judgments.22 That this kind of equitable decision making,
gendered feminine, should be carried on in private is also relevant.
Britomart’s association with this style of equity in Book V reflects
the idea that women’s judgments require private spaces, an idea rein-
forced in the Mercilla episode. Mercilla’s punishment of Duessa
echoes Britomart’s punishment of Radigund in several ways, includ-
ing the role played by privacy and the tension generated when an icon
of mercy enacts a severe punishment.
Like Britomart, Mercilla is an Elizabeth-avatar; by general agree-
ment, she is one of the clearest representations of Elizabeth in the
n The Faerie Queene
poem, and the episode concerning the judgment of Duessa was

immediately understood as an allegory of Elizabeth’s judgment of
Mary Stuart.23 Mercilla’s palace has been said to resemble Hampton
Court, and Mercilla’s door warden, the giant Awe, recalls the queen’s
porter, who was reportedly eight feet tall.24 Caroline McManus men-
tions that even the bevy of white-clad virgins surrounding Mercilla
may be an allusion to Elizabeth’s ladies-in-waiting, who typically
wore white.25 The elaborate symbolism of this court serves as an
encomium to Elizabeth: Mercilla’s rusty sword suggests the “long
rest” from war enjoyed by her kingdom, her scepter is described as
a “sacred pledge of peace and clemencie”; even her person is “Angel-
like” (V.ix.29–30). Mercilla is surrounded by the “louely daughters of
high Ioue” who calm Jove’s anger and his “cruell vengeance stay,” in
much the same way that Isis’s clemency restrains the “cruell doomes”
of Osiris (V.ix.31.4–9).
This queen of mercy hears a raft of arguments against Duessa, who
represents Mary Stuart in this episode but has represented false reli-
gion throughout the poem. The reaction that Duessa inspires in those
who hear her case recalls Spenser’s critique of pity in Book I. Just as
the Red Cross Knight initially pitied “Fidessa” and suffered for it later,
so too does Arthur pity her now: “With the neare touch whereof in
tender hart / The Briton Prince was sore empassionate” (V.x.46.1–2).
Arthur is “inclined much vnto her part” at first, because of the emo-
tion kindled in his tender heart by her plight; the Red Cross Knight
also experienced “passion” upon hearing Duessa’s story, and assured
her that even a heart of flint would “rew” her woes (I.ii.26.5–9). The
intense emotional response of these knights is generated by a perfor-
mance: just as Duessa in Book I was playing the role of the wronged
Fidessa, here too she generates sympathy because she appears to be an
attractive noblewoman, though the reader recalls that in Book I she
was revealed as a hideous witch. Interestingly, Duessa in Book V never
speaks on her own behalf, but the “rare beautie in her face,” along with
her generally wretched condition, elicits a pitying response. Twice
Spenser uses the word “allure” to describe the way Duessa inspires
emotion: “she did sure / The peoples great compassion vnto her allure”;
and in the following stanza, Zele tries to convince those “whom she to
pitie had allured” that they should loath her instead (V.ix.38.8–9 and
39.8). Pity is an emotion that can be “allured,” suggesting manipula-
tion and deception, as Spenser’s narrative so often attests.
But not everyone feels compassion for Duessa. Various “graue
persons,” such as Zele, Kingdomes Care, Authority, and the Law
of Nations, urge but cannot enact the penalty of death (V.ix.43.6).

When a final judgment is demanded of the merciful queen, she
appears to be responding as Arthur did initially: her tender pity is
most manifest. Mercilla weeps tears of grief for Duessa and, rather
than speaking any sentence of doom, draws a purple pall across her
face to hide her tears:
But she, whose Princely breast was touched nere

With piteous ruth of her so wretched plight,
Though plaine she saw by all, that she did heare,
That she of death was guiltie found by right,
Yet would not let iust vengeance on her light;
But rather let in stead thereof to fall
Few perling drops from her faire lampes of light;
The which she couering with her purple pall
Would haue the passion hid, and vp arose withall. (V.ix.50)
The canto ends at this dramatic point, with judgment against Duessa
suspended. Spenser has depicted a queen who literally embodies ten-
der mercy, emphasizing the idea that Mercilla’s “ruth” is found in her
“Princely breast.” At this point, the “perling drops” from Mercilla’s
eyes replace vengeance; her tears are “let . . . thereof to fall” “in stead”
of just vengeance, suggesting the victory of the queen’s personally
clement nature over an externally located vengeance, which is nev- v
ertheless described by Spenser as “just.” Yet, when the next canto
opens, this icon of sacred mercy has condemned Duessa to death.
Mercilla’s final judgment contrasts with Una’s decision in Book I
to let Duessa live. After the witch is captured, Arthur tells the Red
Cross Knight that it is in his power to let Duessa live or die, but Una
quickly answers, “To doe her die (quoth Vna) were despight, / And
shame t’auenge so weake an enimy” (I.viii.45.7–8). Duessa is memo-
rably despoiled, revealing her true monstrosity, but she is not killed.
Perhaps these different judgments—assuming Spenser endorses
both—result from the two different contexts. The Book of Holiness
explores a personal virtue, while Book V is about justice, a public
virtue. The private woman Elizabeth may be compassionate; like
Una and Mercilla, she may be personally merciful. But Mercilla, like
Elizabeth, has a public role to fulfill, and in the interest of justice and
the welfare of the state, Duessa must die.
Spenser lavishes praise on mercy as an ideal through the beautiful
and detailed symbolism of Mercilla and her court. But just as in so
n The Faerie Queene
much Elizabethan prose directed to and descriptive of the queen,

merciful actions are discouraged even while the ideal of mercy is
praised.26InhisViewoftheStateofIreland,Spenserengagesthesame
problem—how both to praise and to condemn mercy—and uses the
same technique. Of course, Elizabeth’s policies regarding Ireland
often drew fire for being too lenient (as well as parsimonious and waf-
f
fling). Spenser’s speaker Eudoxus describes Queen Elizabeth thus:
If it shall happen, that the state of this miserie and lamentable

image of things shall bee tolde, and feelingly presented to her Sacred
Maiestie, being by nature full of mercy and clemency, who is most
inclinable to such pittifull complaints, and will not endure to hear
such tragedies made of her poore people and subiects . . . then she
perhappes, for very compassion of such calamities, will . . . stoppe the
streame of such violences.27
This passage follows Irenaeus’s haunting description of famine in

Munster and might sound like praise for the sacred queen’s mercy
and tender regard for her people. Nevertheless, when put in con-
text this passage can only be read as a lament that tragedies such
as the famine can be used to change the English crown’s policy of
“the sword” in Ireland; Irenaeus has just assured Eudoxus that when
the Soldiers “spoyleth” so that “nothing is very shortly left . . . this is
very necessary to bee done for the soone finishing of the warre.”28
That the queen is “by nature”” full of mercy is, according to a closer
reading of this passage, the real problem. But Christian tradition and
the feminine ideal demand that Queen Elizabeth should be exactly
thus: merciful rather than cruel, gentle rather than tyrannical, so
Spenser overtly praises her mercy as a quality even as he clearly criti-
cizes it as a policy.
Spenser’s account of Mercilla embodies the same paradox. Even
the iconography of the Queen of Mercy, glorious and ostensibly posi-
tive, is nevertheless at times ambiguous. The “bright steely brand,”
the sword that lies at Mercilla’s feet, has been rusted by “long rest,”
and though the narrator says that “she could it sternely draw,” clearly
she has not drawn it in a very long time (V.ix.30.6–9). A rusty sword
often carries negative connotations of idleness and impotence, as
when an unused sword that rusts is compared to a slothful man eaten
awaybyviceinthemedievalPilgrimageoftheLifeofMan.29Andgiven
that Book V follows Arthegall as he imposes true justice in one situ-
ation after another, almost always by use of his sword, the emblem of
Mercilla’s rusted and unused sword is double-edged. Elizabeth her-

self refers to her “rusty sword” in the poem “The Doubt of Future
Foes.” There, Elizabeth asserts, “My rusty sword through rest / Shall
first his edge employ / To pull [poll] their tops who seek such change /
Or gape for future joy.”30 In her threat to draw her sword and “poll
their tops”—cut off their heads—Elizabeth refers specifically to the
“daughter of debate,” Mary Stuart, and her advocates. But as we know,
her reluctance to prosecute, try, and finally execute Mary caused
immense fear and frustration for many of her subjects. As long as it
remains rusty—unused—the sword reflects the message that the nar-
rator ascribes to Mercilla’s scepter: it is the “sacred pledge of peace
and clemencie,” suggesting that the queen’s mercy has produced a
peaceful reign. But not everyone in Elizabethan England desired
peace. The rusty sword is also an emblem of Elizabeth’s failure to
act as many of her Protestant subjects wished her to act: to execute
Mary speedily, to send English troops to support Protestants in the
Low Countries and elsewhere on the continent, and to complete the
conquest of Ireland through brutal means if necessary.
In Book V, Mercilla’s apparent indecision during the trial of Duessa
also bespeaks the paradox Spenser highlights here: Mercilla embod-
ies mercy, but rigor is demanded in this situation. Though Mercilla
knows Duessa’s guilt, she “would not let iust vengeance on her light,”
an ambiguous statement that could mean either that Mercilla will
not allow w Duessa to be punished, or that she will not prevent t Duessa
from being punished.31 Though the canto ends with Mercilla’s with-
drawal and silence, a few stanzas later, Arthur and Arthegall are said
to have “seene and heard” Mercilla “doome a rights” Duessa (V.x.4.3).
These paradoxes of course represent Queen Elizabeth’s famous vac-
illations in the case of Mary Stuart, but these contradictory state-
ments can exist—and Spenser allows them to coexist—because of
Mercilla’s protective hiddenness. Mercilla is described as “seene and
heard” by Arthur and Arthegall, and Spenser shows her sitting “on
high, that she might all men see / And might of all men royally be
seene” (V.ix.27.3–4). In fact, the visual availability of Mercilla is heav-
v
ily emphasized throughout canto ix: some form of the word “see” is
repeated frequently throughout the knights’ encounter with Mercilla,
beginning with the stanza where they approach her palace:
Loe now, right noble knights, arriu’d ye bee

Nigh to the place, which ye desir’d to see:
There shall ye see my souerayne Lady Queene
n The Faerie Queene
Most sacred wight, most debonayre and free,

That euer yet vpon this earth was seene. (V.ix.20.4–8)
But though Arthur and Arthegall are “shewed all the sight” of Mercilla
and her palace, though the queen may “of all men royally be seene,”
her person is never described and she is never actually exposed; rather,
she is always surrounded and veiled. In the first description, she is
covered with a cloth of state that is “like a cloud” and surrounded by
thousands of Angels that “encompassed the throne” (V.ix.28.4 and
29.6). Later, when she weeps for Duessa, she covers her face with a
“purple Pall.” Though Mercilla is on display, she is always protected
by clouds, angels, and veils. Spenser regards such protection as vital
to the rendering of challenging judgments, especially when the judge
is female. An iconic analogue to Mercilla occurs in Book IV: another
veiled, hidden, and ambiguous judge, Venus, who stands “right in the
midst,” yet like Mercilla is both veiled and protectively surrounded
by angels, though in the case of Venus it is a “flocke of litle loues” that
fly around her (IV.x.42.2). Both Mercilla and Venus are importuned
by their subjects, though Venus hears the personal pleading of lovers
rather than the legal pleading of councilors. Both must render a judg-
ment, and both do so in utterly ambiguous ways. Scudamour wants
to seize Amoret from the lap of Womanhood and looks to Venus
for a judgement. He chooses to read her response, a laugh, as one
of approval, but whether he has really received permission to take
Amoret remains uncertain. Like Mercilla, Venus judges from behind
a veil.
Reminiscent of Elizabeth’s anxiety about “being on stage” as
she decides Mary’s fate, Mercilla is given a protective cover that
Elizabeth lacked. We know that Elizabeth wished for a private solu-
tion to the problem of Mary Stuart. According to A. N. McLaren,
the queen’s godly councilors, led by Burghley and Walsingham, were
determined that Mary’s trial and execution should be carried out
publicly, conducted by the “majesty of the state,” so that the justice
of Mary’s fate could be witnessed by all. They feared that Elizabeth
would hold out for a private solution, probably in the form of a secret
assassination of Mary. The queen tried to remove herself from the
proceedings against Mary, violating precedent by not attending the
opening of the 1586 Parliament that had been summoned specifi-
cally to deal with Mary’s execution. “The queen’s absence allowed
the male political nation to enact justice without mercy, hence civic
virtue uninformed by a monarchical prerogative—mercy—claimed
by Elizabeth.”32 Elizabeth’s failure to exercise her merciful preroga-

tive undermines the monarchical principle that she embodies; it
also threatens her image as a clement queen. A decision to execute
Mary could, and did, result in her characterization as a Jezebel, but
a decision to pardon Mary would open her to charges of effeminate
weakness. Spenser responds to the danger of judgments by providing
protective spaces where they can occur in The Faerie Queene.
The shocking description of a poet whose tongue has been nailed
to a post in stanzas 25 and 26 of this canto may also reflect Queen
Elizabeth’s fears about how her judgment of Mary Stuart will be
interpreted. The poet Bonfont, whose name has been changed to
“Malfont,” is being punished because he did “foule blaspheme that
Queene for forged guyle,” a phrase which is usually interpreted as
meaning that he blasphemed the queen through his own “forged
guyle,” but which could just as easily mean that he accused her of
forged guile (V.ix.25.5). Given the context of this episode, given what
we know about Elizabeth’s concern that her treatment of Mary
would be interpreted as guileful rather than genuine, and especially
given the images of protective veiling that Spenser employs in his
depiction of Mercilla, the more obvious reading seems to be that
the queen is punishing a writer who accused her of guile, nailing his
tongue to a post in an attempt to control how her performance is
interpreted and represented.
Notably, Mercilla’s condemnation of Duessa in this account does
not result from her enaction of the sovereign’s personal prerogative:
the product of her “princely breast” is pity, not justice. Some critics
have interpreted Mercilla as representing equity in this episode, if
equity is understood as the prerogative of an individual, be it sover-
eign or judge, to mitigate the law’s harshness in an individual case.33
Whether we understand Mercilla as a representation of the queen’s
personally merciful nature or as a figure who embodies the possi-
bility of equity, the outcome is the same: condemnation results not
from the queen’s prerogative but from the arguments of counsel. A
figure named “Zele,” whom Louis Montrose has characterized as “a
personification of the godly political nation,” prosecutes Duessa and
“vrge[s] her punishment” (V.ix.49.7).34 This is a moment that exempli-
fies the theory of mixed monarchy; Spenser ultimately suggests that
the queen of mercy will rule according to the advice of male council-
ors rather than basing her judgment on her personal inclinations.
Spenser does not represent Mercilla’s judgment of Duessa, leaving
the question unanswered at the end of Canto ix. Canto x opens not
n The Faerie Queene
with a report that Mercilla pronounced Duessa’s doom, but rather

with a philosophical discussion of mercy itself. Spenser asserts that
mercy holds a place equal to that of justice and that mercy comes
from the Almighty; he suggests that “it is greater prayse to saue, then
spill,” and tells us that it is “better to reforme, then to cut off the
ill” (V.x.2.8–9). As critics have long noted, there is poetic evasion
going on here, as Spenser obfuscates the outcome of an extremely
controversial episode in the reign of Elizabeth. But this is also typi-
cally Spenserian misleading; as readers we are invited to misjudge
Mercilla and the nature of mercy itself, and assume that Mercilla’s
tears and mercy’s exalted place will save Duessa’s life—only to have
our misconceptions corrected a few stanzas later. Spenser also places
heavy emphasis on the honor and praise that Mercilla enjoys because
of her justice and mercy. In a moment reminiscent of Guyon’s depic-
tion of Gloriana’s worldwide reputation for mercy and peace, Spenser
emphasizes that Mercilla’s honor shall be raised
Vp to the skies, whence first deriu’d it was,

And now on earth it selfe enlarged has,
From th’vtmost brinke of the Armericke shore,
Vnto the margent of the Molucas. (V.x.3.4–7)
In both Book II and Book V, Spenser focuses on an issue that was of

deep concern to Queen Elizabeth: her reputation, and here, in par-
ticular, her concern about how the execution of the Queen of Scots
might affect her reputation as a merciful Prince of Peace. Spenser’s
insistence on the praise that Mercilla garners, not only from distant
lands but from her own people, and from Arthegall and Arthur as
well, suggests that he recognized how important her image was to
her and sought to reassure her that she had enhanced rather than tar-
nished it when she signed Mary’s death warrant. Spenser was acutely
aware that harsh judgments could result in a sullied reputation: Book
V ends with its hero, Arthegall, being assailed by figures named
Envie and Detraction, who rail at him, accusing him of cruelty.35
In Books II and V of The Faerie Queene, Spenser lavishes praise
on the ideal of mercy through his representation of Gloriana,
Britomart, and Mercilla, but in the action of these books, mercy is
dangerous and often rejected altogether. While Books I and II sug-
gest the dangers of compassion and even of a mercy that appears to
be magnanimous, the Mercilla episode of Book V suggests that for
a maiden queen, the choice between mercy and rigor is itself fraught
with danger. Spenser emphasizes Mercilla’s visibility, reminding us

that, like Elizabeth, Mercilla is onstage. Yet the poet affords her the
protective covering of the cloud, the purple pall, and the break in the
narrative itself. A queen’s mercy may be readily interpreted as wom-
anish pity; yet her rigor may quickly earn her the label “unnatural.”
Spenser is deeply suspicious of leniency but he also recognizes that
judgments, particularly those made by a woman, may pose a danger
not only to the commonwealth but also to the queen herself.
In Book V, then, Spenser treats pity as an aspect not of holiness
or temperance, but of justice: Mercilla’s pity for Duessa may make
her personally admirable but cannot serve as the basis for justice.
Similarly, Arthegall, the knight of justice, feels pity for Radigund and
pays dearly for it. In Book VI, Spenser returns to the subject of pity,
but in yet another context: that of courtesy. Book VI refers often
to pity and mercy, but instead of showing the danger of acceding to
pleas for mercy and feelings of pity, this book posits pity as a condi-
tion of nobility and mercy as the proper response of a chivalric hero.
John D. Staines claims that in Book VI, Spenser revalues pity, autho-
rizing the feminine passions that were dangerous and suspect in ear-
lier books of The Faerie Queene. He convincingly argues that “Book
V is most notable for its absence of pity, while Book VI has a sudden
excess of it.”36 While I agree that pity is reclaimed in Book VI, as will
become apparent, I disagree that the valorization of compassion in
Book VI constitutes an authorization of feminine emotions.
Throughout the Legend of Courtesy, questions about nobility
arise. Is nobility innate or can it be learned? Is true nobility a quality
of birth or the mind? We know that such questions were debated in
Spenser’s age; his own commendatory sonnet to the 1595 translation
offNennio,oraTreatiseofNobility yalertsusthatSpenserhadconsid-
ered the questions raised in that treatise about whether true nobil-
ity is a product of noble blood or a noble mind. In her 2012 essay on
Book VI, Patricia Wareh concludes that Spenser directs the reader
to observe the shifting relationship between courtesy and nobility,
alerting us that outer actions, even courteous ones, do not always
reflect inner truth.37
Thus, in the Legend of Courtesy, Spenser questions what true
nobility is and whether courteous conduct is its index. This explora-
tion of courtesy and nobility creates an interesting context for The
Faerie Queene’s ongoing interrogation of mercy, for the mercy that was
such an ambiguous quality in Books I, II, and V seems to be a cru-
cial marker of true nobility in Book VI. However, just as the motives
n The Faerie Queene
behind courteous speech and behavior are sometimes questionable in

Book VI, so are the motives of mercy. Furthermore, this new valoriza-
tion of mercy, and of compassion as well, may also be the product of
Book VI’s retreat from feminine authority into a realm where mascu-
line knighthood and chivalry reign. Some critics have argued that in
Book VI Spenser displaces Queen Elizabeth, though the nature of that
displacement and the reasons for it vary from critic to critic. William
Nelson observes that this is the only book of The Faerie Queene that
contains no overt praise of the queen, though Nelson regards this as
part of the larger theme of digression from duty: like Calidore, the poet
is diverted from his proper obligations.38 Or by omitting Elizabeth,
Spenser may be registering his disillusionment with the royal court—
this is an explanation commonly proffered. Richard McCoy reads
the conspicuous lack of praise for Gloriana in Book VI as part of the
work’s larger depiction of chivalry in tension with monarchy, arguing
that the exclusion of Elizabeth in Book VI is the culmination of a
chivalric allegory designed to keep Elizabeth and the authority of the
court at a distance.39 Finally, some critics find that Book VI repudi-
ates not just Elizabeth but feminine authority itself.40
Calidore’s first adventure in Book VI lays the groundwork for this
new rendition of mercy. He sees the squire bound to a tree and, after
freeing him, learns about Briana’s treatment of ladies and knights:
her seneschal, Maleffort, accosts them and shaves the women’s hair
and men’s beards as payment for their passage by her castle. Both
Calidore and the narrator comment on how shameful and cruel this
behavior is, and Maleffort’s pitiless nature is emphasized by the nar-
rator (“Ne would he spare for pitty” VI.i.17.9). After Calidore chases
Maleffort back to the castle and kills him there, Briana upbraids our
hero in the harshest terms, despite Calidore’s attempt to lecture her
about the value of civility. The knight waits with Briana at the castle
while her dwarf goes to fetch her champion, Crudor, so that he can
fight Calidore. The narrator describes this rather awkward scene in
terms that emphasize Calidore’s masculine self-control and Briana’s
feminine tantrum:
Where that discourteous Dame with scornfull pryde,

And fowle entreaty him indignifyde,
That yron heart it hardly could sustaine:
Yet he, that could his wrath full wisely guyde,
Did well endure her womanish disdaine,
And did him selfe from fraile impatience refraine. (VI.i.30.4–9)
Briana’s foul “entreaty,” that is, treatment, of the knight is described

as “womanish,” while Calidore’s wisdom and restraint enable him
to guide his wrath rather than allowing himself to be overcome by
emotion, as she is. This emotional self-control that is specifically
opposed to “womanish” behavior is also, a few stanzas later, the basis
for Calidore’s act of mercy. For Calidore defeats Crudor, who begs
for mercy, and Calidore’s reaction to this plea is the opposite of the
emotional responses, based on pity, to which the reader has become
accustomed. Calidore calms his “wrathfull heat / With goodly
patience” before he answers Crudor, just as earlier he had wisely con-
trolled his wrath when dealing with Briana (VI.i.40.2–3). Further,
Calidore’s answer—another lecture about civility—aligns mercy with
self-control. He tells Crudor that nothing is more blameworthy in a
knight than pride and cruelty, then says, “In vaine he seeketh others
to suppresse, / Who hath not learnd him selfe first to subdew,” fol-
lowed by a similarly structured maxim: “Who will not mercie vnto
others shew, / How can he mercy euer hope to have?” (VI.i.41.5–6 and
42.1–2). The man who cannot “subdue” himself, that is, control his
passions, is also the man who refuses mercy to others. Calidore offers
mercy not because the emotion of pity gets the better of him, but as
a result of his emotional self-control.
It is instructive to compare this episode with the similar one in
Book II, when the defeated Pyrochles begs Guyon for mercy. Guyon
spares Pyrochles’s life but fails to place conditions upon his clemency,
while Calidore’s more rational approach leads him to “propound” a
series of three conditions: Crudor must promise to behave better to
knights, to aid ladies, and to accept Briana as his love, since it was
his callous treatment of her—agreeing to love her only if she could
provide a mantle made of human hair—that led to the attacks on
passing knights and ladies in the first place. Guyon exacts no prom-
ises or oaths from Pyrochles, though he naively reminds Pyrochles
that he owes allegiance henceforth to the man who spared his life.
Of course, this reminder has no effect on Pyrochles, who later tries
again to attack Guyon. By contrast, Calidore has Crudor swear a
solemn oath on the cross-shaped hilt of his sword. In comparison
to Guyon’s approach, Calidore’s brand of mercy produces very dif- f
ferent results, including the fact that Crudor, unlike Pyrochles, is
reconciled to the conditions propounded by the victor. Calidore’s
mercy also reaps more benefits. Mercy was long promoted as a prac-
tical political tactic because the clemency of the powerful can poten-
tially bind their subjects in gratitude and loyalty. Ironically, when
n The Faerie Queene
Guyon grants Pyrochles his clemency, he not only fails to extract any
binding oaths, he also allows his foolish clemency to go so far as to
unbind Occasion, a serious error in judgment. Calidore’s mercy has
the opposite effect: Briana is so grateful that she throws herself at his
feet and “her selfe acknowledg’d bound for that accord, / By which he
had to her both life and loue restord” (VI.i.45.8–9). Spenser repeats
the idea in the following stanza, suggesting its importance: Briana
freely gives her castle to Sir Calidore along with “her selfe bound
to him for euermore.” Spenser remarks that she is “so wondrously
now chaung’d, from that she was afore” (VI.i.46.8–9). Guyon’s fool-
ish clemency, which the narrative of Book II aligns with feminine
emotionalism, brings chaos, suggested by the unbinding of the dis-
sonant force of Occasion. By contrast, Calidore’s clemency, offered
rationally, carefully—with conditions—and clearly distinguished
from any “womanish” passion, has the desired effect of binding his
former enemies to him. This mercy establishes a better order and is
transformative.41
Thus in Book VI, mercy has been recuperated by distinguishing
it from feminine lack of restraint and emotional fluctuation; mercy
is rational, the product of a self-control that Spenser associates with
proper masculinity. Chivalry is an important imaginative force in
The Faerie Queene, and Spenser’s depiction of its traditions is alter-
nately celebratory, critical, and even mocking. As McCoy points out,
the trappings of chivalry are mostly rejected in Book VI, signaled by
the frequent discarding of armor that occurs in this book with no
ill results.42 If this rejection of the forms of knighthood is a way of
distancing chivalry from the queen’s court, then one could argue that
chivalry itself is recuperated, and the mercy that should be a part of
the chivalric code is elevated by Spenser in this fully masculine con-
text. Mercy in Book VI is one index of nobility and is associated not
only with masculine restraint and reason, but also with courage.
Many critics have analyzed the discourse of nobility that runs
through Book VI. One important passage that highlights the ques-
tion of nobility’s origins is the narrator’s reflection on the Salvage
Man, who rescues Calepine and Serena from Turpine. We are told
that, given his wild upbringing, the Salvage Man had never known
gentleness or pity until he heard Serena shrieking and saw Turpine
attacking Calepine. At the sight, “Euen his ruder hart began to rew, /
And feele compassion of his euill plight” (VI.iv.3.5–6). This descrip-
tion is reminiscent of the satyrs’ “unwonted ruth” on witnessing Una’s
distress. But in Book VI, the Salvage Man’s compassion is, according
to the narrator, a clear sign that he has gentle blood: even though he
was raised among “saluage beasts,” he “shewd some token of his gen-
tle blood, / By gentle vsage of that wretched dame” (VI.v.2.5–6). The
context of a different book results in a different conclusion: there
was no suggestion that the satyrs in Book I were anything but fauns;
certainly they were not of gentle blood. But in Book VI, Spenser tells
a similar story in a different context: while the entire poem could
be described as a romance, in Book VI the elements of romance are
intensified; while the entire poem concerns knighthood, Book VI
foregrounds the knights’ code of courtesy. This chivalric code calls
for knights to protect and care for those weaker than themselves;
the chivalric response to a damsel in distress is supposed to be one of
sympathy and succor. That courtly impulse was questioned in Book
I and rejected outright in Book II when the Palmer stopped Guyon
from offering succor to a distressed damsel in canto xii. Here in the
Legend of Courtesy, in a different context and far removed from the
problem of feminine authority, the pity that a knight might feel for
a distressed lady is a crucial sign of his “gentleness.” But even in this
context, Spenser reminds his reader that this code can be abused.
The story of Turpine in Book VI emblematizes pity’s role in
courtly conduct. Turpine is the antithesis of chivalry: he refuses to
help Calepine and Serena after Serena has been badly wounded by
the Blatant Beast, and then he attacks Calepine while the knight
is traveling with the fragile, injured lady. Calepine ends up hiding
behind Serena, who begs Turpine to spare her knight, but Turpine
ignores her pleas and cruelly wounds Calepine, leaving him for dead.
Later, Arthur goes to Turpine’s castle to get revenge. Pretending to
be a wounded knight in need of shelter, Arthur proves the discour-
tesy of Turpine’s house by the reaction elicited by his situation. The
prince asks Turpine’s groom “to pitty his ill plight,” but the groom—
called “outrageous” by the narrator—demands that Arthur leave at
once, saying that his master refuses lodging to all errant knights
(VI.vi.20.9 and 21.1). Just as Turpine showed a complete lack of pity
for the wounded Serena, his servant refuses to pity the supposedly
wounded Arthur. Of course, such a pitiless knight turns out to be
utterly base. Turpine is a coward who flees Arthur’s attack and tries to
hide behind his lady, Blandina. Arthur hits Turpine on the head with
his sword but stops short of killing him because of the pleas of the
lady, Blandina, who covers Turpine with her skirts and begs Arthur
for mercy. Arthur “with the ruth of her so wretched case, / . . . stayd
his second strooke, and did his hand abase” (VI.vi.31.8–9). Arthur’s
n The Faerie Queene
“ruth” stands in obvious contrast to Turpine’s lack of pity for Serena

in the parallel episode when he, Turpine, was the aggressor and forced
Calepine to hide behind Serena. Thus, as it does through most of
Book VI, the capacity for pity indicates nobility; the pitiless are the
base in the Legend of Courtesy.
However, even in this context, we are reminded that the tendency
toward pity, though it is a mark of “gentleness,” can also render one
vulnerable. Arthur in this episode grants mercy to Turpine in part
because of Blandina’s pleas, but he does punish the cruel and cow- w
ardly knight:
Yet since thy life vnto this Ladie fayre

I giuen have, liue in reproch and scorne;
Ne euer armes, ne euer knighthood dare
Hence to professe. (VI.vi.36.1–4)
Arthur acknowledges that he spared Turpine’s life because of

Blandina, whose tears and prayers he pitied, but a few stanzas later
the narrator explains that Blandina is an expert actress:
Yet were her words and lookes but false and fayned,
To some hid end to make more easie way,
Or to allure such fondlings, whom she trayned
Into her trap vnto their owne decay:
Thereto, when needed, she could weepe and pray. (VI.vi.42.1–5)
Arthur’s chivalrous response to Blandina’s tears was to show mercy

to Turpine, and while this is the correct response, indicative of
nobility, Arthur is nonetheless being manipulated. Reminiscent of
Duessa’s false tears and pleas for mercy in Book I, Blandina’s ability
to “weepe and pray” when it suits her purposes is a reminder that a
virtuous person’s natural sympathy can easily be abused. And just as
Pyrochles in Book II, after being spared by Guyon, is angry rather
than grateful and returns to try and harm him later, so too Turpine,
despite Arthur’s mercy toward him, seethes with rancor and wants
vengeance:
[Who] notwithstanding that in former fight

He [Turpine] of the Prince his life receiued late,
Yet in his mind malitious and ingrate
He gan deuise, to be aueng’d anew
For all that shame, which kindled inward hate. (VI.vii.2.3–7)
Thus as soon as Arthur rides away, Turpine pursues him with venge-
ful intentions, eventually enlisting two naïve young knights to attack
Arthur on his behalf. Arthur is unhurt in the encounter, but one of
the young knights is killed. Arthur again shows mercy when the
second knight begs for his life, and again he puts conditions on his
mercy, demanding that the defeated knight seek out the one who
incited the attempt. In the end, the knight who received Arthur’s
mercy is true to his word and proves to be virtuous when he refuses
to attack a sleeping Arthur as Turpine wants him to do; Turpine is
again captured by Arthur, who this time baffles him, that is, hangs
him by the heels in a tree so that his shame will be public.
When Turpine and the second young knight approach the place
where Arthur is sleeping, they see the body of the first knight who
was killed attacking Arthur at Turpine’s behest. As Blandina did ear-
lier, Turpine feigns emotion, but the emotion he feigns is pity:
Much did the Crauen seeme to mone his case,

That for his sake his deare life had forgone;
And him bewayling with affection base,
Did counterfeit kind pittie, where was none. (VI.vii.18.1–4)
Here the narrator makes a surprising comment: “For wheres no cour-

age, theres no ruth nor mone” (VI.vii.18.5). Ruth, or pity, is a quality
of the courageous. This remark takes us back to the role of pity in
knighthood, suggesting again that the capacity to feel pitiful emo-
tions is an index of nobility and that pity is the proper response of
knights to those who suffer distress. Pity is here fully recuperated
as a masculine virtue; the experience of pity leads men to courte-
ous actions throughout Book VI. Yet even here, in the midst of this
positive portrayal of pity, Spenser warns of the way one’s pity can be
manipulated, and shows how Arthur’s initial mercy to Turpine—as a
result of a woman’s manipulation of his pity—has fatal results.
Genuine pity for the suffering of another is more positively repre-
sented in Book VI than anywhere else in The Faerie Queene, but even
here, in the context of masculine authority, the tears of women—
whether real or fake—make mercy problematic. Calidore’s pity must
be practiced with a self-control that is carefully contrasted with the
“womanish” passion of Briana, and Blandina’s sham emotions elicit
an undeserved pity from the noble prince Arthur, just as did Duessa’s
plight in Book V. A love poet and one who venerates the goodly flame
of authentic emotions in human relationships, Spenser nevertheless
n The Faerie Queene
warns repeatedly against the emotion of pity: men who succumb too
easily to pity, like Arthegall, are feminized, and they suffer for their
failure to control their passions. The treatment of mercy in The Faerie
Queene should be read in the context of tensions about Elizabeth’s
image and practice of mercy. In the public arena, mercy practiced
by—or elicited by—a woman raises the suspicion that frail emotions,
easily misguided, are the basis for faulty judgments. The image of
the clement queen is simultaneously celebrated and undermined, as
Spenser praises the mercy and peace of Gloriana and Mercilla, even
as he shows the dangers of merciful judgments.
CHAPTER 3
“PROUD AND PITILESSE”:

ELIZABETHAN MERC
R Y AND
THE SONNET TRADITION
M
any writers participate in the construction of Elizabeth’s
image as a merciful queen, even if, like Spenser, they
also question and challenge the clemency enshrined in
that image. It is no coincidence that there are so many literary repre-
sentations of mercy in this period: Shakespeare explores the theme in
many of his plays; questions about mercy and justice are central in The
Faerie Queene, and the lack of mercy shown by Euarchus is an impor-
tant focus of the fifth book of Sidney’s Arcadia. But mercy also plays a
crucial role in that very popular late sixteenth-century genre, the love
sonnet. The sonneteers plead for the lady’s pity, but their depictions of
mercy are often more complicated than they seem at first glance, and
are inflected by tensions surrounding Queen Elizabeth’s clemency.
In the English love poetry that might be described as “Petrarchan”
in themes and form, the speaker’s usual stance is supplicating: he
accuses his beloved of being hard-hearted or cruel and begs for her
mercy. While the motif of the “cruel fair” is found in the continen-
tal poetry that served as model and inspiration for the Elizabethan
sonneteers, late sixteenth-century English writers were far more
interested in this trope than were their predecessors. Petrarch does
portray Laura as a “cruel fair” at times in his Rime Sparse: he com-
plains that she has a “cor di smalto” (heart of stone) in Poem 70, for
instance, and speaks of his lady’s “cruel side” from which he tries to
force a sigh (Poem 131) and laments that the “road of mercy is closed”
to him in Poem 130.1 But pleas for Laura’s mercy and accusations
that she is cruel occur less frequently in Petrarch’s sequence than do
similar complaints in the poems of the English writers under consid-
eration here.2 Continental Petrarchists also place less emphasis on
the “cruel fair.” Ronsard, for example, in Sonnets Pour Helene often
laments his lady’s coldness and makes liberal use of the love-as-war
motif, but only occasionally accuses his beloved of cruelty or wishes
for her pity.3 Certain English poets—Samuel Daniel and Edmund
Spenser, for example—make this commonplace notion of the lady’s
cruelty a dominant theme in their poetry.
Why did this motif enjoy such popularity in late sixteenth-cen-
tury English sequences? Many critics have analyzed the way that
Elizabethan courtiers depict the public world of the court in terms of
the private world of love.4 But the connection between the political
subtext of Elizabethan love poetry and the dominance of the “cruel
fair” motif in that same poetry has not been remarked; no one has
considered the sonnet tradition’s specific focus on feminine cruelty
and pity in the context of debates about Queen Elizabeth’s mercy
and the representations of her policies and her person as both cruel
and excessively pitying. In this chapter, I will examine the sonnet
sequences written by three poets who may be described as mem-
bers of the Sidney circle: Philip Sidney, Samuel Daniel, and Edmund
Spenser.Theirthreesonnetsequences—AstrophilandStella,Delia,
and Amoretti—all foreground questions about cruelty and pity that
can be more fully understood if we read them in the context of ten-
sions that surrounded the queen’s mercy. In the lover’s traditional
plea for pity, we can hear not only the poet’s desire for political
position and preferment, but also his warning about the danger of
granting mercy. Pleas for pity are constructed critically in the poems
of Sidney, Daniel, and Spenser, and the outcomes that occur when
women offer the “mercy” demanded by their wooers demonstrate
the vulnerability of those who respond mercifully.
The popularity of the “cruel fair” topos in the English sonnet
tradition is surely part of the interplay between the rhetoric of love
poetry and that of the Elizabethan court. After all, the language of
love poetry, while it could serve the general purpose of flattering the
queen, was most often used by courtiers who wanted something from
their monarch: positions, preferment, payment, or sometimes true
mercy in a more legal sense. The situation of the pleading lover and
the cold-hearted lady in love poetry is well suited to expressing the
political desires of courtiers. Leonard Forster, in his classic book The
Icy Fire, was the first modern critic to analyze the Petrarchan rheto-
ric used to address and represent Queen Elizabeth; he states bluntly
that the queen played a role in the renewed vogue of Petrarchism in
late sixteenth-century English literature because she saw that this
style was one that could benefit her: “She was the only sovereign in
Elizabethan Mercy and the Sonnet Tradition
n 69
Europe who was fitted to assume the character of the petrarchis-

tic ideal; she was the only Virgin Queen, who could combine in her
own person political sovereignty and ideal domination over men’s
hearts.””5 But the very examples Forster cites show the aptness of
Petrarchan language not just for flattering Elizabeth, but specifi-
cally for pleading for her mercy. Thus Forster uses the example of the
Earl of Essex, for instance, writing to the queen from custody and
paraphrasing Petrarch in order to beg forgiveness and reinstatement.
The examples used by Forster suggest that Petrarchan rhetoric may
have provided male courtiers with more than a language of flattery:
because it positions the man as the petitioner and the woman as the
wielder of power, Petrarchan rhetoric offered men in an otherwise
male-dominated culture an established and thus comfortable way of
supplicating a female superior.
So when Elizabethan love poetry is read through a political lens,
we might assume that pleas for the lady’s mercy reflect the court-
ier’s (or would-be-courtier’s) desire for the queen’s mercy, or at least
benevolence and favor. Yet, as discussed in the first chapter, dur-
ing Elizabeth’s reign her councilors, Parliaments, and preachers
were more likely to condemn her “mildness” and clemency than to
praise it. Nevertheless, disapproval of excessive mercy and desire for
that same mercy—seemingly two contradictory stances—can and
do exist simultaneously, at times. Even those courtiers who regu-
larly urged Queen Elizabeth to be more punitive probably neither
anticipated nor desired that her rigor should be directed toward
them. By the same token, Elizabethan courtiers who used the lan-
guage of love poetry to plead for favors, preferment, or mercy from
the queen might generally disapprove of her mercy. An interesting
example is provided by William Davison, Puritan-leaning Member
of the Parliament of 1586–87 that is famous for the intense pressure
it brought upon Queen Elizabeth in the matter of Mary, Queen of
Scots. Both Houses were unanimous in petitioning Queen Elizabeth
to proceed with the death sentence against Mary. Neale states that
“on this occasion, unlike 1572, there was not even a single voice in
favour of lenity. Mary must die.”6 Davison was made Secretary of the
Privy Council just in time to play a crucial part in the proceedings
against Mary; in the queen’s eyes he was responsible for dispatch-
ing the death warrant—which she had signed—before she had given
permission. Whether Davison was complicit in trying to force the
queen’s hand or was simply a scapegoat for blame that should have
been borne by Privy Council members or the queen herself, no one
knows for sure.7 Nevertheless, he was actively opposed to mercy for

the Queen of Scots and may have been instrumental in hastening her
death. But when the queen’s wrath fell upon him, he used Petrarchan
rhetoric to plead for the compassion that he (along with the rest of
Parliament) had rejected for Mary:
If once I might Astraea’s grace regain;

If once her heart would on my sorrows rue,
Alas, I could these plaints forgo,
And quite forget my former woe.
.................
Ah, if I might
But gain her sight,
And show her, ere I die, my wretched case!8
To ask the queen to rue, that is, pity, his sorrows and look on him
again—even though his state is so wretched that he is dying—echoes
the rhetoric of countless love poems in which a man claims to be
dying for love and begs a woman to take pity on him.9
Some Elizabethan love poetry, then, might express the poet’s
desire for political favor or forgiveness when the lover pleads for
“mercy” from a hard-hearted lady—and this might be the case even
if, in the actual political arena, the same poet would normally object
to the queen’s clemency. On the other hand, some sonnet writers
who plead for the pity of the “cruel fair” complicate this convention
by subverting it. As Catherine Bates shows in her book The Rhetoric
of Courtship, Petrarchan rhetoric allows a complex posture that is
at once wooing—courting, supplicating—and self-analytical, one
in which the speaker is highly conscious of his predicament and its
possibilities. “The structural and semantic ambivalence of courtship
provided Elizabeth’s subjects with a rich and varied means of explor-
ing relations with their sovereign.”10 Though Bates does not consider
mercy—personal or monarchical—as a component of courtship, some
important English sonneteers look closely at the meaning and out-
comes of mercy, and the role that demands for mercy might play in a
subject’s relationship with his sovereign. In three important sonnet
sequences, Sidney, Daniel, and Spenser express the desire for a pow- w
erful woman’s pity, but they also analyze the motives and outcomes of
such desires. Thus, in these sonnets, supplication is the posture of the
speaker and may certainly express the poet’s real hopes for advance-
ment or reinstatement at court—but pleas for a woman’s pity are also
examined critically and revealed to be sometimes manipulative, often
n 71
even dangerous, in a way that corresponds to the kinds of warnings

against excessive mercy that were directed at Queen Elizabeth.
Philip Sidney’s Astrophil and Stella

That Philip Sidney had a particular and personal point of view on the
nature of Elizabeth’s justice is undeniable. His problems and disap-
pointments at Elizabeth’s court are often cited, even though exactly
what transpired between Sidney and his sovereign is unknown.11 His
absence from court during the time he resided at his sister’s estate,
Wilton, may have been forced or may have been chosen. But indis-
putably his withdrawal from Elizabeth’s court followed close on the
heels of his father and mother’s withdrawal, as well as the fall from
favor of his uncle, the Earl of Leicester. In general, the Sidney fam-
ily and their circle declined in power during the years 1578–1579,
signaled by their increasing distance from the queen. Michael G.
Brennan states that by the end of 1579, Philip Sidney’s father, Henry,
“seems to have largely withdrawn from court life” after incurring
the queen’s anger by his handling of Ireland while he served as the
queen’s viceroy.12 The year 1579 also saw Sidney’s mother’s formal
retirement from court life: plagued by family demands, poor health,
and scarred by smallpox, she, like her husband, suffered a sharp
decline in status and, according to Brennan, became an “embarrass-
ment” to Elizabeth.13 In June of 1579, Elizabeth also learned, to her
fury, the news of Leicester’s secret marriage to Lettice Knollys the
previous year: his uncle’s temporary fall from the queen’s favor prob-
ably damaged Sidney’s career, but the birth of his uncle’s son in 1579
also meant that Sidney was no longer Leicester’s heir. And in 1579,
Sidney had his famous quarrel with the Earl of Oxford over the use
of a tennis court and was excoriated by the queen in a private audi-
ence. Finally, at the end of 1579, Sidney wrote his outspoken letter to
the queen advising her against the Anjou match. Whether Sidney’s
subsequent withdrawal to Wilton in 1580 was imposed by an angry
queen or not, clearly the previous two years had not been kind to the
Sidney family, and it is impossible to think that Sidney’s prose and
poetry from this period was untouched by his and his family’s declin-
ing fortunes and removal from court.
The exact date off Astrophil and Stella’s composition is unknown,
but most scholars believe that it was written in the early 1580s,
and it has become commonplace to read the poems as reflecting
Sidney’s frustrated attempts to win not romantic love but political
preferment. Arthur Marotti asserts that Sidney uses love as a meta-

phor for political ambition and that Penelope Rich, the inspiration
for the figure of Stella, is a fitting symbol of what he wants to obtain.
According to Marotti’s influential analysis, the coterie audience for
whom Sidney wrote would have understood the context of Sidney’s
ownfrustratedambitionsandreadAstrophilandStellaaccordingly.14
Along with Marotti, Peter Stallybrass, Ann Rosalind Jones, Maureen
Quilligan, and others have found political significance in the tale
of Astrophil’s desire for Stella, but this is not to say that historicist
readings necessarily reduce Astrophil and Stella to an allegory of
political frustration.15 On the contrary, most critics grapple with the
complexity of Sidney’s sequence and its tonal and referential shifts.
The poems sometimes invite an autobiographical reading: the son-
nets that pun on the name “Rich” are testament to that, and some
critics have assumed that, to a greater or lesser extent, the sequence
reflects Sidney’s real-life desire for Lady Penelope Devereux, who
married Robert Lord Rich in 1581.16 Ilona Bell convincingly argues
that sonnet sequences like Sidney’s Astrophil and Stella are first and
foremost about love and courtship, and reminds us not to overlook
the real women who served as ideal readers and participatory audi-
ences of men’s poetry. Marion Wynne-Davies says that the sequence
has “two layers of meaning: an external narrative in which the
characters of Astrophil and Stella are located, and an inner, inti-
mate circle where the seemingly true identities of Philip Sidney and
Penelope Rich may be discovered.” She argues that the reader of
the sequence must continually move between inner and outer lay- y
ers of meaning. By contrast, other critics emphasize the separation
between Sidney-the-poet and Astrophil-the-lover. Michael R. G.
Spiller argues that “Sidney created the first deconstructive lyric per-
sona in the sonnet’s history,” meaning that the artifice of the text is
heightened so that the reader is constantly reminded that the text
is a fiction. Spiller offers the actual history of Sidney’s relationship
with Penelope Devereux as a reason for this metafictional approach:
if Sidney wrote the poems knowing the ultimate failure of his court-
ship, the whole sequence would be infused with irony.17 Other critics
who emphasize the distance between Sidney and Astrophil find in
Astrophil a negative example, a warning against the rejection of rea-
son and Christian values, and the dangers of sexual passion. Thus,
critics who focus on the sequence’s narrative of love (rather than on
its political subtext) differ in the degree to which they expect the
reader to sympathize with the protagonist. Are we to read Astrophil
as a sympathetic reflection of Sidney’s own frustrated desire for
n 73
Penelope Rich, or should we regard Astrophil as an object of criti-

cism, even ridicule?18
This question might be profitably applied to political readings
of the sequence as well. Readings—such as Marotti’s—that focus
not on the sequence’s overt topic of passionate love, but rather on
the submerged political content, usually operate on the assump-
tion that Astrophil’s political complaints, desires, and strategies
reflect Sidney’s.19 But we should not uncritically assume that the
speaker is voicing Sidney’s own political feelings any more than we
should assume that the poems genuinely express Sidney’s passion for
Penelope Devereux. Rather, we should understand the poet-speaker
Astrophil not only as an ironically portrayed lover, but also, at times,
an ironically portrayed courtier. Astrophil demands two things of
Stella that many courtiers, and probably Sidney himself, desired
from their queen: her presence, and her pity. But the course of the
sequence, which shows the use Astrophil makes of these boons when
Stella grants them, suggests that while the poems may give voice to
Sidney’s desire to be in the royal presence and be treated mercifully,
even generously, when he’s there, the poems also show the dangers,
for women and for monarchs, of granting access to one’s presence,
and the dangers of listening with too much sympathy to an impor-
tuning subject. In a well-known political reading of Astrophil and
Stella, Ann Rosalind Jones and Peter Stallybrass make the interesting
observation that the fulfillment the poet-lover’s desires can be pro-
vided by his queen but not by his beloved: “For her [Stella] to submit
to Astrophil’s lust would radically lower her status, while Elizabeth’s
accession to a courtier’s ambitions would normally enhance hers.”20
I will argue that, on the contrary, these sonnets suggest the danger
both to Stella and to the queen of acceding too readily to a courtier’s
desire. Just as we can read Astrophil and Stella as both an iteration
of Sidney’s desire for Penelope Rich and, simultaneously, an ironic
deployment of the Petrarchan tradition that shows the moral danger
of unbridled passion, so we can read in the history of Astrophil both
an expression of Sidney’s thwarted ambition as well as a warning for
women and queens about the dangers of pity.
The opening poem of the sequence famously charts Astrophil’s
plan to obtain Stella’s “grace” by inspiring her pity:
Loving in truth, and fain in verse my love to show,

That she (dear she) might take some pleasure of my pain:
Pleasure might cause her read, reading might make her know;
Knowledge might pity win, and pity grace obtain. (1.1–4)21
Sidney’s poet-speaker regards the lady’s pity as a step toward the ful-
fillment of his desire: as Olivia says in Twelfth Night t when Cesario
offers her pity rather than returning her love, pity is “a degree to love”
(III.i.123). As was demonstrated in Chapter One, though there may
be a distinction between mercy, a godly virtue, and pity, a product of
human emotion, the distinction seems to be lost in much discourse of
the sixteenth century. Here, Astrophil wants to engage Stella’s pity,
but he also wants her grace, a nuanced word that can suggest, among
other things, heavenly grace, which in Christian thought accompa-
nies God’s mercy: both are freely given, undeserved, and save man-
kind.22 If we interpret Astrophil as a courtier as well as lover, we can
find evidence as early as this opening poem that he will say or do
whatever is expedient to win that pity and grace from his sovereign:
he will seek “fit words to paint the blackest face of woe,” suggest-
ing that his grief might be as much posture as reality. Throughout
the sequence, Astrophil will repeatedly claim to be sincere, and
will characterize himself as Stella’s suffering slave. He contrasts his
simple sincerity with the “sweetest style” of other poets who write
in traditional Petrarchan oxymorons: “living deaths, dear wounds,
fair storms, and freezing fires,” while he displays “all the map of my
state . . . / When trembling voice brings forth, that I do Stella love”
(6.9, 13–14). Sir Walter Ralegh makes a similar claim of sincerity in
one of his poems to Queen Elizabeth when he says,
Silence in love bewrays more woe

Than words, though ne’er so witty;
A beggar that is dumb, you know,
Deserveth double pity. 23
Astrophil’s attempt to win Stella’s pity is likewise based in part on his

assertion of sincerity: he is silent, or speaks in few words, because his
love is authentic.
Despite such claims that Astrophil is a plainspoken and heart-
felt poet, Sidney provides glimpses throughout the sequence of the
manipulative speaker who emerged in the very first poem. Though
in Sonnet 40, Astrophil declares himself “a wretch” who has long
sought Stella’s “grace,” and says to Stella, “I by thee am overthrown,”
a few poems later he begs for grace again in such a way that calls
his claims of sincerity and subordination in doubt. In Sonnet 45,
Astrophil complains that, though “Stella oft sees the very face of
woe / Painted in my beclouded stormie face,” nevertheless she “cannot
n 75
skill to pity my disgrace” (45.2–3). The first two lines echo the open-
ing sonnet in which Astrophil seeks fit words “to paint the blackest
face of woe”; again, the reference to “painting” troubles the claim of
sincerity. Furthermore, according to Astrophil, a “fable” that Stella
heard about two tragic lovers inspired her pity: “Pity thereof gate in
her breast such place. / That, from that sea derived, tears’ spring did
flow” (45.7–8). Astrophil’s response to this event is striking:
Alas, if fancy drawn by imaged things,

Though false, yet with free scope more grace doth breed
Then servant’s wrack, where new doubts honour brings;
Then think, my dear, that you in me do reed
Of lovers ruin some sad tragedy:
I am not I, pity the tale of me. (45.9–14)
Hinted earlier in the sequence, Astrophil’s willingness to use any

means to inspire Stella’s pity is bluntly stated here. The language of
this and some of the surrounding poems also reminds us of the figure
of the queen as she is shadowed in Stella: Astrophil is her “servant” in
Sonnet 45 and, in the following sonnet, he complains to Cupid that
she “rules” both of them “with a beck” and “tryannizeth” Cupid by
banishing him. These poems invite us to read Astrophil not only as
a lover but also as a courtier who feigns emotion in order to elicit his
queen’s pity.
Sonnet 45 also hints at the conventional belief that women are
easy to manipulate because of their emotional nature. Stella heard
a “fable” and wept copiously; Astrophil suggests she regard him as
a “tragedy,” a “tale,” in order to win a similarly passionate response
from her. Astrophil’s words imply that he may be able to sway Stella’s
judgment by playing on her emotions, specifically her pity. We can
read this poem, and the outcome of Astrophil’s attempts to win
Stella’s pity, in the context of anxieties that the queen might prove
a poor judge because of her womanish tendency to feel unwarranted
pity.
The poem that immediately precedes 45, Sonnet 44, is also
focused on the lady’s pity, but introduces a new idea that will come
to dominate the sequence: the important, even life-giving power of
the lady’s presence. Astrophil begins Sonnet 44 by saying that his
“smart”—his pain—“may pity claim of any hart” (44.2–3). He argues
that Stella’s “sweet heart is of no tiger’s kind.” Nevertheless, no pity
is forthcoming: “And yet she hears, yet I no pity find; / But more I
cry, less grace she doth impart” (5–6). So far, the sonnet is unremark-
k
able and traditional. In the sestet, however, Sidney introduces a novel
idea as he answers the question posed in the octave: How can the
sweet and noble Stella be so devoid of pity?
I much do guess, yet find no truth save this:

That when the breath of my complaints doth touch
Those dainty doors unto the court of bliss,
The heavenly nature of that place is such
That once come there, the sobs of mine annoys
Are metamorphosed straight to tunes of joys. (9–14)
Several aspects of these lines are noteworthy. First is the imagery

of Stella as the court itself, reminiscent of the elaborate metaphor
in Sonnet 9 comparing Stella’s face to “Queen Virtue’s court.” Both
images imply Stella’s queenship. The sonnet also dramatizes the situ-
ation many readers off AstrophilandStella assumeto be the context in
which Sidney wrote this sequence: he is on the outside of the court,
bemoaning his lot, finding that the doors are shut against him and
that no one inside shows him mercy. The poem establishes a cru-
cial connection between pity and presence: because he is outside,
his attempts to inspire Stella’s pity fail miserably. Astrophil has no
control over the way his laments are heard inside the “court of bliss”
because they are “metamorphosed,” changed from their original
form and out of his control.
The situation of the absent courtier is vividly imagined in Sidney’s
poem, just as it is portrayed in many surviving letters to Elizabeth
from various noblemen. In the world of court, being in the actual
presence of the monarch was a privilege for which there was keen
competition. Paul E. J. Hammer asserts that, because of Elizabeth’s
gender, “the status and rewards traditionally to be obtained by physi-
cal intimacy with the monarch could not be sought through mem-
bership in the privy chamber.”24 Hammer argues that the convention
of expressing romantic love for the queen replaced that physical inti-
macy, but the fact that writers often used the language of roman-
tic love to plead for physical presence suggests that the relationship
between presence and romantic language is more complicated than
Hammer allows.25 The conventions of Petrarchan love include
expressions of intense longing for the presence of the beloved, mak-k
ing it well suited for courtiers who desire to attend on the queen and
reap the potential benefits that result from that presence. Absent
n 77
courtiers sometimes write to the queen in the idiom of romantic love

to express their anxiety about falling out of favor while away from
court.
Some of the famous romantic passages from the letters of Sir
Christopher Hatton to Queen Elizabeth reflect the anxiety of the
absent courtier. Hatton, a great personal favorite of the queen’s, left
court to travel to Antwerp for his health in 1573. Far from banished,
Hatton was the beneficiary of the queen’s concern to the extent
that she sent her personal physician to accompany him overseas.
Nevertheless, Hatton’s letters to the queen from this period suggest
the insecurity that even a favored courtier feels when he must be
away from court. “No death, no hell, no fear of death shall ever win of
me my consent so far to wrong myself again as to be absent from you
one day,” he writes to her in June of 1573.26 The next month, he writes
that “The lack I feel doth make me know your greatest worth. . . . I
love yourself. I cannot lack you.”27 Hatton’s passionate protestations
of love are coupled with the anxiety that his love will be doubted: “I
pray God, you may believe my faith,” he writes in the same passage.28
Courtiers who attended constantly on the queen could presumably
provide daily persuasion of their faithful devotion and reap the con-
sequent rewards: after his return from abroad, Hatton continued to
serve Elizabeth and was made a privy councilor and vice-chamberlain
of the queen’s household in 1577.
Sonnet 44 suggests other reasons why access to the power-
ful woman is important. When Astrophil begs for Stella’s pity, his
laments are “metamorphosed” when they enter the court of bliss.
Stella’s pity is not forthcoming for Astrophil because she never hears
his “sobs.” Absent courtiers often express acute anxiety that they
will be misrepresented or misunderstood while they are not pres-
ent; they fear the queen’s harsh judgment if they are not present to
defend themselves. For example, in 1591 when the Earl of Essex led
an expedition to assist Henri IV with the siege of Rouen, his letters
to Elizabeth reiterate how he longs to be in her presence: “I must
nott let this second day passe without complaining to your majes-
tie of the misery of absence. I shall thinke my lyfe very unpleasant
till I have ridd myself of this fr[ench] action that I may once againe
enjoy the honor the pleasure the sweetnes which your presence is
accompanied with.”29 But a reading of the entire sequence of letters
suggests that lacking the sweetness of the queen’s presence was not
Essex’s most powerful motive for “misery.” Even more acute is his
anxiety about how his actions will be interpreted when he is not in
the queen’s presence to represent himself. He frets about “slander”

and writes self-justifying letters to Elizabeth that anxiously express
his fear that, in absence, he has lost her favor: “If your majesties favor
be no more assured to me then that slander and suspition, which are
the basest enemies a man can have, dare threaten to take yt from me
I have lived too long. Many men have lived happily by your favor but
none shall dye so resolutely for your unkindness.”30
Sidney’s father, Sir Henry Sidney, also wrote letters to Queen
Elizabeth that reveal the same worry about being slandered by his
political enemies while he was absent from court. Writing from his
post in Ireland, Sidney defended himself against her criticisms of
the way he was handling his role as viceroy and expressed the belief
that he and his actions were being misrepresented by his enemies at
court. In one letter, Henry Sidney prepares to answer charges and
objections the queen has raised about his conduct; but he reveals his
anxiety about the risks of this epistolary explanation, “which . . . I
could not so plaineley set downe in Writinge, were it never be so
large a Discowrse . . . but having there soche Ennemies to me, and
Adversaries to your Prerogatyve and Proffitt, they would impugne (as
they have donne) as moche as lay in theim any thinge I should write.”
At the end of the letter, Sidney begs that, if the queen is still not sat-
isfied with his explanation, he might himself be allowed to come to
court “to answere myne owne Matters, and to prove unto you that
to be trewe which I have saied, to the Disprofe of theim, whosoever
have informed you to the contrarie.”31 The situation of the absent
courtier is particularly precarious because his enemies at court have
direct access to the sovereign’s ear, while he, from a distance, must
rely on the slow and unreliable progress of a letter which, even when
it arrives, may be “metamorphosed,” as was Astrophil’s complaint, so
that its intended message is subverted or altogether contradicted.
We have few letters written by Philip Sidney to the queen, his
letter of advice about her courtship with the Duke of Anjou being a
famous exception. One brief letter that he wrote her from Gravesend
in November 1585, while on his way to Flushing, does reflect the desire
to be well-regarded and judged fairly when away from court. After
assuring her that if he learns of any important matter he will inform
her of it (“to yowr own handes . . . recommend it”), Sidney writes,
In the mean tyme I beseech yowr Majesti will vouchsafe legibly to

reed my hart in the cowrce of my lyfe, and though it self bee but of a
mean worth, yet to esteem it lyke a poor hows well sett.
n 79
Roger Kuin glosses Sidney’s request that the queen read his heart in
the course of his life as “an elegant expression of continuing duty, and
a plea for not being misunderstood.” He comments also on the meta-
phor of Sidney’s heart as a poor house: “its nearness to the Queen
confers upon it a choice location.”32 As he departs England, Sidney
expresses concern about being misunderstood but also constructs a
metaphor that emphasizes the value of closeness to the queen.
Astrophil’s desperate desire to be in Stella’s presence may be read
both personally and politically: the lover longs for the presence of the
beloved and the courtier competes for the privilege of monarchical
presence. The plea for presence is closely akin to the plea for mercy,
or pity, in the worlds of both the courtier and the courting poet: only
in the presence of the powerful woman can her suitor make his case
most effectively; he fears her harsh judgment if he is misrepresented;
furthermore, he knows that pity is harder to withhold in a personal
interview. Astrophil’s attempts to be with Stella, and the uses he
makes of that presence when he obtains it, dominate the rest of the
sequence. This is a departure from the tradition in which Sidney is
working: Petrarch often wishes for the actual presence of Laura but
spends much more time recalling her image than actually seeing or
attempting to see her. And while Petrarch’s sonnets sometimes tes-
tify to the life-giving power of the beloved’s physical presence—in
Poem 191, for example, Petrarch compares the sight of Laura to the
sight of God, which grants eternal life: “Why should not I live on
the life-giving sight of you?”—the poet rarely experiences that actual
presence and certainly never abuses it, as Astrophil does. Astrophil
and Stella dramatizes the lover-courtier’s desire for the lady-queen’s
presence as a means to obtaining her pity and grace, but the sequence
also dramatizes the way physical presence can render the lady, or the
queen, vulnerable.
Sidney’s sequence suggests the risk of offering pity as well as pres-
ence. Queen Elizabeth was often chastised because her clemency and
forbearance made her realm—and her person—vulnerable. Allowing
her subjects to approach her was also a risky business; how to con-
trol access to the queen was a problem that perpetually plagued her
household. Mary Hill Cole, in her analysis of Elizabeth’s progresses,
calls access to the queen a two-edged sword: “Elizabeth’s belief that
her dynastic security lay in her popularity . . . ran headlong into the
reality that her progresses made her more vulnerable.”33 The queen
could and did use public progresses to reward subjects with her pres-
ence, and her subjects often used the opportunity of an audience
with the queen to try and press certain suits. But Cole also describes
several assassination plots that revolved around taking advantage of
access to her physical presence while she was on a progress.34 The
best-known example from Elizabeth’s reign of the way personal
access to the monarch could be abused involves the Earl of Essex,
who famously rushed to the queen’s bedchamber the moment he
arrived at the palace after having left his Irish post without permis-
sion in 1599. The story as told by contemporaries emphasizes the
queen’s dishevelment (he found her just having arisen from bed with
her hair down) as well as the intimacy between the two of them, as
Essex is said to have kissed her hands and neck and had a long pri-
vate conversation with her. No one knows exactly what transpired or
exactly how Elizabeth reacted, but we do know that she later com-
manded him to keep to his chamber and eventually banished him
from court. Essex’s desperation to gain access to the queen bespeaks
his fear of losing her favor because of the slanders of his enemies; he
did fear, perhaps justly, that his letters to the queen from Ireland had
been intercepted by his political enemies and that his eloquent pleas
on his own behalf had never been received.
Astrophil desperately desires Stella’s presence for all of the rea-
sons implied in the accounts of courtiers who want access to the
queen: Stella has the power to confer grace on him; her judgment of
him might be harsh if he is not present to make his own case; further,
there is the suggestion that he can use a personal audience to manip-
ulate her emotions. In Stella’s presence, Astrophil can observe and
evaluate her responses. For example, in Sonnet 45, Astrophil watches
her reaction to the tale of sad lovers and so learns what moves her.
In the sonnets immediately preceding Sonnet 44 in which
Astrophil is on the outside of the “dainty doors” of the court of bliss,
the poet devotes two poems to Stella’s eyes, which taken together
demonstrate the desire for and dangers of presence. In Sonnet 42,
Astrophil begs Stella’s eyes to “ever shine on me” (42.8). Interestingly,
he apostrophizes the eyes as “O eyes, where humble looks most glo-
rious prove” and as “only loved tyrants, just in cruelty,” before he
begs, “Do not, O do not, from poor me remove” (42.5–7). This poem
clearly depicts Stella as a sovereign in whose powerful gaze the poet
longs to stand; he describes her force as the “majesty of sacred lights,”
and begs, “Yet still on me, O eyes, dart down your rays” (11–12). The
humble, supplicating tone of the poem and the references to Stella’s
majesty (and tyranny) open up the possibility that the poem refers to
Sidney’s actual majesty, Elizabeth, and his desire to be in her presence,
n 81
perhaps to regain a position he has lost. The next poem abandons

the language of state for a more personal love language, in which the
“fair eyes, sweet lips, dear heart” of the woman are enumerated by
the speaker. Yet his admission that, with Cupid’s help, he hopes “to
prey” on these attributes of the woman justifies her withdrawn and
protected heart, the place Cupid goes when he wants “for quiet’s sake
[to] remove / From all the world,” for he knows well that in her heart,
“no man to him can come” (43.12–14). The two poems are compan-
ion pieces about the woman’s withdrawal and the man’s desire for
her presence, with the first poem’s language inviting a political read-
ing and the second poem eliciting a more personal reading. But the
second poem, with its language of predation, also provides a justi-
fication for female withdrawal. The poems work on several levels:
the speaker could be expressing political or romantic desire; and the
poet could be presenting the speaker straightforwardly or ironically.
These three sonnets that register the speaker’s longing to be in the
presence of the lady are followed by Sonnet 45, in which the speaker’s
willingness to dissemble in order to win Stella’s pity is plainly stated:
“I am not I, pity the tale of me” (45.14), which may serve as a final
ironic commentary on the way Astrophil will use Stella’s presence to
try and gain her pity by any means.
Sidney’s sequence also makes apparent the risk that physical pres-
ence poses for the lady. When Astrophil is in Stella’s presence, he is
increasingly opportunistic and eventually physically aggressive. Even
before Astrophil reaches this point, his language bespeaks aggres-
sion when he describes his attempts to win Stella’s pity. In Sonnet 61,
for example, he says,
Oft with true sighs, oft with uncalled teares,

Now with slow words, now with dumb eloquence,
I Stella’s eyes assail, invade her ears;
But this at last is her sweet-breathed defense. (61. 1–4)
The language of assault is obvious, as Astrophil’s words “invade”

Stella’s ears and she must mount a defense against them. This lan-
guage foreshadows what actually happens when Astrophil is alone
with Stella. In the Second Song, Astrophil finds Stella asleep and
decides to “teach her that she, / When she wakes, is too too cruell”
(3–4). His method of correcting her “cruelty” is to kiss her while she
sleeps, a moment that he describes using language similar to that of
Poem 61: “Now I will invade the fort,” says Astrophil as he realizes
that her hand, that “waking gardeth, / Sleeping, grants a free resort”
(Second Song 13–15). The stealing of the kiss earns Stella’s anger, not
only for the act itself but even more for Astrophil’s publicizing of it: he
devotes a series of poems to the joys of the kiss, and it becomes clear
that Astrophil has gained a kind of power over Stella. Apostrophizing
the kiss itself, Astrophil declares, “How fain would I paint thee to
all men’s eyes” (81.7). To Stella’s protest, he suggests the only way to
silence him: “Stop you my mouth with still still kissing me” (81.14). A
moment in which Stella was unguarded and Astrophil had physical
access to her led to his veiled threat that he can “paint” that kiss for
the world, which she forbids “with blushing words,” stating that she
“builds her fame on higher seated praise” (81.8–9). Stella’s fame, that
is, her reputation, is threatened because of Astrophil’s access to her
physical presence. That threat intensifies in the Fourth Song.
This song presents Astrophil and Stella alone together at night,
a moment when the two are in each other’s presence with more pri-
vacy than ever before in the sequence. Astrophil does not provide
any more information than that his “only joy,” Stella, is here—we do
not know if he has come uninvited to her room, or fortuitously found
her alone in the house, or arranged a clandestine meeting with her.
In other words, we do not know the extent of his willfulness or her
willingness. But what the reader does know is that, now that they are
together and Astrophil begins to press his suit, Stella’s one consistent
response is “No.” “No, no, no, no, my dear, let be” is the refrain spo-
ken by Stella at the end of each stanza. We can also infer that in this
private moment when he is in Stella’s presence, Astrophil becomes
physically aggressive. He importunes her verbally at first—“Take me
to thee and thee to me” is his refrain—but in the eighth stanza he
asks, “Sweet, alas, why strive you thus? / Concord better fitteth us. /
Leave to Mars the force of hands” (43–45). Stella’s “striving” could
be verbal, except that Astrophil explicitly refers to “force of hands,”
indicating that Stella has had to push him away. Unsurprisingly (to
most readers), the very next poem records Stella’s “change of looks,”
and Sidney once again uses political imagery to depict Stella as the
“judge,” though of course Astrophil protests that he is guilty of noth-
ing but “all faith, like spotlesse ermine” (86.5). Ultimately, time spent
in Stella’s physical presence, intimately rather than publicly, leads to
Stella’s rejection of Astrophil and a series of poems on absence.
Thus the dangers of presence and the pains of absence are the
theme of the sequence’s later poems. Poems 87, 88, and 89 all bemoan
Astrophil’s absence from Stella, which the poet characterizes as a
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departure forced upon him by duty: “When I was forced from Stella,
ever dear, /. . . . / By iron laws of duty to depart” (87.1–4). Yet duty
and the “cruel might” of honor, which Astrophil also blames for the
separation, do not prevent Astrophil from fantasizing about Stella’s
physical presence. In the Tenth Song, Astrophil directs his thoughts
to “take up the place for me” (14) and imagines this act in terms that
suggest an invasion: “Thought, see thou no place forbear; / Enter
bravely everywhere, / Sieze on all to her belonging” (19–21). In this
fantasy, in which Astrophil’s thought storms the castle, the roles are
reversed, and Astrophil imagines himself as the Prince:
Think of my most princely power,
When I, blessed, shall devour,
With my greedy lickerous senses,
Beauty, music, sweetness, love,
While she doth against me prove
Her strong darts but weak defences. (31–36)
Stella’s pity is no longer necessary; in Astrophil’s fantasy, the ability

to “enter bravely everywhere” into the presence of Stella allows him
to master her, so that his is the “princely power,” not to be resisted,
and her defenses are “weak.”
In Astrophil and Stella Sidney dramatizes both his own very real
desire to be in the presence of the queen as well as his understanding
of the way that a courtier’s access to the queen’s pity and presence
can render her vulnerable. Sidney, along with other sonneteers of his
period, chose to highlight the role of pity in courtship; we should read
their examination of pity not only in the context of political strug-
gles over the queen’s mercy but also in the context of fears about the
queen’s ability to judge wisely because of her supposed tendency to
be foolishly moved by pity. If on one level Astrophil and Stella voices a
courtier’s desire for the queen’s mercy, it also cautions against mercy.
It is well known that Sidney favored the Protestant causes that often
spawned opposition to the queen’s forbearance and clemency. He was
committed to the English cause in Ireland, especially given his father’s
role as viceroy; he had witnessed the St. Bartholomew’s Day massa-
cre; he was devoted to the defense of Protestants in the Netherlands,
a cause for which he gave his life. If he desired Elizabeth’s “mercy”
for himself, he was also aligned with those who protested the queen’s
mercy on many other fronts.35 Thus Sidney might well contest the
image of the clement queen even as he desired her clemency for him-
self. In his Defence of Poesy, y Sidney proclaims the power of poetry to
inspire its interlocutors to virtuous action. His philosophy of poetry

suggests that Astrophil and Stella might provide an example that
could offer guidance to its readers, among them Queen Elizabeth. As
Sidney makes clear, both positive and negative literary examples teach
important lessons: “If the poet do his part aright, he will show you in
Tantalus, Atreus, and such like, nothing that is not to be shunned; in
Cyrus, Aeneas, Ulysses, each thing to be followed.”36 Sidney says that
the poet can more readily direct the prince by the feigned examples
he creates than can the philosopher by the counsel that he offers.37
Astrophil’s attempts to manipulate Stella through inspiring her pity,
and the result when she relents, can serve as instruction to Sidney’s
prince about the dangers inherent in showing mercy.
Samuel Daniel’s Delia

SamuelDaniel’ssonnetsequence,Delia,istiedtoAstrophilandStella
by several different threads. A year before the first edition of Delia was
published in 1592, twenty-eight of Daniel’s sonnets were appended to
an unauthorized printing of Sidney’s sequence. Also, Sidney’s sister
Mary Sidney Herbert, the Countess of Pembroke, was Daniel’s patron
and Daniel dedicated the 1592 edition to her.38 Further, there are many
echoes off Astrophil and Stella in Daniel’s sonnets. Lisa Klein, inThe
ExemplarySidneyandtheElizabethanSonneteer,analyzestheimpactof
Sidney’s sequence on the work of several writers who followed him,
arguing that contemporary poets who praised and imitated Sidney
not only used him to authorize their own poetic vocations but also
contested and modified Sidney’s image; thus, their engagement with
the exemplary Sidney was fundamentally ambivalent. In her chapter
on Daniel, Klein reads Delia as engaged with Sidney’s sequence at its
core, imitating and alluding to poems from Astrophil and Stella. For
Klein, the sonnet persona crafted by Daniel “significantly refash-
ions Sidney’s desiring Astrophil while acknowledging his debt to
the prior poet.”39 Though Klein addresses the Petrarchan rhetoric of
Elizabeth’s court and acknowledges that the virtuous beloved of the
English Petrarchists might be “one alter ego of the virgin queen,” her
reading of Delia omits any mention of the way that Daniel’s construc-
tion of Delia and his relationship to his Petrarchan model might signal
the poet’s attitude toward the queen herself or the power dynamics of
her court. Rather, Klein assumes another real-life powerful woman,
the Countess of Pembroke, as the one to whom Daniel addresses his
poetic “courtship.””40 This follows the way most critics read Delia; it
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is not a sequence that seems rooted in a genuine love affair. Rather,

Delia seems to be an exercise, albeit a very successful one, the first of
Daniel’s multivalent writing career in which he tried his hand at lyric,
drama, epic, as well as literary criticism.
To read Daniel’s sequence with the Countess of Pembroke in mind
as his ideal reader and to understand the figure of Delia herself as
shadowing the Countess makes perfect sense. Not only does the 1592
Delia open with a dedication to the Countess, but there are also refer-
ences to Delia’s location that suggest Wilton: Delia “beautifies” the
west and lives not on the Thames but on the Avon in Sonnet XLVIII.
We should be cautious about making this reading too pronounced,
however: Klein points out that we do not know the extent of Mary
Herbert’s actual support of the poet, nor do we know when Daniel’s
association with the Countess began.41 Nevertheless, the dedication
does suggest that Daniel either had or sought her support. But while
Daniel pursued aristocratic patronage, clearly he also aspired to royal
recognition. His early career included bids for the attention of such
court favorites as Sir Edmund Dymoke, the queen’s champion, and Sir
Francis Walsingham. According to John Pitcher, Daniel was a favor-
ite of the courtly elite after the publication of his Civil Wars (1595) and
he dedicated his Works (1601–1602) to Queen Elizabeth. The queen
and various members of her court are known to have owned copies
of this folio.42 If Delia is written in homage to Philip Sidney and also
as a bid for patronage and preferment from a powerful woman, it
only makes sense to perceive not only Mary Sidney but also Queen
Elizabeth herself as a possible reader and honoree of the sequence.
The name Delia is an anagram of Ideal, suggesting that behind this
poetic figure stands not a real woman but the Ideal Woman: beautiful
and chaste. The name Delia also alludes to Cynthia, one of the most
common representations of Queen Elizabeth; Delia means “of Delos,”
the island of Mount Cynthus where Cynthia (Diana) was born. After
her death, Elizabeth was memorialized as Delia by Thomas Newton
in his poem “Atropoïon Delion, or the Death of Delia.””43
Certain poems in Delia do allude directly to the queen. For
example, the very first lines of the sequence call the lady’s beauty a
“boundless Ocean” to which the poems, like a river, run 44:
Unto the boundles Ocean of thy beautie

Runs this poore river, charg’d with streames of zeale:
Returning thee the tribute of my dutie,
Which heere my love, my youth, my playnts reveale. (I. 1–4)45
Spenser uses the same image explicitly to compliment Queen

Elizabeth in Book VI of the 1596 Faerie Queene:
Then pardon me, most dreaded Soueraine,

That from your selfe I do this vertue bring,
And to your selfe doe it returne againe:
So from the Ocean all riuers spring,
And tribute backe repay as to their King. (VI.Pr.7.1–5)
In both the first poem of Delia and this Spenserian stanza, not only
is Queen Elizabeth represented as the ocean, but the tribute of her
subjects is like a river that both springs from and returns back to
the ocean. The sonnet inscribed on the famous Ditchley portrait of
Elizabeth appears to include the exact same image, suggesting that
it was a typical one to describe the relationship between the queen
and her subjects: “Rivers of thanckes still to that oc[ean . . . ] / Where
grace is grace above.””46 Helen Hackett suggests that it became con-
ventional to associate Elizabeth with the ocean because she was so
often figured as the moon that controls the ocean, an idea “used to
assert English claims to imperial power.””47 Daniel uses this idea as
well in a sonnet that names Cynthia: “My Cynthia hath the waters
of mine eyes” (XL). Of all his sonnets, this one most clearly alludes
to Queen Elizabeth. Delia is compared to the moon and he, in his
devotion, to the sea:
Th’Ocean never did attende more duely,

Uppon his Soveraignes course, the nights pale Queene:
Nor paide the impost of his waves more truely,
Then mine to her in truth have ever beene. (XL 5–8)
The words “Soveraigne” and “Queene” together in one line make

it difficult to overlook the allusion to Elizabeth. Daniel is compar-
ing his devotion to Delia to the faithfulness of the sea that ever
attends on the moon, and by implication to the dutiful attendance
of courtiers upon their sovereign. The lines may also allude to Sir
Walter Ralegh’s “The Ocean to Cynthia,” or at least to the conceit
Ralegh adopted that he was the ocean (Queen Elizabeth’s nickname
for him being “Water”) and she the moon that controlled him. In
this poem as in so many others in the sequence, Delia is portrayed as
hard-hearted: “Yet nought the rocke of that hard hart can move” (9),
a metaphor that, found in combination with the idea of this lady as
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a moon goddess, may remind us of Spenser’s portrayal of Belphoebe,

who is the moon, the virginal huntress, and also the possessor of a
heart like a “rock of stone.”
A final Elizabeth reference in the sequence is also a Spenserian
one: in Sonnet XLIIII, Delia is found in the “joyfull North” where
she “joys” in her honor, “fayrer than the sun” (3–7). The placement
of Delia in the north is not in keeping with other references to the
Countess of Pembroke’s home in the southwest of England. But it
soon becomes clear that the poet’s “joyfull North, where all my for-
tune lyes” is England itself:
Florish faire Albion, glory of the North,

Neptunes darling helde betweene his armes:
Devided from the world as better worth,
Kepte for himselfe, defended from all harmes. (9–12)
This nationalistic image makes much more sense as a compliment to

Queen Elizabeth than to Mary Herbert: Delia’s home and the place
where the poet’s fortunes lie is England, surrounded by oceans (held
in Neptune’s arms) and thus protected from the world (“defended
from all harms”). The image of a woman “fayrer than the sunne” on
whom “the world smyleth,” one who appears to be seated in the Ocean
itself (in Neptune’s arms) recalls Guyon’s description of Gloriana in
The Faerie Queene Book II:
In widest Ocean she her throne does reare,

That ouer all the earth it may be seene;
As morning Sunne her beames dispredden cleare;
And in her face faire peace, and mercy doth appeare. (II.ii.40.6–9)
Like Delia, this queen is a sunlike beauty reigning over the ocean and
visible to the entire world. The language used to describe both Delia and
Gloriana in this passage hints at the image of Queen Elizabeth as a bea-
con for Protestants at home and on the continent: the world smiles on
Delia, the woman fairer than the sun, which recalls the woman clothed
with the sun in Revelation, an image associated with Queen Elizabeth
early in her reign. Even the idea of Gloriana’s peace is captured in
Daniel’s final couplet: “Still let disarmed peace decke her [Albion] and
thee; / And Muse-foe Mars, abroade farre fostred bee” (13–14). The only
quality mentioned by Spenser that Daniel omits is mercy.
In these passages, Daniel’s descriptions of Delia echo Spenser’s

portrayals of Gloriana, suggesting not only that Delia, like Gloriana,
shadows Queen Elizabeth, but also that Daniel may share some of
Spenser’s political and religious attitudes. Given his association with
the Sidney family and his later connection to the Earl of Essex and
his circle, Daniel may be voicing, in the context of Protestant causes,
the same misgivings as did Spenser and Sidney about the royal image
of forbearance and clemency.48
The poet’s complaints about Delia’s merciless cruelty take a cen-
tral place in this sequence, for reasons that have not been explored
fully.49 Pleas for the lady’s “grace” are to be expected in a sequence
that most critics understand as an exercise in which the Petrarchan
model has been adapted as a vehicle for flattery of an actual or poten-
tial patron. But in this sequence, the speaker repeatedly protests
Delia’s cruelty, though these protests, as I will demonstrate, are rep-
resented ironically by Daniel. Critics who write about Delia inevitably
focus on Daniel’s use of the carpe diem theme because he is the first
in the English tradition to make use of this idea within a Petrarchan
sequence: starting at Sonnet XXX the poet begins to remind Delia
that time will eventually destroy her beauty but that his poems will
immortalize her; as Klein says, this idea too corresponds to a read-
ing of the sequence as a plea for patronage, since the poet is using
the carpe diem theme not to seduce Delia but to remind a devout lady
of her mortality and highlight his promise to eternize her through
his poems.50 But how to understand the first thirty sonnets in this
sequence of fifty, since they relentlessly play on the idea of the lady’s
cruelty and the poet’s desperate but unfulfilled desire for her pity?
More than half of the first thirty sonnets refer explicitly to the lady’s
cruelty and/or the poet’s pleas for mercy, and many others suggest
the same idea by characterizing the lady as a tyrant or focusing on
her disdain, making this the dominant idea in the sequence. Even in
the last twenty sonnets, XXX through L, when the poet turns to his
consideration of mortality and the eternizing power of poetry, he still
returns to the theme of the cruel fair (Sonnets XXXIX and XLIII).
The prominence of this motif in Delia has been noted but not fully
explained: Lowry Nelson comments that Daniel “rather too insis-
tently” harps on the “cruel fair,” but takes this observation no further.51
I would suggest that both the pleas for mercy and the reminders of
time’s depredations are presented ironically by Daniel; and that like
Sidney, whom he imitates in other ways, Daniel is asking his reader
to recognize a seduction attempt as just that. Whether Daniel’s
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ideal reader is Mary Sidney Herbert or Queen Elizabeth, Daniel is

asking her to read his poems on several levels: they are adept sonnets
in the Petrarchan mode; they are flattering portrayals of a beauti-
ful, virtuous, and powerful woman; they certainly could be read as
pleas for patronage, but they are also poems that hold their speaker
up to a certain amount of ridicule as he exaggerates his claims of his
suffering and her cruelty. Like Sidney, Daniel writes a sequence of
poems that allows the reader multiple points of view. The poet-lover
may on one level be Daniel himself wooing a woman or flattering a
patron, but Daniel also expects his reader to recognize this speak- k
er’s self-deception and attempts at manipulation of a woman. Like
AstrophilandStella,Deliaaandthepoemthatfollowsit,TheComplaint
of Rosamond, serve as a warning for women against those who would
use demands for mercy to render them vulnerable.
The endless repetition of the complaint that Delia is cruel lessens
the impact of the lament: the speaker characterizes it as a “Hydra,”
and indeed his sorrows are a self-enclosed and self-replicating litany
of woe (XVI). That his laments are more self-serving than they are
sincere is suggested many times in the sequence, perhaps most baldly
in Sonnet VI, which begins “Faire is my love, and cruell as sh’is faire.”
But at the end of the sonnet, he remarks
And had she pittie to conjoine with those,

Then who had heard the plaints I utter now.
O had she not been faire, and thus unkinde,
My Muse had slept, and none had knowne my minde. (VI. 9–12)
The lady’s supposed cruelty therefore provides the excuse for the
poet’s self-promotion. Though he claims in the next sonnet that his
poems reveal his “error” and bring about his “disgrace,” the later son-
nets in which he exalts the eternizing power of his poetry belie these
claims. Characterizing Delia as inhumanly cruel serves the speaker’s
purpose of poetically pressuring her for “pity” and thus of publiciz-
ing himself.
As early as the second sonnet, Daniel implies the same idea when
his speaker calls his laments about Delia’s cruelty a “monument”:
Sigh out a story of her cruell deedes,

With interrupted accents of dispayre:
A Monument that whosoever reedes,
May justly praise, and blame my loveles Faire. (II.5–8)
These lines suggest not only the self-serving nature of the claim that
the lady is cruel but also the inherent threat here—and often found
in Astrophil and Stella—that the poems depicting her this way will
negatively publicize her. But, like almost every declaration made
by Daniel’s speaker, this assertion too is contradicted later in the
sequence in the sonnets that claim to immortalize the lady’s beauty
and virtue. In fact, this claim completely undercuts the argument
that the lady should be “kind,” because if she were, the monument of
poetry would not exist. That his poems about Delia will immortal-
ize her despite the depredations of time is a claim that the speaker
makes forcefully in the final poems of the sequence:
These are the Arkes the Tropheis I erect,

That fortifie thy name against old age,
And these thy sacred vertues must protect,
Against the Darke and times consuming rage. (XLVI. 9–12)
Of course, Delia’s “sacred vertues” would no longer exist were she to

yield to the speaker’s incessant demands for her “pitie,” just as the
poems themselves would not exist were she not “unkind.”
Thus, when the sequence is read in its entirety, the speaker under-
mines his fundamental argument that Delia is cruel and should show
him mercy. We are meant to see this and to understand, finally,
that the speaker and the Petrarchan mode in which he writes are
self-enclosing and self-consuming. The entire sonnet sequence ends
with a four-stanza ode that encapsulates the speaker’s solipsism; it
reminds us that the eternal memory of Delia depends upon her refusal
to pity the speaker:
Eccho daughter of the ayre,

Babbling gheste of Rocks and Hills,
Knows the name of my fearce Fayre,
And soundes the accents of my ills:
Each thing pitties my dispaire,
Whilst that she her Lover kills. (Ode 13–18)
The echo embodies the eternizing power of these poems: they will
forever resound—echo—through the rocks and hills, memorializing
the name of Delia because she was fierce and resisted the speaker’s
pleas for her pity. The poet may never experience her pity, but he
relies on the pity of the world to keep her memory, and his, alive. The
n 91
echo is also a common Renaissance trope for solipsism; as such it

reflects the self-contradiction of the poet, who demands a pity that,
had it been granted, would have obviated the very poetic achieve-
ment that he celebrates.
The role of pity in Daniel’s poems is rendered even more complex
by the last poem in the original 1592 edition of Delia: The Complaint
of Rosamond. Daniel is the first writer to append a complaint to a
Petrarchan sonnet sequence, and many critics regard Shakespeare’s
sonnets and the “Lover’s Complaint” that follows them to be
influenced by the structure of Daniel’s volume.52 The relationship
between the sonnet sequence and the complaint is a complex one,
with many of the themes and images from Delia reprised and very
differently inflected in the complaint. As Pitcher says, there is a
“rich flow of internal reference between these poems”: “silence set
against speech, life against death, secrecy against open scandal.”53
Obviously the stance of the Delia speaker, importuning a chaste
lady for her pity and love, is severely undercut when the sequence
is followed by the story of a woman who did relent and suffered
a tragic outcome as a result. The story of Rosamond Clifford was
familiar to Elizabethans: a country girl of unusual beauty, she was
sent to the court of Henry II, became his mistress, and was con-
sequently murdered by his jealous wife, Queen Eleanor. Daniel
retells the story in the voice of Rosamond’s ghost, speaking to and
through the poet’s Muse, whose words provide an ironic counter-
point to many ideas at play in the preceding sonnets. For example,
Rosamond begins her story by speaking of the shame that still
attends her even after death: “A sheete could hide my face, but not
my sin, / For Fame finds never tombe t’inclose it in” (6–7). Now the
fame that the poet promises Delia takes on a sinister new mean-
ing: Rosamond possesses fame that outlives her, just as the poet
promised Delia that she would, but in the case of a woman who
acquiesced to a lover’s demands, fame is actually infamy, a shame-
ful reputation. Furthermore, the carpe diem theme from the last
twenty Delia poems is very ironically presented in Rosamond, since
the matron uses exactly that argument to persuade Rosamond to
accept the king as her lover.54
But the most complex connection between the sonnets and the
complaint lies in the construction of pity and mercy in both poems.
Rosamond asks the poet to tell her story in order to inspire pity for
her in those who hear it. She refers specifically to Delia, establishing
a parallel between herself and the poet, since both of them want
Delia’s pity:
Delia may happe to deygne to read our story,

And offer up her sigh among the rest,
Whose merit would suffice for both our glorie,
Whereby thou might’st be grac’d, and I be blest,
That indulgence would profit me the best. (43–47)
Some critics have assumed that this implied identification between

Rosamond and the poet predisposes us to feel sympathy for
Rosamond, as she and the poet share the common aim of inspiring
Delia’s pity.55 But other critics find Rosamond an unsympathetic
character: Ronald Primeau finds her a “self-centered, fame-seeking
hedonist” rather than a truly repentant and sympathetic charac-
ter.56 As John Kerrigan says, Rosamond’s “unredeemed nature” has
troubled some readers, and it is true that she is less interested in
drawing a moral lesson from her downfall than she is in ensuring
the sympathetic attention she believes she deserves.57 I would argue
that Rosamond is a seductive figure whose rather self-justifying
account of her affair with Henry II inspires pity but also has the
potential to mislead the reader. Here Rosamond’s language can be
read against itself: she says that she has come to “solicit” the poet
to “forme” her “case” and “register” her “wrong,” terms that suggest
that this complaint will be less a confession and more a self-defense,
which indeed it is (33–35). Rosamond’s ghost also describes the pity
she wants from Delia in these terms: “That indulgence would profit
me the best” (47). The word “indulgence” hints that Delia’s pity
would not be truly deserved by Rosamond, not to mention the reli-
gious implication—surely troubling to a Protestant reader—that the
“indulgence” of a living person could help a dead soul enter heaven,
or Elysium. Rosamond’s statement that Delia’s sighs would “profit”
her also suggests her self-interest. Taken altogether, Rosamond’s
language in the complaint’s introductory stanzas leads us to read
her character’s demand for pity just as critically as we read the same
demand made by the poet of Delia.
The most striking representation of pity in the Complaint t occurs
in the description of the casket that Henry sends Rosamond the day
before their affair begins (372). The casket has not attracted the criti-
cal attention that it deserves; it obviously plays an important role in
the poem, coming as it does at the exact midpoint of the work. The
n 93
Complaint t has 106 stanzas; as the first half of the poem comes to an
end, Rosamond describes her decision to give in to the King in a line
that evokes the image of balanced halves: “Thus stood I ballanc’d
equallie precize, / Till my fraile flesh did weigh me downe to sinne”
(351–52). Thus, as the poem’s second half begins, the balance has
tipped and Rosamond has begun her fall into sin; we are in the brief
space of time between Rosamond’s acceptance of the king’s suit and
the beginning of the affair itself. As stanza 53 begins, exactly halfway
through the poem, Rosamond begins a six-stanza description and
discussion of the casket that she received from the king on “the day
before the night of my defeature” (372).
As Rosamond describes this gift, she elaborates at great length
upon the story that is engraved on the lid of the casket: that of
Amymone, daughter of Danaus, and her sexual encounter with the
god Neptune. Critics often focus on the disparity between the usual
story of Amymone and the story as the casket—or Rosamond’s inter-
pretation of the casket—depicts it. Rosamond describes Amymone
struggling with Neptune and ultimately being “forc’d to goe” with
the god against her will (384). In most versions, Amymone is not
violently raped, though in some versions she is coerced by Neptune.
She is seeking water when the sea god finds her, and she becomes
his lover; in exchange he gives her the gift of the water her family
needs. Kelly Quinn explains Rosamond’s depiction of the Amymone
scene as an attempt to manipulate the reader: according to Quinn,
Rosamond misreads the story, changing Amymone from a woman
who sleeps with a king for personal gain into a helpless victim of rape,
thereby suggesting that she herself is a rape victim rather than one
who succumbed to the temptation of riches and pleasures.58 Kenji
Go disagrees, reading these stanzas as a verbal emblem, in which
a picture is combined with an interpretation—Rosamond’s in this
case—one that invites the reader to unlock its meaning. According
to Go, the story that Rosamond tells is not really a departure from
the original myth, because the engraving actually depicts, not the
rape of Amymone, but the moment when she capitulates. Rosamond
describes the tears on Amymone’s face as she lies at Neptune’s feet
and says, “O myracle of love, / That kindles fire in water, heate in
teares” (394–95). Go says that Rosamond understands the engrav- v
ing to show the moment when Amymone capitulates, stops resist-
ing Neptune, and willingly becomes his lover, just as Rosamond has
done / will do in regard to the King.59 Both Quinn and Go focus
on the relationship between the original myth and these stanzas, a
problematic approach given that there are different versions of the

story and we do not know which one Daniel knew or is referring to
here.60 I suggest that the more obvious disparity in these stanzas lies
not in the relationship between the story Rosamond tells and some
other version of the myth. Rather, the notable disparity is between
what is actually pictured in the engraving and Rosamond’s interpre-
tation of it. What Rosamond sees on the casket is Amymone lying at
Neptune’s feet:
There might I see described how she lay,

At those proude feete, not satisfied with prayer:
Wailing her heavie hap, cursing the day. (386–88)
Presumably the line “wailing her heavie hap, cursing the day” is
Rosamond’s interpretation, as is the following: “In act so pittious to
expresse dispaire” (389). Rosamond cannot hear wails or curses, and
she is attributing motive and meaning to Amymone’s cries when she
says that they “expresse dispaire.” But apparently she can see a crying
figure lying at Neptune’s feet, and she says that tears are also vis-
ible: “Her teares upon her cheekes poore carefull gerle, / Did seeme
against the sunne cristall and perle” (391–92). But these tears are “all
in vaine,” we are told, and though the word “cruel” in never used to
describe Neptune, when Amymone lies at his “proude feete, not sat-
isfied with prayer” we should hear an echo from the sonnets; this
could describe the relationship between the abject poet-lover and
the “cruel” woman who exercises her power over him. In Sonnet XX,
for example, the poet bemoans the “cruelst faire, that sees I languish
for her, / Yet never mercy to my merit giveth”; he goes on to say that
she “tread[s] me downe with foote of her disgrace” (7–8 and 10). A
sonnet lady is quite likely to be depicted metaphorically as a cruel
tyrant who ignores the pleas for pity by the victim that lies at her
feet. And as we shall see, Rosamond eventually will attribute cruelty
not to Neptune, but to Amymone.
In the following stanza Rosamond continues to focus on
Amymone’s tears, which apparently are visible “upon her cheekes”
in the picture, and begins the process of shifting the role of victim
from Amymone to Neptune. Rosamond addresses the “myracle of
love” that kindles “fire in water, heate in teares,” and in this stanza
love not only kindles heat, it also “makes neglected beautie might- t
ier prove: / Teaching afflicted eyes affects to move” (396–97). The
“fire” and “heat” are Neptune’s because these are the “affects,” the
n 95
emotions, that Amymone and her tears are able to “move,” that is,
produce, in Neptune—a god of water—as she lies at his feet weep-
ing, a posture which in Rosamond’s telling is now proved “mightier”
because Amymone’s beauty provokes Neptune’s desire.61 These lines
echo the typical love sonnet rhetoric: the lady’s beauty is powerful
and, according to Rosamond, even “afflicted eyes”’—that is, weeping
eyes—can be mighty because they can kindle desire. The final lines
of the stanza are these: “To shew that nothing ill becomes the fayre, /
But crueltie, that yeeldes unto no prayer” (398–99). As Go points out,
this is the “moral” that Rosamond takes from the engraving, and it is
the point of much of the rhetoric in Delia as well: it does not become
a fair maiden to resist; it is cruel to refuse a man’s sexual advances,
and cruelty is unbecoming in a fair maiden. But while Go takes this
as a straightforward reading of the engraving on the casket, I find
it extremely ironic. Rosamond has reversed the roles of Neptune
and Amymone, despite the evidence of her own eyes. A situation in
which a man is cruelly oppressing a woman has been turned into the
sonnet cliché in which the lady—even one who is lying at the feet of
her rapist weeping—is “cruel” for not submitting.
When Rosamond began telling the story engraved on the casket,
she described herself, newly persuaded to accept Henry’s advances, as
“wrought to sinne” and so taken away to a solitary grange where she
would await the king (365–66). On the day before the king is to come
to her, he sends the “casket richly wrought” that Rosamond describes
(373). The repetition within two stanzas of the word “wrought” to
depict both the casket, “richly wrought,” and Rosamond herself,
“wrought to sinne,” is noteworthy. Rosamond has been “wrought,”
shaped like a work of art, by King Henry’s wooing and the persua-
sions of the matron. The casket thus represents Rosamond herself
as well as the story that she is telling, which is also a work of art, her
work of art designed to inspire pity. The casket was “wrought” for
the purpose of “presaging to Rosamond” her fall; Rosamond herself
is “wrought” through her own self-describing and justifying words;
Daniel’s sonnets were also “wrought” for Delia: all these works of art
should be understood as persuasive, and all of them are self-serving
in their attempts to persuade. During the Renaissance, anxiety about
the persuasive power of both visual images and poetry was common:
Peter Herman shows that early modern condemnations of poetry
were based on various objections, including the often-voiced opinion
that love poetry can entice people, especially women, into unchaste
behavior.62 By ironically representing the cliché of the powerful and
cruel sonnet lady, Daniel invites the reader to consider the poten-
tially destructive effect of this rhetoric.
Early in the Complaint, t Rosamond depicted herself using son-
net clichés: King Henry, despite his political power, is her subject:
“Whom Fortune made my King, Love made my Subject” (157). She
claimed that there was no armor that could defend the king from
the “transpearcing rayes” of her “Christall-pointed eyes” (170) in an
echo of Sonnet XXIII of Delia in which Delia’s “fairest eyes doe pen-
etrate so deepe” (7). Yet despite these echoes of the sonnet rheto-
ric that depicts the “cruel” woman overpowering her male subject,
Rosamond eventually acknowledges the king’s power over her: “But
what? he is my King and may constraine me” (337). The rhetoric of
love poetry is used by and against Rosamond: her own false sense
of her power helps lead to her downfall, and when she misreads
Amymone’s story according to the terms of love poetry, transform-
ing a powerless female victim into a powerful and “cruel” sonnet
lady, she reinterprets herself from victim of a powerful king into a
powerful woman who is doing what is right—showing mercy and
eschewing cruelty—when she submits. It is true that Rosamond’s
interpretation is self-serving, but it also parrots the persuasive rheto-
ric of the sonneteers, positing women who resist as cruel, even in the
face of visual evidence that it is the male aggressor who is cruel and
the female victim who is suffering, not the other way around. Thus
the description of the casket—the actual “picture” of Amymone and
Neptune—and the meaning Rosamond derives from it are purposely
misaligned by Daniel. We are reminded that art might well mis-
represent in order to persuade. The poet-lover might falsely repre-
sent the lady as cruel; Rosamond might falsely represent the casket
engraving as an instance of female cruelty; Rosamond might mis-
represent herself as a helpless victim of King Henry. By the end of
The Complaint of Rosamond, the ideal reader of Delia—an authorita-
tive woman such as the Countess of Pembroke or Queen Elizabeth
herself—has been asked to reevaluate the idea presented most force-
fully in the sequence: that the resisting woman is cruel and that her
response to the importuning lover should be pity. Rosamond’s story
shows the potentially tragic outcome for the woman if she does not
resist, as well as showing, through Rosamond’s interpretation of the
casket engraving, the danger of the sonnet rhetoric that positions
the lady who refuses as a cruel tyrant in order to persuade her that
relenting is virtuous.
n 97
Edmund Spenser’s Amoretti

In the Amoretti Spenser shares some of the same concerns that are
expressed in Astrophil and Stella and Delia. Like Samuel Daniel,
Spenser was connected to the Sidney family and perhaps could be
described as a member of the Sidney circle: in 1579–1580 he was at
Leicester House in the service of Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester,
who was Philip Sidney’s uncle. Spenser and Sidney may have known
each other during this time. That Spenser promoted the connection
is clear from his dedication of his first major work, The Shepheardes
Calender, to Sidney. Spenser also pays tribute to Daniel, praising him,
inColin Clouts Come Home Againe, as one who “doth all afore him far
surpasse”(417).63Spenser’sAmorettiialsosharesthetripartitestructure
that seems to have been Daniel’s innovation—the “Delian” structure
noted by Katherine Duncan-Jones and also found in Shakespeare’s
sonnets—but with a twist: while the 1592 Delia volume contains
the sonnets, followed by Anacreontics, and finally the Complaint of
Rosamond, Spenser’s 1596 Amoretti volume features the sonnets, fol-
lowed by Anacreontics, followed not by a complaint but rather by
a celebration of marriage, the Epithalamion. Despite this suggestion
that Spenser’s courtship poems lead to a happy resolution, the son-
nets still share with Sidney’s and Daniel’s poems a concern with the
Petrarchan trope of the cruel fair, and an implicit warning to women
about the dangers of pity. Also, like his predecessors, Spenser may
have Queen Elizabeth in mind as a potential reader of his poems,
despite the seemingly personal nature of the courtship he records.
And like Sidney and Daniel, Spenser’s Protestant sympathies might
well cause him to criticize rather than celebrate the political mercy
of the queen.
Critics have read Spenser’s sequence from a variety of perspectives,
emphasizing its artistry, its theology, its exploration of gender roles,
and often, its strongly autobiographical feeling. Because the poems
allude directly to the “Elizabeth” being courted, and we know that
Spenser married Elizabeth Boyle around the time the poems were
published, it was once assumed by critics that the speaker in the
poems should be understood as Spenser himself and that the poems
record the courtship of Elizabeth Boyle. The title Amoretti even
implies that the poems are tokens of love offered to his beloved as
a sign of the engagement that finds its culmination in their wedding
day, recorded in the Epithalamion. But even some critics who read the
sequence autobiographically acknowledge a gap between Spenser and

his speaker. For example, S. K. Heninger characterizes the poems as
a highly personal wedding gift for the bride, but he also notes that
the gift is “a sort of self-conscious joking with the sonnet tradition”
in which Spenser “takes a wry stance” vis-à-vis the poet-speaker of
the poems.64 Other critics have remarked on this distance that is cre-
ated between Spenser and his poet-lover, and some have analyzed the
different voices and different tones in which this poet-lover speaks, a
variety regarded as a weakness by some critics and a strength of the
sequence by others.65 Spenser’s sequence, despite its seemingly per-
sonal context, can and should be read as a public performance: like
Sidney and Daniel, Spenser creates a complex poetic persona and
invites his reader to view that persona through a critical lens.
But who is Spenser’s reader? If we regard the sequence as auto-
biography, we would assume Elizabeth Boyle, of course. But even if
Amoretti is not, like Daniel’s Delia, explicitly linked to a quest for
patronage, Spenser’s publication of these poems suggests the pub-
lic nature of the project, even if the sequence originated in a private
context. These poems were not circulated in manuscript or obtained
by an opportunistic printer. Spenser oversaw their publication,
apparently shortly after his marriage: if the dates implied in the
poems themselves accurately refer to real-life events, Spenser mar-
ried Elizabeth Boyle in June of 1594; the volume was entered in the
Stationer’s Register in London in November of 1594.66 Furthermore,
Spenser gestures beyond the private context of the poems by allud-
ing to his “Empresse” Elizabeth and drawing our attention to the
name she shares with his beloved (Sonnets XXXIII and LXXIII).
Spenser’s direct references to Queen Elizabeth invite the reader to
consider the personal and political as analogous and suggest that, as
she is for his epic, Queen Elizabeth may also be an assumed audience
for this 1596 publication.
Ilona Bell, in her persuasive reading off Amoretti, highlights the role
of the wooed lady, Elizabeth, as the poems’ auditor and respondent,
depicting her as a resisting reader who teaches the poet “to undertake
a far more probing exploration” of courtship and his assumptions
about women and love.67 According to Bell, the sequence dramatizes
the way a self-assured woman time and again challenges the poet’s
claims about her and about their relationship, so that the poems may
be read not only as the history of a courtship, but also as a dialogue
about courtship between lover and lady. One topic of this ongoing
conversation about courtship is the appropriateness of Petrarchan
n 99
conventions. Bell examines the poet-lover’s use of Petrarchan exag-

geration, along with the lady’s mockery of his conventional love lan-
guage, pointing out that there is a serious critique embedded in her
mockery: the lady wants the lover to know that she recognizes the
flattering and manipulative falsehoods of this convention.68 Thus
Spenser in his sequence both follows the Petrarchan model so popu-
lar in the 1590s, but also, as do Sidney and Daniel, critiques certain
aspects of Petrarchism.
To the observation that Spenser’s Amoretti contains a serious cri-
tique of Petrarchan wooing, I would add this: the Petrarchan trope
that dominates this sequence, as it did Daniel’s Delia, is that of the
cruel fair. Spenser repeatedly characterizes his lady as cruel and him-
self as seeking mercy: roughly a third of the sonnets in the first half
of the sequence contain references to the lady’s cruelty and/or the
speaker’s desire for her mercy or pity. The many overstated allusions
to the blood-lust and cruelty of this lady have been taken seriously
by some readers, but most critics recognize some form of parody
in the more exaggerated poems in the sequence, as for example in
Sonnet XX where the speaker characterizes the lady as “more cruell
and more salvage wylde, / then either Lyon or the Lyonesse” (9–10).
Though the speaker defends his lady’s “portly pride” in an early son-
net (V) as “the thing which I doo most in her admire,” apparently,
like courtiers who might decry a sovereign’s too-easy mercy toward
others but expect it for themselves, this speaker quickly becomes
frustrated when the lady’s proud resistance to the base things of the
world extends to his seduction. Her “portly pride” is renamed “rebel-
lious pride” in Sonnet VI, though he still insists that her resistance
to seduction is a sign of the lady’s virtue. But by Sonnet X, the virtu-
ous lady has been reframed as a “Tyrannesse” who enjoys seeing “the
huge massacres which her eyes do make” (5–6). In Sonnet V, the poet
praised the lady’s pride because it implied “scorn of base things”;
now, five sonnets later, the speaker asks the Lord of Love to shake
the lady’s “proud hart” and make her “bow to a baser make [mate],”
presumably himself (11). Like Daniel, Spenser allows the reader to
see the speaker’s self-contradictions on the matter of the lady’s resis-
tance, which is called cruelty in men’s love rhetoric. From Sonnet X
until the turning point mid-sequence, the accusations of the lady’s
cruelty come thick and fast: she is a “cruell warriour” in Sonnet XI,
one who entraps him in “cruell bands” in Sonnet XII, and she refuses
to “looke with pitty” on his pain in Sonnet XVIII. Spenser allows us
not only to hear the lady’s refutation of this accusation against her; he
also allows the reader to observe the poet’s self-contradictions, so

that the typical lover’s complaint about the resisting woman’s cruelty
is revealed to be false. The lady’s response also draws our attention
to the fact that this accusation is an attempt to manipulate her; it is
part of a seduction that fails. In fact, when this lover tries to “soften
her hard hart” with his tears, she laughs:
But when I pleade, she bids me play my part,

and when I weep, she sayes teares are but water:
and when I sigh, she sayes I know the art,
and when I waile she turnes hir selfe to laughter.
So doe I weepe, and wayle, and pleade in vaine,
whiles she as steele and flint doth still remayne. (XVIII.9–14)
In the Amoretti, Spenser dramatizes the relationship between two

constructed characters: both the poet-persona’s self-contradictions
and the lady-persona’s mocking response to his pleas for pity lead the
reader to examine critically these pleas, along with accusations that
she is cruel.
In many of the Amoretti sonnets about mercy and cruelty, the lan-
guage of monarchical power is used to portray the lady:
Fayre cruell, why are ye so fierce and cruell?

Is it because your eyes have powre to kill?
then know, that mercy is the mighties jewell,
and greater glory thinke to save, then spill. (XLIX 1–4)
Mercy is the jewel of the “mighty,” by which the lady can gain “glory,”
a claim that recalls Portia’s assertion that mercy is “mightiest in the
mightiest” and “becomes / The throned monarch better than his
crown” (IV.i.188–89). Conversely, in poems that complain of her cru-
elty, the lady is called a “Tyrannesse” (Sonnets X and XLIII), and in
one poem is depicted as the judge to whom the speaker complains in
order to gain justice (Sonnet XII). The argument about mercy and
cruelty has political implications, and just as the reader is invited to
take the lady’s part and recognize the self-serving manipulation in a
lover’s pleas for a woman’s “mercy,” so too the reader can recognize
that accusations of cruelty and pleas for mercy in the political sphere
should not necessarily be taken at face value.
Sidney and Daniel both examined the threat of slander as one
tool that might be used in the manipulation of a woman: Astrophil
threatens to publicize the kiss (and thus shame Stella) and Daniel’s
n 101
poet-persona tells the story of Delia’s “cruell deeds” in order that

readers might praise him and blame her (Sonnet II). Spenser’s
speaker never makes this threat—in fact he expresses his own out-
rage over the “false forged lyes” that someone has told, lies that
stirred the anger of his lady (LXXXVI). But the poet of the Amoretti
is concerned with the question of how to represent his beloved and
expresses doubt about his ability to portray her in terms very like
those he uses to address Queen Elizabeth in the proem to Book III
of The Faerie Queene. There, he famously asks his “dredd Soverayne” to
pardon him for his inability to paint her “glorious portraict” plainly
and clearly. InAmoretti XVII, the poet asks “what pen, what pencil”
can fully express the “glorious portraict” of his lady’s angelic face. In
both the Proem and the sonnet, the poet expresses his fear that he
will sully the lady’s / queen’s inexpressible perfection in his attempt
to express it. The Proem refers the queen to Ralegh’s “The Ocean to
Cynthia” as a work wherein she can see herself portrayed in “living
colours, and right hew”; Amoretti XVII ends with the similar decla-
ration that “a greater craftsman’s hand” is needed to express “the life”
of his lady.
Such similar language and ideas suggest again the correspondence
between the poet’s lady and his queen and also that it might profit
us to read the Amoretti in dialogue with The Faerie Queene. The two
poems share language about the difficulty and danger of describing
an indescribable woman, and Spenser depicts his lady in terms simi-
lar to those he uses in The Faerie Queene to portray Belphoebe, the
figure in whom he invites Elizabeth to see a reflection of her “rare
chastitee” (III.proem.5).
Both Belphoebe and the lady off Amoretti are remote, self-assured,
chaste, and stern enemies of the “sparke of filthy lustfull fyre”
(
(Amoretti LXXXIIII). Both are asked to pity a forlorn lover, though
it would be closer to the truth to say that the lover off Amoretti repeat-
edly demands his lady’s pity. The speaker in Amoretti exclaims that
his listener must be “no woman, but a sencelesse stone” to remain
unmoved by his pleas (LIIII); he characterizes her as having a hard
heart (like steel or flint) because she will not “look with pitty” on
him (XVIII). “Fayre be ye sure but proud and pitilesse,” he pro-
claims, “hard and obstinate, / as is a rocke” (LVI). Naturally Spenser
never characterizes Belphoebe, acknowledged reflection of Queen
Elizabeth, in such harsh terms, but when the virgin huntress is
pierced with pity at the sight of the wounded Timias, we are told
that the sight is so “heauy” that it “could haue made a rocke of stone
to rew”—and then a few lines later we are told that “the point of pitty
perced through” Belphoebe’s heart, suggesting a correspondence
between her heart and that “rocke of stone” (III.v.30).
Timias recovers from his physical wound only to sustain an emo-
tional wound when he falls in love with Belphoebe. His lovesick- k
ness is such that Belphoebe fears for his life, though she does not
understand herself to be the cause. She applies “costly cordialls” that
do no good because the cure, according to the narrator, would be
that “sweet Cordiall, which can restore / A loue-sick hart” (III.v.50).
Sonnet L describes a similar situation, in which the poet says that
he is suffering from a “double malady,” of “harts wound” and “bod-
ies griefe.” A physician seeks to appease his suffering with “some
cordialls”—but the “sweet Cordialls” that would give his heart ease
“passe Physitions art.”
Though verbal parallels connect Belphoebe to Spenser’s sonnet
lady, and Timias to the Amoretti speaker, several important differ-
ences exist, maybe most crucially that the poet-lover off Amoretti is not
nearly as self-effacing as Timias. Timias never pleads for Belphoebe’s
pity or love in Book III; in fact, he castigates himself for ingratitude:
Vnthankfull wretch (said he) is this the meed,

With which her souerain mercy thou doest quight?
Thy life she saued by her gratious deed,
But thou doest weene with villeinous despight,
To blott her honour, and her heauenly light. (III.v.45.1-5)
Timias resolves to “dye rather, dye” than “so disloyally / Deeme of

her high desert, or seeme so light” (III.v.45.6–7). Of course, the situ-
ations are different: Belphoebe is a clear representation of Queen
Elizabeth; part of Timias’s sense of his unworthiness comes from his
“lowly place” as a “meane Squire.” Difference of degree is not a prob-
lem that plagues the speaker of Amoretti. However, Timias’s sense
that courtship of Belphoebe would be poor thanks for the mercy she
has offered him, and would blot her honor, is not a sentiment shared
by the lover in Amoretti. Even after the rift between Belphoebe and
Timias in Book IV, there is no pleading on the part of the squire;
rather, he lives in miserable silence at a distance from his beloved,
until the turtle dove helps reunite them, and Belphoebe finally
relents and pities him.
Spenser’s speaker is no Timias. Rather than suffering in silence,
he pleads loudly and often; rather than characterizing the beloved
n 103
as merciful even when she is not providing exactly what he wants,

he hyperbolically characterizes her as cruel. Spenser portrays Timias
as admirable in his forbearance and respect for his beloved. And
though Timias’s attitude toward Belphoebe is colored by her high
position, which reflects her role as Elizabeth’s avatar, the speaker in
Colin Clouts Come Home Againe expresses a nearly identical attitude
toward his beloved Rosalind, who is a shepherdess, not a queen.
After describing his visit to Cynthia’s court, Colin is asked about
his fair Rosalind by the other shepherds, who speak critically of her
because of her “cruelty”: Hobbinol says that Rosalind had repaid
Colin’s devotion with “scorne and foule despite” (905), and Lucid says,
I have often heard

Faire Rosalind of divers fowly blamed:
For being to that swaine too cruell hard,
That her bright glorie else hath much defamed. (907–910)
But Colin defends Rosalind for her “cruel” resistance in terms rem-
iniscent of Timias, as well as the Amoretti speaker’s defense of his
lady’s pride:
For she is not like as the other crew

Of shepheards daughters which emongst you bee,
But of divine regard and heavenly hew,
Excelling all that ever ye did see.
Not then to her that scorned thing so base,
But to my self the blame that lookt so hie:
So hie her thoughts as she her selfe have place,
And loath each lowly thing with loftie eie.
Yet so much grace let her vouchsafe to grant
To simple swaine, sith her I may not love:
Yet that I may her honour paravant,
And praise her worth, though far my wit above. (931–42)
The lady of the Amoretti was originally described in similar terms

as having a lofty countenance that scorned to look on base things
(XIII), and like Belphoebe, whose face is a “heuenly portraict of
bright Angels hew,” Rosalind is “of divine regard and heavenly hew”
( Q II.iii.22.2). Most notably, Colin’s final stance is identical to that
(FQ
of Timias: he claims to be content to honor and praise Rosalind,
apparently accepting that he is not worthy to love her or to expect
love from her in return. Rosalind plays the part of both the idealized
beloved and the idealized queen, and indeed critics have noted paral-
lels between Rosalind and Cynthia (Queen Elizabeth) inColin Clout.
Colin himself at this moment defends woman’s so-called cruelty, a
word that could refer either to the resistance of a chaste lady, or to
the virtue of a queen who will not be swayed from the path of righ-
teousness by manipulative pleas for her pity.
By contrast to both Colin and Timias, the Amoretti speaker is
portrayed as manipulative and aggressive. Though the Belphoebe-
Timias episode in The Faerie Queene contains some submerged criti-
cism of Queen Elizabeth’s obduracy in the face of her courtiers’
desires, in Amoretti Spenser allows us to look critically at the other
side of the coin: the way accusations of cruelty and pleas for mercy
can be used to manipulate and ultimately render the woman vulnera-
ble.TheeAmoretti,likeeAstrophilandStellaaandDeliaandtheComplaint
of Rosamond, suggests what the lady risks when she does take pity
on an importuning lover. There seems to be a turning point in the
sequence after which the dominant cruelty-pity motif completely
vanishes: the “assurance” sonnets that are numbered LVIII and
LIX. The halfway point numerically follows on the heels of these
sonnets: Poem LXII, the New Year’s sonnet.69 After this point, the
accusations of cruelty and pleas for pity disappear, though it is not
clear what, if any, resolution has been reached. The speaker seems to
have returned to his earlier assessment of the lady’s “pride,” which is
praised again, rather than being characterized as cruelty: in Sonnet
LXI, he warns against accusing her of pride, saying that her perfec-
tion makes reasonable her “scorne / [of] base things that to her love
too bold aspire” (11–12). In Sonnet LXIII, a revision of the traditional
Petrarchan sonnet in which the ship sails through stormy seas with-
out finding its port, the poet at last achieves the “happy shore” that
he has sought (5). This poem comes immediately after the mid-point
New Year poem and signals that the lady has finally accepted the
lover. In the next sonnet, the lover kisses her lips: “Comming to kisse
her lyps, (such grace I found)” (LXIIII.1).
However, these two sonnets that celebrate his success are followed
by the first of several that record the lady’s fear: “The doubt which
ye misdeeme, fayre love, is vaine / That fondly feare to loose your lib-
erty” (LXV.1-2). Her fear is explained in several sonnets that depict
their developing relationship in terms of her captivity. For example,
in Sonnet LXVII, the speaker, in another revision of Petrarch, envi-
sions the lady as a deer that he once pursued who now returns only to
be “fyrmely tyde” by her erstwhile hunter. Just as in the earlier part
n 105
of the sequence, the poet’s own language as well as the lady’s objec-
tions invite the reader to perceive these images of captivity as prob-
lematic: in the final line of Sonnet LXVII, the poet describes his
“deer” as “with her owne will beguyld”; the ambiguity of that word
“beguyld,” suggesting as it does that the lady has been deceived and
perhaps victimized, is emphasized by its placement as the final word
of the poem. In Sonnet LXXI, the lady has embroidered a picture
of herself as a bee captured by a spider, the poet, who assures her
that he will make her prison “sweet.” But the lady’s doubt remains
embodied in the embroidery that the speaker describes. The remain-
der of the sequence, while it leads toward a conclusion in marriage
and the Epithalamion, suggests that, once she shows mercy, no lon-
ger offers “cruel” resistance, and accepts the lover, the lady’s liberty,
peace, and even reputation are at risk. The lovers’ “hungry eyes” are
never satisfied with gazing on “the object,” as he characterizes the
lady in Sonnet LXXXIII, a poem that is followed by his reprimand:
“Let not one sparke of filthy lustfull fyre / breake out, that may her
sacred peace molest” (LXXXIIII). Almost immediately following
this poem is the most troubling one of all, which opens with a very
Fairy Queene-like image of slander:
Venemous toung tipt with vile adders sting,

Of that selfe kynd with which the Furies fell
theyr snaky heads doe combe, from which a spring
of poysoned words and spitefull speeches well. (LXXXVI.1–4)
Spenser’s sequence does lead toward a happier conclusion than do

other sonnet sequences, but the road is neither straight nor smooth.
The poet shows how the lover suffers from the lady’s refusal of his
suit and joys in her ultimate acceptance. But once the lady takes pity
on the lover and relents, her situation becomes less stable and more
problematic. Characterized as a captive, vulnerable to lust and slan-
der, the lady was better protected when she maintained her so-called
cruelty.
Ilona Bell mentions that, by the end of the sequence, the beloved
“seems less like a conventional sonnet lady than like Elizabeth I” in
her determination to chart her own course and defend her own lib-
erty.70 We do not have a report of Queen Elizabeth’s response to any
of the three sonnet sequences discussed here, but we do know that
the queen was well able to read between the lines and that on one
occasion, she responded in verse to a Petrarchan lament written to
her by Sir Walter Ralegh in such a way that suggests her understand-
ing of the way Petrarchan rhetoric is being used to persuade her.71
Courtiers, or would-be courtiers, would expect to find in Elizabeth
a canny reader who was likely to understand their critical construc-
tion of the Petrarchan plea for mercy. If the Amoretti sonnets map
the speaker’s education by a self-assured woman, he and his read-
ers are educated politically as well as personally; the lessons learned
by the speaker might be taught by his beloved or by his queen. The
speaker learns that what a desiring male subject represents as cruelty
might, instead, be the female (and female sovereign’s) necessary self-
protection. If her pity is too easily won; if her heart is tender rather
than stony; if she shows mercy under strong rhetorical pressure, she
may render herself vulnerable to masculine control and lose the sov- v
ereignty that allows her to be the paragon described by the poet in
Sonnet LIX: “Thrise happie she, that is so well assured / Unto her
selfe” (1–2). Perhaps this is a lesson that the poet-speaker of Amoretti
learns, but it may also be a lesson he hopes to convey to one of his
imagined readers, Queen Elizabeth.
Sidney, Daniel, and Spenser all write with Elizabeth in mind as an
ideal reader, and their poems foreground accusations of cruelty and
pleas for pity. Sidney and Spenser may write to woo real-life women;
Daniel may write to gain the patronage of the Countess of Pembroke,
but all three poets also shadow their queen in the cruel mistress who
denies their suits. These poems reflect the cultural tensions gener-
ated by Elizabeth’s image as a merciful queen: as individual courtiers,
all three poets desire the queen’s “mercy,” understood as her favor,
forgiveness, and preferment. However, all three poetic sequences—
AstrophilandStella,DeliaandtheComplaintofRosamond,andthe
Amoretti—also display mercy’s detrimental consequences. The fear
that the queen judges according to emotion rather than reason, and
that her mercy makes her, her realm, and her religion vulnerable,
is reflected in the warnings against pity expressed in the poetry of
Sidney, Daniel, and Spenser.
CHAPTER 4
““A GOODLY MUSICKE IN HER

REGIMENT”: ELUSIVE JUSTICE IN
The Merchant of Venice
A
complex set of factors, including conceptions of feminin-
ity, cultural expectations, political expediency, and per-
haps personal inclination, shaped an image of Elizabeth as
an exceptionally merciful queen. This image was constructed in and
by a culture that at times resisted the very clemency that it enshrined.
For example, the love poetry discussed in the previous chapter shows
that a courtier could simultaneously demand the queen’s mercy for
himself and repudiate her clemency when it was extended to oth-
ers. The resistance to mercy was strongest from fervent Protestants
who wanted their queen to take much harsher measures to protect
the realm from Catholicism, whether that meant punishing dissent-
ers more rigorously, seeking out treason more vigorously, or taking
military action on the continent or in Ireland. Originally, the image
of Elizabeth as a clement queen suggested her role as a champion of
transnational Protestantism; eventually, however, that image was at
odds with the actions demanded by her militantly Protestant sub-
jects.Shakespeare’sMerchantofVeniceengagesthesetensionsbystag-
ing a queenly figure, Portia, whose judgments drive the play and in
whom mercy and rigor are apparently reconciled.
The tension between sustaining and resisting the image of the
clement queen is nowhere clearer than in sermons preached before
Elizabeth on the subject of religious enemies. A happy balance
between revered queenly mercy and punitive monarchical justice
was necessary but elusive, according to the complaints voiced in
some of these sermons. In Thomas Drant’s 1570 sermon chastising
Elizabeth for her supposed “mildnesse” in the face of the Northern
Rebellion, the preacher uses an unfavorable comparison between
his queen and the biblical King David to make this point. Besides
contrasting David’s destruction of “Gods enemies” with the queen’s

failure to eradicate religious threats, Drant also claims that David
achieved a balance that Elizabeth lacks: David played a song of judg-
ment and mercy, plucking both strings and creating a harmonious
kingdom as a result. “Our Prince,” says Drant, “hath yet but stricken
the one string, and played upon mercy: but if she would now strike
upon both the stringes, and let her song be of mercy, and judgment,
then there would be a goodly musicke in her regiment.”1 As the ser-
mon proceeds, the definition of “goodly musicke” becomes clear.
Drant wants Elizabeth to render harsh judgment, not against all, but
against her religious adversaries; he assures Queen Elizabeth that it
is “both good policie and good divinitie, to punish Gods enemies,
and her enemies,” though at first he names no specific foes. But after
promising her repeatedly that she can be severe—like Moses, or
Solomon, or David—and yet still be called “a milde, and a mercifull
Prince,” Drant explicitly names Roman Catholics as the enemies of
the queen and of God: “The worst traitors to God, and most rebels
to the Prince, are those Papistes.”2 Drant’s demand that Elizabeth
execute harsher justice against “Gods enemies” is a frequent refrain
during the queen’s reign, but so is the desire for “goodly musicke.”
A harmonious balance between severity and lenity seems, for Drant
and many others, to mean that the queen should maintain her repu-
tation as a mild and merciful prince even as she treats her religious
enemies with great severity.
In this chapter, I will argue that Portia in The Merchant of Venice
is Shakespeare’s most complete and complex representation of the
mercy paradox: the conflicted fantasy that the queen should stand
for mercy, yet enact rigorous punishment, especially against those
whom Drant called “Gods enemies.” Like Spenser’s Mercilla, Portia
simultaneously represents tender mercy and enables harsh justice;
she embodies the demand for “goodly harmony” in that she prevents
violence and vengeance, but she also enables punitive “justice” to be
directed at Shylock, who can be read as one of those enemies against
whom Elizabeth’s preachers warned: a threatening religious “other.”
But after the harsh judgment handed down in the courtroom scene,
Portia’s final, private act is to grant to Bassanio the mercy that was
denied Shylock. In these and other respects, Merchant of Venice, in
its representation of Portia, interrogates the paradox of Elizabethan
mercy.
Though we do not know for certain when Shakespeare wrote
Merchant, t it probably dates from the mid-1590s, some years after the
n The Merchant of Venice
Elusive Justice in 109
particular crises of Elizabeth’s reign that produced the strongest calls

for rigor: the Northern Rebellion (1569) and the trial of Mary Stuart
(1586). However, one could say the same about Book V of The Faerie
Queene; yet Mercilla’s condemnation of Duessa was immediately rec-
ognized as an allegory of Elizabeth’s condemnation of Mary when
the second edition of The Faerie Queene was published in 1596, despite
the fact that Mary Stuart had been executed nearly ten years earlier,
in 1587. I do not suggest that we read Portia’s treatment of Shylock as
an allegory of some particular incident. Rather, I suggest that Portia
is a character who reflects certain aspects of Elizabeth’s representa-
tion that were in tension throughout her reign. Furthermore, debate
about the queen’s response to religious conflict and arguments that
she was too mild were still fully present in the 1590s. As discussed in
Chapter Two, Elizabeth’s Irish campaigns had sparked criticism that
she was inconstant and parsimonious, though Spenser in his View of
thePresentStateofIrelandattributesElizabeth’ssporadicIrishpolicy
to the fact that she is “by nature full of mercy” and cannot bear to
hear of her Irish subjects’ suffering. The queen was also under pres-
sure in the 1590s to take stronger action against Spain: the threat of
a second Spanish armada loomed, motivating the Cadiz expedition
of 1596 with its controversial results. Though she was not subject to
attacks on her clemency as direct as those voiced in the 1570s and
1580s, Elizabeth was still subject to strong criticism for her lack of
severity in responding to these political situations, all of which were
religious conflicts at heart. The Earl of Essex and his faction pas-
sionately urged a strong military response to Spain and vehemently
opposed the possibility of a negotiated peace. Reading Merchant of
Venice in the context of ongoing tensions over Elizabeth’s mercy as
well as the immediate context of Catholic threats from the continent
and Ireland permits a more complex understanding of the way the
play interrogates ideas of Elizabethan justice and mercy.
During the first three acts of the play, Portia has no direct connec-
tion to the struggle between Antonio and Shylock or to the debate
between justice and mercy. But even before Portia steps into the
legal battle over the pound of flesh, Merchant t invites us to see her as
a queen and a judge. The contest to win her hand, for example, seems
to hint at the courtships of Queen Elizabeth and the queen’s difficult
task of choosing the proper husband.3 Portia’s damning judgments
of the suitors derive from national stereotypes: the French lord is
giddy and shallow; the German lord is a drunkard; and the Scottish
lord quarrels with the English lord. These national stereotypes
contribute to the play’s exploration of prejudice; however, they also

might have reminded the original audience of the difficulties the
queen had faced in the past as she tried to make decisions about
potential husbands. Popular objections to Elizabeth’s foreign suit-
ors were the main deterrent to marriage, and these objections often
reflected the era’s religious tensions, as Catholic suitors were seen as
especially problematic.4
Though Elizabeth was long past marriageable age in the 1590s
when Merchant t was composed, Portia as well as other androgynous
heroines of Shakespearean comedy written during this decade
recall legendary aspects of the famous queen. As Leah Marcus has
argued, the sexually composite women of Shakespeare’s romantic
comedies—Rosalind, Viola, Beatrice, and Portia—resonate with the
image of the young Elizabeth: authoritative and powerful but still
potentially a wife and mother. These characters, says Marcus, “offer
a fecund, generative vision of the cross-dressed yet sexually available
virgin—a vision which gains some of its nostalgic energies from the
fact that it comes too late.””5
Portia’s very name conjures an image of a woman who, like Queen
Elizabeth, is exceptional in her virtue, strength, and wisdom—all the
qualities necessary for proper judgment. When Bassanio speaks of
Portia to Antonio in the first scene of the play, he provides this con-
text: “Her name is Portia, nothing undervalu’d / To Cato’s daughter,
Brutus’ Portia” (I.i.165–66). By alluding to Portia, the wife of Brutus,
Bassanio calls to mind Shakespeare’s character inJulius
n Caesar as well
as the source for that play, Plutarch’s Lives. In that work, Portia is
described as “excellently well seen in philosophy, loving her husband
well, and being of noble courage, as she was also wise.”6 Before she
approached her husband to ask him to confide in her, she tested her-
self in order to prove that she was reliable and able to keep a secret by
privately wounding herself, giving herself a “great gash in the thigh”
with a razor. She bore the pain and subsequent fever silently and stoi-
cally; only after proving herself did she demand Brutus’s confidence,
saying, “I confess that a woman’s wit commonly is too weak to keep
a secret safely. But yet, Brutus, good education and the company
of virtuous men have some power to reform the defect of nature.
And for myself, I have this benefit moreover: that I am the daugh-
ter of Cato and wife of Brutus.”7 Like Queen Elizabeth, Plutarch’s
Portia is an exception to the “rule” that women are weak, and she
transcends a woman’s natural infirmities through education and the
company of virtuous men. As Linda Shenk has demonstrated, the
image of Elizabeth as a “learned queen” was powerful and popular,

and suggested not only the queen’s capability but also positioned
her as champion of transnational Protestantism.8 Shakespeare’s
Portia is similarly strong-minded and learned; and when she plays
the “wise young judge” in the courtroom, she asserts Christian hege-
mony against a threatening religious other. Her ability to control
a Venetian courtroom and use the law to undermine the bond and
defeat Shylock sets her apart from other heroines of Shakespearean
comedy. Rosalind, Viola, and Beatrice are all clever, but none is
learned in the way that Portia appears to be. Furthermore, none of
the other heroines of Shakespearean comedy uses a masculine dis-
guise to infiltrate an exclusively male institution such as the court
of law. Rosalind and Viola (and later Imogen) adopt their disguises
for self-preservation, and Rosalind and Viola use their male personae
to pursue a romantic relationship. In all of these cases, we could say
that the characters are reminiscent of the queen in their androgyny:
each dons a masculine role just as she does, arguably, as a reigning
monarch. But only in Portia’s case is the parallel truly apt, because
only Portia inhabits a masculine role in a public space.
Portia’s rhetoric throughout the play is also reminiscent of a strat-
egy that was often employed by Queen Elizabeth: the disarming
claim of feminine weakness coupled with an assertion of monarchi-
cal power that occurs in a number of Elizabeth’s speeches, none so
familiar as the words with which she exhorted the troops in 1588: “I
know I have the body but of a weak and feeble woman, but I have
the heart and stomach of a king and of a king of England too.”9 This
strategy also played a part in Elizabeth’s judgments, as she often
insisted on her naturally clement nature at moments when she exe-
cuted justice most harshly. Portia frequently employs a similar strat-
egy, as, for instance, in her conversation with the Prince of Aragon:
here she is simultaneously majestic and mild, to paraphrase Sir John
Hayward’s description of Queen Elizabeth’s “coupling mildness with
majesty.”10 Portia authoritatively asserts the rules of this contest—
“If you fail, without more speech, my lord, / You must be gone from
hence immediately”—but humbles herself at the same time: “To
these injunctions every one doth swear / That comes to hazard for my
worthless self” (II.ix.7–18). To the audience, privy to Portia’s caustic
remarks about her unwanted suitors, it is clear that the authoritative
Portia is the real Portia; her humility is a guise. But as her failed suit-
ors read aloud the scrolls’ harsh judgments, Portia’s meek pose seems
to relieve her of any responsibility for their fates.
This strategy is most apparent in her speech following Bassanio’s

choice of the correct casket. When he steps forward and asks her
to confirm that he has indeed won her hand in marriage, rather
than offering a definitive judgment, Portia modestly declares her-
self merely “an unlessoned girl, unschooled, unpracticed,” who will
submit herself to the direction of her new husband. Portia’s depic-
tion of her own deficiencies quickly gives way to her assertion of
power: “But now I was the lord / Of this fair mansion, master of my
servants, / Queen o’er myself” (III.ii.159, 167–69). In making a dis-
arming though surely insincere statement of her inadequacies and
claiming that she needs to be directed by Bassanio, Portia follows
a common rhetorical tactic of Elizabeth’s, deploying her supposed
“feminine weakness” in order to make her subsequent assertion of
power more palatable to her audience.11 Portia has in fact declared
herself a queen, though she refers to a queenship over herself, a kind
of self-determination. Bassanio’s response to her speech explicitly
compares Portia to a prince:
Madam, you have bereft me of all words,

Only my blood speaks to you in my veins,
And there is such confusion in my powers,
As, after some oration fairly spoke
By a beloved prince, there doth appear
Among the buzzing pleased multitude,
Where every something, being blent together,
Turns to a wild of nothing, save of joy
Express’d and not express’d. (III.ii. 175–83)
By comparing his internal “confusion” to the response of the “buzz-

ing pleased multitude” after a prince’s oration, Bassanio not only
imagines Portia as a monarch but himself as her subject; thus Portia’s
“queenship,” which in her speech seemed a personal quality, has been
recast in Bassanio’s speech as a public quality, in that he envisions
Portia as a prince who has given a public oration to the multitude.
When Portia dons her masculine disguise and appears as the doc-
tor of law in a Venetian courtroom, she most fully embodies the con-
flicting fantasies of Elizabeth as a judge who can act as both a tender,
merciful queen and rigorous scourge of religious enemies. Portia’s
words and actions project a merciful image even as they simultane-
ously enact a punitive justice. Portia’s is the voice of mercy, respond-
ing to the apparently hopeless case against Antonio with the words,
“Then must the Jew be merciful” (IV.i.182). In her speech to Shylock,
“The quality of mercy is not strained,” she supposedly attempts to

persuade him of mercy’s inherent value. Critics have pointed out
that Portia’s role, interceding with Shylock on behalf of Antonio,
suggests that of the Virgin Mary in the medieval Processus Belial,
in which Mary intervenes with a strict judge—the devil—on behalf
of mercy for a sinner.12 But Portia’s seemingly Marian intercession
should not be read as a sincere attempt to win Shylock’s mercy for
Antonio. Portia speaks of mercy as a kingly y attribute that “becomes /
The throned monarch better than his crown” (IV.i.188–89). Mercy is
“mightiest in the mightiest,” she claims, and monarchs are most god-
like when they practice it:
His sceptre shows the force of temporal power,

The attribute to awe and majesty,
Wherein doth sit the dread and fear of kings;
But mercy is above this sceptred sway,
It is enthroned in the hearts of kings,
It is an attribute to God himself;
And earthly power doth then show likest God’s
When mercy seasons justice. (IV.i.190–97)
Fully half of this famous speech is devoted to an analysis of the role

of mercy in kingship. Portia’s claims about the importance of monar-
chical mercy are completely traditional: mercy is a godlike virtue,
and in practicing mercy, monarchs reveal their true greatness and
reflect their quasi-divine natures. But why should these claims about
monarchical mercy be the focus of Portia’s speech to Shylock? This is
probably not a portrayal of mercy that would appeal to the relatively
powerless Shylock. Rather, the beautiful paean to kingly mercy sug-
gests that Portia shadows Queen Elizabeth; the speech identifies her
with a monarch’s godlike mercy while at the same time alienating
Shylock even further from the demand that he must show mercy to
Antonio.
Portia brilliantly manages this courtroom drama: she succeeds in
reclaiming her money, saving Antonio, defeating Shylock, and entrap-
ping Bassanio. Her position in the Venetian court reflects that of
Queen Elizabeth: asked to render judgment but expected, because of
the traditions that adhere both to femininity and queenship, to pro-
pose mercy. As Drant expressed it in his sermon, Queen Elizabeth
must play both the string of judgment and the string of mercy. Portia
successfully answers both demands by apparently pleading the case
for mercy but actually luring Shylock to reject that mercy and insist
upon the letter of the law by repeatedly assuring him that “lawfully”
he may claim the pound of flesh (IV.i.231–32).
Though the “quality of mercy” speech is very familiar, we often
overlook the last few lines. After concluding her meditation on
mercy, Portia says to Shylock,
I have spoke thus much

To mitigate the justice of thy plea,
Which if thou follow, this strict court of Venice
Must needs give sentence ’gainst the merchant there. (IV.i.202–5)
In essence, Portia is telling Shylock that if he presses his suit against

Antonio, he will win. If her true intention is to convince him to drop
his plea, these lines make little sense; Portia covertly invites Shylock
to continue demanding the pound of flesh even as she overtly dis-
courages him. Both at this moment and later, in her dealings with
Bassanio, Portia employs a tactic that Queen Elizabeth frequently
used, according to the memoir of her godson, Sir John Harington.
He describes the way that the queen would invite, even encourage,
someone’s opinion, and then use that opinion against them later.
Harington quotes Sir Christopher Hatton as saying, “The Queene
did fish for men’s souls and had so sweet a baite, that no one coude
escape hir network.” Harington expands on this idea, describing
how Elizabeth would “cause everie one to open his moste inwarde
thought to her,” sometimes to their consequent regret when she
“disprove[d] to their faces what had been delivered a month before.
Hence she knew every one’s parte, and by thus fishinge, as Hatton
sayed, she caught many poor fish, who little knew what snare was
laid for them.”13 Portia uses a similar strategy with Shylock and, later
in the scene, with Bassanio. In her guise as the doctor of law, Portia
“fishes” for the “inward thought” of both men, which will allow her,
later, to place the blame for the consequences on them rather than
on herself. Shylock, of course, has openly pursued Antonio’s pound
of flesh, but at the end of Portia’s “quality of mercy” speech, when
she promises him success in the court if he demands strict justice,
that is precisely what he continues to do, committing himself more
and more adamantly to the exact letter of the law. In her “quality
of mercy” speech, Portia reminds Shylock that “in the course of jus-
tice, none of us / Should see salvation” if it were not for God’s mercy
(IV.i.199–200). But after Portia goes on to suggest that Venetian
law will inevitably rule against Antonio, Shylock explicitly rejects
that mercy and embraces strict justice: “I crave the law, / The pen-
alty and forfeit of my bond” (IV.i.206–7). Shylock’s demand for pure
law, unseasoned by mercy, is a stance that Portia will use against him
moments later when she grants him exactly what he has demanded,
the letter of the law: flesh but no jot of blood. “The Jew shall have
all justice. Soft, no haste. / He shall have nothing but the penalty”
(IV.i.321–22).
If we assume that Portia comes into the courtroom knowing that
a precise reading of the bond’s language will free Antonio from the
threat of Shylock’s knife, then we can see that much of what she says
and does here serves another purpose: throughout this scene, Portia
repeatedly distances herself from the severity she will eventually
enact. She is willing to take credit for attempts at mitigation: “I have
spoke thus much / To mitigate the justice of thy plea” (IV.i.202–3).
But when she voices a harsh judgment, she attributes that judg-
ment to the law, or the language of the bond, or Shylock’s previous
demands—never herself. By seeming to argue for mercy, she leads
Shylock to insist publicly that he wants only what the bond decrees.
Just as she initially seemed to stand for mercy, Portia seems to stand
for charity when she asks him to have a surgeon nearby before he
cuts the pound of flesh from Antonio. When Shylock reiterates his
reliance on the bond—“Is it so nominated in the bond?”—Portia
responds with, “’Twere good you do so much for charity.” Shylock’s
answer, “I cannot find it, ’tis not in the bond,” further relieves Portia
of responsibility for what she is about to do: rule that Shylock shall
have nothing but the bond he has repeatedly demanded.
Of course, Portia has not finished playing the string of judgment
when she denies Shylock the pound of flesh. Critics who would see her
as a figure of Marian mercy must contend with what Portia does next:
“Tarry, Jew, / The law hath yet another hold on you” (IV.i.346–47).
Surely a Marian figure who stands for mercy and charity would not
persecute her defeated enemy in this way. But even as Portia intro-
duces the new charge that Shylock, an alien, has broken Venetian law
by seeking the life of a citizen, she still manages to distance herself
from the process of Shylock’s destruction.
Unlike Spenser’s Mercilla, Shakespeare’s Portia does not execute
justice between the pages or between the acts: both the dismantling
of Shylock’s claim and the destruction of Shylock himself happen
onstage. But Portia is safely distanced from the final judgment of
Shylock. Not only does she portray Shylock himself as responsible
for the loss of the bond and his principal, but as soon as Portia raises
the issue of Shylock’s supposed violation of the law of Venice, the

actual decisions about Shylock’s money, life, and religion are placed
in the hands of the Duke and Antonio. According to Portia, the law
of Venice has a hold on Shylock and his life “lies in the mercy / Of
the Duke only, ’gainst all other voice” (IV.i.355–56). The Duke spares
Shylock’s life but takes his money and goods, which leads Shylock to
cry, “Nay, take my life and all, pardon not that: / You take my house
when you do take the prop / That doth sustain my house” (IV.i.374–76).
And it is Antonio who demands that Shylock convert to Christianity
under the threat of losing even more of his money and property, and
the Duke who adds a renewed threat of death to Antonio’s demand
that Shylock renounce his religion. Portia has given the Duke and
Antonio the tools and the instructions to dismantle the “alien threat,”
but her hands, one might argue, remain clean.
We might recall the strange history of the execution of Mary
Stuart and find a parallel: Elizabeth in that case signed the death
warrant and then apparently tried to withhold it. She claimed that
the warrant had been dispatched without her approval, and the story
of her rage when she learned about Mary’s execution is legendary.
What no one knows is the extent to which Elizabeth’s disavowal of
knowledge or complicity was sincere. When she signed Mary’s death
warrant, Elizabeth provided her councilors with the tool they needed
to destroy Mary, but by claiming that she never agreed to dispatch
the warrant, Elizabeth tried to deny responsibility for that execu-
tion. What Portia does in Act IV of Merchant t is similar, in that she
provides the tool to eradicate a man who might be seen as a threat
to the Venetian state without taking direct action against him. If
Elizabeth was concerned about losing her reputation for “mildnesse,”
then it would have been important for writers to tread carefully when
depicting any rendering of judgment by the queen. Thus Spenser’s
Mercilla condemns Duessa between the cantos; and thus Portia her-
self provides only the means by which to destroy Shylock, leaving the
actual destruction to the Duke and Antonio.
In this ability to divest herself of responsibility for harsh actions,
Portia resembles one of Shakespeare’s most memorable monarchs,
Henry V. Both Henry and Portia use rigor and mercy as aspects of a
performance designed to achieve their ends while avoiding accusa-
tions of severity. Many critics have read Shakespeare’s Henry IV and
Henry V as interrogations of political authority, and as part of that
interrogation, the plays explore the uses of theatricality. Stephen
Greenblatt comments that Henry V’s insistent reminders of its own
theatricality—such as the Prologue’s demand that the spectators use

their own imaginary powers to construct the king and his wars—
are a reflection of Elizabeth’s mode of power, which depends on the
engagement of spectators in a theatrical display.14 Just so, the theatri-
cal displays of kingly mercy and rigor in Henry V generate the same
sort of tension between image and action described in this book. The
play dramatizes the promotion of an image—Henry V as a merciful
Christian monarch—alongside harsh and often violent actions that
contradict that image. The critical history of Henry V suggests this
tension: some have regarded Henry as the “mirror of all Christian
kings” praised by the Chorus, while others see him as a Machiavellian
politician embarking on an unjust war in order to solidify his own
power. Henry’s own words and actions can produce these divided
reactions, and as Gunter Walch has shown, the Chorus’s mytholo-
gizing of Henry often conflicts with what is actually represented
on stage, drawing the audience’s attention to the actual process of
representation; thus Shakespeare in Henry V explores the process by
which representations of power serve an ideological function.15
Henry’s self-representation, often achieved theatrically, serves
to promulgate the image that many critics accept, that of the ideal
Christian king. It is true that Henry does not always paint himself
as exceptionally merciful, as Queen Elizabeth did; however, in a play
that depicts the invasion of France, the sentencing to death of trai-
tors and criminals, an assault on a city, and a bloody battle, the man
responsible for all of these actions consistently denies responsibil-
ity and makes others answerable for his decisions. Henry uses stage
management and rhetoric so that the absence of mercy is always
attributed to someone else. In the second scene of the play, Henry
seeks justification for his claim of the throne of France by ceremoni-
ously asking the Archbishop—in front of the court—to “justly and
religiously unfold / Why the law Salique, that they have in France, /
Or should, or should not, bar us in our claim” (I.ii.10–12). Henry also
emphasizes the importance of an honest answer, reminding everyone
of the violence and bloodshed that will result from a war with France.
“Take heed how you impawn our person, / How you awake our sleep-
ing sword of war,” says Henry; and he claims that he will hear what-
ever the Archbishop tells him “and believe in heart, / That what you
speak is in your conscience wash’d / As pure as sin with baptism”
(I.ii.21–22 and 30–32). This demand for sincerity serves to establish
the persona that Henry will claim a moment later when confront-
ing the Dauphin’s messenger: “We are no tyrant, but a Christian
king, / Unto whose grace our passion is as subject / As is our wretches

fett’red in our prisons” (I.ii.241–43). Henry claims that his “sleeping
sword” is not roused by passion, as a tyrant’s might be; only a righteous
moral justification will compel his rigor. But the audience knows that
Henry is well aware of Canterbury’s ulterior motive for promoting
war with France, a fact that calls into question Henry’s supposedly
heartfelt belief in Canterbury’s sincerity. In the first scene, we learn
that the Archbishop has offered Henry what is in essence a bribe,
to obtain his support for the Church in opposition to a bill now in
Parliament. The bribe concerns the invasion of France: “to give a
greater sum” of church money than ever offered to a monarch before,
for use “in regard of causes now at hand, /. . . . As touching France”
(I.i.77–79). Though the private conversation between the bishops
in the first scene does not unequivocally establish that Henry has
already decided to invade France, it does suggest that plans may have
gone farther than the following public scene suggests they have.
When Henry asks the Archbishop publicly if he can “with right and
conscience” claim the French throne, the Archbishop answers, “The
sin upon my head, dread sovereign!” (I.ii.96–97). Surely this answer is
exactly what Henry has been seeking. As R. Scott Fraser says, “The
king has . . . stage-managed a scene in which the justification for the
war is put on another’s head.”16 Henry casts himself as righteous by
assuring that the Archbishop publicly accepts responsibility for the
justice of the war, much as Portia leads Shylock to say, “My deeds upon
my head!” (IV.i.206). Shylock is responding to Portia’s claim that we
ought to show mercy to others because we expect and need God’s
mercy: “We do pray for mercy, / And that same prayer doth teach us
all to render / The deeds of mercy” (IV.i.200–2). When Shylock asserts
that he will bear all responsibility for the justice or injustice of his
deeds, without reference to mercy, he has (arguably) publicly absolved
Portia of responsibility for the harsh judgment he will receive.
Henry places responsibility for the impending war not only upon
Canterbury but also upon the French themselves, specifically the
Dauphin. After he is insulted by the Dauphin’s gift of tennis balls,
Henry takes the opportunity to shift the responsibility for the
war’s bloodshed away from himself and onto the French prince. The
Dauphin’s joke will make “thousands weep” as wives lose their hus-
bands and mothers lose their sons:
And tell the pleasant prince this mock of his

Hath turn’d his balls to gun-stones, and his soul
Shall stand sore charged for the wasteful vengeance

That shall fly with them. (I.ii.281–84)
Henry acknowledges that he will be vengeful—as he says, “I am com-

ing on / To venge me as I may” (I.ii.291–92). But, according to this
speech, the Dauphin’s soul will bear the responsibility for Henry’s
violent vengeance and its effects on the French people.
Henry’s speech to the citizens of Harfleur is similar: it simultane-
ously threatens and disclaims cruelty. Henry conjures up a horrible
vision of rape, pillage, and savagery, telling the citizens that unless
they surrender, he will unleash his soldiers to prey upon their daugh-
ters, bludgeon the elderly, and spit babies on pikes. In this extremely
theatrical speech, Henry explicitly rejects mercy: “The gates of
mercy shall be all shut up” (III.iii.10). Nevertheless, he claims that,
if his soldiers ravage the city, the responsibility will lie with the citi-
zens themselves; in reality, it is they who will have rejected mercy:
“Therefore, you men of Harflew, / Take pity of your town and of
your people” (III.iii.27–28). In this scene, Henry uses rhetoric alone
to claim that someone else, not he, lacks mercy. An even more theat- t
rical method of achieving the same end occurs when Henry discov- v
ers and condemns the traitors Cambridge, Scroop, and Grey. Just as,
in Act I, Henry characterized the Dauphin as responsible for a war
that Henry himself had already decided to undertake, here he sets a
scene and manipulates events, not in order to reach a decision about
the fate of the three traitors, but in order to place the responsibil-
ity for his unmerciful response on them and remove it from himself.
Just as Portia leads Shylock to reject mercy, so also Henry manipu-
lates Cambridge, Scroop, and Grey to recommend against mercy in
the case of a man who railed against the king. Having led them to
commit themselves to harsh punishment in a case where the king’s
security is threatened, he is able to make them, rather than himself,
responsible for their own death sentences. When the three lords beg
mercy, Henry responds, “The mercy that was quick in us but late, /
By your own counsel is suppress’d and kill’d. / You must not dare (for
shame) to talk of mercy” (II.ii.79–81). Henry has again staged a scene
that allows him to project the responsibility for harsh or unmerciful
actions onto others. Like Shakespeare’s Henry, Portia ultimately can
place the blame for her judgment elsewhere.
Portia and King Henry are similar in their aims and methods, tak- k
ing a harsh course of action but projecting the responsibility for that
harshness onto others. But neither Portia nor any avatar of Queen
Elizabeth is likely to claim openly the role of punisher or avenger,

as King Henry does. One of the primary distinctions between rep-
resentations of kingly and queenly power lies in this: Henry plays
the role of avenger—of his honor which has been insulted by the
Dauphin and the French refusal to recognize his right to the throne.
He plays the role of attacking warrior—and he makes it clear that
this is indeed a theatrical role in the speech wherein he explains to
his soldiers how to act the warrior’s part. Henry plays the role of puni-
tive judge when he sentences the three traitors to death or endorses
the execution of his old friend Bardolph. Queens are traditionally
expected to play a different role. Portia’s first act in the courtroom,
memorialized by a powerful and beautiful speech, is to adopt the tra-
ditional queenly role of intercessor. The echo of Marian intercession
that critics have noted in Portia’s “quality of mercy” speech could
just as well be described as an echo of medieval queenship, since the
queen’s conventional posture of intercession derives from the identi-
fication of earthly queens with Mary, the queen of heaven in medi-
eval Christian tradition.
The Case of Roderigo Lopez

Shylock is a religious “other” and an alien; Portia’s claim that he is
now vulnerable to prosecution under the law of Venice is based on
his status as a foreigner who has threatened the life of a citizen. Jews
were no particular threat to Elizabeth’s throne, though the recent
case of Roderigo Lopez, Elizabeth’s personal physician who was
found guilty of plotting to murder her, may have inspired a wave of
anti-Semitism, as some have argued. Many critics have read Merchant
as a commentary on or reflection of the Lopez case, emphasizing
Lopez’s Jewish heritage and the anti-Semitism that was certainly
present in the proceedings against him. That Lopez was a Jew who
had converted to Christianity obviously hurt his credibility with
many of the English: like Shylock, Lopez is often referred to as “the
Jew” by those who wrote about him.17 The laughter that greeted his
final words, when he protested that he loved Queen Elizabeth as he
loved his lord and savior Jesus Christ, is a famous aspect of his story.
Shakespeare may well have had this anti-Semitism in mind when
he wrote Merchant. t But it has also been argued that we should read
Shylock as a representative not of Judaism specifically but of the reli-
gious “other,” and specifically as an emblem of Roman Catholicism.18
We can identify an even more precise context when we remember
that the accusations against Lopez situated him as an agent of Spain,

plotting to assassinate Queen Elizabeth. To the English public, the
Lopez case was presented as one strand in a web of Catholic intrigue
against the Elizabethan state: David Katz comments that the evi-
dence put before the jury during Lopez’s trial linked his conspiracy
with another alleged plot by Irish Jesuits that was uncovered at the
sametime.19Andina1594publication,ATrueReportofSondryHorrible
Conspiracies, the Lopez Plot is included with those of Catholic con-
spirators in order to “place greater emphasis on the complicity of
Philip II and the Roman Catholics.”20
The case of Dr. Lopez also displayed again the queen’s reluctance
to punish, and entailed a familiar conflict between the queen and
some of her councilors, Essex especially, who was the moving force
in Lopez’s arrest and interrogation. Lopez was actually under house
arrest at Essex House in January 1593/94 when the Earl had an audi-
ence with the queen in which she called him “a rash and temerarious
youth” and generally lambasted Essex for accusing against her physi-
cian.21 It is still unclear whether the queen was ever completely per-
suaded of Lopez’s guilt, though even Essex’s enemies at court seem
to have been convinced after the trial in February 1593/94.22 She did
eventually sign his death warrant, but after his death, she allowed his
widow to retain his property, a merciful act that may have signaled
the queen’s continuing doubt about whether Lopez had received jus-
tice. Her reluctance to sign the death warrant may also have reflected
her doubts. The reason given for Elizabeth’s delay is unknown,
though an account by Bishop Goodman, who was a child at the time
of the Lopez affair, claims that Elizabeth had secretly corresponded
with Lopez and promised him that he would eventually be freed.23
Clearly, too, the procrastination angered many of Elizabeth’s coun-
cilors, who complained that the people were disgruntled and wanted
to see the execution occur. Lopez himself is supposed to have said,
when asked about the delay, that “he did appeal to the Queen’s own
knowledge and goodness for the acquitting of him.”24 We will never
know exactly what transpired, but the story does sound familiar: as
she did in the cases of Norfolk and Mary Stuart, Elizabeth hesitated
to authorize a harsh punishment and was criticized for it. All three
were cases in which the accused person embodied a threat to estab-
lished religion.
If the case of Roderigo Lopez served as an inspiration for Merchant
of Venice, anti-Semitism is only one of the issues that the case raises
and the play engages. The Lopez affair foregrounds the question
of Elizabeth’s clemency and the complaint that she is inadequately

cautious and punitive when it comes to dealing with threats to her
throne. As the summary of evidence against Lopez states, the phy- y
sician was “not suspected, especially by her, who never fears her
enemies nor suspects her servants.”25 But the arrest, trial, and death
of Dr. Lopez also should be understood in the context of a larger
struggle over England’s policy toward Spain. Paul Hammer offers
a detailed and suggestive account of Essex’s handling of the Lopez
affair: the Earl’s prosecution of Lopez was the incident that “truly
signalled Essex’s arrival as a politician whose views carried genuine
weight with Elizabeth and his colleagues,” according to Hammer,
who suggests that Essex may have “projected” this plot in order to
play the starring role in its discovery and punishment.26 The queen
and Burghley initially ridiculed Essex for his accusation of treason
against Lopez, possibly because they were well aware of Lopez’s
dealings with the Spanish and believed Essex’s “revelation” to be old
news about an affair in which Lopez had tricked the Spanish out of
money. Essex returned days later and raised the stakes, now accusing
Lopez of having plotted against the queen’s life. This was a charge
that could not be ignored, and Hammer describes Essex’s relentless
pursuit of evidence in the case: he interrogated the old physician and
met with other councilors almost daily through February and March
1593/94, eventually obtaining enough evidence to convict Lopez.
Hammer suggests that Essex “worked very hard to turn this political
victory into a public triumph,” but the triumph was not solely one of
personal ambition.27 Essex used the Lopez affair to secure his posi-
tion at court and shape his public image as an important political
force; but the conviction of Lopez on charges that he received money
from Spain to assassinate Elizabeth also scuttled plans for renewed
peace talks with Spain, plans that Essex opposed.
Understanding the accusations against Lopez as part of an effort
to sway public opinion against peace with Spain introduces a new
context in which to read Merchant of Venice and its engagement with
the image of Queen Elizabeth. Essex competed with other council-
ors and with Elizabeth herself throughout the 1590s as he sought to
control England’s foreign policy and assure his own preeminence at
court. He used the spectacles of Elizabethan chivalry to promote
himself as the exemplar of masculine aristocratic virtue, as ana-
lyzed by Richard McCoy in The Rites of Knightood.28 Paul Hammer
details how Essex courted public approval and also relentlessly
“tried to mobilize public support for aggressive war policies which
the queen disliked and his rivals opposed.”29 After the Cadiz expe-
dition of 1596, Essex pressured the queen into using the returning
army to attack Calais, then held by the Spanish. Essex embarked on
what Hammer calls “the Elizabethan equivalent of a multi-media
campaign” to achieve these goals, a campaign that was underway
at precisely the time Shakespeare was writing Merchant. t There is
probably an allusion to the Cadiz expedition in the opening scene
of Merchant, t when Salerio refers to the “wealthy Andrew” as he dis-
cusses Antonio’s fears for his merchant ships. The St. Andrew (San
Andres) was one of the Spanish galleons captured in this expedi-
tion. Merchant t appeared in the Stationers’ Register in July 1598, so it
was composed between the summer of 1596 and July 1598.30 Among
Essex’s self-promotions during the years 1596–98 was an account of
the capture of Cadiz that glorified his role; when this pamphlet, the
“True Relacion,” was banned from publication, it was instead circu-
lated in manuscript, as were copies of a letter Essex had earlier sent
to the Privy Council in which he announced his plan to ignore the
queen’s instructions of a limited scope for the Cadiz expedition.31 In
1597, Essex presented a large psalter, booty from the Cadiz raid, to
King’s College, Cambridge, where it was publicly displayed with a
Latin dedication that praised Essex as a Hercules.32 In 1598, Essex
wrote his Apologie, framed as a letter to Sir Francis Bacon, defending
himself against charges of warmongering. Though this letter was not
published until later, it circulated in manuscript for years. One theme
in these various representations is the characterization of Essex as a
warlike hero—a Hercules—whose self-sacrifice and worldly wisdom
stands opposed to the foolish effeminacy of those who seek peace
with Spain.
Essex never directly accuses the queen of naively pitying Lopez,
nor does he bluntly characterize her pacific Spanish policies as
effeminate. But all of this is implied in the contrasting image of him-
self that he promotes: an aristocratic war hero, actively uncovering
and punishing Catholic treason, a Hercules whose exploits bring
to England an honor that has been lacking. Essex’s self-promotion
includes strong hints of the contrast between himself and his queen,
as well as the message that his valor and virtues should prevail for the
good of England and the queen herself. In his Apologie, a vehement
argument against peace with Spain, Essex repeatedly warns against
the appearance of weakness: “Now if we shew our selves so weake,
that wee follow not the advantage we have, we shall hereafter be
thought so weak, as we may have any condicions bee inforced upon
us.”33 According to Essex, Spain is now militarily and financially

crippled; it is the perfect moment for England to seize the advan-
tage. To display forbearance rather than force would be folly: “Wee
give the enimy as good as he can desire, in forbearing him when hee
is weakest, and letting goe our advantage, when it is greatest, wee
shew, that nothing can draw us to warre, if wee may have peace.”34 To
strike while the enemy is weak strengthens England; to forbear is to
be weak in the face of “the chiefe enimy of our religion.”35 But Essex
reveals his belief that England already has a reputation for weakness
when he compares the ten years since the 1588 Armada attack to the
ten-year siege of Troy: “They have prepared a Sinons horse, which
cannot enter if we cast not downe our walles.” But Essex goes on to
say that “we are thought more credulous then the Trojans were.”36
Never does he directly blame any of this on the queen, though he
recounts times when the queen restrained his desired scope of mili-
tary action or refused his proposals. But he implies that forbearance
toward Spain has cost England its honor: “And is this such a degen-
erate age, as we shall not be able to defend England? No, no, there
is some seede yet left of the auncient virtue.”37 Though Essex wrote
his Apologie four years after Roderigo Lopez’s trial and execution,
in this letter he actually alludes to the Lopez affair, making it part
of his argument against peace negotiations with Spain. The Lopez
case apparently still had enough currency and impact to be cited
as a reminder of Spanish perfidy but also, by implication, evidence
that Essex’s aggressive stance had been successful at rooting out real
threats to the queen and the English nation. Forbearance and a desire
for peace, qualities for which Elizabeth is hailed, are denigrated by
Essex as dishonorable and potentially disastrous.
ThusthecaseofRoderigoLopezthatinspiredMerchantofVenice
gestures toward more than anti-Semitism. It invokes the threat
posed by Catholic Spain, the debate over peace negotiations with
Spain, and implicitly a struggle for dominance between Essex and
his queen. The Lopez affair became one of many weapons in the
Earl of Essex’s propaganda war against the Elizabethan regime.
Paul Hammer points out that Essex’s appeals to public opinion can
be understood as contributing to the growth of a public sphere in
Elizabethan England. As I have argued, the queen’s gender plays
a role in this development: traditional ideas about woman’s nature
allowed those who would mobilize public opinion against her policies
to suggest that she was dominated by the common deficiencies of her
sex, such as excessive emotion, fearfulness, or inconstancy. Essex’s
campaign to sway public opinion insinuates two competing, and

implicitly gendered, images: Essex the bold and active warrior versus
Elizabeth the pacific and passive queen. Shakespeare’s portrayal of
Henry V reflects the first image: a warrior whose audacious attack
on his country’s enemy demonstrates England’s honor. By contrast,
the portrayal of Portia responds to the conflict between these two
images. In Portia, Shakespeare imaginatively engages two competing
versions of the ideal ruler and creates a figure simultaneously puni-
tive and merciful. She takes action against a religious other with the
severity and aggression that Essex wished England to employ against
Catholic Spain, but rather than being openly vengeful and harsh, she
distances herself from the destruction of Shylock and acts through
others. Further, she still projects the traditional, merciful image that
was desirable in so many ways to Elizabeth and her subjects.
The question of the queen’s relationship to a masculine corporate
body, such as her Privy Council or Parliament, is also raised by the
Lopezaffairandengagedin MerchantofVenice. Obviously,theques-
tion of peace or war with Spain was one that divided her councilors and
pitted her (and Burghley) against Essex. When she protested Lopez’s
innocence, Elizabeth hotly opposed Essex and his allies; she was also
in conflict with the special commissioners who had tried Lopez when
she would not sign the death warrant, despite their requests. She stood
in a similarly oppositional position with her Parliaments and privy
councilors when she vacillated over the prosecution and execution of
Mary. Spenser captures this conflict in his allegory of Mary Stuart’s
trial; as discussed in Chapter Two, his Elizabeth-avatar, Mercilla, is
positioned between the figure of Duessa, representing Mary, and a
host of male figures, emblematic of the queen’s godly councilors call-
ing for severe justice. Spenser valorizes the idea of mixed monarchy
in the Mercilla episode, as the queen of mercy appears to forego her
prerogative and accede to the advice of the men who guide her. Portia
is similarly situated: like Mercilla, she stands between a religious
“other” and a masculine, corporate body that argues against that
“other.” Mercilla’s councilors argue for the punishment of Duessa;
Antonio’s male cohort urges the dismissal of Shylock’s claim against
Antonio. Portia may appear, initially, to defend Shylock’s claim
against the importuning of the men in the courtroom, just as Mercilla
seems initially to resist the demand for Duessa’s death sentence. But
like Mercilla, ultimately Portia enacts their will; unlike Mercilla,
Portia goes much farther than anyone expects when she contends
that Shylock has actually committed a capital crime. Though Portia
ultimately does what the men in the courtroom want her to do, she
never appears to heed their advice or “take counsel” from them or
from anyone else; nevertheless, these Christian men witness not only
her successful defense of their co-religionist; they also see her lay the
groundwork for the destruction of their religious enemy. Spenser may
be allegorizing his ideal vision of queenship when he depicts Mercilla
forgoing her own personal inclinations and acceding to the wishes
of her godly councilors. Shakespeare dramatizes a powerful woman
who rejects masculine guidance but ultimately achieves even more
than these men have asked. As an avatar of Elizabeth, Portia main-
tains the image not only of the queen’s mercy but also of her sover-
eignty, but at the same time, accedes to the desires of the masculine
cohort she seems initially to oppose.
When Antonio’s friends demand that Shylock’s suit be over-
turned, Portia tells them flatly that they are wrong: “Why, this bond
is forfeit, / And lawfully by this the Jew may claim / A pound of flesh”
(IV.i.230–32). Though Portia’s dismissal of masculine advice and
ability to render her own judgment might suggest an assertion of the
value of individual prerogative, ironically Portia speaks against
the claim of prerogative in the course of the scene. Bassanio asks
the Duke to intervene in terms that suggest the role of Chancery,
a court of equity that was sometimes characterized as representing
the prerogative of the ruler to take into account the particulars of
an individual case and mitigate the harshness of the law, if appropri-
ate. Elizabethan England witnessed a conflict between common law
courts and Chancery, the court most strongly associated with royal
prerogative. As several critics have noted, this conflict is raised in
Merchant’s ’ courtroom scene when Bassanio says to the Duke, “And I
beseech you, / Wrest once the law to your authority: / To do a great
right, do a little wrong” (IV.i.214–16).38 Portia’s response upholds the
primacy of the law and appears to reject prerogative:
It must not be, there is no power in Venice

Can alter a decree established.
‘Twill be recorded for a precedent,
And many an error by the same example
Will rush into the state. It cannot be. (IV.i.218–22)
Portia insists that there is no power in Venice higher than the law; the
Duke’s prerogative cannot change the law. If we understand Portia
as figuring Elizabeth, this assertion becomes quite intriguing: the
ruler valorizes common law above her own prerogative. Just as Portia
advocates mercy yet practices rigor, she advocates the precedence of
law yet undermines the law. The debate between equity and law is
quickly raised, quickly dropped, and ultimately rendered pointless
by Portia’s handling of the matter: she will not overturn the law;
rather, she will subvert the law by reading the bond to an absurdly
literal degree, thus producing a loophole in the law. Put simply, she
maintains the letter of the law but violates its spirit, undermining
her own assertion that she will uphold the “intent and purpose of the
law” and award Shylock the pound of flesh (IV.i.247).
Portia’s words and actions in the courtroom scene suggest the ten-
sions generated by the contradictory demands on Queen Elizabeth.
Portia upholds and subverts the law. She stands for mercy and enacts
rigor. She opposes and accedes to the demands of a male assembly.
The final scene of the play continues this engagement with the para-
doxical attitudes toward the merciful queen by staging a moment
of generous forgiveness. In the courtroom scene of Act IV, even as
Portia settled one conflict she instigated another by demanding from
Bassanio the very ring she placed on his finger in Act III. Portia’s
treatment of Bassanio corresponds even more closely to the tactic
described by Harington: as the doctor of law, she urges Bassanio
to give her the ring; when he agrees, he has opened himself to the
reproaches she will aim at him later.
After hearing her husband prefer his friend’s life to hers—when
he announces that he would sacrifice his wife in order to deliver
Antonio—she tests a loyalty that is now in doubt (IV.i.282–87).
Arguably she proves her new husband disloyal when, in her disguise
as Balthazar, she manages to obtain the ring that he swore never to
give away. The end off Merchant t dramatizes the resolution of this sec-
ond conflict, a resolution permitted by Portia’s decision to forgive
her errant husband rather than treat him harshly, as she did Shylock.
Though Portia forgives Bassanio, she uses his indiscretion (which he
committed at her own insistence, when she demanded the ring in her
disguise as Balthazar) to establish her dominance over him. When
she gave him the ring in Act III, she declared that her house, her ser-
vants, and herself were all bestowed upon him along with the ring:
I give them with this ring,

Which when you part from, lose, or give away,
Let it presage the ruin of your love,
And be my vantage to exclaim on you. (III.ii.171–74)
Whether or not Bassanio’s decision to part with the ring foretells

the ruin of their love, we cannot know, but certainly Portia has
secured her “vantage” by playing a part and manipulating Bassanio.
“Exclaim” on Bassanio she certainly does when the subject of the
ring is discussed in the final scene, chastising him for failing to rec-
ognize the “virtue” of the ring and the “worthiness” of she who gave
it (V.i.199–200). As critics have recognized, Portia asserts not only
her own worth and honor in this scene, she also asserts control.39
She lays claim to her own body and her own honor when she tells
Bassanio, in a jest the audience understands, that she’ll have the doc-
tor of law for her bedfellow, swearing it “by mine honor, which is yet
my own” (V.i.232).
But Portia’s bountiful forgiveness is registered in this final scene
just as forcefully as is her dominance. After Bassanio begs several times
for pardon, Portia finally grants it when Antonio offers his own soul
as the collateral that will guarantee Bassanio’s faith: “I dare be bound
again, / My soul upon the forfeit, that your lord / Will never more
break faith advisedly” (V.i.251–53). Portia’s forgiveness binds Bassanio
to her even more closely, and draws her rival Antonio into the bond
as well. Monarchs were often advised to be merciful in order to win
their subjects’ love and create a sense of obligation, thus strengthen-
ing their own position. In the final scene of Merchant, t the powerful
Portia, having punished Shylock, allows those in her personal orbit to
experience her clemency, thus putting them in her debt. She has chal-
lenged the bond between Bassanio and Antonio, which was strength-
ened by Antonio’s willingness to sacrifice himself for Bassanio, so
that Bassanio would always be bound to Antonio when he recalled
his friend’s generosity. By saving Antonio from Shylock and forgiving
Bassanio for parting with the ring, Portia has trumped Antonio and
created an even stronger bond of obligation between both men and
herself. Portia is represented as a bountiful nurse and nourisher of her
people in the play’s last scene. Bestowing on Lorenzo and Jessica the
deed of gift from Shylock and mysteriously in possession of news that
three of Antonio’s argosies have after all come safe to harbor, Portia
feeds everyone, a point emphasized in the final line spoken to her in
the play when Lorenzo exclaims that she “drop[s] manna in the way /
Of starved people” (V.i.294–95). By comparing Portia to Yahweh as
he preserved his chosen people, Lorenzo invokes the idea of Queen
Elizabeth as protector and nurse of the Church of England.
The figure of Portia embodies a number of contradictions. She
is not only a character who advocates and practices mercy, but also
one who enacts severe punishment. She is both married and a virgin;
both humble and proud; both feminine and masculine—all contra-
dictions found in the complex representations of Queen Elizabeth.
In a brief moment near the opening of Act V, Portia and Nerissa
approach the house after having been on their secret mission in the
courtroom of Venice. In this scene, Shakespeare repeatedly draws
our attention to the moon—that emblem of inconstancy and symbol
of Queen Elizabeth’s chastity. The first line of this scene is Lorenzo’s
assertion that “the moon shines bright” (V.i.1). Ninety lines later, as
Portia and Nerissa, approaching the house, spy the candle burning
in the window, Nerissa says that when n the moon shone brightly, they
couldn’t see the candle. A few minutes later Gratiano swears “by
yonder moon” that he gave his ring to the judge’s clerk (V.i.142). The
moon shines, then it doesn’t, then it does. But Portia’s comment may
hold the key to interpreting this inconstant moon’s meaning: she
invokes the myth of Endymion with her line, “The moon sleeps with
Endymion, / And would not be awak’d” (V.i.109–10). Though there
are various versions of the Endymion story, the one most contempo-
rarytoMerchant tisLyly’sEndymion,aplaywellknowntoShakespeare,
and a play that was performed before the queen and openly represents
her as Cynthia. At this moment in Shakespeare’s play, we might hear
the suggestion, through the reference to Endymion and the moon,
that Portia, like Lyly’s Cynthia, shadows the queen. As Leah Marcus
has suggested, the identification of a dramatic character with Queen
Elizabeth could easily have been intensified during performance if
the actor imitated the inflections and mannerisms of the queen. 40
Portia goes on to reinforce the possibility when she says, “A substi-
tute shines brightly as a king” (V.i.94).
Not only does Lyly’s play Endymion n represent Queen Elizabeth in
the figure of Cynthia, but it has also been interpreted as a commen-
tary on her relationship to Catholics in her realm. The play is about
Endymion’s unrequited love for Cynthia, but it also dramatizes a
conflict between Cynthia and a lady-in-waiting named Tellus who
vies for Endymion’s love. Tellus recalls some aspects of Mary Stuart:
a rival to Cynthia, she is also unscrupulous in contrast to Cynthia’s
virtue. In a situation reminiscent of Mary’s, Tellus is imprisoned
and manages to captivate her jailer, Corsites. At the end of the play,
Cynthia rescues Endymion from a forty-year sleep caused by the sor-
ceress Dipsas at Tellus’s request. Tellus’s crimes are revealed, but she
is penitent and Cynthia forgiving. David Bevington reads Endymion
as a plea for tolerance for Catholics, and both Bevington and John
Staines in his more recent work on the play identify the figure of
Tellus as Mary Queen of Scots.41 Staines argues that pity is Cynthia’s
distinguishing feature, citing her assertion, “It shall never be said
that Cynthia, whose mercy and goodness filleth the heavens with
joys and the world with marvels, will suffer either Endymion or any
to perish if he may be protected” (III.i.60–63). Staines emphasizes
the phrase “Endymion or any” to highlight the claim that Cynthia’s
mercy extends to everyone. Truly, Cynthia does take mercy on her
rival Tellus at the end of the play, leading Staines to read Endymion
n as
a wish fulfillment wherein Elizabeth’s pity can transform an enemy
into an ally and restore the commonwealth.
I would add to this compelling reading the fact that Cynthia’s
clemency, though praised fervently in the course of the play, is not
universally endorsed. Lyly portrays Elizabeth as supremely, divinely
merciful, and he portrays mercy as an effective means of reconcili-
ation and healing. But he also voices the other view of Elizabeth’s
mercy: that it endangers her and the commonwealth. For instance,
Cynthia’s courtiers complain about her habitually merciful judg-
ments as they anticipate how she will treat Tellus once she learns that
Tellus is ultimately responsible for Endymion’s forty-year sleep. “I
marvel what Cynthia will determine in this cause,” muses Panelion.
“I fear as in all causes,” says Zontes, “hear of it in justice and then
judge of it in mercy. For how can it be that she that is unwilling to
punish her deadliest foes with disgrace will revenge injuries of her
train with death?” (V.iii.9–13). A less blunt but more elaborate asser-
tion of the danger caused by Elizabeth’s mercy occurs in Endymion’s
dream. This vision, which he recounts to Cynthia, includes a psy- y
chomachia of sorts in which a beautiful lady is torn between malice
and pity. Once she chooses mercy, she becomes ravishingly beautiful
yet greatly endangered. Endymion describes her thus at the moment
when “mercy overcame anger”: “There appeared in her heavenly face
such a divine majesty, mingled with a sweet mildness, that I was
ravished with the sight above measure” (V.i.105–8). The description
obviously refers flatteringly to Queen Elizabeth, using the familiar
idea of her majesty mixed with mildness; the interesting thing is that
this same lady was described at the beginning of Endymion’s dream
as threatening, angry, “passing fair but very mischievous” (V.i.88).
Surely her choice of mercy over anger is a positive one, since when
mercy triumphs, the lady’s “mischief” is transformed into majesty.
Yet, in the next vision recounted by Endymion, Cynthia is threat-
ened by a multitude of enemies, including barking wolves, and
allegorical figures of Treachery, Ingratitude, and Envy. As do many

Elizabethan writers, Lyly engages the paradox of Elizabeth’s clem-
ency, invoking both the beautiful image of a merciful queen and the
anxiety inspired by her acts of mercy.
Though the representation of Queen Elizabeth in Endymion n is at
times ambiguous, and her mercy inspires both devotion and anxi-
ety, Endymion’s great opening speech in celebration of his Cynthia
offers a way of understanding some of these contradictions. Portia
seems to echo this speech when she reflects on the moon at the start
of Act V. Endymion says that his queen may be labeled wavering
and inconstant by malicious men and fools, but that Cynthia, the
moon, displays her greatest virtue in the constancy with which she
changes. She “waxeth young again” even at the moment when she is
in “the pride of her beauty and latter minute of her age” (I.i.57–59).
Her perfection is that of the seasons: “Flowers in their buds are
nothing worth till they be blown, nor blossoms accounted till they
be ripe fruit; and shall we then say that they be changeable for that
they grow from seeds to leaves, from leaves to buds, from buds to
their perfection?” (I.i.45–50). This is very similar to Portia’s medita-
tion as she approaches her home and thinks about the difference the
right moment makes to our understanding and valuation of things.
The “crow doth sing as sweetly as the lark” if it is heard alone in the
silence of the night. “How many things by season season’d are / To
their right praise and true perfection!” (V.i.102–8).
Like Cynthia in Endymion’s laudatory speech, Portia acts in
accordance with what a particular situation or moment demands.
In Merchant of Venice, when Portia confronts Shylock, apparently
the moment is right to play the string of judgment and to punish, if
she is to “destroy Gods enemies,” as many Protestants demanded of
their queen. If the play also allows us to criticize Portia for cruelty
to Shylock, that potential criticism might be offset by her powerful
rhetoric extolling mercy, as well as her mercy toward those in her
personal orbit. Shakespeare constructs a queenly figure in whom the
conflicting demands for feminine compassion and masculine rigor
are both fulfilled.
CHAPTER 5
“P
PARDON IS STILL THE NURSE
OF SECOND WOE”: Measure for
Measure AND THE TRANSITION
FROM ELIZABETH TO JAMES
forMeasurewasperformedatthecourtofthenew
M ames I, in December, 1604, and was probably

composed earlier that year or late in 1603. Thus the play,
written soon after Elizabeth’s death, is the product of a moment of
transition. Feelings about the passing of Elizabeth and the accession
of the new king were not uniform; clearly some subjects welcomed
the change while others greeted it with apprehension. Posthumous
panegyrics for Elizabeth were often combined with celebrations of
James, but the degree to which the feelings expressed in either one
were genuine is impossible to determine.1 Catherine Loomis offers
a nuanced portrait of the country’s mood in her analysis of literary
responses to the transition from Elizabeth to James. In the hundreds
of poems written after her death in March 1603, Elizabeth was cel-
ebrated for her peaceful reign, her foreign policy successes, and her
learning.2 However, not every writer depicted both the former queen
and the new king in wholly positive terms. Some worries about the
transition itself were openly expressed, such as the objection to James
as a foreign-born king, or the fear that civil war might result if the
succession was uncertain or if the people refused to accept James. In
response to such concerns, some writers tried to naturalize the transi-
tion: James was depicted as the sun following the moon just as the day
follows the night, or imagined as Elizabeth’s son and heir.3
Not only were there concerns about whether the transition itself
would go smoothly and whether the English people would accept the
new sovereign. There were also many writers who hinted or remarked
outright on the expected difference between the two rulers, whether
the difference was forecast to improve or worsen the political situ-

ation. For example, some expressed concern that James might not
continue Elizabeth’s policy of peace, while, by contrast, other elegists
suggested that a more militaristic king would be an improvement.
John Watkins asserts that many of Elizabeth’s subjects welcomed the
change from female to male leadership, citing the Venetian ambas-
sador’s claim that Elizabeth’s ministers believed England to be weak
militarily because of Elizabeth’s incompetent rule.4 Writing a few
decades later, Bishop Godfrey Goodman looked back and recalled
that the people were “generally weary of an old woman’s govern-
ment.””5 But even if the English did, in general, welcome the promise
of a male monarch, the monarch in question raised concerns because
of his views on the nature of kingship. James’s monarchical theories
were well known in England even before his arrival because of his
political treatises. Both the treatise on the divine right of kings, The
TrewLawofFreeMonarchies,andthebookofadviceforhissonHenry,
Basilicon Doron, had been written in 1598 and subsequently printed
in Edinburgh. Both were reprinted in London in the year of James’s
accession,1603.6TheTrewLawofFreeMonarchiesclearlyandrepeat- t
edly states James’s belief that the people’s allegiance and obedience to
their king should be “as to Gods Lieutenant in earth, obeying his com-
mands in all things.”7 James explicitly rejects the idea that the people
can ever have any right to judge, reject, or rebel against a monarch:
God is the only one who can sit in judgment on the rightful king.8
Along with anticipating a more absolutist ideology, James’s new
subjects may also have expected that the new king would execute jus-
tice with more rigor than did his predecessor. James’s own remarks
about the role of clemency are fairly conventional: in the Basilicon
Doron, he advocates moderation in all things. “Use Justice, but with
such moderation, as it turne not in Tyrannie”; in the next paragraph,
he says the same about clemency: ““Nam in medio stat virtus” (Virtue
resides in the middle).9 Nevertheless, James’s admonition to Henry
that a king should be most severe at the outset of his reign prom-
ised a different brand of justice, at least initially, than English people
had known under Elizabeth. James advises: “When yee have by the
severitie of Justice once setled your countries, and made them know
that ye can strike, then may ye thereafter all the daies of your life
mixe Justice with Mercie.”10 As with the other anticipated changes
James might bring, this newfound severity might be regarded as
either salutary or harmful. In a sermon preached before James in
1604, Henry Hooke welcomes the new king’s promised rigor. Hooke
Measure forMeasureandtheTransitionfromElizabethtoJames 135
focuses rather pointedly on the gender difference between the two

sovereigns, describing Elizabeth as a phoenix and emphasizing the
miraculous way that a man—James—has risen from the ashes of a
woman.11 Immediately following this image, he establishes two paral-
lels: between Elizabeth and David, and between James and Solomon,
arguing that the Solomon-like James will perfect the “good order
and civille peace” that David, in his zeal, began to establish in the
“Lord’s house.” But the final item on Hooke’s list registers a complaint
about Elizabeth’s clemency, along with the hope that James’s justice
will be stricter: “What sinnes David winked at, being overswayed by
the greatness of his nobles, whose imployments otherwise were nec-
essary, Solomon in his wisdom found meanes to drawe unto punish-
ment.”12 While dissatisfaction with Elizabeth’s rigor is unsurprising,
especially coming from a Puritan-leaning preacher, it is rather sur-
prising that Hooke blames her nobles for the late queen’s tendency to
“wink” at sin. Perhaps Hooke is employing the traditional subterfuge
of blaming the monarch’s councilors rather than directly accusing the
king or queen. But the complaint that Elizabeth’s leniency was the
fault of powerful nobles hints at another of Hooke’s points: James, as
a king, is expected to be more powerful than the late Elizabeth, who
was, after all, only a woman. Hooke says that “what was not possible
for a woman to effect, man should be both able and industrious to per-
form,” and asserts that the hearts of the elect rejoice in this hope.13
Elegies written for Elizabeth and poems in celebration of the
new king rarely express the expectation of greater rigor as bluntly
as Hooke does in his sermon. Nonetheless, the hints are there. For
example, Robert Pricket in his “Souldiers Wish,” a poem written
to celebrate James’s accession, paints a portrait of Elizabeth that
focuses on her merciful bearing toward her people. By contrast, he
paints James as a warlike figure, expressing the hope that James will
do more than Elizabeth, a “Mayden Queen,” could accomplish, and
offering his soldier’s sword to the efforts of the new king.14
Others who anticipate greater rigor from James dread it rather
than welcome it. Sir John Harington, not an elegist but a diarist,
clearly expresses the worry that James’s brand of justice will be
more severe and arbitrary than Elizabeth’s. In a well-known pas-
sage dated 1603, Harington laments the passing of Elizabeth, his
“gracious Queene” and “goode mistresse.” Of course, the queen was
Harington’s godmother and he enjoyed a close and affectionate
relationship with her, so his sense of loss at her death is probably not
typical. But it is interesting that the concern he next expresses about
the incoming monarch stems not from his own anticipated loss of
position; rather, Harington comments on the brand of justice he
expects from James:
I heare our new Kynge hath hanged one man before he was tryede; ’tis
strangely done: now if the wynde blowethe thus, why may not a man
be tried before he hathe offended.15
John Aylmer said of Elizabeth at the start of her reign that she came
in like a lamb, not a lion: “She hangeth no man, she behedeth none.”16
By contrast, one of James’s first acts was to order a man hanged,
bypassing a trial in a manner that may have been troubling to many
English subjects. The incident occurred in April of 1603 when James
was traveling toward London for his coronation and stopped in
Newark-Upon-Trent. A man was arrested and reportedly confessed
to being a cutpurse; James ordered his hanging on the spot. The offi-
cially sanctioned account of James’s progress reports the episode as
an example of the king’s dedication to justice, and mentions in the
same passage that James also issued a general pardon for the prison-
ers in the town’s jail.17 But the incident raises questions: Why was a
cutpurse deemed to deserve hanging when other criminals rated the
king’s pardon? The king’s attitude toward justice seems arbitrary and
perhaps personally motivated here, and those who were concerned
about James’s more absolutist views may have seen in this incident a
harbinger of future woes.
While criticism of Measure often situates the play in the context
of James’s reign—his political writing and the events of his first
year as king—few critics connect the play to the reign of Elizabeth.
Stephen Cohen is an exception: in a study of the generic tensions in
the play, he reads Measure as a cross between romantic comedy and
the disguised ruler play, a genre which was popular immediately after
James’s accession. Thus Measure’s mixed genre reflects the transition
from Elizabeth to James: the play has elements of romantic com-
edy, a genre that displaces traditional masculine authority in favor
of vibrant and conciliatory heroines. However, the play ultimately
shifts from being a romantic comedy to being a disguised ruler play,
a genre that valorizes the masculine ruler’s personal fiat.18
Though not a study of generic tensions, this chapter will also focus
onthewayMeasureforMeasureregistersthedifferencesbetweenthe
two monarchs. The moment of transition from Elizabeth to James is
indeeddiscernibleinShakespeare’sMeasurefor Measure,aplaythat
is deeply engaged with questions about political authority. More spe-

cifically, I will argue that the difference between the ideologies and
practices of the two monarchs when it comes to dispensing justice is
one of the play’s important topics, and that the Duke himself—past
and present—reflects the tension between their different approaches
to mercy.
A dominant critical approach is to analyze Measure for Measure
in terms of its engagement with the new king’s ideology of rule and
to find in the play’s concluding scene a reflection of James’s absolut-
ism. Critics differ not so much on whether Shakespeare represents
James’s rule in Measure, but on how he represents it. One older criti-
cal approach was to read Measure for Measure as an entertainment
specifically designed to flatter James, a reading mocked by Richard
Levin as the “King James Version” of the play.19 But even critics who
avoid reducing the play to flattery often interpret Measure as reflect-
ing the ideology of the new king. For instance, Leonard Tennenhouse
argues that with James’s accession, the stage mounted a defense of
patriarchy, participating in the cultural shift that occurred when the
throne passed to a man who invoked his role as authoritarian father
to represent his power. According to Tennenhouse, Measure and the
other absent ruler comedies that suddenly dominated the London
stage dramatize the need for such a monarch by showing the disorder
that his absence spawns, and his ability to discern truth and restore
order in the end.20 Jonathan Dollimore also reads the play’s ending as
empowering the Duke, who “embodies a public reconciliation of law
and morality,” though it is a “fantasy resolution” in which the very
fear of social disorder that spawns authoritarian rule is validated and
assuaged by the Duke’s exercise of power.21 By contrast, other critics
read the play not as an endorsement but rather as a critique of abso-
lutism in general and James’s use of power in particular. Carolyn E.
Brown, for instance, finds in the play, and especially its final scene,
a scathing criticism of James’s cruel exercise of partisan power.22
Most critics find the play neither an endorsement nor an indictment
of James’s rule, but something in between: a play that interrogates
James’s brand of kingship. As Leah Marcus points out, Measure may
at once promulgate and question James’s ideas about rule; it is open
to a range of interpretations and reactions from its audience.23
Measure for Measure may valorize, subvert, or interrogate James
and his absolutist ideology through the character and actions of
the Duke, but the play also presents more than one version of Duke
Vincentio. Measure for Measure does not represent the Duke solely
as he appears in the final scene: there we see him—arguably—as a

ruler whose personal authority and wisdom enable him to execute
true justice. But Measure also reflects upon the Duke as he was in the
past, by highlighting the effect of his previous leniency. Therefore, it
is possible to see in the Duke himself the transition from Elizabeth
to James, from one ruler’s personal clemency to another’s apparently
strict execution of justice.
Whether Elizabeth was truly lenient or not, the image of her as
a loving and gentle mother was often deployed during her reign and
even more often after her death. Her frequent claims of abiding and
mutual love between her and her subjects formed part of that image;
and as discussed in Chapter One, Elizabeth seems to have embraced
the traditional idea that clemency makes a ruler well loved.24 We
know that Cecil, frustrated by her reluctance to execute the Duke
of Norfolk, lamented the queen’s belief that mercy made her more
popular with her people. But as we have seen, the same clemency
that may have enhanced Elizabeth’s popularity also caused anxiety
and, in the view of some, put the kingdom itself at risk.
This paradox about the ruler’s leniency is suggested in the Duke’s
interview with Friar Thomas. The Duke explains his withdrawal
from Vienna in terms of the problems caused by his previous clem-
ency. According to the Duke, Vienna’s “strict statutes and most bit-
ing laws” have been allowed to slip for these fourteen years (I.iii.19).25
The Duke’s self-characterization recalls Queen Elizabeth’s: he
depicts himself as a masculine version of her image as a tender
mother; he was a “fond father” who cautioned his children with pun-
ishments that were never enacted, sticking the “threat’ning twigs of
birch” in their sight to frighten them—but for lack of use, “in time
the rod / Becomes more mock’d than fear’d” (I.iii.23–27). True, James
often depicted himself as a father to his people, but he typically used
the paternal metaphor to emphasize the people’s duty to obey him or
his own responsibility to execute justice:
The King towards his people is rightly compared to a father of chil-

dren, and to a head of a body composed of divers members. . . . For
from the Head, being the seate of Judgement, proceedeth the care
and foresight of guiding, and preventing all evill that may come to the
body or any part thereof.26
James emphasizes the king/father/head’s duty to protect the people

against evils of various kinds, including internal evil, just as at the
MeasureforMeasureandtheTransitionfromElizabethtoJames 139
start of the treatise, he asserted that, like a father, the king must
correct any of his children that offend. Here he goes on to recom-
mend that the king, in his role of father/head, cut off any incurably
rotten members so as to prevent the spread of infection in the body
politic. Duke Vincentio, by being a clement rather than a chastising
father, has failed to do this. The resulting social disarray necessitates
more rigorous justice in the future, but the Duke does not want to
execute strict justice because he fears what such harshness might
do to his image. His exact words are “I have on Angelo impos’d the
office, / Who may, in th’ambush of my name, strike home, / And yet
my nature never in the fight / To do in slander” (I.iii.40–43). This
curious statement is suggestive of more than the Duke’s concern
that his popularity might wane if he were to enforce the laws. He
is also afraid that his “nature” might be put in disrepute: people
might make judgments not simply about his actions but also about
his innate character. The line is reminiscent of Elizabeth’s frequent
claims to be “by nature” compassionate, which suggest her anxiety
that a woman perceived as harsh might be judged “unnatural,” since
women are supposed to be naturally tender-hearted. The Duke’s anx- x
ieties about being the enforcer reflect a concern about public opinion
that is more Elizabethan than Jacobean: while Elizabeth frequently
asserted her reliance on her people’s love, this was a position that
James, the absolutist, rejected.27 The Duke uses the word “slander”
here, introducing an important theme in Measure that is related to
questions of mercy and judgment. Hoping to remove himself not just
from the public eye but also from the arena of public discourse, the
Duke seeks to control the force of public opinion, reflected in gossip
and slander. Ironically, it will turn out that the Duke’s withdrawal
from the public eye has done more to inspire slanderous speculation
thantostifleit.MeasureforMeasuresuggeststhatslander,alongwith
other powerful and uncontainable forces, such as passion, is difficult
if not impossible to control.
Measure for Measure speaks a language of unruly excess, which
creates a troubling discontinuity in that the play appears to promise
somethingthatisneverdelivered.Theverytitle,MeasureforMeasure,
embodies a perfect balance and enclosed circularity, the opposite
of what the play actually dramatizes: things uncontrollable and
ever-increasing by their very nature. The play is rife with images of
things breeding, seething, thronging, and multiplying; slander is one
such unruly force. The Duke describes a Vienna where corruption
boils and bubbles “till it o’errun the stew” (V.i.318–19), so that the
stews—brothels—are imagined as actual stewpots whose contents

are uncontrollably overflowing. The image suggests not only the
ungovernable nature of sexual passion but also the literal increase
brought about by sex: the “teeming foison” of the “plenteous womb”
of a pregnant Juliet, for instance (I.iv.43). Just as sexual passion is
uncontrollable and has uncontrollable results in the play, so also the
public itself and its discourse on the ruler are outside any individual’s
control.
The Duke’s reluctance to “stage himself” in his people’s eyes
has long been thought to reflect King James’s response to crowds:
there is much evidence that James disliked the noisy hoi polloi.
Eighteenth-century critic Thomas Tyrwhitt was the first to propose
thatseveralpassagesinMeasureforMeasurealludetoJames’sdistaste
for crowds, a connection fully explicated by David L. Stevenson in
1959.28 Stevenson cites the now-familiar description of James’s reac-
tion when, during a 1604 visit to the Merchants Exchange before his
royal entry, he encountered enthusiastic crowds of Londoners who
excitedly and noisily ran up and down when they realized who the
passenger in the carriage was. James was vocal about his distaste for
what he deemed the “untaught love” of the multitude and contrasted
their behavior unfavorably with the decorum of the merchants in
the Exchange, who stood silent and still before their sovereign.29
Jeffrey Doty has elaborated on this idea in Measure, arguing that
the play interrogates the idea of the unruly populace and its corol-
laries: news, gossip, and political analysis. Doty finds that the char-
acters’ frequent exchanges of news, opinion, and gossip—much of
it concerning affairs of state and the Duke himself—constitute an
emergent public sphere. According to Doty, this kind of public com-
mentary on the ruler suggests that his authority is not absolute but
rather dependent on his popularity, an idea that Elizabeth cultivated
and James rejected. The Duke aims to restore his sacred author-
ity, in Doty’s reading, which he apparently does in the end when he
manages to silence the unruly voices of his people. Doty also finds a
link between sex and discourse in the language of the play: both are
forms of circulation, exchanges between people, and both are unruly
and dangerous.30
IinterprettheendingoffMeasureforMeasuredifferentlythandoes
Doty, but his reading of the play’s engagement with questions of pop-
ularity and public discourse is very convincing. Notably for my read-
ing, the world of uncontrolled passions and unruly public discourse is
the world created by the “old” Duke, whose clement reign, depicted
as weak, suggests the style of Elizabeth. The play’s language under-

lines the role that the ruler’s mercy played in producing this Vienna,
in which the forms of exchange that Doty mentions, sexual activity
andpublicdiscourse,rununchecked.MeasureforMeasurealsoaligns
mercy with these unruly words and passions. Just as “liberty,” the lack
of restraint that Claudio bemoans, produced a new person growing
inside Juliet, so too the “freedom” or generosity of legal pardon pro-
duces new transgressions, according to many characters in the play.
The Duke explains how his reluctance to punish gave the people
“scope,” and that same scope, or liberty, has led to the production of
moreevildeeds(I.iii.35–38).InMeasureforMeasure,mercyisrepeat- t
edly aligned with sexuality, the fruits of pardon with the fruits of
intercourse: Escalus casts pardon as a maternal figure when he says
that “Pardon is still the nurse of second woe” (II.i.284). Angelo, too,
imagines the production of future crimes (a propagation permitted by
mercy) in terms of conception and birth. He tells Isabel that the law
Like a prophet
Looks in a glass that shows what future evils,
Either now, or by remissness new conceiv’d,
And so in progress to be hatch’d and born,
Are now to have no successive degrees,
But here they live, to end. (II.ii.94–99)
In other words, the law, by imposing a severe penalty on Claudio, will

end what otherwise would be an endless succession of evils, “con-
ceived” and “hatched and born” in the future. The “severe” Angelo,
as he is frequently called, will literally sever Claudio’s head to cut off
that succession of future sins, just as James recommended that the
king should cut off the corrupt members of the body politic to pre-
vent the spread of infection.31 The Duke’s clemency permitted this
endless breeding of sin, just as unrestrained sexuality permits end-
less breeding; as Angelo would cut off the breeding of sin by cutting
off Claudio’s head, Pompey suggests that a literal cutting off of sex
organs is the only way to control sex: “Does your worship mean to geld
and splay all the youth of the city?” he asks Escalus in response to the
magistrate’s assertion that fornication is against the law (II.i.230–31).
The association of mercy with sex is most dramatic in Isabel’s words
to Claudio: “Mercy to thee would prove itself a bawd,” meaning that
if Claudio were mercifully pardoned, that pardon would simply allow
him to reproduce his crimes.
Jeffrey Doty notes that sex and public discourse are based on
exchange between people; both result in a kind of public circulation
(of disease and of news).32 In Measurefor Measure,mercy is imagined
in similar terms, as a bawd promoting a sinful exchange between two
people, resulting in the reproduction of crimes. After telling Claudio
that mercy would prove a bawd in his case, Isabel says that his sin
was “not accidental, but a trade,” meaning that he is a habitual sin-
ner. Mercy, like a bawd or pimp, would simply allow him to continue
committing the sexual sins that she now characterizes as no better
than the “trade” of whores and their customers. Lucio’s joking name
for Mistress Overdone, “Madame Mitigation,” takes on new signifi-
cance when seen in this light. As a bawd, Mistress Overdone allays or
mitigates sexual desire, but the term “mitigation” is most commonly
used in regard to judgments. Sixteenth- and seventeenth-century uses
of the word “mitigate” refer to the abatement of the law’s severity or
the softening of a harsh punishment.33 The fact that the nickname
“Madame Mitigation” brings together sexual and legal connotations
emphasizes the link between the two uncontrollable forces of sex and
mercy. Mistress Overdone and her house of prostitution sow disease
in Vienna, but the play repeatedly suggests the difficulty of stop-
ping or controlling the circulation of sex and sexual disease. When
Mistress Overdone is being escorted to prison in Act III, Escalus says,
“Double and treble admonition, and still forfeit in the same kind!”
(III.ii.193–94). His next words—“This would make mercy swear and
play the tyrant”—hint that she has previously been shown a mercy
that allowed her brothel to continue operating, reminding us of the
way mercy is seen as propagating evil in this play.
InMeasureforMeasure,Isabelfollowstraditionallinesinarguing,
as Portia does, that mercy is a godly virtue. She makes the conven-
tional claim that god’s mercy should be imitated by man, specifically
the magistrate, Angelo. But the current state of Vienna in the wake
of the Duke’s fourteen years of leniency, as well as the language that
registers mercy’s uncontrollable results, undercuts her claim. Isabel
also asks Angelo to feel compassion for Claudio as a way of inspir-
ing him to act mercifully; yet compassion itself seems suspect in this
play. As we have seen, detractors of mercy often cited its supposed
basis in emotion: though some writers tried to distinguish between
emotionally generated compassion and true mercy, feminine mercy
was always suspected of being nothing more than womanish pity.
UpuntilthefinalsceneinMeasureforMeasure,pleasforcompassion
cause harm rather than good. When Isabel tries to inspire empathy
in Angelo for Claudio, she asks him to imagine himself feeling simi-
lar feelings, experiencing similar temptations. Escalus raises the
same point with Angelo, but these appeals to the magistrate’s empa-
thy have the unexpected effect of generating not mere sympathy but
rather an overpowering emotional response, suggesting the danger
of emotional contamination.
Empathy is a term not coined until the early twentieth century, but
the sympathetic experience of someone else’s passions was discussed
in the early modern period in several different ways.34 Treatises on
rhetoric identify real passion as the basis of eloquence; the goal of the
rhetorical transaction is to express one’s own passions effectively so
as to “move the like affections” in the listeners.35 Thus a shared expe-
rience of emotion could be said to lie at the heart of rhetorical per-
suasion. Such moving of another’s affections might be represented
as salutary or dangerous, depending on one’s point of view. Puritan
objections to theater have become well known, and while these
objections included the licentious subject matter of many plays, the
cross-dressing actors, and the idleness and “effeminacy” of the audi-
ence members, many of these writers also warned of the power of
theater (or imaginative literature in general) to sway the affections of
theapprehender.AnthonyMunday,intheThirdBlastofRetraitfrom
Playes and Theaters, reports that some “citizen wives,” on their death
beds, have tearfully confessed that theater-going turned them into
whores: they “received at those spectacles such filthie infections,
as have turned their minds from chast cogitations, and made them
of honest women light huswives.”36 Gosson’s School of Abuse, a pam-
phlet that primarily attacks the stage, opens with an assault on poets
that suggests a similar poisoning effect when he likens their works
to “cups of Circe, that turn reasonable men into beasts.” Sidney’s
response, the Defence of Poesy, does not refute the infectious quality
of imaginative literature, but calls for poetry to move us to “right
action” rather than sin.
Stephen Greenblatt famously identifies empathy as a form of
power; the “ability to transform given materials into one’s own sce-
nario” is called “improvisation” by Greenblatt. He sees improvisation
as a central mode of Renaissance behavior; the ability to understand
another’s symbolic structure permits the subject to insert himself into
another’s scenario for the purposes of domination.37 In Greenblatt’s
formulation, there is no reciprocity and little sympathy: the subject
does not share the other’s symbolic structure but rather is able to
inhabit it and improvise within it for his own power. By contrast,
the Renaissance idea of compassion, or fellow feeling, does assume

reciprocity, but it similarly implies the vulnerability of the one who
apprehends the “affections” of another. Thus some treatises on emo-
tion suggest that feelings can be dangerously contagious, harkening
back to Seneca’s description of pity as a sickness of the mind brought
on by seeing someone else’s unhappiness.38 Just as Sidney does not
dismiss the idea of poetry’s powerful effect but argues that we should
be moved to good actions by its power, some Renaissance writers dis-
agree with the Stoic denigration of the passions while tacitly agree-
ing that passions can be contagious: Thomas Wright, for example,
notes that sometimes the passions should be stirred up in the service
of virtue.39 Thus passions—whether a display of genuine emotion, or
passions played out in theater, in poetry, or in rhetoric—could infect
the apprehender with similar passions, and this experience of empa-
thy, shared emotions, might be salutary or detrimental.
InMeasureforMeasure,theattempttoinspireempathyinAngelo
has an unexpectedly detrimental result that suggests this anxiety
about emotional contagion. Both Isabel and Escalus try to make
Angelo feel empathy for Claudio by suggesting that he may have
experienced the same kind of sexual passion that led Claudio into
fornication. It is not coincidental that Angelo’s sudden passion for
Isabel follows upon two consecutive scenes in which he is asked to
empathize with Claudio’s sexual desire. Act II opens in the middle
of what appears to be an argument between Escalus and Angelo over
the death sentence the latter has imposed upon Claudio. Escalus asks
Angelo whether he might not have erred just as Claudio has done if, at
some point in his life, the “working of his [your] own affections” had
occurred at a time and place convenient for him to act upon his desire
(II.i.8–16). Angelo does not deny having felt such sexual passion, but
he makes a distinction between feeling and acting: “’Tis one thing to
be tempted, Escalus, / Another thing to fall” (II.i.17–18). By distin-
guishing between feeling and action, and thus between himself and
Claudio, Angelo refuses to empathize with the condemned man. But
in the next scene, Isabel makes the same plea: “Go to your bosom, /
Knock there, and ask your heart what it doth know / That’s like my
brother’s fault” (II.ii.136–38). When Thomas Wright describes the
way our passions are moved, it is in strikingly similar terms: imagina-
tion works on the heart, which produces the emotion and draws forth
the bodily humors that will increase it.40 It is at this moment, when
Isabel asks Angelo to examine his heart, seat of the passions, for an
emotional experience like that of her brother, that Angelo speaks
the first words—in an aside—that indicate his desire for Isabel: “She
speaks, and ’tis / Such sense that my sense breeds with it” (II.ii.141–42).
Playing on two meanings of the word “sense,” Angelo suggests that the
meaning of Isabel’s words—their “sense”—has aroused his senses.
The word “sense” has many possible meanings in this period, but
among them are two contrasting ideas. “Sense” can denote signifi-
cation or meaning as well as, more broadly, intelligence and sound
judgment. But “sense” can also be used as a collective singular to
mean faculties of corporeal sensation that are considered “channels
for gratifying the desire for pleasure and the lusts of the flesh.” 41 On
one level Angelo is simply saying that his senses are aroused either by
imagining or remembering the feeling of sexual desire, as Isabel asks
him to do. But he is also suggesting that the interaction of her mean-
ing and his faculties of sensation have created something; his sense
has “bred” with hers; powerful feelings were generated in him by her
appeal to his empathy. Moments earlier, Angelo described the end-
less progeny of evils that would be “hatch’d and born” in the future if
Claudio’s sin were not decisively punished (II.ii.97). The interaction
that characterizes public discourse and sexuality, with unmanage-
able results, occurs here as well. The breeding of Angelo’s senses with
Isabel’s meaning—a call for empathy—will indeed create future sins,
in a way that the play represents as ultimately uncontrollable.
Thus, at least initially, Measure for Measure represents mercy as
dangerous. The language of the play aligns mercy with other uncon-
trollable elements whose essential character is exchange: public
discourse and sexual passion. Mercy breeds unmanageable results,
and is spawned by compassion, which suggests the possibility of dan-
gerous emotional contagion. This negative representation of mercy
is connected to the ruler’s past style and behavior, suggesting the
past of Elizabeth’s reign. But if all this is true, how do we explain
the play’s resolution? Though few today would argue that Measure
for Measure has a satisfying comic ending, still the play does follow a
comic trajectory, and so the ending features near-universal forgive-
ness, including pardons for all from the Duke, despite his purported
plan to enforce the law more strictly. As has often been noted, by
the end of the play he has done nothing of the kind, and even Lucio’s
original sentence of whipping, pressing to death, and hanging—his
“forfeitures”—are remitted and his slanders forgiven by the Duke
(V.1.519–20). The Duke’s practice of mercy characterizes the end-
ing as comic, and clemency for Angelo and Lucio allows the typical
marriages of comic conclusions, though these are admittedly rather
disturbing unions. If the Duke’s pardons constitute the comic reso-

lutionoffMeasureforMeasure,thenwhyismercydepictedasproblem-
atic, even dangerous, throughout the rest of the play? How can mercy
be the progenitor of woes and also generate a happy ending? Is there
a distinction between what the Duke does at the end of Measure and
the versions of clemency seen up to this point in the play?
The Private and the Public

How mercy is deployed, and specifically whether the granting of
clemency is a public or private matter, seems to be the pivot upon
which this question turns. If there is one fundamental difference
between the Duke as he was, and the Duke who renders justice in the
play’s final scene, that difference lies not in his rigor. The difference
lies in the public, performative quality of his mercy in the final scene.
The Duke’s earlier clemency has apparently been a private matter, if
we take him at his word that he has never liked to “stage” himself to
the eyes of the people (I.i.68–69). Lucio’s explanation to Isabel in I.iv
about the Duke’s absence and Angelo’s consequent stewardship does
indeed suggest that the Duke was a ruler who kept his decisions and
their motives secret. Lucio is speaking not of the Duke’s judgment
on any particular man, but rather about the way the Duke misled
them into thinking that they were about to enter a war (presumably
with Hungary):
The Duke is very strangely gone from hence;

Bore many gentlemen (myself being one)
In hand, and hope of action; but we do learn
By those that know the very nerves of state,
His [givings]-out were of an infinite distance
From his true-meant design. (I.iv.50–55)
Why Lucio should explain all of this to Isabel is unclear: the point he
needs to convey to her is simply that the Duke is gone and that Angelo,
whose “blood / Is very snow-broth,” is now in charge and unlikely to
remit the death sentence he has imposed on Claudio (I.iv.57–58). But
Lucio’s depiction of the Duke in this passage establishes an important
idea about him: he has been a secretive ruler and even deliberately
misled his subjects. The spatial metaphor that Lucio uses—the Duke’s
assertions were at “an infinite distance” from the truth—suggests the
private spaces in which the Duke operated. Apparently, at least some
people were familiar with this interior space—the “nerves,” that is,
inner workings—of his government, but Lucio and many other gen-
tlemen of Vienna were not. The private spaces in which the Duke
operated are suggested in Lucio’s memorable characterization of him
in a later scene as the “Duke of dark corners” (IV.iii.157). That the
Duke’s past judgments and their motives were hidden is also implied
in Lucio’s claim that “the Duke yet would have dark deeds darkly
answer’d, he would never bring them to light” (III.ii.176–78).
The problem with such private judgments is revealed in this very
scene, when Lucio draws his own conclusions about the reason for
the Duke’s clemency in cases of sexual transgressions: “He had some
feeling of the sport; he knew the service, and that instructed him
to mercy” (III.ii.119–20). The Duke’s history of retreating from the
public eye and privately conferring mercy seems to have made him
especially vulnerable to public discussion and interpretation of his
motives. Lucio even claims to know the reason for the Duke’s aloof- f
ness: “A shy fellow was the Duke, and I believe I know the cause of
his withdrawing” (III.ii.130–32). Though he never reveals the pur-
ported reason, Lucio makes it clear that it does the Duke no credit:
“No, pardon; ’tis a secret must be lock’d within the teeth and the
lips. But this I can let you understand, the greater file of the subject
held the Duke to be wise” (III.ii.134–37). When the Duke, in his dis-
guise as a friar, avers that the Duke was indeed wise, Lucio scoffs: “A
very superficial, ignorant, unweighing fellow” (III.ii.139–40). Lucio
implies that the Duke retreated from the stage of public life to hide
his own ignorance, with an emphasis on his poor judgment hinted in
the adjective “unweighing.””42 Lucio’s judgment of the Duke is doubt-
less unreliable, but the point is that the Duke’s habitual privacy has
allowed a man like Lucio to invent explanations for things that are
unknown, making the withdrawn Duke paradoxically more, rather
than less, subject to the speculation and gossip of his subjects.
Though James may have abhorred the noisy public, he understood
the connection between the monarch’s public appearance and pub-
lic opinion. In Basilicon Doron, he complains of the fault that com-
mon people share: “to judge and speak rashly of their Prince,” and
the solution he offers is that the Prince rule so well as to “stop their
mouthes from all such idle and unreverent speeches.””43 This advice
seems uselessly vague, but in the third chapter of Basilicon Doron,
James elaborates on how a king should behave, and in so doing reveals
his awareness that the impressions a monarch makes on the public
are crucial. The chapter begins with James’s acknowledgment that “a
King is as one set on a stage,” and continues with specific advice about
how his son should comport himself in the future, recognizing that
“the people, who seeth but the outward part, will ever judge of the
substance, by the circumstances.””44 Therefore, he advises his son on
everything from his behavior at table, his dress, and his gestures, to
his choice of friends and behavior with women. This chapter reveals
that like Elizabeth, James knew and accepted the necessity of a cer-
tain amount of public show on the part of a king, given that people
are always formulating judgments about the king based on what they
see. Nowhere does James recommend withdrawing from the public
eye; rather, he advises Henry to create a public image that will allow
his people to draw favorable conclusions about his character.
PrivacyandpublicityarecrucialfactorsinMeasureforMeasure,not
just in its treatment of mercy and judgment in general. Private spaces
such as Isabel’s convent and Mariana’s moated grange can be pro-
tective, but private spaces can also be dangerous. The play registers
a deep distrust of the use of private spaces for rendering judgment.
The fact that Angelo sees Isabel privately when she comes a second
time to ask him to mitigate his judgment against Claudio allows the
magistrate to abuse his power. That this private space makes Isabel
vulnerable is emphasized when she threatens to “proclaim” Angelo’s
corruption to the world, demanding that he sign Claudio’s pardon,
“Or with an outstretched throat I’ll tell the world aloud / What
man thou art” (II.iv.153–54). The hexameter line emphasizes Isabel’s
threat to break the bounds of this private space and, like a rooster
crowing, draw public attention to the truth about Angelo. But the
magistrate’s terrifyingly simple response says everything about the
dangers of privacy: “Who will believe you, Isabel?” (II.iv.154). The
private space within which Angelo works as a magistrate permits
his abuse of power. Though the Duke may want to withdraw from
the public eye, this scene suggests how easily the power to judge can
lead to corruption if the judgments are decided and rendered behind
the scenes. There is also an echo of the sonnet writers’ warnings to
women about giving private access to their presence: Isabel’s private
audience with Angelo allows a plea for pity to be abused. Though we
have no reason to think that the Duke’s previous customary mercy
was similarly corrupt, his habitual privacy led the public to specu-
late about aspects of his life that remained hidden, allowing Lucio
to spread rumors that the Duke’s leniency was somehow personally
motivated or a product of his own moral laxity. This depiction of pri-
vacy’s dangers may also invoke early modern debates about equity: to
rely on the “king’s conscience” to resolve legal questions means that

judgments are made according to the personal and private inclina-
tions of one person.
A common scholarly approach toMeasure for Measure is to read
the play in terms of Renaissance ideas and debates about equity.45
Aristotle explains that in some matters it is impossible to make a
general statement that will always be correct. Thus, equity rectifies
a deficiency in the law and also fulfills the law’s original intention
(“deciding as the lawgiver would himself decide if he were present on
the occasion”).46 Many critics have pointed out that Claudio’s situ-
ation is a perfect example of the need for applying the principle of
equity to legal judgments: an equity that includes consideration of
the specifics of any case, or the application of the spirit of the law.47
According to Claudio, Juliet is “fast” his wife on the basis of a “true
contract,” and the postponement of their wedding was caused by
a dispute over a dowry (I.ii.145–53). By providing this explanation
for the couple’s sexual activity and by creating the sexually corrupt
Vienna as a context for Claudio’s “crime,” Shakespeare directs our
attention to the inequity of Claudio’s death sentence. The audi-
ence recognizes the difference between Claudio and Lucio, who has
impregnated a woman and refuses to support her and the child; nor
is Juliet a prostitute like Mistress Overdone or Kate Keepdown. In
its spirit, the law against fornication seems aimed at the habitués of
the brothel, not two people who are contracted to be married (and
may well have been considered married according to Elizabethan
customs).48 Thus the play seems to advocate for equity under the law,
since in the case of Claudio, justice would be mitigated if his particu-
lar circumstances and the law’s intention were taken into consider-
ation.49 Escalus is the voice of this sort of equity in the play, pointing
out as he does the potentially mitigating circumstances in Claudio’s
case, to no avail.
Though equity as a general principle may have been relatively
uncontroversial in early modern England, the association between
equity and royal prerogative led to debates about both the principles
and the practice of justice. According to opponents of equity, the
fact that the practice of equity allows an individual to interpret the
law makes possible a very subjective, or personally interested, inter-
pretation; equity potentially puts an individual (the judge or Lord
Chancellor or monarch) above the law.50 Unsurprisingly, James I
championed equity and connected it to royal prerogative in his writ-
ings, in ways that did not comfort those already concerned about
his absolutist ideology. In his History of the Common Law, w Theodore

Plucknett observes that the characterization of Chancery as an
arbitrary court dependent on the king’s prerogative was false; he
blames royalists for trying to argue that the system of equity was
an outgrowth of absolutist doctrine.51 The controversy about equity
famously came to a head in 1616, in two interrelated cases that pit-
ted Sir Edmund Coke against Chancery. In the end, Coke, who
objected to Chancery’s overturning of common law in these cases,
was removed from the King’s Bench.52
Just as some critics have argued that Measure for Measure shows
the need for equity in legal decisions, as seen in the case of Claudio
and Juliet, others have argued that the play registers distrust and
disapproval of Jacobean ideas about royal prerogative, which were
seen as undergirding the claims of equity. I would suggest that in
Measure, equity is called into question by the play’s treatment not
only of prerogative but also of privacy. Advocates of the king’s pre-
rogative tended to speak of the monarch’s private judgments as “mys-
teries” not necessarily apprehensible to common men. James, when
he wrote about equity in The Trew Law, w specifically linked it with a
royal prerogative based on secret knowledge he might hold:
And where he sees the lawe doubtsome or rigorous, hee may inter-
pret or mitigate the same, lest otherwiseSumma ius beesumma iniuria:
And therefore generall laws, made publikely in Parliament, may upon
knowen respects to the King by his authoritee bee mitigated, and sus-
pended upon causes onely knowen to him.53
James refers to the “causes onely knowen to him,” the secret knowl-
edge of the king, suggesting one of the mysteries of state among which
he included his royal prerogative.54 Opponents of royal prerogative of
course took exception to this notion of a semidivine monarch with
a mysterious, even superhuman ability to judge correctly. James’s
treatise on The Trew Law of Free Monarchies was written partly in
response to one such opponent: his former tutor George Buchanan,
who argued in De Juri Regni Apud Scotos (1579) that monarchs must
be subject to the law. In this dialogue, Buchanan writes that kings
share the faults of all humankind, arguing that therefore a king who
is not subject to the law could bend the law “to all actions for his own
benefit and advantage.” He argues that it would be better to have
no laws than to allow the king such power over the law. If the king
is allowed such authority, then “what he pleaseth the Law doth say,
Measure for MeasureandtheTransitionfromElizabethtoJames 151
what pleaseth him not, it doth not say.””55 For Buchanan, a king who is
above the law will inevitably bend the law to serve his private inter-
ests; for James, the king’s private knowledge qualifies him to correct
the law in certain cases.
These two opposing points of view are reflected in the ambiva-
lent treatment of legal equity by William Lambarde in his 1591
work kArcheion n,subtitled
dADiscourseUpontheHighCourtsofJusticein
England. This important late Elizabethan analysis of England’s legal
and political institutions was based on Lambarde’s many years of
experience as a common lawyer; thus he might be expected to share
in the hostility that advocates of the Common Law felt toward insti-
tutions such as Chancery and the Star Chamber. However, Lambarde
was also a friend of Sir Thomas Egerton, who would soon be Lord
Chancellor under James.56 Lambarde’s discussion of equity seems
balanced between the two sides and is instructive for that reason.
According to Lambarde, the law as written is generally good and just,
but it may need correction when circumstances arise that the law
does not foresee. This is the usual argument for equity: Lambarde
says that “to apply one generall Law to all particular cases, were to
make all Shooes by one Last, or to cut one Glove for all Hands.”57
But he also warns that equity should be appealed to only in “rare
and extraordinary matters,” for a single human being should not
normally wield so much power. “If the Judge in Equitie should take
Jurisdiction over all, it should come to passe (as Aristotle saith) that a
Beast should beare the rule: For so he calleth man, whose Judgment,
if it bee not restrained by the Chaine of Law, is commonly carried
away, with unruly affections.””58 Buchanan warns against investing
the king with too much power; Lambarde warns against investing
a judge with too much power; but the argument against both is the
same, based on human nature’s subjection to its own unruly passions
and the unfitness of any single person to wield so much unchecked
authority.
In Buchanan’s dialogue, Maitland, whose arguments oppose
those of Buchanan, likens the public to a many-headed beast. From
the absolutist’s point of view, the public is the out-of-control bestial
force that needs to be governed by the ruler’s absolute authority.
Buchanan and Lambarde warn of the opposite: the private, power-
ful individual, be he a king or a judge, is the beast who cannot hope
to control his passions. In Measure for Measure, as we have seen, the
public and its discourse are imagined as uncontrollable; however, as
Angelo, invested with such authority as a judge, begins to lust after
Isabel, he describes his passions as an unruly public that crowd and

eventually overpower his reason:
Why does my blood thus muster to my heart,

Making both it unable for itself,
And dispossessing all my other parts
Of necessary fitness? (II.iv.20–23)
Angelo goes on to compare the blood that rushes to his heart at the
arrival of Isabel to the crowds who swarm around a monarch:
And even so
The general subject to a well-wish’d king
Quit their own part, and in obsequious fondness
Crowd to his presence, where their untaught love
Must needs appear offense. (II.iv.26–30)
It has become traditional to see in these lines an allusion to the behav-

ior of the crowds that James so disliked on his visit to the Merchants
Exchange in 1604. This image also brings together the two contrast-
ing ideas that undergird the debate about equity and, more broadly,
absolutism. In comparing personal passions to the tumultuous pub-
lic, this passage raises the question: Who is unruly and needs to be
controlled? Is the public the unruly entity—the many-headed beast—
that requires the firm hand of the monarch? Or is human nature
itself—including the monarch’s human nature—the beast that must
be subjected to law? Further, Measure suggests that even if one is not
abusing the right to make private judgments, one can be perceived
that way by a slanderous public: the unruly crowd that the Duke
avoids. But Measure shows how a single person’s access to this kind
of power can lead to corruption, because the individual is also sub-
ject to unruly passions. In his rigidity regarding Claudio’s sentence,
Angelo may represent the rejection of equitable interpretation of the
law; however, his secret abuse of his power to interpret the law repre-
sentstheworstfearsoftheopponentsofequity.MeasureforMeasure
allows us to see not only the necessity of equity, but also the danger
of equity, since the power to grant it resides in an individual.
In the final scene off Measure for Measure, Isabel embodies all the
problematic aspects of mercy previously described in this chapter
when she makes an emotion-based plea for undeserved clemency for
Angelo. She also functions as a voice of equity when she says, “I partly
think / A due sincerity governed his deeds, / Till he did look on me”
(V.i.445–47). Her attempt to judge Angelo’s original motive reflects
one aspect of equitable decision making. Her plea for Angelo’s life
is also an instance of emotional contagion. She kneels down not for
herself but out of compassion for another: Mariana, who passionately
begs Isabel for help: “Sweet Isabel, take my part!” (V.i.430). Mariana’s
pleading makes clear her love for Angelo: when the Duke tells her
that she will inherit Angelo’s possessions so that she can buy herself
a better husband, she replies, “O my dear lord, / I crave no other, nor
no better man” (V.i.425–26). Isabel responds compassionately to the
other woman’s love, grief, and pleading.
Isabel’s plea embodies the mercy and compassion that were
depicted as damaging earlier in the play. When she acts as an inter-
cessor between the Duke and Mariana, kneeling to beg mercy of the
Duke, Isabel’s position reflects the traditional image of medieval
queens as well as the Blessed Virgin, who intervenes in heaven’s stern
judgment of even the most deplorable sinners, which Angelo cer-
tainly is. Arguably, mercy for Angelo might permit the endless gen-
eration of sin invoked earlier in the play, but at this moment Isabel’s
compassionate plea for mercy is represented as revealing a heretofore
hidden truth rather than spawning a sinful progeny. When Isabel
says to the Duke, “Look, if it please you, on this man condemn’d /
As if my brother liv’d,” her generous interpretation of Angelo and his
position turns out to be factually correct (V.i.444–45). Isabel embod-
ies not only the myth of the Blessed Virgin here but also the myth of
the merciful queen Elizabeth (a name which is the English form of
Isabel). Richard Mulcaster describes how Elizabeth, on her entrance
into London for her coronation, passed a weeping man who turned
his head away at the sight of her. Though it seems likely—given his
averted face—that this man lamented her accession, the new queen
chose to put the best possible interpretation on his behavior; when
asked whether she thought the man wept for sorrow or gladness, the
queen replied, “I warrant you it is for gladness.” Mulcaster remarks,
“A gracious interpretation of a noble courage, which would turn the
doubtful to the best.””59 The fact that Isabel’s merciful and imagina-
tive “reading” of the situation—that Claudio still lives—turns out to
be true seems to valorize, even celebrate, qualities that have earlier
troubled this play: compassion, mercy, and equity.
If the Duke’s past leniency, carried out behind the scenes, recalls
the reign of Elizabeth, then that image of the clement queen, respond-
ing with feminine pity and generous in her interpretations—and thus
judgments—is now refracted in Isabel. But these qualities no longer

seemproblematicinActV.Thelanguageoff MeasureforMeasure,up
until this final scene, repeatedly registers the danger of mercy, com-
passion, intercession—when they are private. But in public, staged,
and under the control of the Duke, mercy no longer poses a threat.
The merciful judgments of the Duke can produce a comic ending,
because he uses mercy in the way that James did when, in 1603, he
remitted the death sentences for three conspirators in the Main Plot.
On this occasion, James signed death warrants and then reversed
them at the last moment, when the men were actually on the scaf- f
fold. Robert Cecil’s description of what happened is instructive:
I doubt not but you would equally with us admire, the excellent
Mixture of the King’s Mercy with Justice; for even after he had first
absolutelytaughtusallourDuties,toleaveallMediationinthisCase,(Mercy
being only his) he signed three warrants for the Execution of the two
Lords Cobham and Grey y with Sir Griffin Markham.60
After each man came to the scaffold and made full preparation to
die, each was recalled by the king’s messenger. Finally, all three were
brought to the scaffold together and the King’s pardon was publicly
announced, which was received by “all of the Standers by, with such
Joy and Admiration, as so rare and unheard of a Clemency most wor-
thyly deserved.”61 The public reception of the king’s mercy is whole-
heartedly positive, according to Cecil; no one warns about foolish
clemency, as so often happened in Elizabeth’s time, despite the fact
that these men were accused of a treasonous plot. But this monarchi-
cal mercy is staged in such a way that it dramatizes James’s power:
as Cecil says, James began by teaching them their duty and his own
absolute power by refusing to allow anyone to intercede for the con-
demned men. But having asserted his authority, James, theatrically
and very publicly producing last-minute pardons, stages himself as
a figure of godlike power. It forms a striking contrast to the way
Elizabeth was so often represented in these cases, as a weak monarch
whose “womanish pity” caused her to waffle behind the scenes.
Jeffrey Doty argues that the Duke inMeasure for Measure stages
a final scene intended to establish his sacred authority. Since Doty
has also argued that the Duke desires to free his authority from any
dependence on popularity, it seems counterintuitive to suggest that
this theatrical final scene could accomplish that. But Doty’s point is
that this is a different kind of public performance from those staged
Measure for MeasureandtheTransitionfromElizabethtoJames 155
by Elizabeth: rather than evoking love and cheers, the Duke’s per-
formance produces “awe and silence.”62 I would like to amplify this
difference by noting that Elizabeth’s merciful judgments were never
staged in the theatrical fashion that James employed with the Main
conspirators. Elizabeth’s reluctance to execute harsh justice was usu-
ally carried on behind the scenes, resulting in frustrated assertions
from her courtiers such as Cecil’s to Walsingham when the execution
of Norfolk was delayed: “I cannot write you what is the inward cause
of the stay of the Duke of Norfolk’s death.”63 The phrase “inward
cause” suggests how privately the queen deliberated: even an insider
like Cecil is unsure of her motives. Elizabeth’s public performances
resulted in adoring cheers rather than awed silence in part because
she typically staged herself as a loving queen and mother to her peo-
ple, not as a judge, whether harsh or merciful. Her judgments, as we
have seen, were often hidden, perhaps because, as a woman, she was
likely to be condemned no matter whether she was harsh or mild.
Unlike Elizabeth, James attended Star Chamber hearings in per-
son, a practice that made his personal judgments more public but
also potentially cast a court of law as an embodiment of personal
monarchy. Thus legal historian Theodore Plucknett suggests that
the “greatest blow” to the Star Chamber “came from its friend rather
than its enemies,” for when James attended in person, “the spectacle
of the sovereign sitting for five days and giving judgment in a libel
action” must have seemed “a triumph of the principle of personal
monarchy.”64 Plucknett’s use of the word “spectacle” to describe
James’s attendance attests that the principle of personal monarchy is
strengthened by the public nature of the king’s judgment; whether the
judgment is merciful or rigorous is not the point.65 James’s interactions
with and attempts to control his Parliaments were similarly public in
a way that Elizabeth’s were not. Elizabeth and James both followed
the tradition of addressing Parliament in an opening and closing
speech, but James’s words to Parliament were much more highly pub-
licized. Only rarely were Elizabeth’s speeches to Parliament printed,
the Golden Speech of 1601 being the best-known exception. James,
by contrast, had his first speech to the Parliament of March 1604
printed by the royal printer in London and also in Edinburgh, a prac-
tice that would continue throughout his reign.66 Despite our impres-
sion of James as a withdrawn and private monarch and Elizabeth
as one who permitted much more public access to her person, the
distinction between the two is finer than this. James staged himself
differently. His progress into London for his coronation was his first
and last; such celebrations of mutual love between himself and his
people were not his chosen theater of power. However, public and
publicized appearances before legislative and judicial groups such as
Star Chamber and Parliament worked to establish James as a differ-
ent kind of authoritative figure, one who believed in the supremacy
of his personal judgments and who believed in staging them.
Does the end of Measure valorize this idea of kingship as invested
absolutely in a single figure whose judgments do and should supersede
those of the law? I would say rather that the play stages this brand of
authority and suggests its reliance on public show. The Duke at the
end of Measure may not have silenced the unruly discourse of a bur-
geoning public sphere: Lucio is still talking, though the Duke does
have the last word. But he has performed his mercy in such a way
as to brand it a sign of power rather than weakness. Paradoxically,
mercy exercised behind closed doors subjected him to unregulated
public discourse much more so than does a mercy exercised in pub-
lic. Isabel’s moment of intercession recalls an older model of mercy
associated with the late queen: traditionally feminine, based on com-
passion, and enacted not as a sign of power but undertaken from a
posture of subordination. Queen Elizabeth’s mercy in reality prob-
ably had none of these traits, but as we have seen, her clemency was
often represented as a sign of feminine weakness rather than monar-
chical power. James may have regarded his predecessor’s reliance on
popularity as another weakness, one that undercuts absolutist ideol-
ogy,butMeasureforMeasureshowsthepotentialpowerconferredon
a male monarch as a result of his public performance of mercy.
CHAPTER 6
“GOOD QUEENE, YOU MUST

BE RULL’D”: FEMININE MERCY
R
IN THE PLAY
A S OF HEYWOOD
AND DEKKER
A
fter the death of Elizabeth in March of 1603, panegyrics
remembered her as a loving mother to her people, a virtu-
ous and wise princess who, by God’s special care, was able
to survive and thrive despite the many dangers that surrounded her.
Often, writers celebrated the peace enjoyed during her reign: “Full
foure and fortie yeares foure months seven dayes, / She did maintaine
this realme in peece alwayes.”1 But as discussed in Chapter Five, not
everyone lamented the end of Elizabeth’s peaceful reign. In Thomas
Dekker’s The Wonderful Year (1603), courtiers, lawyers, merchants,
citizens, and shepherds mourned the queen’s death; only the soldier,
walking on wooden legs, “brisseld up the quills of his stiffe porcupine
mustachio, and swore by no beggers that now was the houre come for
him to bestirre his stumps.”2 Those who hoped that James might prove
less irenic than Elizabeth would soon be disappointed, of course, but
some of her subjects initially welcomed a man’s accession, expecting
an end to certain traditionally “feminine” qualities associated with
the queen, such as an aversion to war and an excess of clemency.
This chapter addresses three plays written within a few years of
Elizabeth’s death that directly represent her: Thomas Heywood’s
IfYouKnowNotMeYouKnowNobody, y PartsIandII,andThomas
Dekker’s The Whore of Babylon. In all three, we can identify the cel-
ebration of masculine authority that was occasionally expressed
openly as James came to power. The queen’s clemency is an important
topic in these plays and is clearly associated with her gender; however,
there is little fear that her actual judgments will endanger herself and
her realm. Elizabeth’s mercy causes less tension in Heywood’s and
Dekker’s plays than it does in most literary representations that we

have seen because the queen’s agency is reduced; her councilors seem
to exercise more authority than she does. Heywood’s plays, in par-
ticular, stage Elizabeth as a much more docile and conventionally
feminine figure than she actually was, despite his dramatization of
her famous visit to the troops at Tilbury. By the time this rousing
scene is reached, however, Elizabeth has been inscribed in very con-
ventionally feminine terms and her dangerously merciful nature has
been restrained by the men around her. Both Heywood and Dekker
return to a figuration of her mercy present at the outset of her reign:
Elizabeth’s mercy identifies her as a champion of Protestantism and
distinguishes her from the Roman Catholic Mary Tudor. Both play- y
wrights also emphasize God’s control over events to such an extent
that Elizabeth herself finally seems less the agent of her own fate and
more a passive creature directed by the men around her and by God’s
providence.
Thomas Heywood was a professional playwright whose dramati-
zation of Elizabeth’s trials during the reign of Mary Tudor was enti-
tled
dIfYouKnowNotMeYouKnowNobody y.Subtitled“TheTroubles
of Queene Elizabeth” and first printed in 1605, it was followed the
next year by If You Know Not Me You Know Nobody, PartII. This
second play focuses not on Queen Elizabeth but on the merchant
Thomas Gresham. In her introduction to the Malone Society reprint
of Part II, Madeleine Doran speculates that Heywood, wanting to
capitalize on the popularity off If You Know Not Me, may have taken
a play about Thomas Gresham that he had written earlier and inter-
polated scenes about Queen Elizabeth into the already existing play,
resulting in “a single two-part play recording the troubles and glories
of Elizabeth’s life and reign.”3 Heywood’s plays were indeed extraor-
dinarily popular; there were eight editions of Part I and four edi-
tions of Part II within thirty years after they were first published.
What accounts for this popularity? Teresa Grant says that the
story of Elizabeth’s youthful trials was a familiar and beloved tale
in early modern England that “tugged at its collective heartstrings.””4
Catherine Loomis suggests that the uncomplicated world depicted
by Heywood was comforting.5 Perhaps Heywood’s portrayal of the
queen is comforting not only because it is so simplified, familiar, and
celebratory. Heywood also depicts an Elizabeth who exemplifies
conventionally feminine qualities, yet is still able to triumph and rule
successfully. Her successes, however, have little to do with her own
agency; some other force promotes Elizabeth’s cause and protects
Feminine Mercy in the Plays of Heywood and Dekker 159
her, whether that force is aristocratic males, London merchants, or

God’s providence.
In If You Know Not Me, Heywood emphasizes the youth and
innocence of the Princess Elizabeth. Catherine Loomis points out
that our very first glimpse of Elizabeth in this play highlights her
vulnerability, as the sickbed on which she lies is carried onto the
stage. Her agency is elided, according to Loomis, and her survival
attributed to divine intervention rather than any efforts of her own.6
Certainly Heywood’s young Elizabeth does not resemble the cou-
rageous Elizabeth of the Armada story. For example, Heywood’s
Princess Elizabeth repeatedly expresses her fear of impending death.
When she is about to be examined by Mary’s councilors, she implies
her willingness to die by naming herself “a Virgine and a Martyr”
(v.342), and she reiterates her trust in God; she also refuses to admit
guilt and proclaims her innocence when questioned by the Bishop of
Winchester.7 Despite her brave words in these situations, when she
is alone with her gentlewomen, she says that her fear and the queen’s
displeasure, though they have cured her body’s illness, have made her
“hart sick, braine sick, and sick even to death” (v. 313–15). “My hart is
fearfull,” she tells Gage in a later scene (xiv.985). After she is released
from the Tower into the guardianship of Beningfield, Elizabeth
says, “What fearfull terror doth assayle my hart? / Good Gage come
hether and resolve me true / In thy opinion; shall I out live this night?”
(xiv.976–78). Even when she finally gets her desired audience with
her sister, Elizabeth weeps what she calls a “womanish teare, / In
part compeld by joy, and part by feare” (xviii.1255–56). This portrait
of a frightened young woman adds to the pathos of her situation and
contributes to the play’s power to tug at the heartstrings of the audi-
ence, as noted by Grant. It also, however, represents Elizabeth as
traditionally feminine. As Janel Mueller suggests about Elizabeth’s
omission of courage as one of the cardinal virtues she embraced as a
ruler, “courage” was coded masculine and connoted the possibility of
violent action that Elizabeth resisted when she had to decide Mary
Stuart’s fate.8 If You Know Not Me removes traditionally masculine
qualities from Elizabeth and celebrates her merciful nature as part
of this picture of perfect femininity.
Despite her imprisonment and ill use, when Elizabeth comes to
power at the end of the play, she treats her former enemies with mercy.
The Constable treated her harshly when she was in the Tower; the
audience heard him say, “Oh that I could but draine her harts deare
blood, / Oh it would feede me, do my soule much good” (ix.755–56). In
the final scene, when Elizabeth is queen, he begs forgiveness: “Pardon

me gratious Madame ’twas not spleene, / But that alegance that I ow’d
my Queene” (xxiii.1528–29). Elizabeth immediately pardons him:
“We do as freely pardon as you truly serve” (xxiii.1532–33). Though
she toys a bit with her next petitioner, Beningfield, the outcome is the
same. After referring to him as her jailer, she says, “When we have
one we would have hardly us’d / And cruelly delt with, you shall be the
man.” But she follows this dig with the promise of clemency: “This is
a day for peace, not vengeance fit, / All your good deeds wee’le quit, all
wronges remit” (xxiii.1546–49). Immediately after she speaks these
lines, she is presented with the sword of justice, her words having sug-
gested the lenient brand of justice she is expected to purvey.
Grant notes that Heywood deliberately contrasts Elizabeth’s
clemency with her sister Mary’s “perfidious cruelty” in order to char-
acterize Elizabeth as the antithesis of her predecessor: “After gain-
ing the throne Mary persecutes her religious enemies and returns
the country to the errors of the Catholic faith; but Elizabeth metes
out no punishments—even to those who have done her substan-
tial wrong—and embraces the true Protestant religion.”9 Her claim
that the contrast implies the distinction between their respective
religions agrees with the way claims of Elizabeth’s merciful nature
were used early in her reign to promote her image as a champion of
Protestantism. However, I would argue that Mary’s portrait is a bit
more ambivalent than Grant allows. True, we are meant to compare
Elizabeth’s leniency in the final scene with Mary’s severity toward
Master Dodds in the first scene. But Mary is not unrelentingly cruel.
Her harshness toward Dodds, who asks for the freedom to practice
their Protestant faith that was promised to the men of Suffolk, cer-
tainly characterizes Catholicism as the religion of oppression. But
our clearest impression of Mary is not that she is personally cruel, but
rather that she is dominated by the men around her. The pillorying
of Dodds is not her command, but that of the Bishop of Winchester.
Winchester and Beningfield convince Mary that Elizabeth poses
a danger, resulting in the order that Elizabeth be brought to court
and questioned. Elizabeth’s greatest peril occurs when Winchester
tries to have her death warrant signed—but not by Mary, rather, by
Philip, who is alerted to the fact that the warrant has been slipped
into papers he is sealing in time to recall it. It is Philip, not Mary,
who orders Elizabeth released from her confinement and brought
to Hampton Court. At his urging, Mary accepts her sister into her
presence. Heywood depicts both queens as dominated by the men
around them.10 Mary’s allegiance to Catholicism and domination by

cruel men like the Bishop of Winchester contribute to her severity.
Elizabeth’s clemency signals her virtuous adherence to the true faith;
that her supporters are godly men is signaled by their compassion.
Heywood does not characterize Mary as a cruel Jezebel, as did
Knox and Becon. She does not have Elizabeth’s (or Philip’s) degree
of compassion, but the play suggests repeatedly that, were Elizabeth
actually in her presence, Mary would relent and pity her. Historically,
Mary did resist giving Elizabeth a personal audience during the time
she was under suspicion. Both the real-life events and Heywood’s
portrayal suggest how a personal audience with the monarch can pro-
vide access to pity.11 The first person to speak to Mary on Elizabeth’s
behalf insists that the princess “only craves but to behold your face, /
That she might cleare her selfe of all supposed treasons” (ii.116–18).
When Elizabeth is being conveyed to the Tower in the famous barge,
Winchester asks Beningfield, “Did you not marke what a pitious
eye she cast / To the Queens window as she past a long?” (vii.517–18).
Recognizing that Elizabeth wants to linger near Mary’s window,
Winchester insists that the bargeman row away hastily. Shandoyse,
having witnessed the princess’s conveyance to the Tower, says, “Yet
who shall hinder these my eyes to sorrow / For her sorrow: By Gods
marry deere, / That the Queen could not, though her selfe were here”
(vii.550–52). Elizabeth craves the personal meeting with Mary for the
very reason that Shandoyse suggests here: if Mary actually saw and
spoke to the dejected Elizabeth, she would be more likely to pity her.
When the sisters finally meet, at Philip’s urging, Mary eventu-
ally forgives Elizabeth, but Heywood leaves her motive obscure.
Obviously, Mary is partly swayed by her husband’s insistence. Before
Elizabeth even enters, Mary promises Philip that she will bestow
her favor on Elizabeth, though she says, rather caustically, that
her favor shall be “farre bove her desert” (xviii.1239). Mary is not
as tenderly inclined toward Elizabeth as is Philip. She tells him to
step behind the arras, saying “There shines too much mercy in your
face” (xviii.1244). Once Elizabeth enters, Mary questions her sister,
but Elizabeth pleads effectively for herself (as Mary says, “We know
you can speake well”) (xviii.1267). This too suggests the potency of
the personal audience; Elizabeth finally gets a chance to speak for
herself and powerfully insists that even torture, imprisonment, and
death cannot cause her to die as anything but Mary’s “true subject,
and true sister” (xviii.1281). Mary’s questioning ends with her sud-
den command that Elizabeth should rise and kiss her hand. “Sister
this night your selfe shall feast with me, / To morrow for the coun-
try you are free” (xviii.1303–4). Whether Mary was influenced by her
husband, convinced by Elizabeth’s speech of self-defense, or moved
by pity is never clear. Perhaps Heywood means to suggest none of
the above: Elizabeth’s final word to Mary is that “God hath kept his
promise . . . To rayse them frends that on his word relie,” implying
that her reconciliation with Mary was God’s work (xviii.1298). That
explanation accords with Heywood’s providential theme (following
Foxe’s account) but also, notably, it removes the agency for this rec-
onciliation from either woman.
If You Know Not Me, Part II provides a dramatic portrayal of
Queen Elizabeth’s mercy toward her would-be assassin, Dr. Parry.
In Heywood’s sequel, Elizabeth is a secondary character, appear-
ing only three times. In her first appearance, she visits Gresham’s
newly constructed Royal Exchange and names it. Here she has a
comic encounter with the merchant Hobson. The play ends with a
long scene dramatizing her visit to the troops at Tilbury during the
attack of the Spanish Armada. In between these two is the scene
in which Dr. Parry attempts to assassinate her. William Parry’s 1585
plot to murder Elizabeth as she walked in the Palace Gardens had
caused an uproar when it was revealed, though Parry lost his nerve
when he approached the queen and did not actually attack her. He
was executed in 1585.12 In dramatizing this event, Heywood provides
a nuanced portrayal of Elizabeth’s mercy. She is in her garden when
Parry first approaches her, comparing the plants to her subjects and
herself to the gardener:
In such a Garden may a Soveraigne

Be taught her loving subjects to maintaine;
Each Plant unto his nature and his worth,
Having full cherishing, it springeth foorth.
Weedes must be weeded out, yet weeded so
Till they doe hurt, let them a Gods name grow. (xv. 2325–30)
Painting Elizabeth as a nurturer who cherishes each subject, this

speech constructs the popular maternal image of the queen, an
image that requires that she be tenderly merciful. Her paradoxical
desire both to destroy and sustain the weeds points clearly to the
problem with the queen’s clemency. Her generous forbearance is an
important part of her image, but it can also be dangerous, given that
the weeds can hurt the garden.
These words foreshadow the complexities of Elizabeth’s relation-

ship with Dr. Parry, who has just delivered a soliloquy expressing his
indebtedness to Elizabeth because she showed him mercy once before,
a gratitude that conflicts with the oath he has taken to kill her. Her pre-
vious mercy has indeed had the effect described in statecraft literature
that advises a monarch to grant clemency in order to bind and obligate
his subjects. Parry meditates on the queen’s earlier pardon, saying,
I had been eaten up with wormes ere this,

Had not her mercie given a life to this;
And yet these hands if I performe my oth,
Must kill that life, that gave a life to both. (xv.2282–85)
Heywood shows that the queen’s mercy had the effect of creating a
sense of obligation in Parry, but the crucial point seems to be that
his sense of obligation is not strong enough to override his intention.
Parry reflects not only on Elizabeth’s merciful nature and his debt
to her, but also on the solemn oath he took to kill her and the prom-
ises he made to “holy fathers and grave Catholikes” (xv. 2297). He
finally decides to go forward: “And by a subjects hand, a Soveraign
dies” (xv. 2301). After he makes two false starts, the queen sees his
weapon and cries, “Parry, Villaine, Traitour, / What doost thou with
that Dagge?” (xv.2350–51). Her lords hurry to her, Parry’s attempt is
foiled, and he immediately asks for her mercy.
The first part of this scene emphasizes Elizabeth’s image as a merci-
ful, loving mother; it shows the political benefits of mercy in dramatiz-
ing Parry’s sense of obligation to the queen, but it also suggests that
the potential benefit of granting clemency is outweighed by the risks.
But at the end of the scene, any sense that mercy might be salutary
vanishes. Elizabeth’s personally merciful nature endangers her and
requires external control. When Parry, having just threatened to shoot
Elizabeth, says, “Mercie dread Queene,” she immediately responds, “I
thanke my God I have mercie to remit / A greater sinne, if you repent
for it: Arise” (xv.2366–68). Heywood depicts Elizabeth’s mercy as a
boundless, God-given gift; she is represented as an icon of sacred mercy
here, but she is not allowed to enact that mercy. Instead, Leicester
intervenes, outraged, and tells the other lords to take Parry away:
Let her alone, sheele pardon him againe:

Good Queene we know you are too mercifull,
To deale with Traitours of this monstrous kinde.
Away with him to the tower, then to death. (xv.2370–73)
When Elizabeth protests, his reply is startling: “Good Queene, you

must be rul’d” (xv.2377). Elizabeth’s voice is not authoritative. She is
not trusted to act independently: if left alone, she will pardon Parry
again. She is overruled by her lords, specifically Leicester; his impe-
rious statement, “You must be ruled,” is the scene’s final line. In
staging this scene, Heywood is able to characterize Elizabeth as a
loving, nurturing figure and an icon of sacred mercy. But the queen’s
excessive mercy is no threat because she submits to the authority of
Leicester and her other lords, recalling Aylmer’s words, “If she shuld
judge in capitall crimes: what daunger were there in her womannishe
nature? none at all. For the verdict is the 12 mennes, whiche passe
uppon life and deathe, and not hers.”13
As John Watkins has pointed out, Heywood’s plays efface memo-
ries of Elizabeth as an absolute monarch. This stage Elizabeth, who
makes concessions to her people and has limited agency herself,
emerges as what Watkins calls “an icon of anti-Stuart resistance.”14
In If You Know Not Me Part II, the merchants rather than the queen
take center stage and seem to be responsible for the success and con-
tinuity of the nation. Repeatedly, these non-aristocratic men dis-
play an agency that Heywood’s Elizabeth does not possess. They
are virtuous, generous, and their contributions—such as charitable
gifts to the poor, loans to the crown, and the building of the Royal
Exchange—promote English prosperity and are markers of their
nobility. Gresham is several times referred to as royal, suggesting that
he displaces Elizabeth as the most authentic monarch in the play.
Not only are these men extraordinarily generous, but Heywood
specifically emphasizes the capacity to feel pity and the merci-
ful judgments of one of them, old Hobson.15 He takes pity on John
Rowland, a man who owes him money that he cannot repay. “I am the
man whom you call’d Tawniecote,” Rowland says, to which Hobson
replies, “And I the Hobson that will pitie thee” (xi.1661–62). When
Tawny-Coat describes his wife and children’s hunger and his own
inability to earn more than threepence a day, Hobson responds, “Alas
the while, poore soules I pittie them” (xi.1678). Tawny-Coat tries to
pay Hobson five shillings that he has saved as a start on repaying the
twenty pounds he owes, but Hobson returns it, telling him to use it
to buy bread for his children. A few scenes later, Hobson learns that
his former employee Tim is about to be hanged for an earlier theft in
which he stole a hundred pounds from his master. Hobson is horri-
fied to learn that Tim will hang: “A hundred thousand pound cannot
make a man; / A hundred shall not hang one by my meanes: / Men
are worth more then monie” (xiv. 2178–80). He goes charging off to
save him, riding a horse without saddle, bridle, boots, or spurs, lead-
ing Nowell to say, “They will take him for a mad man.” Tawny-Coat
replies, “Als one to him he doo’s not stand on bravery / So he may doe
men good” (xiv.2198–99).
This insistence on Hobson’s mercy contributes to the play’s con-
struction of the merchant class as England’s nobility. In Renaissance
culture, mercy is often adduced as a sign of true nobility; a long-stand-
ing tradition associates mercy with monarchy.16 Notably, Hobson’s
acts of mercy do not have dangerous or problematic repercussions, as
does Elizabeth’s forgiveness of Dr. Parry. The aftermath of his pity
for Tawny-Coat is glimpsed near the end of the play in the words of
Lady Ramsie:
Amongst these, I hold old Hobson well deserv’s

To be ranckt equall with the bountiful’st.
He hath rais’d many falling, but especially
One master Rowland, once called Tawnicote,
But now an able Citizen late chosen
A Maister of the Hospitall. (xiv.2126–31)
Hobson deserves “to be ranckt equal with the bountiful’st,” an inter-

esting choice of words that hints at the connection between the mer-
chant’s merciful deeds and social rank.
If You Know Not Me Part II celebrates mercy as a noble quality
that is most salutary and unproblematic when practiced by the men
of the merchant class. Queen Elizabeth is represented as the loving,
merciful mother whose generous lenity toward Parry is admirably
virtuous but politically foolish and fundamentally feminine. The play
ends with the Spanish Armada scene, but even here, at the moment
in her reign when the queen was most openly figured as masculine,
Heywood’s Elizabeth draws attention to the limitations posed by her
gender:
Oh had God and Nature

Given us proportion man-like to our mind,
Wee’d not stand here fenc’t in a wall of Armes,
But have been present in these Sea alarmes. (xvii.2544–47)
As Watkins says, “Although Elizabeth distinguishes between her

masculine mind and her female body, she concedes the intransigence
of the body’s limitations.”17 In a scene that appears in the 1633 edi-

tion of this play, the Spanish belittle England as “a petty island gov-
v
ernd by a woman”; Don Pedro scoffingly suggests that the queen and
her ladies will greet the Armada “in their smocks, willing to pay /
Their maidenheads for ransome.”18 Of course, these lines are ironic
given the well-known outcome of the Spanish invasion. But this
disparagement of Elizabeth’s gender is not completely repudiated
in Heywood’s dramatization, since the queen does indeed acknowl-
edge her limited ability to defend her country.19 England is instead
defended by aristocratic men of war, and also, by implication, the
merchants who supply the funds. The Armada scene’s heroes are
Drake, Furbisher, Leicester, and the other martial men whom the
queen repeatedly thanks. If You Know Not Me Part II constructs an
Elizabeth of diminished personal authority, investing that authority
in men of both the aristocratic and merchant classes. In this context,
the queen’s mercy can be celebrated as an aspect of her loving, mater-
nal care of her subjects.
Thomas Dekker’s Elizabeth play followed Heywood’s plays by a
couple of years. If You Know Not Me was first printed in 1605, fol-
lowed by Part II in 1606; Dekker’s The Whore of Babylon n dates
from 1607. Like Heywood, Dekker was a professional writer and a
man of the theater who wrote with commercial interests in mind.
Heywood’s Elizabeth plays were extraordinarily popular, which
may have motivated Dekker to write The Whore of Babylon.20 But
the play also accords with the fervent Protestantism he displays
in other works. Julia Gasper labels Dekker a “militant Protestant”
and calls The Whore of Babylon n “the definitive militant Protestant
play.”21 Unfortunately for Dekker, his play did not attain the popu-
larity of Heywood’s Elizabeth plays; The Whore of Babylon n was only
published in one edition. Whereas Heywood’s play is a mixture of
city comedy and history, Dekker’s generic approach is quite differ-
ent, which may explain its lesser popularity. Dekker allegorizes his
subject matter, so that the Roman Catholic Church is depicted as
the Empress of Babylon; Elizabeth is Titania, queen of Faerie Land;
one of her councilors, in a nod to Spenser, is named “Florimell.”
Catherine Loomis finds that the play’s spectacular scenes and long,
ornamented speeches link it to the Jacobean court masque.22 Julia
Gasper calls itcomoedia apocalyptica, by which she means that it inter-
prets history according to Protestant historiography based on the
Book of Revelation and other scriptural texts.23 Certainly the play
echoes Protestant interpretations of Revelation that identified the
Whore of Babylon with the papacy: Dekker’s Empress of Babylon

rides a seven-headed beast and has cardinals and kings at her com-
mand. Titania is her great enemy because she “calls her selfe Truth,”
in opposition to the Empresse’s claims to embody truth (I.i.59).24
Dekker dramatizes the same Catholic plots against Elizabeth that
Heywood does—Dr. Parry’s assassination attempt as well as the
Spanish Armada—but adds another important Catholic antago-
nist in Edward Campion (called Campeius). He also includes a brief
account of the Lopez affair.
Given the militantly Protestant tone of Dekker’s play, it is unsur-
prising that The Whore of Babylon n evokes Elizabeth’s image as a
champion of international Protestantism much more emphatically
than does Heywood’s play. The queen’s mercy is central to that
image. However, Titania’s mercy closely echoes that of Heywood’s
Elizabeth in other respects. The mercy of Titania serves to contrast
her with the cruel Empress of Babylon, as Elizabeth’s mercy con-
trastedwithMary’sgreaterseverityinIfYouKnowNotMePartI.But
like Elizabeth in Part II of Heywood’s play, Titania is endangered by
her own mercy. She twice forgives Dr. Parry, allowing him to return
again to try and kill her. But her mercy is ultimately unthreatening
because of our sense that Titania is constantly protected by God and
the guidance of her “fairy peers.” Dekker depicts Titania as willing
to punish when necessary, but personally disinclined to do so. Both
playwrights construct Elizabeth figures whose triumphs are less the
product of their own abilities and actions, and more the result of
their careful councilors and God’s providence.
Mercy is almost immediately introduced as a contested quality
in The Whore of Babylon. In the play’s first scene, the Empresse of
Babylon complains that “Our royall signet, / With which, we, (in a
mothers holy love) / Have sign’d so many pardons, is now counterfeit”
(I.i.28–30). She means that Titania is challenging the Empresse’s
claim to “true Soveraignty” (I.i.20) by asserting that the Empresse’s
mercy is counterfeit, her proclamations lies, and her churches
(“Babylonian Sinagogues”) unclean (I.i.28–35). The Empresse’s claim
to have signed so many pardons out of her motherly love is a par-
ody of Elizabeth’s image of the loving monarch who, as she often
reminded her subjects, was always by nature inclined toward mercy.
But the Empresse’s claim to be a merciful mother quickly collapses,
as the audience hears her persuading the three attendant kings of the
danger posed by Titania, which inspires their hatred for the Fairy
Queen. As one of the kings says,
I could be glad to loose the divine office

Of my creation, to be turn’d into
A dogge, so I might licke up but her blood,
That thrusts us from our vineyards. (I.i.129–32)25
Despite their desire for Titania’s blood, their first attempts will be
guileful as they attempt to woo her, always secretly acting on behalf
of the Empresse.
The Empresse alleges her mercy as part of her larger claim to be
the world’s true sovereign. The fraudulence of that claim is revealed
immediately. Titania’s mercy to a neighboring country, by contrast,
validates her true sovereignty. Fideli, one of her councilors, tells her:
The Sea-God hath upon your maiden shores,

(On Dolphin’s backs that pittie men distrest)
In safetie sett a people that implores,
The Soveraigne mercie flowing from your brest. (II.i.229–32)
These neighbors represent the Netherlands, whose plight is described

by Fideli. Unlike the historical Elizabeth, who resisted the level
of English involvement in the Netherlands that many committed
Protestants desired, Titania immediately says, “Give them our pres-
ence” (II.i.257). Dekker conflates the plight of the Protestant states
in the Netherlands with that of the dispossessed heir to the throne of
Portugal. Just after Fideli recounts the troubles of the Netherlands,
Titania’s councilor Parthenophill tells her of the Prince’s plight:
he is identifiable as another antagonist of Spain, Don Antonio of
Portugal, who opposed Philip II’s claim to the throne of Portugal.
Essex and other Protestants supported Don Antonio’s claims, in the
face of Queen Elizabeth’s opposition.26 But in Dekker’s play, just as
she immediately agreed to help the Netherlands, Titania quickly
offers succor to the disinherited Prince:
Pittie and we had talk before you came,

She hath not taken yet her hand from ours,
Nor shall shee part, until those higher powers
Behold that Prince: good works are theirs, not ours. (II.i.271–74)
Pity, envisioned as a woman, holds the queen’s hand in this emblem-

atic image that genders pity feminine and also suggests the queen’s
intimate reliance on that emotion. But Titania’s adoption of pity
carries no threat: first, her pity serves a cause that Protestants sup-
ported, and second, she immediately subjects her own power to that
of heaven, suggesting that everything, including her feminine emo-
tion of pity, is under God’s control.
Like Heywood’s Elizabeth, Dekker’s Titania bows to the will of
her male councilors. When wooed by the three kings, clearly rep-
resentative of courtships by Catholic princes (the most famous and
controversial being the Duke d’Anjou), Titania listens to the objec-
tions of her “fairy peers,” then says, “Princes are free-borne, and have
free wills, / These are to us, as vallies are to hills, / We may, be coun-
celd by them, not controld” (I.ii.209–11). But this surprising asser-
tion of her sovereignty is quickly revealed to be nothing more than
a means of taunting the suitors: Titania promises that, despite the
opposition of her councilors, she will bestow her love on the suitors
at a later time. When asked to “name that most happie hour,” she
answers in a riddle:
When Lambes of ours, are kild by wolves of yours,

Yet no blood suckt; when Heaven two Suns endures . . . (I.ii.231–32)
Having cited a long list of impossibilities, Titania concludes: “But

then (and not till then) I sweare, / Shall your bewitching charmes
sleepe in mine eare” (I.ii.250–51). By raising the possibility of Titania’s
absolute authority and then turning it into a joke played on her suit-
ors, Dekker radically undermines it. The scene also suggests the
way Titania’s personal sovereignty could imperil her and her realm:
had she truly believed her own absolutist rhetoric and acted on it by
opposing her council, she would have been the victim of these blood-
thirsty kings (who, after she exits the stage, threaten to tear her limb
from limb). In the following scene, Titania calls her councilors “wise
pilots” and says,
how it agrees
When Princes heads sleepe on their counsels knees:
Deepe rooted is a state, and growes up hie,
When Providence, Zeale, and Integritie
Husband it well: Theis fathers twill be said
(One day) make me a granddame of a maid. (II.i.33–38)
This rhetoric of mixed monarchy is unmistakable, and vividly

gendered. As the prince, Titania is the most passive figure, sleep-
ing with her head on the knees of her peers. They are the “fathers”
who “husband” well the state. Through their decidedly masculine

efforts, she will be preserved and also fruitful: they will make her a
“granddame”—suggesting both old age and progeny—though she is
a maid.
This valorization of masculine authority and activity occurs again
in a speech made by the first Cardinal to the kings who are seek- k
ing Titania’s life. He suggests that her death may not solve all their
problems:
Say that Titania were now drawing short breath,

(As that’s the Cone and Button that together
Claspes all our hopes) out of her ashes may
A second phoenix rise, of larger wing,
Of stronger talent, of more dreadfull beake. (III.i.232–36)
This prophecy of the accession of James I reflects the attitude

expressed in Henry Hooke’s 1604 sermon, in which he describes James
as a phoenix rising from Elizabeth’s ashes and predicts that, as a man,
James will be able and eager to accomplish what a queen could not.27
The assumption that Elizabeth’s masculine successor will prove larger,
stronger, and more powerful than the queen aligns with the play’s por-
trayal of a queen dependent on the judgment of her male peers.28
A long scene dramatizing several threats against Titania’s life fore-
grounds the question of the queen’s mercy in The Whore of Babylon. In
the course of this scene, IV.ii, Titania is asked to sign the death war-
rant for a rebellious peer, avoids an attack from an unnamed gentle-
man who has sworn to kill her, is given a cup of poison by Dr. Roper
(Lopez), and hears Parry confess that he was enlisted by foreign pow-w
ers to kill her. Each situation displays Titania’s personally clement
nature, but she never opposes the advice of her “fairy peers” by argu-
ing for leniency. The scene opens with Fideli presenting Titania with
a death warrant for someone described as the moon, a person who
borrowed her light from the sun (Titania) and then tried to eclipse
Titania’s brightness. The incident has led all the Fairies to entreat
the queen on their knees to pull this menace “out from the firma-
ment.” As her councilor urges Titania to sign the death warrant for
this unnamed threat (probably Mary Stuart), we can see the resem-
blance and difference between Titania and Spenser’s Mercilla.29 Like
Spenser, Dekker creates an Elizabeth-figure who simultaneously
embodies tender mercy and enacts rigorous justice: Titania does
sign the warrant. The difference is that Titania puts up very little
resistance to the will of her council. Mercilla’s hesitation to permit

Duessa’s death resembles more accurately what Queen Elizabeth
actually did. Dekker’s maiden queen proclaims her merciful nature
just as Elizabeth often did, but she departs from the behavior of the
real-life Elizabeth when she quickly agrees to sign the death warrant.
Though Titania protests that her “hand was made to save, but not
to kill,” she easily accedes to Fideli’s wishes, though as she does, she
emphasizes her own quite different personal inclination:
Yet if we needs must bow, we would incline

To that [the scale] where mercy lies, that scale’s divine:
But so to save were our own breast to wound,
Nay (which is more) our peoples: for their good,
We must the surgeon play, and let out blood. (IV.ii.26–30)
Titania stresses her own inclination to mercy and characterizes her-

self as divinely merciful. In proposing—momentarily—to wound
her own breast by saving a condemned man, she invokes the popu-
lar image of the pelican, a symbol of Christ’s mercy often associated
with Elizabeth. However, she quickly recalls that to save a con-
demned criminal would potentially wound not just herself, but her
people. Thus, when Titania signs the death warrant, she claims to be
motivated not by vengeance or personal considerations, but by her
loving concern for her people.
Dekker continues this pattern of showing Titania’s personal
clemency joined with her willingness to take severe action. After
Fideli discovers that Roper has offered Titania a poisoned cup in
exchange for payment from those who seek her overthrow, the queen
exclaims,
Our mercy makes them cruell, hunt out these Leopards:

Their own spots will betray them: they build caves
Even in our parkes: to them, him, and the rest,
Let death be sent, but sent in such a shape,
As may not be too frightfull. Alacke! what glorie
Is it to buffet wretches bound in gives? (IV.ii.132–37)
Titania acknowledges that her own mercy has encouraged these

attempts on her life: “Our mercy makes them cruell.” These words
echo the complaints of Elizabeth’s councilors that she does herself
harm by being too lenient. But even as Titania seems to reject that
harmful mercy, declaring, “Let death be sent,” her natural tenderness

emerges: “but sent in such a shape, / As may not be too frightfull.” Her
reluctance to strike is also seen in her first encounter with Dr. Parry,
which follows immediately. Here Titania is effectively alone: her peer
Florimell is described in the stage direction as “aloofe.” Only in this
scene and in her later interview with Dr. Parry is Titania ever alone;
in these two scenes, when no councilors are there to urge her sever-
ity or mete out punishment, she shows nothing but mercy. In this,
their first encounter, Paridell (Dr. Parry) confesses his confederacy
with the “monsters” from foreign lands who are “fighting against the
heaven of your blest raigne” (IV.ii.153–57). Titania exclaims, “How
durst you (being our subject) wade so far?” Paridell’s answer is ambig-
uous: “Your eare of mercy” (IV.ii.163–64). Is he requesting permis-
sion to carry on with his story and receive a merciful hearing? Or is
he, as Titania herself did in the case of Dr. Roper, blaming her mercy
for his own willingness to transgress?
Paridell claims to have abandoned his earlier intent to kill her and
insists that he is now a loyal subject who can be useful to her. Titania
apparently accepts this, takes no further action, and exits the stage.
But the next time we see Paridell, he is discussing his plan to mur-
der Titania. In Act V, when Paridell is in her presence again, Titania
sends her guard away and speaks with him alone. This time she asks
him if he knows of plans to kill her, and he answers no. Paridell
“offers to stab her from behind,” but when she turns, he kneels down
and tells her that he was about to kill himself out of grief that she
suspects him. Titania is again kind and comforting, causing him to
say, “O machlesse; I’me all poison, and yet she / Turnes all to goodnes
by wise tempering me” (V.ii.5–6). Just as did Heywood, Dekker
raises the possibility that the prince’s clemency could have a salutary
effect; but just as in Heywood’s play, Dr. Parry’s sworn oath to kill the
queen trumps his gratitude and admiration for her. Titania’s mercy,
offered three times, makes Paridell hesitate but does not finally stop
his attempt on her life. As he vows to do the deed—“Now, now, knit
all your sinews in this arm”—and steps toward her again, her coun-
cilors enter and stop this final attempt. Finally, Titania allows justice
to take its course. When Paridell says that nothing can save him now
but her mercy, she responds, “It must not: Princes that would safely
live, / May grieve at traytors fall but not forgive” (V.ii.159–60).
Dekker’s Titania fulfills the wishes of militant Protestants in a
way that her real-life counterpart never did. Titania’s peers curb her
feminine pity, and when she is in their presence, she always accedes
to their demand for harsh measures, though never without stress-

ing her natural clemency and tender pity for those she must pun-
ish: she “may grieve” at Paridell’s treachery but she may not forgive
it. Furthermore, Titania’s mercy inspires her to be an unhesitating
champion for Protestant and anti-Spanish forces abroad, thus gloss-
ing over Elizabeth’s real-life resistance to that role.
The prominence of mercy as a topic in these plays testifies to its
continuing importance in representations of Queen Elizabeth. While
she lived, the queen’s mercy generated conflict; because her image
as a clement queen inscribed her in traditionally feminine terms, it
was both comforting and troubling. As militant Protestants grew
increasingly disappointed by the queen’s tepid support of their aims
and fearful of the realm’s vulnerability to Catholic forces, Elizabeth’s
mercy was often denigrated and resisted. As the preceding discus-
sion has shown, The Faerie Queene, the love poetry of Sidney, Spenser,
andDaniel,andShakespeare’splaysMerchantofVeniceandMeasure
for Measure all inscribe mercy in ambivalent terms and often suggest
that clement actions and decisions have damaging results. After the
queen’s death, Heywood and Dekker still acknowledge the risks of
Elizabeth’s mercy but contain those risks by constructing a queen
who is far more biddable than the real-life Elizabeth ever was. Both
Heywood and Dekker recuperate the troublesome mercy of Queen
Elizabeth, placing it under the control of men and using it to signal
her status as a champion of the true faith and a sacred figure whose
reign is God-ordained. In these plays, performed within a few years
of Elizabeth’s death, the image of the clement queen that was con-
tested during her reign now serves the cause of Protestants who most
resisted it.
NOTES
1 “By Nature Full of Mercy”: The Clemency

of the Queen
1. JohnAylmer,An
, Harboroweforfaithfullandtrewesubiectess(London,
1559), O1r.
2. Aylmer, Harborowe, N3r.
3. Aylmer, Harborowe, N4v.
4. Aylmer, Harborowe, O2r.
5. Jacqueline Vanhoutte analyzes the way Aylmer’s pamphlet, osten-
sibly a defense of female rule, becomes a celebration of English
masculinity, seen as superior because it was capable of correcting
aqueen’s“womanish”excesses.Strange
. Communion:Motherlandand
MasculinityinTudorPlays,Pamphlets,andPoliticss(Newark:University
of Delaware Press, 2003), 105–11.
6. Aylmer, Harborowe, H3v.
7. An historian who addresses the mercy of Tudor queens in relation to
their gender is Sarah Duncan, “‘Most godly heart fraight with al mer-
cie’: Queens’ Mercy During the Reigns of Mary I and Elizabeth I,”
in
nQueensandPowerinMedievalandEarlyModernEngland,ed.Carole
Levin and Robert Bucholz (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press,
2009), 31–50. She identifies concerns about the practice of clemency
by both Mary I (her main focus) and Elizabeth I.
8. Louis Montrose, “‘Shaping Fantasies’: Figurations of Gender and
PowerinElizabethanCulture,”Representations2(Spring1983):61–94.
MorerecentworkincludesTheSubjectofElizabeth:Authority,Gender,
and Representation n (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2006).
9. SusanFrye,ElizabethI:TheCompetitionforRepresentation(New n York:
Oxford University Press, 1993).
10. Carole Levin,The Heart and Stomach of a King: Elizabeth I and the
Politics of Sex and Power (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania
Press, 1994).
11. Montrose, Subject of Elizabeth, 3.
12. Allbiblicalreferences are toTheGenevaBible:AFacsimileofthe1560
Edition, ed. Lloyd E. Berry (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press,
1969). See the discussion of Mercilla inThe Spenser Encyclopedia, ed.
A. C. Hamilton (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1990), 169.
13. Seneca, Moral Essays, trans. John W. Basore. Loeb Classical Library
(London: William Heinemann, 1928–1935), I: 439.
176 Notes
14. Saint Augustine, The City of God Against the Pagans, Volume 3,
trans. David Weisen. Loeb Classical Library (Cambridge: Harvard
University Press and London: William Heinemann, 1968), IX, v:
167–71.
15. Sir Thomas Elyot, The Governour (London: J. M. Dent & Sons and
New York: E. P. Dutton, 1907; rpt. 1937), 145.
16. JustusLipsius,Sixe
, BookesofPolitickesorCivilDoctrine,trans.William
Jones (London, 1594), 33.
17. Elyot, Governour, 145.
18. JacquesHurault,Politicke,Moral,andMartialDiscourses,trans.Arthur
Golding (London, 1595), 191–92.
19. Niccolo Machiavelli, The Prince, trans. and ed. Robert M. Adams
(New York: W. W. Norton, 1977), 47.
20. Machiavelli, The Prince, 47.
21. Machiavelli, The Prince, 48.
22. Seneca, Moral Essays, 391 and 397–98.
23. K.J.Kesselring,MercyandAuthorityintheTudorState(Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 2003).
24. Aristotle,TheNicomacheanEthics,trans.H.Rackham.LoebClassical
Library (London: William Heinemann Ltd. And Cambridge:
Harvard University Press, 1934), V.x.6–8, 317.
25. Mark Fortier, The Culture of Equity in Early Modern England
(Aldershot: Ashgate, 2005), 2.
26. Quoted by Fortier as “a common early modern way of looking at
equity,” Culture of Equity,y 20.
27. ThomasWright,ThePassionsoftheMindeInGenerall,intro.Thomas
O. Sloan (London, 1604; rpt. Urbana: University of Illinois Press,
1971), 40.
28. The Ladies Dictionary y (London, 1694), 135–36.
29. John Donne,The Complete English Poems, ed. A. J. Smith (New York:
Penguin Books, 1971; rpt. 1982), 314.
30. Lipsius, Six Bookes, 30–32.
31. Wright, Passions, 3.
32. Foranoverview,seeA.N.McLaren,PoliticalCultureintheReignof
Elizabeth I (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999), 47.
33. Juan Luis Vives,The Instruction of a Christian Woman, ed. Virginia
Walcott Beacham et al. (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2002),
131.
34. SharonL.Jansen,DebatingWomen,Politics,andPowerinEarlyModern
Europe (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008), 96.
35. Vives, Instruction, 98.
36. TheodoraA.Jankowski,WomeninPowerintheEarlyModernDrama
(Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1992), 59–60 and 122–46.
37. Paige Martin Reynolds, “George Peele and the Judgment of Elizabeth
I,” Studies in English Literature 50.2 (Spring 2010): 263–79.
Notes 177
38. Dante,InfernoII.96.TheDivineComedyin y ThePortableDante,trans.

and ed. Mark Musa (New York: Penguin, 1995), 12.
39. MarinaWarner,AloneofAllHerSex:TheMythandtheCultofthe
Virgin Mary y (Vintage Books, 1983), 200.
40. PaulStrohm,Hochon’
, sArrow:TheSocialImaginationofFourteenth-
Century Texts (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1992), 99–102.
41. HelenHackett,VirginMother,MaidenQueen:ElizabethIandtheCult
of the Virgin Mary y (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1995), 168–69.
42. Christine Coch, “‘Mother of my Contreye’: Elizabeth I and Tudor
Constructions of Motherhood,” English Literary Renaissance 26.3
(Autumn 1996): 423–50. In her study of the idea of England as moth-
erland, Jacqueline Vanhoutte adds that Elizabeth “laid claim to
the maternal authority habitually reserved for the nation.” Strange
Communion, 118.
43. Coch, “Constructions of Motherhood,” 445. Vanhoutte analyzes
Elizabeth’s eventual abandonment of maternal rhetoric in the con-
text of the pervasive image of England itself as the mother in Strange
Communion, 125–29.
44. John Carmi Parsons, “The Queen’s Intercession in Thirteenth-
CenturyEngland,”inPoweroftheWeak:StudiesonMedievalWomen, n
ed. Jennifer Carpenter and Sally-Beth MacLean (Urbana: University
of Illinois Press, 1995), 147.
45. Lois L. Huneycutt, “Intercession and the High-Medieval Queen:
TheEstherTopos,”inPoweroftheWeak:StudiesonMedievalWomen, n
ed. Jennifer Carpenter and Sally-Beth MacLean (Urbana: University
of Illinois Press, 1995), 131.
46. Strohm, Hochon’s Arrow, w 95.
47. Strohm, Hochon’s Arrow, w 102–03.
48. See Coch, “Constructions of Motherhood,” and Mary Beth Rose,
“WhereAretheMothersinShakespeare?””ShakespeareQuarterly y42.3
(Fall 1991): 291–314.
49. Strohm, Hochon’s Arrow, w 111.
50. Parsons, “Queen’s Intercession,” 151.
51. Catherine Oakes, “The Scales: An Iconographic Motif of Justice,
Redemption,andIntercession,”Maria:AJournalofMarianStudies1
(August 2000): 12.
52. A good example is Paul E. J. Hammer’s essay “Sex and the Virgin
Queen: Aristocratic Concupiscence and the Court of Elizabeth I,”
SixteenthCenturyJournal31.1(Spring2000):82.Hammerarguesthat
Thomas Becon and John Knox’s labeling of Mary I as a Jezebel was
one reason that Elizabeth I was such a strict guardian of sexual pro-
priety at her court. Hammer assumes that when Becon and Knox
refer to Jezebel, they are accusing female monarchs of a tendency
to “fleshly weakness”; he suggests that Mary Stuart’s “disastrous
liaisons” seemed to fulfill the prediction Knox made when he used
178 Notes
this label. Though I agree that Elizabeth wanted to avoid the kind
of scandal that resulted from Mary’s indiscretions, Becon and Knox
used the term “Jezebel” primarily to signify female cruelty and
tyranny.
53. OxfordEnglishDictionary, y secondedition(Oxford:OxfordUniversity
Press) http://www.oed.com.
54. Janet Howe Gaines provides an overview of the biblical Jezebel as
well as the history of Jezebel as a symbol of women’s transgressions,
including her use by Knox and Goodman in their treatises. Gaines
recognizes that the Jezebel label carries many different connotations,
not only sexual, but her main purpose is not to analyze the many allu-
sions to Jezebel she cites. Her chapter on “Prose Adaptations of the
Jezebel Story” offers thumbnail sketches of Jezebel allusions from
medieval commentaries to a 1993 speech by Jesse Helms. Gaines
notes that the Jezebel label was a popular one during sixteenth-
century religious struggles and that for Catholic and Protestant
writers during this period, “any woman on the opposing side is con-
sideredaJezebel”(99).MusicintheOldBones:JezebelthroughtheAges
(Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1999).
55. Linda Woodbridge discusses several lists of “bad women” that
includeJezebel.WomenandtheEnglishRenaissance:Literatureand
the NatureofWomankind,1540–1620 (Urbana: University of Illinois
Press, 1984).
56. ChristopherGoodman,How , superiorpowersoughttobeobeyedoftheir
subjects (Geneva, 1558), 34.
57. Goodman, Superior Powers, 34–35.
58. Goodman, Superior Powers, 61–62.
59. AnthonyGilby,AnadmonitiontoEnglandandScotlandtocallthem
torepentance,inTheappellationofJohnKnoxefromthecruelandmost
injustsentencepronouncedagainsthimbythefalsebishoppesandclergieof
Scotland (Geneva, 1558), 72.
60. ThomasBecon,,AnhumblesupplicacionuntoGodfortherestoringofhys
holye woorde, unto the churche of Englande (Strasburgh, 1554), 11.
61. JohnKnox,TheFirstBlastoftheTrumpetagainsttheMonstrousRegiment
of Women, facsimile edition (Amsterdam: Theatrum Orbis Terrarum
Ltd., 1972), 2.
62. Knox, Monstrous Regiment, t 9.
68. Geneva Bible, 163.
69. Constance Jordan points out that Goodman implies and Knox asserts
outright that “for a woman to step out of her subordinate position in
Notes 179
the creational hierarchy is tantamount to an act of tyranny,” 434. But

Knox also devotes attention to the specifically tyrannous qualities of
Mary as a ruler, especially her cruelty. Constance Jordan, “Woman’s
Rule in Sixteenth-Century British Political Thought,” Renaissance
Quarterly y 40.3 (Autumn 1987): 421–51.
70. This and all citations of Shakespeare’s plays refer to The Riverside
Shakespeare, second edition, ed. G. Blakemore Evans and J. J. M.
Tobin (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1997).
71. EdwardGosynhyll,,HerebegynnethalytlebokenamedtheScholehouseof
women n (London, 1541), 21.
72. Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, second edition, ed. A. C.
Hamilton et al. (London: Longman, 2001). All subsequent quota-
tions from the poem refer to this text.
73. This notion that cruelty would accompany woman’s authority may
be based in part on Aristotle’s notion that women exhibit virtue only
in response to authority, not as an expression of their own author-
ity. Constance Jordan notes this and concludes that “Authoritative
male virtues in a woman are therefore aberrations and constitute
something like viciousness.” “Woman’s Rule,” 434. See also Judith
Richards, “‘To Promote a Woman to Beare Rule’: Talking of Queens
inMid-TudorEngland,”Sixteenth-Century
” Journal28.1(Spring1997),
120. She discusses the anxiety that the exercise of power might cause
a woman to lose her femininity.
74. JamesAnthonyFroude,A , HistoryofEnglandfromtheFallofWolseyto
the Death of Elizabeth, Volume 10 (London: 1862–70; rpt. New York:
AMS Press, 1969), 333.
75. Aylmer, An Harborowe, D3v.
76. A. N. McLaren discusses Aylmer’s distrust of woman’s rule and ana-
lyzes the struggle between Elizabeth and her councilors over the
idea of mixed monarchy in Political Culture, 59–69.
77. Dudley Digges, The Compleat Ambassador (London, 1655), 164.
78. Digges, Ambassador, 165–66.
79. Judith M. Richards, “Love and a Female Monarch: The Case of
ElizabethTudor,””JournalofBritishStudies38.2(April1999):133–60.
80. Elizabeth I: Collected Works, ed. Leah S. Marcus, Janel Mueller, and
Mary Beth Rose (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2000), 326.
81. Sir John Harington, Nugae Antiquae, Volume 1 (London, 1804; rpt.
AMS Press, 1966), 178.
82. The letter is discussed and quoted at length by J. E. Neale, Elizabeth
I and Her Parliaments, 1559–1581 (London: Jonathan Cape, 1953),
422–24.
83. RichardMulcaster,ThePassageofOurMostDreadSovereignLady,
QueenElizabeth h(London,1559),inElizabethIandHerAge,ed.Donald
Stump and Susan M. Felch (New York: W. W. Norton, 2009), 98.
84. Mulcaster, Queen’s Passage, 104.
180 Notes
85. Linda Shenk examines Elizabeth’s rhetoric of love in a Latin oration

she delivered in 1593 and finds that the queen celebrates her subjects’
profound love for her in an echo of 1 Corinthians, substituting her-
self for God and placing herself at the heart of her people’s religious
devotion. Shenk argues that this stress upon her subjects’ love is a
call for unity in the face of religious divisions both within England
and across Europe that threaten national stability. Linda Shenk,
LearnedQueen:TheImageofElizabethIinPoliticsandPoetry(New y
York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010). See Chapter 4, “Philosopher-
Queen,” especially123–32.
86. Christine Coch, “Constructions of Motherhood,” 446.
87. Burghley,WilliamCecil,Baron.ACollectionofStatePapers(London,
1740), 590.
88. JohnN.King,“TheRoyalImage,1535–1603”inTudorPoliticalCulture,
ed. Dale Hoak (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995), 124–
25. Janel Mueller discusses another instance of substitution in the
four cardinal virtues, as given later in the chapter. King also points
out the emphasis on the Sword of Justice in images of Henry VIII.
In Hans Holbein the Younger’s design for the title-page border of
the 1535 Coverdale Bible, Henry VIII holds a prominently displayed
sword in his right hand and the Bible in his left hand. In his discus-
sion of this composite image of sword and book, King comments
that the sword tends to disappear in images of Elizabeth, or under-
goes subordination to the image of the book (104–6).
89. Carole Levin offers a good overview of this subject, Heart and
Stomach of a King, 17–18. She also tells a story that exemplifies the
queen’s often mild response to religiously motivated dissent: during
a service in her chapel, a fervent Protestant pulled down her silver
cross and candlesticks and stamped on them. The Spanish ambas-
sador de Silva was surprised at her lenient response; she dismissed
the attack as the act of a madman.
90. Shenk, Learned Queen, 44–45.
91. JohnFoxe,ActesandMonumentsoftheselatterandperillousdayes
(London, 1563), B1v-B2r For an account of how some privy council-
orspromotedthe1570editionoffActesandMonuments, seeElizabeth
Evenden and Thomas S. Freeman, “Print, Profit, and Propaganda:
The Elizabethan Privy Council and the 1570 Edition of Foxe’s ‘Book
of Martyrs,’” English Historical Review w 119 (2004): 1288–307.
92. JohnFoxe,Thefirstvolumeoftheecclesiasticallhistorycontayningthe
actes and monumentes of thynges passed (London, 1570), B2v.
93. Thomas Freeman points out that in later editions Foxe dropped
the 1569 edition’s lavish dedication comparing Elizabeth to
Constantine. According to Freeman, the absence of that compar-
ison as well as a new emphasis on Elizabeth’s obligations suggest
that Foxe is pushing the queen toward a thorough reformation
Notes 181
of the Church, which she has, disappointingly, failed to provide.

“Providence and Prescription: The Account of Elizabeth in Foxe’s
‘Book of Martyrs,’” in The Myth of Elizabeth, ed. Susan Doran and
Thomas S. Freeman (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003), 38.
94. Freeman argues that Dering’s sermon was based on the Actes and
Monuments, and that it uses Foxe’s text to identify Elizabeth as a per-
secutor of the godly. “Providence and Prescription,” 44–45.
95. Peter E. McCullough reports that Dering’s sermon rebuking the
queen went through eleven editions in the sixteenth century, more
than any other sermon. Sermons At Court: Politics and Religion in
ElizabethanandJacobeanPreaching g(Cambridge:CambridgeUniversity
Press, 1998), 90.
96. EdwardDering,,ASermonPreachedBeforetheQuenesMajestiee(London,
1570), B2r.
97. Dering, Sermon, C2v, C4r.
98. K.J.Kesselring,TheNorthernRebellionof1569:Faith,Politics,and
Protest in Elizabethan England (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan,
2007), 77.
99. Burghley, State Papers, 557.
100. Burghley, State Papers, 557.
101. Kesselring, Northern Rebellion, 119.
102. Kesselring, Northern Rebellion, 125–26.
103. ThomasDrant.TwoSermonsPreached(London,1570),K3r.Kesselring
lists this sermon as one that voiced support of Elizabeth’s severity,
but actually Drant seems to be arguing for greater severity and criti-
cizing the queen for being too lenient.
104. Drant, Two Sermons, K1r.
105. Drant, Two Sermons, J4r.
106. The best-known examples are Cecil’s defense of Elizabeth’s poli-
cies,TheExecutionofJusticeinEngland,andtheresponsebyCardinal
WilliamAllen,ADefenseofEnglishCatholics,whichaccusesElizabeth
of cruelty and religious persecution. Allen says that those who “extol
the equity and mercy used in Her Majesty’s regiment” are “libelers,”
.
101.Folger DocumentsofTudorandStuartCivilization,ed.RobertM.
Kingdon (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1965).
107. JamesE.Phillips,ImagesofaQueen:MaryStuartinSixteenth-Century
Literature (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1964), 162–64.
108. Marcus, Mueller, Rose, Collected Works, 197.
110. Speech to Parliament, November 12, 1586. Marcus, Mueller, Rose,
Collected Works, 194.
111. A. N. McLaren, Political Culture, 225. Many issues converge in this
question of a private versus a public solution, including the queen’s
participation in an action that could be understood as undermining
the principle of monarchy itself.
182 Notes
112. Speech to Parliament, November 24, 1586. Marcus, Mueller, Rose,

Collected Works, 201.
114. In an interesting reading of Elizabeth’s self-presentation dur-
ing this difficult time, Paola Baseotto concludes that Elizabeth
exploited conventional ideas about femininity in order to distance
herself from the affair of the Queen of Scots. I find some of her
analysis compelling, especially her reading of Elizabeth’s self-
representation in her correspondence with James. But some of
the sources Baseotto cites, including others’ complaints about the
queen’s effeminate and dangerous clemency, seem to me to bespeak
the way Elizabeth’s male subjects tended to represent her rather
than her own self-representation. See “Mary Stuart’s Execution
andQueenElizabeth’sDividedSelf”inRepresentationsofElizabeth
I in Early Modern Culture, ed. Alessandra Petrina and Laura Tosi
(Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan 2011), 66–82.
116. Reynolds discusses Elizabeth’s speeches about how her judgment
of Mary will be interpreted, though with a somewhat different
emphasis than mine. Reynolds argues that the queen is trying to
combat the idea that as a woman she is controlled by her passions;
she claims impartiality because she does not want to be perceived as
tyrannical. I argue that Elizabeth wants to be seen not only as fair
but also as clement, so that she is not accused of unnatural cruelty—
which is one aspect of tyranny, to be sure. Reynolds, “Judgment of
Elizabeth I,” 273.
119. Janel Mueller, “Virtue and Virtuality: Gender in the Self-
Representation of Queen Elizabeth I,” in Form and Reform in
RenaissanceEngland:EssaysinHonorofBarbaraKieferLewalski
(Newark: University of Delaware Press and London: Associated
University Presses, 2000), 231–34.
120. Marcus, Mueller, Rose, Collected Works, 196-97.
121. J. E. Neale, Elizabeth I and Her Parliaments, 1584–1601 (New York:
W. W. Norton, 1966), 111.
122. PeterLakeandStevenPincus,eds.ThePoliticsofthePublicSpherein
Early Modern England (Manchester: Manchester University Press,
2007), 3.
123. Lake and Pincus, Public Sphere, 3.
124. R. G., Salutem in Christo (London, 1571), A4r-v.
125. Peter Lake, “The Politics of ‘Popularity’ and the Public Sphere: The
‘Monarchical Republic’ of Elizabeth I Defends Itself,” inThe Politics
ofthePublicSphereinEarlyModernEngland(Manchester:
d Manchester
University Press, 2007), 59–93. See also Michael Graves, “The
Notes 183
Management of the Elizabethan House of Commons: The Council’s

Men-of-Business,”ParliamentaryHistory y2(December1983):11–38.
Graves analyzes the role of men such as Thomas Norton, a member
of Parliament who “consistently allied himself with the Council,
not only to hurry the Commons along, but also to pressurize an
obstinate, vacillating queen for her own good” (18). As Lake shows,
the means used to “pressurize” the queen was often an appeal to
the court of public opinion. Graves focuses on the 1572 Parliament’s
attempts to push through the execution of Norfolk and have Mary
Stuart attainted and barred from inheriting the crown.
126. The writer also proposes the very course of conduct Elizabeth
resisted in Mary’s case: a public accounting of her crimes. In the
closing lines of the pamphlet, he claims that his “report” will be
proved true “when her Majestie shal cause the parties now impris-
oned to answeare openly thereto, by order of her laws, as there is
no doubt but she wyl observe to all maner of subjectes that course.”
Salutem in Christo, A7r. The author expresses his confidence that the
public handling of Mary—an approach that Elizabeth vehemently
opposed—will soon be undertaken by the queen. As discussed in
Chapter Two, Elizabeth’s resistance to, and anxiety about, public
display in the cases of Mary Stuart and others may have resulted in
part from concerns about violating expectations of femininity.
2 “The Sacred Pledge of Peace and Clemencie”:

Elizabethan Mercy in The Faerie Queene
1. ColinBurrow,EpicRomance:HomertoMilton(Oxford: n Clarendon
Press, 1993), 101.
2. The Faerie Queene, second edition, ed. A. C. Hamilton etal. (London:
Longman, 2001). All further quotations from the poem refer to this
edition.
3. SeeDarrylGless,InterpretationandTheologyinSpenser r(Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1994), 156–57. Carol V. Kaske reads
this as an instance of the biblical poetics of contradiction, or equiv-
v
ocation.Spenser
. andBiblicalPoetics(Ithaca:CornellUniversityPress,
1999), 111–18.
4. See Graham Hough for the argument that the satyrs are governed
by natural law alone, and natural law reveres the truth. A Preface to
The Faerie Queene (New York: Norton, 1963), 150.
5. Richard Douglas Jordan argues for reading the satyrs as the Jews
in“UnaamongtheSatyrs:TheFaerieQueene,1.6,”ModernLanguage
Quarterly y 38.2 ( June 1977): 123–31.
6. Andrew Hadfield, “The ‘Sacred Hunger of Ambitious Minds’:
Spenser’s Savage Religion,” in Religion, Literature, and Politics in
184 Notes
Post-Reformation England, 1540–1688, ed. Donna B. Hamilton and

Richard Strier (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996),
27–45. Hadfield links the savage nations of Books I and VI with
the Irish; he finds a number of ironic reversals in both episodes
that problematize the idea of a single and accessible truth. He con-
nects the explanation of Ireland’s adherence to Catholicism offered
by Irenius in the View w to this episode: in both, the “savages” act
in good faith and their mistaken belief is the result of ignorance,
not evil (38). Todd Butler, in his excellent essay “That ‘Saluage
Nation’: Contextualizing the Multitudes in Edmund Spenser’s The
FaerieQueene,”readsthisandotherepisodesfromTheFaerieQueene
alongside religious commentary from the period and suggests that
the satyrs’ behavior in their first encounter with true religion con-
forms to the way many zealous Protestants saw their fellow English
Protestants: tepidly Protestant, failing to become enthusiastic and
devoted in their faith. Spenser Studies 29 (2004): 104–8.
7. Todd Butler, “That ‘Saluage Nation,’” 105.
8. Jennifer Rust, “‘Image of Idolatryes’: Iconotropy and the Theo-
Political Body inThe Faerie Queene,” Religion and Literature 38.3
(Autumn 2006): 140–41.
9. Montaigne uses this term in “By Divers Meanes Men Come to a
LikeEnd,”inTheEssayesofMichaelLordofMontaigne,trans.John
Florio, 1603 (London: J. M. Dent and Sons and New York: E. P.
Dutton, 1928), 18.
10. Kathleen Williams, “Vision and Rhetoric: The Poet’s Voice in The
Faerie Queene,” ELH H 36.1 (1969): 139.
11. See Hamilton’s note, Faerie Queene, 178.
12. This idea is discussed in Chapter One.
13. Notably, in Book II the one fruitful act that is called “mercy” comes
from God, who after Guyon faints sends a guardian angel to aid
the fallen knight. The narrator tells us of a God who “loues his
creatures so, / And all his workes with mercy doth embrace, / That
blessed Angels, he sends to and fro” (II.viii.1.6–8). Of course, here
“mercy” means not forgiveness but succor.
14. The connection between women’s breasts and women’s tender
natures is frequently invoked in this period; for example, a seven-
teenth-century “guide” to the female sex claims that women’s “soft
breasts were made to entertain tenderness and pity.” The Whole
Duty of a Woman, or A Guide to the Female Sex(London,
x 1696): 21.
Along the same lines, we have the iconography of charity as a nurs-
ing mother, as reflected in Spenser’s Charissa.
15. Hamilton, Faerie Queene, 169.
16. Gerald Morgan, “The Idea of Temperance in the Second Book
of The Faerie Queene,”Review of English Studies, n.s. 37 (February
1986): 32.
Notes 185
17. Mark Fortier addresses this question and reviews the various criti-
cal answerstoitin TheCultureofEquityinEarly ModernEngland
(Aldershot: Ashgate, 2005), 116–21.
18. See for instance Sean Kane, Spenser’s Moral Allegory y (Toronto:
University of Toronto Press, 1989), 160.
19. AndrewMajeske,EquityinEnglishRenaissanceLiterature:Thomas
More and Edmund Spenser (New York: Routledge, 2006).
20. Majeske, Equity, y 102.
21. Majeske reads the episode in Isis Church as one where Britomart
foolishly lets down her guard and is taken in by the priests’ suspect
interpretation of her dream. “It is dubious whether there really is
such a thing as the controlling power of equity; instead it appears
to be an invention created by the Isis priest who uses it to fool
Britomart into acting on men’s behalf to help preserve and maintain
men’s dominance over women” (107). Majeske points to Britomart’s
reestablishment of men’s rule and her own disappearance from the
poem as evidence.
22. Majeske, Equity, y 100. The tradition of queenly intercession is dis-
cussed in Chapter One.
23. Critical readings of this episode abound, with most critics either
explaining how Mercilla’s condemnation of Duessa befits her
representation as Queen of Mercy, or explaining the cause of
the rupture between her name and her actions. Several critics
attribute the rupture to a decline in Spenser’s idealism; see for
example Thomas H. Cain, Praise in n The Faerie Queene (Lincoln:
University of Nebraska Press, 1978), 141–46, and Mihoko Suzuki,
MetamorphosesofHelen:Authority,Difference,andtheEpic(Ithaca: c
Cornell University Press, 1989), 193. Critics Rene Graziana and
James Phillips have argued that Mercilla shows mercy toward her
own people in protecting them from Duessa. See James E. Phillips,
“Renaissance Concepts of Justice and the Structure of The Faerie
Queene,BookV,”inEssentialArticlesfortheStudyofEdmundSpenser,
ed. A. C. Hamilton (Hamden, CT: Archon Books, 1972), 482–83.
Rene Graziana, “Elizabeth at Isis Church,” PMLA 79 (1964): 376–
89. T. K. Dunseath argues that Mercilla represents the harmony
between justice and mercy, and that mercy in her case means the
suppressionofwrath.SeeeSpenser’sAllegoryofJusticeinBookVof
The Faerie Queene (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1968),
216–18. I am less interested in whether or not Spenser endorses
Mercilla’s judgment and more interested in the way the episode
resonates with particular tensions about Elizabethan mercy and
its representations. In Epic Romance, Colin Burrow does examine
the episode partly in terms of tensions about Elizabethan mercy,
though his understanding of Elizabethan mercy differs consider-
ably from mine. Burrow reads Spenser as offering, throughout The
186 Notes
Faerie Queene, a corrective to Elizabeth’s “wilfully random mode of

supremacy,” 101. He says that, in the Mercilla episode, Spenser sup-
plies a mode of pity less “impulsively arbitrary” than the queen’s,
132. I don’t think Elizabeth’s supposed capriciousness is the main
problem Spenser grapples with in The Faerie Queene or in this epi-
sode, though I agree that how to represent the personal mercy of
the sovereign is the central and problematic issue for Spenser.
24. TheSpenserEncyclopedia,ed.A.C.Hamilton(Toronto:Universityof
Toronto Press, 1990), 169.
25. CarolineMcManus,Spenser’
, sFaerieQueeneandtheReadingofWomen
(Newark: University of Delaware Press, 2002), 19.
26. An essay that focuses on the representation of mercy in this epi-
sode is John D. Staines, “Elizabeth, Mercilla, and the Rhetoric
ofPropagandainSpenser’ssFaerieQueene,”Journal
” ofMedievaland
EarlyModernStudies31.2(Spring2001).StainesarguesthatSpenser’s
account derives in part from propaganda justifying the execution of
Mary, and that Spenser’s use of this rhetoric of propaganda serves
to subvert the “official” position. Staines is interested in the “slip-
pery meaning of mercy” (291) in this canto, but we arrive at differ-
ent conclusions. He regards the era’s discussions of the difference
between pity and clemency as “doublespeak,” whereas I think there
is real concern that a female monarch cannot exercise godly mercy
without lapsing into weak pity. Staines also suggests that the epi-
sode “draws attention . . . to the political program that produces an
appearance of Justice and Mercy” (302), suggesting a wholesale cyni-
cism that I don’t find in this episode. I argue not that Spenser is
cynical about Elizabeth’s claims to be merciful but rather that he is
sensitive to the dangers of both merciful and harsh judgments.
27. EdmundSpenser,AViewoftheStateofIreland,ed.AndrewHadfield
and Willy Maley (London: Blackwell, 1997; rpt. 1988), 102.
28. Spenser, A View, w 102.
29. William Nelson offers this and other examples of negatively con-
noted rusty swords in “Queen Elizabeth, Spenser’s Mercilla, and a
Rusty Sword,” Renaissance News 18 (1965): 113–14.
30. Marcus,Mueller,andRose,CollectedWorks,134.Afootnoteexplains
that all other manuscripts of this poem read “poll” rather than
“pull.”
31. Thomas Roche argues that “let” in this context means “prevent or
hinder.” See The Faerie Queene, ed. Thomas P. Roche Jr., with the
assistance of C. Patrick O’Donnell (New Haven: Yale University
Press, 1981), 1205. I doubt that “prevent” is the primary meaning
since the line suggests that Mercilla would not let just vengeance
fall on Duessa despite her evident guilt. However, the two possible
meanings of “let” nicely embody the paradox that informs the entire
episode.
Notes 187
32. A.N.McLaren,PoliticalCultureintheReignofElizabethI(Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1999), 225–26.
33. Mark Fortier provides a helpful survey of the early modern debate
about equity’s role in the law, detailing diverse opinions ranging
from those who regard equity as a necessary force to correct the law
and bring about true justice, to those who regard equity as a threat to
law, the undermining of true justice by the conscience, or whim, of
anindividual.TheCultureofEquityinEarlyModernEngland,59–86.
Perhaps because one can find such radically different perspectives
on equity in this period, critics have been able to apply the idea of
equity to Spenser’s Legend of Justice and reach very different con-
clusions. For example, James Nohrnberg explains equity as “a kind
of temperance within the execution of justice” (385) and sees the
changing of Arthur’s mind away from “vain pity” to a well-balanced
sense of justice as crucial to the point of this episode.The Analogy of
The Faerie Queene (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1976),
366. In Epic Romance, Colin Burrow reads the Mercilla episode as
a reflection of Spenser’s unease with Queen Elizabeth’s lenity and
refers to the context of early modern opinions that equity threatens
the law. Others discuss equity as the sovereign’s ability not only to
mitigate punishment but also to impose punishment; for instance,
Michael O’Connell suggests that Britomart’s dream and her sub-
sequent defeat of Radigund reflect Elizabeth’s ability as sovereign
to apply equity in Mary Stuart’s case and punish her more harshly
thanthelawpermits.MirrorandVeil:TheHistoricalDimensionof
Spenser’s Faerie Queene (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina
Press, 1977), 145–46. What all such readings have in common is the
recognition that the person of the sovereign and the force of law are
two different aspects of justice; critics differ on whether these two
forces work together or in opposition to one another in Spenser’s
allegory, just as legal writers differed on whether equity was a com-
plement or threat to law.
34. Louis Montrose, “Spenser and the Elizabethan Political Imaginary,”
ELHH 69 (2002): 936–37. Douglas Northrop argues that the descrip -
tion of Mercilla’s court would lead contemporary readers to rec-
ognize Parliament, with Elizabeth/Mercilla presiding. “Mercilla’s
Court as Parliament,”Huntington Library Quarterly y 36 (February
1973): 153–58.
35. Arthegall’s end in Book V is generally understood to represent the
outcome of the career of Arthur, Lord Grey, Lord Deputy Governor
of Ireland from 1580 to 1582. Spenser served as Lord Grey’s sec-
retary. Grey was recalled because of his harsh policies, especially
the massacre at Smerwick where 700 Irish, including women and
children, were killed. See Ciarin Brady, “Grey, Arthur, Fourteenth
Baron of Wilton,” in The Spenser Encyclopedia, 341–42.
188 Notes
36. John D. Staines, “Pity and the Authority of Feminine Passions in

Books V and VI of The Faerie Queene,”Spenser
” Studies 25 (2010): 131.
37. Patricia Wareh, “Competitions in Nobility and Courtesy: Nennio
and the Reader’s Judgment in Book VI of The Faerie Queene,”Spenser
”
Studies 24 (2012): 163–89. That a complex relationship exists between
courtesy and nobility has long been recognized. Frank Whigham
offers a succinct explanation of some of the complexities in his entry
on the social code of courtesy inThe Spenser Encyclopedia. Courtesy
as a social code has been described as a way of trying to block upward
mobility: prescribing a code of behavior that demarcates the true
elite can unmask those who would pretend to a status they were not
born to. On the other hand, the very act of codifying the rules and
techniques that distinguish the noble from the common can serve
the cause of upward mobility. Strategies such as those explained in
The Courtier, if put into print, may be learned.
38. WilliamNelson,ThePoetryofEdmundSpenser(NewYork:Columbia
University Press, 1963; rpt 1965), 293.
39. RichardC.McCoy,TheRitesofKnighthood:TheLiteratureandPolitics
of Elizabethan Chivalry y (Berkeley: University of California Press,
1989). See especially 133–49.
40. See for example Katherine Eggert, Showing Like a Queen: Female
AuthorityandLiteraryExperimentinSpenser,Shakespeare,andMilton
(Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2000).
41. Catherine Bates reads the motif of binding in Book VI as a reflec-
tion of Spenser’s ambivalent stance toward the court in general and
Queen Elizabeth in particular: she analyzes the bonds in Book VI
in the context of the bonds of reward and gratitude between patron
and poet, providing a valuable way of thinking about the often-
noted mood of disillusionment present at the end of The Faerie
Queene. But her argument that “any form of restriction or bond in
Book VI thus proves to be as ineffectual as it is unwelcome” seems
to me an overstatement (161). Briana’s transformation is a case in
point.TheRhetoricofCourtshipinElizabethanLanguageandLiterature
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992).
42. McCoy, Rites of Knighthood, 144.
3 “Proud and Pitilesse”: Elizabethan Mercy and

the Sonnet Tradition
1. All references to Petrarch’s Canzoniere are to Robert M. Durling’s
translation. Petrarch’sLyricPoems (Cambridge:HarvardUniversity
Press, 1976).
2. Among the 366 poems that comprise the Rime Sparse, there are
approximately ten that directly accuse Laura of cruelty. There are
Notes 189
a number that depict her iciness or hauteur. Petrarch is more likely

to say that he spied pity in her expression than he is to accuse her of
cruelty; in part, this is because of the transformation Laura under-
goes after her death part way through the sequence.
3. Anne Lake Prescott describes the connection between Ronsard
and a number of Elizabethan writers inFrench
n Poets and the English
Renaissance:StudiesinFameandTransformation(New n Haven:Yale
University Press, 1978), 91–131.
4. Elizabeth Harris Sagaser, in her analysis of Samuel Daniel’s Delia,
comments that the popularity of the “cruel-fair” topos during the
reign of Queen Elizabeth is probably not coincidental, but she takes
the discussion no further. “Sporting the While: Carpe Diem and the
CruelFairinSamuelDaniel’s DeliaandTheComplaintofRosamond,”
Exemplaria 10.1 (Spring 1998): 145–70.
5. LeonardForster,TheIcyFire:FiveStudiesinEuropeanPetrarchism
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1969), 147.
6. J.E.Neale,ElizabethIandHerParliaments,1584–1601(NewYork:W.
W. Norton, 1958), 113.
7. Neale, Elizabeth I and Her Parliaments, 136–43.
8. Davison had his son, the poet John Davison, write this verse, which
appears inThe Queen’s Garland, ed. M. C. Bradbrook (Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 1953), 19–20.
9. Forster points out that this poem echoes Tasso’s Aminta. Icy Fire,
140–141.
10. CatherineBates,TheRhetoricofCourtshipinElizabethanLanguageand
Literature (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992), 4.
11. Michael G. Brennan, in his 2006 history of the Sidneys and the mon-
archy, offers a detailed account of the decline of the Sidney family’s
position and influence at court during the years 1578 and 1579. But
when Brennan examines Philip Sidney’s extended stay at Wilton,
which he thinks lasted from March until August of 1580, he is unsure
whether Sidney “chose (or was obliged) to withdraw from court and
takeupresidencewithhissister”(80–81).TheSidneysofPenshurstand
the Monarchy, 1500–1700 (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2006).
12. Brennan, The Sidneys, 75.
13. Brennan, The Sidneys, 70.
14. Arthur F. Marotti, “‘Love Is Not Love’: Elizabethan Sonnet Sequences
and the Social Order,” ELH H 49.2 (Summer 1984): 396–428.
15. Like Marotti, Michael Spiller suggests that “it may well be that, in writ-t
ing to, for and about Stella, Sidney was displacing his frustrated political
ambitions.”TheDevelopmentoftheSonnet:AnIntroduction(New n York:
Routledge, 1992), 118. Others have taken the political reading of the
poems in different directions. Ann Rosalind Jones and Peter Stallybrass
note that the Petrarchan idiom posits the man as humble suitor but
also performs an act of public mastery. “The Politics of Astrophil and
190 Notes
”
Stella,”Studies inEnglishLiterature24(1984):53–68.Quilliganthinks
Sidney is turning the Petrarchan forms of Elizabeth’s court to his own
purposes, asserting his mastery by making the Petrarchan sequence
hisown.“SidneyandHisQueen,”inTheHistoricalRenaissance:New
EssaysonTudorandStuartLiteratureandCulture,ed.HeatherDubrow
and Richard Strier (Chicago: Chicago University Press, 1988), 171–96.
Peter Herman focuses on Sidney’s attitude toward poetry itself: “The
fall from political favor is analogized as a fall into poetry; domination
by a female monarch as domination by the feminine imagination.”
Astrophil is effeminized in a reflection of the way Sidney felt emas-
culated by the queen’s exercise of power over him. Squitter-Wits and
Muse-Haters:Sidney,Spenser,Milton,andRenaissanceAntipoeticSentiment
(Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1996), 121.
16. Katherine Duncan-Jones warns against exaggerating the political
dimensionoffAstrophilandStellabutalsowarnsagainsteasyassump-
tionsaboutSidney’sfeelingsforPenelopeDevereux.Sir . PhilipSidney:
Courtier Poet t (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1991), 223–50. A less
sophisticated reading is found in a biography of Sidney that suggests
that, if Sonnet 41 depicts the “Four Foster Children of Desire” tilt,
this must mean that Penelope Devereux was still a controlling force
in Sidney’s life in 1581 (238). Despite the author’s tendency to read
AstrophilandStellaasautobiography,heneverthelessacknowledges
that “Stella is often only a cipher, a means to explore the many sides
of Astrophil—lover, poet and courtier.” Alan Stewart, Philip Sidney:
A Double Life (New York: Thomas Dunne Books, St. Martin’s Press,
2000), 240.
17. Marion Wynne-Davies,Sidney to Milton, 1589–1660 (Basingstoke:
Palgrave Macmillan, 2003), 14. Bell, Poetry of Courtship. Spiller,
Development of the Sonnet, t 108 and 112–13.
18. Another important approach to Astrophil andStella considers what
the sequence reveals about Sidney’s views on poetry itself. As
S. K. Heninger states, Sidney distinguishes between “fictive lover
and actual poet.” By so doing, Sidney can comment not only on
Astrophil as a lover but also on Astrophil as a poet. “Sidney and the
SecularizationofSonnets,”inPoemsinTheirPlace:TheIntertextuality
andOrderofPoeticCollections,ed.NeilFraistat(ChapelHill:University
of North Carolina Press, 1986), 82.
19. There are many political readings of Astrophil and Stella, some of
which posit a more complex stance for the speaker than simple sup-
plication. Maureen Quilligan reads Sidney as resistant to the queen’s
power in “Sidney and His Queen.” Elizabeth Mazzola examines the
language of maternity and infancy in the sequence to claim that
Sidney both desires and resists Elizabeth as a maternal figure. See
FavoriteSons:ThePoliticsandPoeticsoftheSidneyFamily(New y York:
Palgrave Macmillan, 2003).
Notes 191
20. Jones and Stallybrass, “Politics of Astrophil and Stella,” 66.

21. This and all further quotations from Sidney’s work refer to Katherine
, PhilipSidney:TheMajorWorks(Oxford:Oxford
Duncan-Jones,Sir
University Press, 2002).
22. For example, Hebrews 4:16, “Draw near the throne of grace and find
mercy” or Ephesians 2:4–9, “Because God is rich in mercy you have
been saved by his grace.”
23. Bradbrook, Queen’s Garland, 30.
24. PaulE.J.Hammer,ThePolarisationofElizabethanPolitics:ThePolitical
CareerofRobertDevereux, 2nd EarlofEssex,1585–15977(Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1999), 57.
25. Whether the intimacy of the queen’s privy chamber was forbidden
to all men or only to some, many women experienced that intimacy.
Membership in Elizabeth’s inner circle conferred significant power
on certain ladies of the court.
26. SirHarrisNicolas,MemoirsoftheLifeandTimesofSirChristopher
Hatton n (London: Richard Bentley, 1847), 25.
27. Nicolas, Christopher Hatton, 28
28. Nicolas, Christopher Hatton, 28.
29. Hulton Manuscript, Letter 4. Forty-three letters from Essex to
Queen Elizabeth are found in the Hulton collection, a bound vol-
ume of manuscript letters with facing-page transcriptions. Some of
these letters have never been published. The British Library bought
the manuscript in 1999. BL Additional MS 74286.
30. Hulton Manuscript, Letter 9.
31. Arthur Collins,Letters and Memorials of State, Volume 1 (London
1746; rpt. AMS Press 1973). Letter from Henry Sidney to Queen
Elizabeth, September 1577, 218 and 220. See also the letters of August
1577 (204–06) and February 1578 (235–238).
32. Roger Kuin, ed.The Correspondence of Sir Philip Sidney, y Volume 2
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012), 1123.
33. Mary Hill Cole,The Portable Queen: Elizabeth I and the Politics of
Ceremony y (Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1999), 163.
34. Cole, Portable Queen, 165–66.
35. That Sidney might represent royal favor as mercy is demonstrated in
a letter from Sidney to Sir Christopher Hatton (December 1581) in
which he refers to the queen’s offer of the share in a patent for the
seizure of some recusants’ goods as “a Princes mercie.” See Kuin,
Correspondence, 1046.
36. Sidney, Major Works, 224.
37. Sidney, Major Works, 224.
38. The first edition of Delia contained the sonnet sequence, an ode,
and The Complaint of Rosamond, discussed below. Daniel quickly
published a second edition of Delia with a few changes, and then a
third edition two years later in which he added his play The Tragedy
192 Notes
of Cleopatra. See John Pitcher for a fascinating and detailed account

of Daniel’s many publications. “Essays, Works, and Small Poems:
Divulging, Publishing, and Augmenting the Elizabethan Poet,
SamuelDaniel”inTheRenaissanceText:Theory,Editing,Textuality, y ed.
Andrew Murphy (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2000),
8–29.
39. Lisa Klein,The Exemplary Sidney and the Elizabethan Sonneteer
(Newark: University of Delaware Press, 1998), 137.
40. Klein, Exemplary Sidney, y 28 and 143.
41. Klein, Exemplary Sidney, y 139.
42. Pitcher, “Essays, Works, and Small Poems,” 12–13.
43. ThomasNewton,,AtropoïonDelion,orthedeathofDeliawiththeteares
of her funerall (London 1603).
44. Klein remarks that this conceit is often applied to Queen Elizabeth,
but assumes that this imagery simply serves to exalt the lover’s mis-
tress, Exemplary Sidney, y 146.
45. AllquotationsfromDaniel’spoemsreferto o SamuelDaniel:Poemsand
a Defense of Rhyme, ed. Arthur Colby Sprague (Cambridge: Harvard
University Press, 1930).
46. The sonnet, visible on the portrait, is nonetheless damaged. Roy Strong
providesatranscriptioninGloriana:ThePortraitsofQueenElizabethI
(London: Pimlico, 2003), 137. It seems that the queen is depicted as
the sun at the sonnet’s start and then as a “boundless ocean” to whom
the “rivers of thanckes retourne” at the sonnet’s end.
47. HelenHackett,VirginMother,MaidenQueen:ElizabethIandtheCult
of the Virgin Mary y (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1995), 176. Ralegh’s
poem The Ocean to Cynthia figures the queen as Cynthia and her
lover—himself—as the ocean, but he also uses the imagery of rivers
returning to the ocean to represent his devotion to the queen.
48. A few years after writing Delia, Daniel became closely associated
with Charles Blount, Lord Mountjoy, a devoted follower of Essex.
According to Rees, “Through Mountjoy he met Essex and came
to love him.” Daniel was called before the Privy Council and ques-
tioned about his 1605 play, Philotas, which some interpreted as a sedi-
tious comment on the Essex affair. See Joan Rees, Samuel Daniel:
ACriticalandBiographicalStudy y(Liverpool:LiverpoolUniversity
Press, 1964), 64 and 97–98.
49. Elizabeth Harris Sagaser argues that Delia and Rosamond,
taken together, valorize the “cruel fair” as an autonomous and
self-possessed woman who can reap the pleasure of her beauty and
the glory it brings her. Sagaser’s reading of the poems is compelling
and complements mine, though she is more interested in analyzing
the carpe diem poems from the end of the sequence than she is in the
first thirty sonnets. But my reading also differs from hers in several
respects, including that I do not regard Daniel’s use of the “cruel
Notes 193
fair” motif as typical. Sagaser asserts that Delia is “cruel and fair, as
sonnet beloveds almost always are,” but there is only one other son-
net beloved whose cruelty gets the amount of attention that Delia’s
does, and that is Spenser’s Elizabeth in the Amoretti. “Sporting the
While,” 148.
50. Klein, Exemplary Sidney, y 148–49.
51. Lowry Nelson, “The Matter of Rime: Sonnets of Sidney, Daniel,
and Shakespeare,” inPoetic Traditions of the EnglishRenaissance,
ed. Maynard Mack and George deForest Lord (New Haven: Yale
University Press, 1982), 130.
52. Shakespeare’sSonnets, ed. Katherine Duncan-Jones (London: Arden
Shakespeare, 1997), 88–89.
53. Pitcher, “Essays, Works, and Small Poems,” 9.
54. Sagaser analyzes the logical fallacies in the advice given to Rosamond
by the “matron,” advice that echoes the carpe diem themes in Delia.
She also provides a good analysis of the way the carpe diem poems in
Delia invite a critical reading of their own surface claims. “Sporting
the While,” 164.
55. See Laura G. Bromley, “The Lost Lucrece: Middleton’s The Ghost
of Lucrece,” Papers on Language and Literature 21.3 (Summer 1985):
260–61.
56. Ronald Primeau, “Daniel and the Mirror Tradition: Dramatic Irony
in The Complaint of Rosamond,” SEL L 15.1 (Winter 1975): 23.
57. JohnKerrigan,,MotivesofWoe:Shakespeareandthe“FemaleComplaint”:
A Critical Anthology y (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1991), 164.
58. Kelly A. Quinn, “Ecphrasis and Reading Practices in Elizabethan
NarrativeVerse,”Studies
” inEnglishLiterature44.1(Winter2004):22.
59. Kenji Go, “Samuel Daniel’s The Complaint of Rosamond and an
Emblematic Reconsideration of A Lover’s Complaint,” t Studies in
Philology y 104.1 (Winter 2007): 92–97.
60. Both Quinn and Go mention the story as told by Apollodorus
and Hyginus. But Quinn also mentions Lucian’s account in which
Amymone is raped, and there is another possibility that neither
considers: Philostratus’s Imagines, in which Amymone is indeed
described as pale and trembling with fear when pursued by Neptune
(Book I.8). Philostratus, Imagines, trans. Arthur Fairbanks (London:
William Heinemann Ltd. and Cambridge: Harvard University
Press, 1931; rpt. 1960).
61. Go interprets this line to mean that Amymone, through her weep-
ing, begins to feel desire for Neptune. I do not find this argument
convincing; I think it is clear that Rosamond is talking about the
“fire” that is kindled in Neptune as he looks at the weeping woman
at his feet: not only do Amymone’s tears inspire “heat” in Neptune,
but of course he is the god of the sea and the whole myth is based
on his control over water: he has dried up a well, Amymone needs
194 Notes
the water and is seeking it when they become lovers. “Fire in water”
encapsulates the story itself, in which a search for water leads to a
passionate encounter.
62. PeterC.Herman,Squitter-Wits
, andMuse-Haters,97.Hermancites
William Prynne’s Histriomastix x (1633) where he complains that love
poems entice people to lust and adultery. He also discusses William
Alley’s The Poore Mans Librarie (1571) where a poet is punished for
reciting wanton verses before a woman, whose chastity is threat-
ened merely by the hearing of such poems, 50. Herman discusses
several objections to poetry, including idleness, effeminacy, and the
Protestant association of the imagination with the beliefs and prac-
tices of Roman Catholicism.
63. ThisandfurtherquotationsfromSpenser’sColinClout tandAmoretti
refertoTheYaleEditionoftheShorterPoemsofEdmundSpenser,ed.
William A. Oram et al. (New Haven: Yale University Press 1989).
64. S. K. Heninger, “Sequences, Systems, Models,” 85–86.
65. SeeforexampleDonnaGibbs,Spenser’s
, Amoretti:ACriticalStudy
((Scolar Press, 1990), 61–97 and Michael R. G. Spiller, TheDevelopment
of the Sonnet, 148.
66. See Alexander Dunlop’s introduction, Shorter Poems of Edmund
Spenser, 583.
67. IlonaBell,ElizabethanWomenandthePoetryofCourtshipp(Cambridge:
68. Bell, Poetry of Courtship, 160.
69. Oram, Shorter Poems, 637.
70. Bell, Poetry of Courtship, 183.
71. See Ilona Bell’s discussion of this lyric dialogue in Elizabeth I: The
Voice of a Monarch h (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010), 20–23.
4 “A Goodly Musicke in Her Regiment”: Elusive

Justice in The Merchant of Venice
1. Thomas Drant. Two Sermons Preached (London 1570), K2r.
2. Drant, Two Sermons, K1r and K4r.
3. Samuel Johnson mentions the potential allusion in his notes on
Shakespeare, but neither Johnson nor subsequent critics pursue the
parallel any farther. Johnson says simply, “Perhaps in this enumera-
tion of Portia’s suitors, there may be some covert allusion to those
ofQueenElizabeth.”Notes to Shakespeare,Volume1:Comedies,125.
Project Gutenberg. www.gutenberg.org r . Marjorie Garber also men-
tions the possible allusion, saying, “It is possible to see Portia in a
historical-allegorical frame as a figure for Queen Elizabeth here—
a lady richly left, whose dead father’s hand seems to control the
choice of a husband. Elizabeth, like Portia, was the target of suitors
Notes 195
from many nations as well as a number of wellborn Englishmen.”

Shakespeare after All (New York: Pantheon Books, 2004), 288.
4. Perhaps there is also a reference to the queen’s lack of autonomy in
her marital decision. The scene opens with Portia’s lament about
her own lack of choice in the matter, which may suggest the posi-
tion of the younger Elizabeth in the days of her courtships. As Susan
Doran has convincingly argued, Elizabeth ultimately rejected her
various suitors not primarily because of her personal desires or to
uphold her virginal image, but because every serious courtship gen-
erated controversy rather than consent. According to Doran, had
Elizabeth’s council ever united behind one of her suitors, it is likely
she would have gone forward with the match. “Why Did Elizabeth
NotMarry?”inDissingElizabeth:NegativeRepresentationsofGloriana,
ed. Julia M. Walker (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1998),
30–59. Elizabeth herself alluded to the power of her people’s will,
sometimes as unhappily as does Portia, who laments, “O me, the
word choose! I may neither choose who I would, nor refuse who I
dislike; so is the will of a living daughter curb’d by the will of a dead
father” (I.ii.22–25). As the queen wrote in a poem she inscribed on
the flyleaf of a book, “To others’ will my life is all addressed, / And
no way so as might content me best.” Elizabeth I: Collected Works,
ed. Leah S. Marcus, Janel Mueller, and Mary Beth Rose (Chicago:
University of Chicago Press, 2000), 300.
5. LeahS.Marcus,PuzzlingShakespeare:LocalReadingandItsDiscontents
(Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988), 97. Perhaps there is
even a sly nod to the contrast between this nostalgic vision and the
reality of the present when Portia says to Nerissa, “If I live to be as
old as Sybilla, I will die as chaste as Diana, unless I be obtain’d by
the manner of my father’s will” (I.ii.106–8). As my student Francine
Koenig pointed out to me, this allusion to a chaste but ancient Sybil
reflects the reality of Queen Elizabeth’s image in the 1590s: in her
60s and unmarried, she was an aging Virgin Queen.
6. Shakespeare’s Plutarch, ed. T. J. B. Spenser (Hammondsworth,
Middlesex: Penguin Books, 1964), 118.
7. Spenser, Shakespeare’s Plutarch, 300.
8. LindaShenk,LearnedQueen:TheImageofElizabethIinPoliticsand
Poetry y (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010)
9. Marcus,Mueller,andRose,CollectedWorks,326.MaryBethRosepro-
vides a list of scholars who have commented on this rhetorical strategy.
While Rose agrees that the queen employed this technique—asserting
the conventional inferiority of the female only to supersede that con-
vention when she appropriates the power of a king—she argues that
Elizabeth also claimed a specifically female authority grounded in
lived experience. “The Gendering of Authority in the Public Speeches
of Elizabeth I,” PMLA 115.5 (October 2000): 1077–82.
196 Notes
10. JohnHayward,TheBeginningoftheReignofQueenElizabeth(1636). h
Quoted in Donald Stump and Susan M. Felch, Elizabeth I and Her
Age (New York: W. W. Norton, 2009), 642.
11. Ironically, her claim that she is “unschooled” and “unlessoned” is spo-
ken in the context of an eloquent speech, not unlike the way Queen
Elizabeth seems to have opened her Latin orations before a univer-
sity audience with similar disclaimers: “Although feminine modesty,
most faithful subjects and most celebrated university, prohibits the
delivery of a rude and uncultivated speech in such a gathering of most
learned men. . . . ” Latin Oration at Cambridge University, August 7,
1564. Marcus, Mueller, and Rose, Collected Works, 87.
12. See John D. Rea, “Shylock and the Processus Belial,” Philological
Quarterly y 8 (1929): 311–13. James O’Rourke explains that the cult
of virgin was a phenomenon contemporaneous with the eleventh-
century rise of anti-Semitism. “Racism and Homophobia in The
Merchant of Venice,” ELH H 70.2 (Summer 2003): 384.
13. Sir John Harington, Nugae Antiquae Volume 1 (London, 1804; rpt.
AMS Press, 1966), 358–59.
14. Stephen Greenblatt, “Invisible Bullets: Renaissance Authority
andItsSubversion,”inPoliticalShakespeare:NewEssaysinCultural
Materialism, ed. Jonathan Dollimore and Alan Sinfield (Ithaca:
Cornell University Press 1985), 44.
15. Gunter Walch, “Henry V as Working-house of Ideology.” Reprinted
inShakespeare
n andPolitics,ed.CatherineM.S.Alexander(Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press 2004), 198–205.
16. R.ScottFraser,“HenryVandthePerformanceofWar,”in nShakespeare
and War, ed. Ros King and Paul J. C. M. Franssen (Basingstoke:
Palgrave Macmillan, 2008), 74.
17. See for example a letter of Robert Cecil reprinted in Arthur Dimock,
“The Conspiracy of Dr.Lopez,” The English Historical Review9.35 w
( July 1894): 466.
18. See for example Chris Jeffery, “Is Shylock a Catholic?” Shakespeare
in Southern Africa 16 (2004): 37–51. Also Lawrence Danson, The
Harmonies off The Merchant of Venice (New Haven: Yale University
Press, 1978), 78–81. Danson also mentions that Shylock has been
read as a Puritan by many critics. For a recent example, see Cedric
Watts,“WhyIsShylockUnmusical?”in nHenryV,WarCriminal?And
OtherShakespeareanPuzzles,ed.JohnSutherlandandCedricWatts
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), 148–53.
19. DavidS.Katz,TheJewsintheHistoryofEngland,1485–1850 (Oxford:
Clarendon Press, 1994), 90.
20. Katz, Jews, 97. The Lopez plot is similarly treated in an address by
Elizabeth, probably written by Burghley, also from 1594 and dis-
cussed by Arthur Dimock, “Conspiracy,” 468.
21. Katz, Jews, 86.
Notes 197
22. Katz, Jews, 90–92.

23. Godfrey Goodman, The Court of King James I, Volume 1 (London:
Richard Bentley, 1839), 154.
24. Katz, Jews, 95.
25. Quoted by Katz, Jews, 91.
26. PaulE.J.Hammer,ThePolarisationofElizabethanPolitics:TheCareer
ofRobertDevereux,2ndEarlofEssex,1585–15977(Cambridge:Cambridge
University Press, 1999), 138 and 159.
27. Hammer, Polarisation, 161.
28. RichardC.McCoy,TheRitesofKnighthood:TheLiteratureandPolitics
of Elizabethan Chivalry y (Berkeley: University of California Press,
1989), 79–102.
29. Paul Hammer, “The Smiling Crocodile: The Earl of Essex and Late
Elizabethan‘Popularity,’”inThePoliticsofthePublicSphereinEarly
Modern England, ed. Peter Lake and Steven Pincus (Manchester :
Manchester University Press 2007), 103.
30. See John Drakakis in the introduction to the Arden Merchant of
Venice.MerchantofVenice,ArdenShakespeareThirdSeries,ed.John
Drakakis (London: Methuen and New York: Bloomsbury Academic,
2010), 31. See also the footnote on “Andrew,” 172.
31. Hammer, “Crocodile,” 99.
32. Hammer, “Crocodile,” 101.
33. RobertDevereux,2ndEarlofEssex,AnApologieoftheEarleofEssex
(London 1600) D4v.
34. Essex, Apologie, E1r.
35. Essex, Apologie, D4v.
36. Essex, Apologie, B4r.
37. Essex, Apologie, D3v.
38. W. Nicholas Knight reads the entire courtroom scene as represent-
ing Chancery procedure and argues that Shakespeare means to advo-
cate for common law and show that Chancery should not impinge
upon it. “Equity, ‘The Merchant of Venice,’ and William Lambarde,”
Shakespeare Survey y 27 (1974): 95–96. Maxine MacKay also argues that
the courtroom scene emphasizes the conflict between Chancery
court and courts of law in Elizabethan England. “The Merchant of
Venice: A Reflection of the Early Conflict between Courts of Law
and Courts of Equity,” Shakespeare Quarterly y 15.4 (Autumn 1964):
371–75. Richard Wilson analyzes the conflict between Chancery
and common law in this scene and finds common law’s victory lim-
ited. He characterizes Elizabethan Chancery as a court where the
bourgeoisie were fighting to curtail royal power and make the com-
mon law an agent of protection for their economic liberty. Wilson
characterizes the common law as victorious in Merchant t but finds
the mercantile society of Venice merciless as it uses a strained legal-
ism to cripple Shylock. “The Quality of Mercy: Discipline and
198 Notes
Punish in Shakespearean Comedy,”Seventeenth

” Century y 5.1 (Spring
1990): 1–42.
39. The seminal article on this is Karen Newman, “Portia’s Ring:
Unruly Women and Structures of Exchange inMerchant of Venice,”
ShakespeareQuarterly y38(1987):19–33.Newmanusesanthropological
theory to show how the gift-giving in Merchant t is a bid for power.
By giving more than can be reciprocated, Portia unsettles the gen-
der hierarchy and short-circuits the system of exchange that con-
ventionally solidifies male bonds and positions women as objects of
exchange.
40. Marcus, Puzzling Shakespeare, 99.
41. See Bevington’s introduction. John Lyly, Endymion, ed. David
Bevington (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1996), 33. All
quotations from the play refer to this edition. John D. Staines, The
TragicHistoriesofMaryQueenofScots,1560–1690:Rhetoric,Passions,
and Political Literature (Burlington: Ashgate, 2009), 112–15.
5 “Pardon Is Still the Nurse of Second Woe”:

Measure for Measure and the Transition
from Elizabeth to James
1. Helen Hackett, in her analysis of these elegies, reminds us that
“questions of sincerity are notoriously unfathomable”: some elegists
probably did regard the dead queen as a “sainted heroine,” while oth-
ers were seeking patronage or displaying their patriotism or literary
skill.VirginMother,MaidenQueen:ElizabethIandtheCultoftheVirgin
Mary y (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1995), 221.
2. Catherine Loomis, The Death of Elizabeth: Remembering and
Reconstructing the Virgin Queen n (New York: Palgrave Macmillan,
2010), 50.
3. Loomis discusses the sun-and-moon references, 52. Hackett also
mentions the conceit of James as the sun following the moon, 220.
John Watkins finds the allusions to James as Elizabeth’s son in
bothsermonsandpoetry.RepresentingElizabethinStuartEngland
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002), 15–17.
4. Watkins, Representing Elizabeth, 18–19.
5. Godfrey Goodman, The Court of King James I, I Volume I (London:
Richard Bentley, 1839), 97.
6. TheTrewLawofFreeMonarchieswasfirstprintedwithouttheauthor’s
name in 1598. Basilicon Doron n was printed in 1599 for private distri-
bution but reprinted in Edinburgh in 1603 in a revised edition. See
KingJamesIandVI:PoliticalWritings,ed. Johann P. Sommerville.
CambridgeTextsintheHistoryofPoliticalThought t (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1994).
Notes 199
7. Sommerville, Political Writings, 72.

8. Sommerville, Political Writings, 81–83.
11. HenryHooke,,AsermonpreachedbeforethekingatWhite-halll(London,
1604), C3v.
12. Hooke, A sermon, C3r.
13. Hooke, A sermon, C4v. In a treatise on the succession written a
few years earlier, Hooke had expressed his hope that “the infirmi-
tie, and inconveniency of woemanhead” might be reformed by the
vigor of a male monarch. See Katherine Eggert’s discussion, Showing
LikeaQueen:FemaleAuthorityandLiteraryExperimentinSpenser,
Shakespeare, and Milton n (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania
Press, 2000), 82.
14. RobertPricket,A, SouldiersWishUntoHisSoveraigneLordKingJames
(London, 1603).
15. Sir John Harington, Nugae Antiquae, Volume I (London 1804; rpt.
New York: AMS Press, 1966), 180.
16. Aylmer, Harborowe, O1v.
17. TheTrueNarrationoftheEntertainmentofHisRoyallMajestie(London,e
1603), E1v-E2r.
18. Stephen Cohen, “From Mistress to Master: Political Transition and
FormalConflictinMeasureforMeasure,”Criticism m41.4(Fall1999):
431–64. Leonard Tennenhouse regards Measure and other city com-
edies from early in James’s reign as replacing the romantic com-
edies that showed powerful, aristocratic women restoring order,
a genre that he reads in the context of Elizabeth’s queenship. The
city comedies replace the powerful woman with a male ruler who
restoresorder.LeonardTennenhouse,PoweronDisplay:ThePolitics
of Shakespeare’s Genres (New York: Methuen, 1986).
19. Richard Levin,New Readings vs. Old Plays: Recent Trends in the
ReinterpretationofRenaissanceDramaa(Chicago:UniversityofChicago
Press, 1982), 171–93.
20. Leonard Tennenhouse, Power on Display, y 147–59.
21. Jonathan Dollimore, “Transgression and Surveillance in Measure for
Measure,”in nPoliticalShakespeare:NewEssaysinCulturalMaterialism
(Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1985), 83–84.
22. CarolynE.Brown,“DukeVincentiooffMeasureforMeasureandKing
James I of England: ‘The Poorest Princes in Christendom,’” CLIO
26.1 (1996): 51–78.
23. LeahMarcus,PuzzlingShakespeare:Local: ReadingandItsDiscontents
(Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988), 164.
24. This is an old idea, expressed for instance by Seneca.
25. Fourteen years is an interesting choice. Might it perhaps remind the
audience of the late queen’s forty-four year reign?
200 Notes

27. See for example James’s advice to Henry in the Basilicon Doron: he
advocates a middle ground between too much and too little affabil-
ity, stating that too much bowing and nodding to the people some-
how implies illegitimacy: “for that form of being popular, becometh
better aspiring Absalons, then lawfull Kings.” Sommerville,Political
Writings, 54.
28. ThomasTyrwhitt,ObservationsandConjecturesUponSomePassages
of Shakespeare (Oxford, 1766), 36–37. Cited in David L. Stevenson,
“The Role of James I in Measure for Measure,”ELH H 26.2 ( June 1959):
188–208.
29. Stevenson, “The Role of James I,” 190–95.
30. JeffreyS.Doty,““MeasureforMeasureandtheProblemofPopularity,”
English Literary Renaissance 42.1 (Winter 2012): 32–57.
32. Doty, “Problem of Popularity,” 48.
33. OxfordEnglishDictionary,secondedition(Oxford:OxfordUniversity
Press) http://www.oed.com.
34. “Empathy” is a term first used in German psychology; the earliest
OED examples are from the first decade of the twentieth century.
Oxford English Dictionary. y
35. Henry Peacham, The Garden of Eloquence (1593), intro. William
G. Crane (Delmar, NY: Scholars’ Facsimiles and Reprints, 1977),
143–44.
36. Asecondandthirdblastofretraitfromplaiesandtheaterss(London1580),
53–54. The “second blast” is a translation of the work of Salvian
of Marseilles; the “third blast,” from which this passage comes, is
attributed to Anthony Munday.
37. Stephen Greenblatt,Renaissance Self-Fashioning: From More to
Shakespeare (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1980), 222–54.
38. See Jacqueline Miller, “The Passion Signified: Imitation and the
Construction of Emotion in Sidney and Wroth,” Criticism 43 (2001):
407–21. She argues for a different idea of emotion where the repre-
sentation of a passion comes first and actually produces the passion.
De Clementia II.v.4–6.
39. ThomasWright,ThePassionsoftheMindeInGenerall,intro.ThomasO.
Sloan (London, 1604; rpt. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1971), 17.
40. Wright says that the imagination, either by sense or by memory,
produces an object to be known. At this moment, Isabella is ask- k
ing Angelo to remember the feeling of sexual passion, but he is also
looking at and listening to her, so his senses are engaged. According
to Wright, the imagination’s spirits “flocke from the brayne, by cer-
tain secret channels to the heart, where they pitch at the dore,” 45.
The heart then draws forth the bodily humors that will increase the
emotion and prompt the body to act upon it.
Notes 201
41. Oxford English Dictionary.

42. In Doty’s reading, Lucio’s remarks highlight the problem with a
public that “liberally discusses its rulers.” “Problem of Popularity,”
45. I would modify this to place some of the blame on the Duke: his
withdrawal from the public eye, rather than assuring his autonomy
as Doty intimates, has rather given the public too much room to
speculate about him.
43. Sommerville, Political Writings, 30–31.
45. For an early example, see Wilbur Dunkel, “Law and Equity in
”
MeasureforMeasure,”Shakespeare Quarterly y13.3(Summer1962):275–85.
Dunkel argues that the play shows the necessity of administering jus-
tice with equity.
46. Aristotle, The Nicomachean Ethics, trans. H. Rackham (London:
William Heinemann Ltd. and Cambridge: Harvard University
Press, 1934), V.x.5, 317.
47. For a recent example of such an argument, see Constance Jordan,
“InterpretingStatuteinMeasureforMeasure,”inShakespearen and
theLaw:AConversationamongDisciplinesandProfessions(Chicago:
University of Chicago Press, 2012), 101–20. Jordan cites Plowden,
Lambarde, Egerton, and James I to elucidate some of the recom-
mended principles and practices of equitable interpretation of the
law in English legal tradition. Angelo does not undertake the careful
questioning, introspection, probing of motives, mitigation of sever-
ity, and other aspects of equitable practice that Jordan identifies.
48. See Victoria Haynes, “Performing Social Practice: The Example
off Measure for Measure.” She points out that it was a common social
practice in Elizabethan England for couples to live together as hus-
band and wife after they were betrothed.Shakespeare Quarterly y 44.1
(Spring 1993): 1–29.
49. See for instance John W. Dickinson, “Renaissance Equity and
”
MeasureforMeasure,”Shakespeare Quarterlyy13.3(Summer1962):287–97.
Dickinson discusses how Escalus’s approach exemplifies equity,
295–96.
50. Mark Fortier’s study of equity in Renaissance thought begins by
citing this “repeated attack on equity”: that it removes the impar-
tiality and stability of the law, making outcomes subject to the pre-
dilections of an individual. He quotes John Selden on the “roguish”
nature of such equity and comments that “self-serving partiality”
isimpliedintheseobjections.TheCultureofEquityinEarlyModern
England (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2005), 1.
51. TheodoreF.T.Plucknett,AConciseHistoryoftheCommonLaw, w fifth
edition (Boston: Little, Brown, and Company, 1956), 193–94. He
argues that to call Chancery a “prerogative” court in the fullest sense
is inaccurate; the court transacted business along settled lines with
202 Notes
little that was arbitrary. However, “the wild speculation of many

royalists to the effect that the Court of Chancery and the system
of equity were dependent upon a personal prerogative of the mon-
arch threw the whole legal system of the country into the political
arena.”
52. See Fortier, Culture of Equity, y 76–81.
54. Though Elizabeth did not invoke this “mystery” as James did, it was
a concept certainly present during her reign. For example, Sir Francis
Knollys, reacting in 1571 to a Puritan-sponsored bill to reform the
Book of Common Prayer, argued that the Parliament should not
meddle with matters of the queen’s prerogative: What “secret cause
or scruple there may be in the hearts of princes, it is not for all peo-
ple to know.” J. E. Neale, Elizabeth I and Her Parliaments: 1559–1581
(London: Jonathan Cape, 1953), 199.
55. GeorgeBuchanan,DeJureRegniApudScotos,oraDialogueConcerning
theDuePrivilegeofGovernmentintheKingdomofScotland(London d
1689), D4v-E1r.
56. See McIlwain’s introduction, Archeion n by William Lambarde, ed.
Charles H. McIlwain and Paul L. Ward (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1957), vii.
57. Lambarde, Archeion, 43.
58. Lambarde, Archeion, 44.
59. RichardMulcaster,ThePassageofOurMostDreadSovereignLady,
QueenElizabeth h(London,1559),inElizabethIandHerAge,ed.Donald
Stump and Susan M. Felch (New York: W. W. Norton, 2009), 106.
60. RalphWinwood,MemorialsofAffairsofStateintheReignsofQueen
Elizabeth I and King James I, Volume 2 (London, 1725; rpt. New York:
AMS Press, 1972), 11.
61. Winwood, Memorials of Affairs of State, 11.
62. Doty, “Problem of Popularity,” 50.
63. Dudley Digges, The Compleat Ambassador (London, 1655), 165–66.
64. Plucknett, Common Law, 192.
65. Elizabeth, like the other Tudors, seldom attended meetings of her
Privy Council, according to G. R. Elton, The Tudor Constitution:
Documents and Commentary y (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1968), 92.
66. See Chris R. Kyle’s study of the Stuart Parliament and its increas-
inglypubliccharacter.TheaterofState:ParliamentandPoliticalCulture
in Early Stuart England(Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2012),
157–58. Kyle also reports that James’s first speech to an English
Parliament was invaded by members of the public who crowded in
and were mistaken for members of the Commons. James’s dislike
of the English Parliament is well known; he avoided calling one for
nearly ten years, leading historian Andrew Thrush to describe the
Notes 203
years 1611–1620 as those of Jacobean Personal Rule. Andrew Thrush,

“The Personal Rule of James I: 1611–1620,” in Politics, Religion, and
PopularityinEarlyStuartBritain:EssaysinHonorofConradRussell,
ed. Thomas Cogswell, Richard Cust, and Peter Lake (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 2002), 84–102. However, those years
were still to come when Shakespeare was writing Measure; in 1604
Shakespeare would have known only about James’s handling of his
first English Parliament and the publicizing of his opening address.
6 “Good Queene, You Must Be Rul’d”: Feminine

Mercy in the Plays of Heywood and Dekker
1. A Mournfull Dittie, Entitled Elizabeths Losse (London, 1603).
2. Thomas Dekker, The Wonderful Year (London 1603), B2r.
3. MadeleineDoran,IfYouKnowNotMeYouKnowNobody, y Malone
Society Reprints, Volume 65 (Oxford: Oxford University Press,
1935), xvii.
4. Teresa Grant, “Drama Queen: Staging Elizabeth in If You Know Not
MeYouKnowNobody,” y inTheMythofElizabeth,ed.SusanDoranand
Thomas S. Freeman (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003), 121.
5. Catherine Loomis, The Death of Elizabeth: Remembering and
Reconstructing the Virgin Queen n (New York: Palgrave Macmillan,
2010), 124.
6. Loomis, Death of Elizabeth, 121–22.
7. This and all further quotations from If You Know Not Me, Parts I
and II, refer to Madeleine Doran’s edition, Malone Society reprints,
Volume 65 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1934–35). The scene
and line numbers are given in parentheses.
8. Janel Mueller, “Virtue and Virtuality: Gender in the Self-
Representation of Queen Elizabeth I,” in Form and Reform in
RenaissanceEngland:EssaysinHonorofBarbaraKieferLewalski, i ed.Amy
Boesky and Mary Thomas Crane (Newark: University of Delaware
Press and London: Associated University Presses, 2000), 231–34.
9. Grant, “Drama Queen,” 123–24.
10. McLuskie suggests that the sympathetic portrayal of Philip sup-
ports the notion of aristocratic virtue in a play that she sees as nego-
tiating “between a popular politics and a proper sense of hierarchy.”
I agree that mercy is often adduced as a sign of true nobility; I argue
that this is the case in If You Know Not Me, Part II. In Part I, Mary
is contrasted with Elizabeth in terms of her relative lack of mercy,
but Heywood also portrays both women as lacking agency. Hence,
Mary is cruel when advised to be by Winchester and merciful when
advised to be by Philip. Kathleen E. McLuskie,Dekker and Heywood:
Professional Dramatists (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1994), 45.
204 Notes
11. This issue—the access to pity potentially provided by an audience

with the monarch—is discussed in Chapter Three.
12. See Carole Levin, The Reign of Elizabeth I (New York: Palgrave
Macmillan, 2002), 94.
13. JohnAylmer,An, Harboroweforfaithfullandtrewesubjectess(London,
1559), H3v.
14. JohnWatkins,RepresentingElizabethinStuartEngland d(Cambridge:
15. Jean E. Howard reads Gresham and Hobson as contrasting figures:
Gresham is the new breed of international merchant-capitalist who
takes staggering risks, deals in huge sums of money, and whose grand
contribution, the Royal Exchange, benefits himself as well as London.
By contrast, Hobson represents the traditional London crafts-guilds
and their values. He is modest, sober, and selflessly charitable.
“Thomas Heywood: Dramatist of London and Playwright of the
Passions”inTheCambridgeCompaniontoShakespeareandContemporary
Dramatists, ed. Ton Hoenselaars (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 2012), 127.
16. Anita Gilman Sherman analyzes the centrality of charity in
Heywood’s play, finding many different constructions of charity,
from charity as a social expression of medieval piety to charity as a
means of status-building for the merchant class. Interestingly, she
notes that, in his meeting with Queen Elizabeth, Hobson takes an
antiquated personal approach to finance while the queen is hard-
nosed and impersonal: “the Queen is behaving like a business-
woman and the merchant like a nobleman.” “The Status of Charity
inThomasHeywood’sIfYouKnowNotMeYouKnowNobodyII,”
inMedievalandRenaissanceDramainEngland,Volume12,ed.John
Pitcher (Madison: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press; London:
Associated University Presses, 1999), 114.
17. Watkins, Representing Elizabeth, 53.
18. ThomasHeywood,TheDramaticWorksofThomasHeywood,Volume
1 (New York: Russell & Russell Inc, 1874; rpt. 1964), 334.
19. In the 1633 edition of the play, the final Armada scene was expanded
to add a speech in which Elizabeth claims to have put on a “bold
and masculine spirit,” but this speech does not appear in the earlier
editions.
20. Darryll Grantley notices “an element of opportunistic pragmatism
shaping Dekker’s oeuvre for the stage” and wonders if the title Whore
of Babylon n was meant to be provocative, following as it does popular
plays of the two preceding years, The Honest Whore and The Dutch
Courtesan. Darryll Grantley, “Thomas Dekker and the Emergence
of City Comedy” in The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare
and Contemporary Dramatists, ed. Ton Hoenselaars (Cambridge:
Notes 205
21. JuliaGasper,TheDragonandtheDove:ThePlaysofThomasDekker
(Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1990), 9.
22. Loomis, Death of Elizabeth, 125.
23. Gasper, Dragon and Dove, 62–63.
24. This and all further quotations from The Whore of Babylon n refer to
TheDramaticWorksofThomasDekker,Volume2,ed.FredsonBowers
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1955; rpt.1964).
25. This little speech is particularly interesting because it casts Titania
as a Jezebel. Throughout, the Empresse and her henchmen char-
acterize Titania and Faerie Land in terms that actually apply to
themselves.
26. Gasper provides a detailed interpretation of the Prince in terms of
the Portuguese succession, Dragon and Dove, 84–85.
27. See Chapter Five for a discussion of Hooke’s sermon.
28. By the time Dekker wrote The Whore of Babylon, it might have been
clear that Elizabeth’s successor would not prove to be the resolute,
masculine champion of Protestant causes that some had expected.
McLuskie assumes, in fact, that this passage voices opposition to the
peaceful policies of James rather than celebrating him. Dekker and
Heywood, 51.
29. Julia Gasper argues that the rebellious “moon” is probably Essex, but
she also takes note of the similarities between this episode and the
trial of Duessa from The Faerie Queene, Book V. She concludes that
the similarities between the two result from their drawing on a com-
mon source about clemency, Seneca’s De Clementia. So many of the
ideas expressed in this treatise were familiar maxims in Renaissance
discourse that it is hard to support the claim that De Clementia was a
specific source used by both authors. See Dragon and Dove, 89–90.
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INDEX
Adams, Robert M., 176n19 Brennan, Michael G., 71, 189n11

Ahab, in Book of Kings, 13, 15 Bromley, Laura G., 193n55
Alexander, Catherine M. S., 196n15 Brown, Carolyn E., 137
Allen, William, 181n106 Buchanan, George, 150–1
Alley, William, 194n62 Bucholz, Robert, 175n7
Anne of Bohemia, Queen of Burghley, William Cecil, Lord, 17, 19,
England, 11 55, 138, 180n87, 181n99–100,
anti-Semitism, 120–1 181n106
Apologie of the Earl of Essex, 123–4 Burrow, Colin, 36, 185–6n23, 187n33
Aristotle,NicomacheanEthics,6,149, Butler, Todd, 38
201n46
Augustine, City of God, 3 Cadiz expedition (1596), 109, 123
Aylmer, John, An Harborowe for Cain, Thomas H., 185n23
FaithfullandTreweSubjectes, cardinal virtues, 22, 30
1–2, 17, 18, 32, 136, 161 Carpenter, Jennifer, 177n45
Catholicism as a threat, 25, 108, 120–4,
Bacon, Francis, 123 160–1, 167
Baseotto, Paola, 182n114 Cecil, Robert, 154, 196n17
Basore, John W., 175n13 Cecil, William. See Burghley,
Bates, Catherine, 70, 188n41 William Cecil, Lord
Beacham, Virginia Walcott, 176n33 Chancery Court, 3, 6–7, 126, 150–1
Beatitudes, 20 chivalry, 40, 58–9, 61–2, 64, 122
Becon, Thomas, An humble ChristianPrayersandMeditations
supplicacion unto God, 12, 14 (1569), 22
Bell, Ilona, 72, 98–9, 105, 190n17, Clifford, Rosamond, 91
194n71 Coch, Christine, 10, 11, 21
Berry, Lloyd E., 175n12 Cogswell, Thomas, 202–3n66
Bevington, David, 129–30 Cohen, Stephen, 136
Bishops’ Bible, 1569 portrait of Coke, Sir Edmund, 150
Elizabeth, 22 Cole, Mary Hill, 79
Blount, Charles, 192n48 Collins, Arthur, 191n31
Boesky, Amy, 182n119, 203n8 common law court, 6–7
Bowers, Fredson, 205n24 compassion, 7, 38–41, 44, 143–5
Bowes, George, 27 and contamination, 143–5
Boyle, Elizabeth, 97–8 manipulated, 39, 41, 51, 63–4, 74–5
Bradbrook, M. C., 189n8, 191n23 for women’s suffering, 39–40, 51
Brady, Ciarin, 197n35 see also mercy
220 Index
“Concerning the Parricides of the Dudley, Robert. See Leicester, Robert

Jezebel of England” (1587), 28 Dudley, Earl of
corporal acts of mercy, 37 Duncan, Sarah, 175n7
Crane, Mary Thomas, 182n119, 203n8 Duncan-Jones, Katherine, 97,
Crane, William G., 200n35 190n16, 191n21, 193n52
cruelty Dunkel, Wilbur, 201n45
of a prince, 5 Dunlop, Alexander, 194n66
of queens, 12–17 Dunseath, T. K., 185n23
Cult of Elizabeth, 9 Durling, Robert M., 188n1
Cult of the Virgin Mary, 9 Dymoke, Edmund, 85
Cust, Richard, 202n66
Edward III, King of England, 9, 11
Daniel, Samuel Egerton, Sir Thomas, 151
Complaint of Rosamond, 89, 91–6 Eggert, Katherine, 188n40, 199n13
Delia, 33, 68, 84–96, 97 Elijah, in Book of Kings, 13
Danson, Lawrence, 196n18 Elizabeth I, Queen of England
Dante Alighieri, 9 Bishops’ Bible portrait, 22
Davison, John, 189n8 as a Christ figure, 171
Davison, William, 69–70 clemency attributed to feminine
Dekker, Thomas weakness, 17–18, 83, 124, 156
characters compassionate by nature, 17, 26,
Empress of Babylon, 167–8 52–3, 139, 167, 171–3
Fideli, 168, 170, 171 as Constantine, 23
Paridell, 167, 170, 172–3 courage and, 30–1, 159
Parthenophill, 168 courtships of, 109–10, 169
Dr. Roper, 170, 171 crisis over Mary Stuart, 28–32
Titania, 166–73 criticized as too lenient, 23–5,
works 27–32, 53, 69, 122, 130–1, 135, 171
The Whore of Babylon, 33, 157–8, as cruel, 17
166–73 as Cynthia/the moon, 85, 86, 129–31
The Wonderful Year, 157 as David, 22, 24, 107–8, 135
Dering, Edward, 24–5, 27 as Delia, 85
Devereux, Robert. See Essex, Robert Ditchley portrait, 86
Devereux, Earl of “Doubt of Future Foes,” 54
Dickinson, John W., 201n49 image as clement queen, 3, 9–10, 12,
Digges, Dudley, 179n77–8, 202n63 19–22, 28, 67, 107, 138, 156, 162–4
Dimock, Arthur, 196n17, 196n20 as Jezebel, 12, 28–9, 56
Dollimore, Jonathan, 137, 196n14 judgment and, 2, 17, 19, 47, 65, 75, 83
Donne, John, 7 lack of vengeance, 1, 29, 32
Doran, Madeleine, 158, 203n7 as a learned queen, 110–11
Doran, Susan, 180–1n93, 195n4, 203n4 male councilors and, 18–19, 56,
Doty, Jeffrey S., 140–1, 154–5, 201n42 125–6, 135, 158, 160–1, 163–4,
Drakakis, John, 197n30 166, 167, 172–3 (see also mixed
Drant, Thomas, 27–8, 107–8 monarchy)
Dubrow, Heather, 190n15 as mediatrix/intercessor, 9–10, 12, 17
Index
x 221
as a merciful monarch, 9–10, 12, 17, Florio, John, 184n9

19–22, 26, 28, 29, 33, 42, 52–5, Forster, Leonard, 68–9, 189n9
57, 65, 83, 138, 153 Fortier, Mark, 6, 185n17, 187n33,
mercy and rigor balanced, 107–8, 201n50, 202n52
112, 113 Foxe,John,,ActesandMonuments,23–4
as a mother, 9–10, 12, 21, 138, 162, 167 Franssen, Paul J. C. M., 196n16
mutual love between herself and Fraser, R. Scott, 118
people, 19–21, 138–9 Freeman, Thomas S., 180n91, 180–1n93,
Northern rebels and, 21, 25–8 181n94, 203n4
as Portia, 109–16 Froude, James Anthony, 179n74
posthumous representations of, Frye, Susan, 2
133–5, 157–73
progresses of, 79–80 Gaines, Janet Howe, 178n54
Protestantism and, 3, 22–5, 33, 42, Garber, Marjorie, 194–5n3
54, 87–8, 107, 111, 128, 158, 160, Gasper, Julia, 166, 205n26, 205n29
167–9, 172–3 Geneva Bible, 15, 29
rhetoric of feminine weakness, genre,offMeasureforMeasure,136–7
111–12 of Whore of Babylon, 166
Shakespeare’s comic heroines and, Gibbs, Donna, 194n65
110–11, 136 Gilby, Anthony, An admonition to
Spanish Armada and, 19, 111, 165–6 EnglandandScotland,12,13–14
speeches to Parliament, 29–30 Gless, Darryl, 183n3
theatricality, 22, 116–17, 155–6 Go, Kenji, 93–4, 95, 193–4n61
Tilbury speech, 19, 111, 165–6 Golding, Arthur, 176n18
as a tyrant, 17, 29–30, 36 Goodman,Christopher,Howsuperior
as the Virgin Mary, 9–10, 12, 17 powersoughttobeobeyed,12–13
as a weak monarch, 20, 124–5, 141, Goodman, Godfrey, 121, 134
154 Gosson, Stephen, 143
as the woman clothed with the Gosynhyll, Edward, Scholehouse for
sun, 87 Women, 16–17
Elizabethan political imaginary, 2 Grant, Teresa, 158–9, 160
Elton, G. R., 202n65 Grantley, Darryll, 204n20
Elyot, Thomas, The Governour, 4 Graves, Michael, 182–3n125
empathy, 143. See also compassion Graziana, Rene, 185n23
equity, 3, 6, 49–50, 56, 126, 148–53 Greenblatt, Stephen, 116–17
Essex, Robert Devereux, Earl of, 69, Gresham, Thomas, 158
77, 80, 109, 121–5 Grey de Wilton, Arthur, Lord,
mobilization of public opinion, 122–4 187n35
promotion of heroic self-image,
123–4 Habermas, Jurgen, 32
Evans, G. Blakemore, 179n70 Hackett, Helen, 9, 86, 198n1, 198n3
Evenden, Elizabeth, 180n91 Hadfield, Andrew, 183–4n6, 186n27
Hamilton, A. C., 37, 44, 175n12, 183n2,
Fairbanks, Arthur, 193n60 184n11, 185n23, 186n24
Felch, Susan M., 179n83, 195n10, 202n59 Hamilton, Donna B., 183–4n6
222 Index
Hammer, Paul E. J., 76, 122–3, 177–8n52, as a father, 138–9

197n31–2 public and, 140, 147–8, 152, 155–6
Harington, John, 19, 114, 127, 135–6 severity and, 134–6, 138
Hatton, Christopher, 77, 114, 191n35 as Solomon, 135
Haynes, Victoria, 201n48 theories of monarchy, 134, 137,
Hayward, John, 111 149–51
Heninger, S. K., 98, 190n18 TrewLawofFreeMonarchies,134,150
Henry II, King of England, 91 Jankowski, Theodora A., 8
Henry VIII, King of England, 26 Jansen, Sharon L., 8
Herman, Peter C., 95, 190n15 Jeffery, Chris, 196n18
Heywood, Thomas Jezebel, 12–16, 28, 29
characters poems, de Jezebelis, 28–9
Beningfield, 159, 161 popular example of a bad woman,
Bishop of Winchester, 159–61 12, 16
Constable, 159–60 as representing woman ruler’s
Dodds, 160 cruelty, 12–15, 28–9, 161
Elizabeth, 158–66 Johnson, Samuel, 194n3
Gage, 159 Jones, Ann Rosalind, 72, 73
Gresham, 162, 164 Jones, William, 176n16
Hobson, 162, 164–5 Jordan, Constance, 178–9n69, 179n73,
Leicester, 163–4 201n47
Mary, 160–2 Jordan, Richard Douglas, 183n5
Parry, 162–3
Philip, 160–1 Kane, Sean, 185n18
Shandoyse, 161 Kaske, Carol V. 183n3
Tawny-Coat, 164–5 Katz, David S., 121, 196n20, 197n22,
If You Know Not Me You Know 197n24–5
Nobody,PartsIandII,33,157–66 Kerrigan, John, 92
Hoak, Dale, 180n88 Kesselring, K. J., 5, 25–7, 181n101,
Hoenselaars, Ton, 204n15, 204n20 181n103
Hooke, Henry, 134–5, 170 King, John, 22
Hough, Graham, 183n4 King, Ros, 196n16
Howard, Jean E., 204n15 Kingdon, Robert M., 181n106
Huneycutt, Lois, 10 Kings, Book of, 13, 15
Hunsdon, Henry Carey, Lord, 18 Klein, Lisa, 84, 192n44
Hurault,Jacques,Politicke,Moral,and Knight, W. Nicholas, 197n38
Martial Discourses, 4 Knox,John,First
, BlastoftheTrumpet
Hyrde, Richard, 8 againsttheMonstrousRegiment
of Women, 1, 12, 14–15
Ireland, 23, 53, 109 Koenig, Francine, 195n5
Kuin, Roger, 79, 191n35
James I, King of England ( James VI Kyle, Chris R., 202n66
of Scotland), 6, 33, 170
accession, responses to, 133–6 Ladies Dictionary, y7
Basilicon Doron, 134, 147–8 Lake, Peter, 32, 197n29, 202n66
Index
x 223
Lambarde, William, 151 McLuskie, Kathleen E., 203n10, 205n28

Leicester, Robert Dudley, Earl of, McManus, Caroline, 51
71, 97 mercy
Levin, Carole, 2, 175n7, 180n89, 204n12 attributed to mothers and the
Levin, Richard, 137 Virgin Mary, 9–10, 17
Lipsius, Justus, 4, 7 Christian monarchy and, 4, 5, 12,
Loomis, Catherine, 133, 158–9, 166, 17, 31, 113
198n3 as a Christian virtue, 3, 5, 31, 37
Lopez, Roderigo, 120–6, 170 courage and, 61, 64
Lord, George deForest, 193n51 distinguished from pity, 3–4, 44
love poetry, 33, 67–71 as emasculating, 44, 48
carpe diem theme in, 88, 91 emotion, product of, 3, 4, 7–8, 17,
courtiers and, 68–70, 75, 76–7, 83, 38–9, 43–4, 45, 48, 51, 65, 142
106 equity and, 6, 49–50 (see also equity)
cruel fair in, 67–8, 88–9, 94–6, as feminine, 1, 7, 9–10, 17, 138, 142,
99–100 159, 168
Elizabeth I and, 68–70, 73, 76, as harmful, 4, 19, 22–5, 31, 45–7, 48,
79–80, 83–4, 85–8, 97–8, 101, 68, 71, 73, 84, 130, 138, 141–6,
105–6 163, 171–2
as immortalizing, 88–91 as a human weakness, 3, 4, 7
Petrarchan rhetoric and, 67–70, 74, justice and, 37, 49
76, 98–9 nobility and, 58, 61–4, 164–5
presence and, 75–83 popularity and, 5, 12, 19–20, 57, 138
Lyly, John, Endymion, 129–31 practical benefits of, 24, 25–6,
29–31, 60, 128, 163
Machiavelli, Niccolo, The Prince,5, 20 presence and, 76–7, 79, 83, 161
Mack, Maynard, 193n51 proper role in governance, 5–7
MacKay, Maxine, 197n38 as public performance, 146–56
MacLean, Sally-Beth, 177n45 self-control, product of, 60–1
Main Plot, 154 sexuality and, 141–2
Majeske, Andrew, 50, 185n21 tyranny and, 36
Maley, Willy, 186n27 Miller, Jacqueline, 200n38
Marcus, Leah S., 110, 129, 137, 179n80, monarchy
181n108–10, 182n112–13, mixed monarchy, 19, 32, 56, 125, 169
181n115, 181n117–18, 181n120, personal authority of, 19, 155, 169
186n30, 195n4, 195n9, 196n11 prerogative and, 3, 6, 55–6, 125,
Marotti, Arthur, 72, 73 126–7, 149–50
Mary I, Queen of England, 1, 10, presence and, 76–80, 83, 161
12–14, 18, 22, 23, 26, 160 Montaigne, Michel de, 39
Mary of Guise, 12 Montrose, Louis, 2
Mazzola, Elizabeth, 190n19 Morgan, Gerald, 44
McCoy, Richard C., 59, 61, 122 Mueller, Janel, 30–1, 159, 179n80,
McCullough, Peter E., 181n95 180n88, 181n108–10, 182n112–13,
McIlwain, Charles H., 202n56 182n115, 182n117–18, 182n120,
McLaren, A. N., 29, 55, 176n32, 179n76 186n30, 195n4, 195n9, 196n11
224 Index
Mulcaster, Richard, Passage of Our Pincus, Steven, 32, 197n29

MostDreadSovereignLady, Pitcher, John, 85, 91, 191–2n38,
Queen Elizabeth, 20–1 204n16
Munday, Anthony, 143 pity. See compassion, mercy:
Murphy, Andrew, 191–2n38 distinguished from pity
Musa, Mark, 177n38 Plucknett, Theodore F. T., 150, 155
Plutarch, Lives, 110
Naboth, in Book of Kings, 15 Prescott, Anne Lake, 189n3
Neale, J. E., 20, 69, 179n82, 182n121, presence. See love poetry: and
189n6–7, 202n54 presence, mercy: and
Nelson, Lowry, 88 presence, monarchy: and
Nelson, William, 59, 186n28 presence
Nennio,oraTreatiseofNobility, y 58 Pricket, Robert, 135
Netherlands, 54, 83, 168 Primeau, Ronald, 92
Newman, Karen, 198n39 privacy, 50, 54–5, 82, 139, 146–56
Newton, Thomas, 85 Privy Council, 32, 125
Nicolas, Harris, 191n26–8 Processus Belial, 113
Nohrnberg, James, 187n33 providence, 158, 162, 169
Norfolk, Thomas Howard, Duke of, public discourse, 139–40, 147–8
17, 19, 32, 138 public sphere, 31–2, 124–5, 140
Northern Rebellion, 21, 23, 25–8, 32, Puritan objections to imaginative
107–8 literature, 143
Northrop, Douglas, 187n33
Norton, Thomas, 182–3n125 queens
as cruel, 12, 14, 17
Oakes, Catherine, 11 as given to idolatry, 14
O’Connell, Michael, 187n33 as Jezebels, 12, 17
O’Donnell, C. Patrick, 186n31 as merciful intercessors, 9–12, 17,
Oram, William A., 194n63, 194n69 50, 120, 153, 156
O’Rourke, James, 196n12 Quilligan, Maureen, 72, 190n15,
190n19
Parliament, 20, 29–30, 31, 55, 125, 155 Quinn, Kelly A., 93–4
Parry, William, 162, 167, 170, 172
Parsons, John Carmi, 11, 177n44 Rackham, H., 176n224, 201n46
Peacham, Henry, 200n35 Ralegh, Walter, 74, 192n47
Peele, George, Araygnement of The Ocean to Cynthia, 86, 101
Paris, 8 Rea, John D., 196n12
Petrarch, Rime Sparse, 67, 79 Rees, Joan, 192n48
Petrina, Alessandra, 182n114 Reynolds, Paige Martin, 8, 182n116
Philip II, King of Spain, 168 Rich, Penelope Devereux, 72
Philippa of Hainault, Queen of Richards, Judith M., 19, 179n73
England, 9, 11 Ridolfi Plot, 19
Phillips, James E., 28–9, 185n23 Roche, Thomas P., 186n31
Philostratus, 193n60 Ronsard, Pierre de, Sonnets Pour
Pilgrimage of the Life of Man, 53 Helene, 67–8
Index
x 225
Rose, Mary Beth, 11, 179n80, Regan, 15

181n108–10, 182n112–13, Shylock, 108, 109, 112–16
182n115, 182n117–18, 182n120, Tamora, 15–16
186n30, 195n4, 195n9, 196n11 comic heroines, 110–11, 136
royal pardon, 6–7 works
Rust, Jennifer, 39 Henry V V, 33, 116–20
Julius Caesar, 110
Sagaser, Elizabeth Harris, 189n4, Lear, 15
192–3n49, 193n54 Macbeth, 16
Salutem in Christo (1571), 32 Measure for Measure, 24, 33,
Selden, John, 201n50 133–56
Seneca, De Clementia, 3, 5, 24, 143, MerchantofVenice,24,33,107–31
199n24, 205n29 Sonnets, 91
sermon, “Unruly Heifer,” 24–5, 27 Titus Andronicus, 15–16
Shakespeare, William Shenk, Linda, 22, 180n85
characters Sherman, Anita Gilman, 204n16
Angelo, 141–5, 148, 152–3 Sidney family, 71
Antonio, 109, 110, 112–16, 127–8 Sidney, Mary Herbert, Countess of
Archbishop of Canterbury, Pembroke, 84–5, 87
117–18 Sidney, Philip, 84, 97
Bassanio, 108, 110, 112–16, 127–8 letters of, 78–9
Cambridge, Scroop, and Grey, Protestantism and, 83
119 works
Chorus, 117 AstrophilandStella,33,68,71–84
Claudio, 141–5, 149 Defence of Poesy, y 83–4, 143–4
Dauphin, 118–19 Sinfield, Alan, 196n14
Duke of Venice, 116 Sloan, Thomas O., 200n39
Duke Vincentio, 137–41, 145–8, Smith, A. J., 176n29
153–6 Sommerville, Johann P., 198n6,
Escalus, 141, 144 199n7–10, 200n26–7, 200n31,
Goneril, 15 201n43–4, 202n53
Gratiano, 129 Spain, 25, 109, 122–4, 165–6
Henry V, 116–20, 125 Spenser, Edmund
Isabel, 24, 142–5, 148, 152–4 characters
Jessica, 128 Amavia, 44
Lady Macbeth, 16 Amoret, 55
Lavinia, 15–16 Arthegall, 47–8, 57
Lorenzo, 128 Arthur, 38, 46, 51–2, 62–4
Lucio, 142, 146–7, 149 Belphoebe, 87, 101–2
Mariana, 153 Blandina, 62–4
Mistress Overdone, 142 Blatant Beast, 62
Nerissa, 129 Bonfont, 56
Pompey, 141 Briana, 59–61
Portia, 4, 24, 107–16, 118, 119–20, Britomart, 47–50
125–31 Calepine, 61–3
226 Index
Spenser, Edmund—Continued Epithalamion, 97

Calidore, 59–61 Faerie Queene, Book I, 36–41;
Charissa, 36–7 Book II, 42–7, 87; Book III,
Crudor, 59–61 101–3; Book V, 17, 47–58, 109;
Cymochles, 43 Book VI, 58–64, 86
Duessa, 40–1, 44, 46, 51–7, Shepheardes Calender, 97
109, 125 ViewoftheStateofIreland,53,109
Furor and Occasion, 45 Spenser, T. J. B., 195n6
Gloriana, 42–3, 87 Spiller, Michael R. G., 72, 189n15,
Guyon, 42–7, 60–1, 87 194n65
Huddibras, 43 Sprague, Arthur Colby, 192n45
Isis, 48–9 Staines, John D., 58, 130, 186n26
lion, 40 Stallybrass, Peter, 72, 73
Maleffort, 59 Star Chamber, 155
Medina, 43 Stevenson, David L., 140
Mercilla, 35, 37, 46, 47, 50–7, Stewart, Alan, 190n16
109, 125, 170–1 Stoic philosophy, 3
Mercy, 35, 37 Strier, Richard, 183–4n6
Osiris, 48–9 Strohm, Paul, 9, 10–11
Palmer, 45–6 Strong, Roy, 192n46
Phaedria, 43–4 Stuart, Mary, 12, 19, 25, 28–31, 32, 41,
Pyrochles, 45–6, 60–1 51–7, 69–70, 109, 125, 129–30,
Radigund, 17, 47–8 159, 170–1
Red Cross Knight, 36–7, Stump, Donald, 179n83, 196n10,
40–1 202n59
Salvage Man, 61–2 Sussex, Thomas Radclyffe, Earl of,
Sans Foy, 40 25–7
Sans Loy, 38, 43 Sutherland, John, 196n18
satyrs, 38–9 Suzuki, Mihoko, 185n23
Scudamour, 55
Serena, 61–3 Tennenhouse, Leonard, 137, 199n18
Timias, 101–2 Throckmorton, Job, 31
Turpine, 61–4 Thrush, Andrew, 202–3n66
Una, 38–41, 52 Tobin, J. J. M., 179n70
Venus, 55 Tosi, Laura, 182n114
Zele, 51 True Report of Sondry Horrible
places Conspiracies, 121
Bower of Bliss, 46–7 Tyrwhitt, Thomas, 140
House of Holiness, 36–7
Isis Church, 48–9 Vanhoutte, Jacqueline, 175n5,
works 177n42–3
Amoretti, 68, 97–106 Virgin Mary, 9, 113, 120
ColinCloutsComeHomeAgaine, as intercessor, 9–10, 11, 153
97, 103–4 Vives, Juan, 8
Index
x 227
Walch, Gunter, 117 Winwood, Ralph, 202n60–1

Walker, Julia M., 195n4 women
Walsingham, Francis, 19, 55, 85 as cruel, 5, 26, 28, 48
Ward, Paul L., 202n56 as emotionally susceptible, 8–9, 28, 75
Wareh, Patricia, 58 judgment and, 2, 8–9, 17, 19, 28, 65
Warner, Marina, 9, 11 as merciful, 1, 17, 18, 37, 139
Watkins, John, 134, 164, 165–6, 198n3 as rulers, 1–2, 8–9, 14–15
Watts, Cedric, 196n18 as tyrants, 15–17, 28
Weisen, David, 176n14 Woodbridge, Linda, 178n55
Whigham, Frank, 188n37 Wright,Thomas,PassionsoftheMinde
Williams, Kathleen, 40 In Generall, 7, 8, 144
Wilson, Richard, 197n38 Wynne-Davies, Marion, 72, 190n17

(Queenship and Power) Mary Villeponteaux (Auth.) - The Queen's Mercy - Gender and Judgment in Representations of Elizabeth I-Palgrave Macmillan US (2014)

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QUEENSHIP AND POWER

Series Editors: Carole Levin and Charles Beem

Linda Darling, University of Arizona (Ottoman Empire)

Published by Palgrave Macmillan

The Lioness Roared: The Problems of Female Rule in English History

Learned Queen: The Imperial Image of Elizabeth I

The Monstrous Regiment of Women: Female Rulers in Early Modern Europe

The Face of Queenship: Early Modern Representations of Elizabeth I

Elizabeth I: The Voice of a Monarch

Tudor Queenship: The Reigns of Mary and Elizabeth

The Death of Elizabeth I: Remembering and Reconstructing the Virgin Queen

The Foreign Relations of Elizabeth I

Wicked Women of Tudor England: Queens, Aristocrats, Commoners

Three Medieval Queens: Queenship and the Crown in Fourteenth-Century England

The Last Plantagenet Consorts: Gender, Genre, and Historiography, 1440–1627

Fairy Tale Queens: Representations of Early Modern Queenship

The Name of a Queen: William Fleetwood’s Itinerarium ad Windsor

The Emblematic Queen: Extra-Literary Representations of Early Modern Queenship

Queenship in Medieval Europe

The Queens Regnant of Navarre: Succession, Politics, and Partnership, 1274–1512

The Queen’s Mercy: Gender and Judgment in Representations of Elizabeth I

1. Great Britain—Politics and government—1558–1603. 2. Great

1 “By Nature Full of Mercy”: The Clemency of the Queen 1

“BY NATURE FULL OF MERC

Of course, Aylmer means to contrast Elizabeth with Mary Tudor,

“natural” woman and queen, who is “lyke a mother” in her patience

theorists often attempt to make a similar distinction between the

InThe Prince, Machiavelli offers a similarly ambivalent account of

reduced the common law courts’ power to pardon in order to have

Thus in early modern England, the proper role of mercy in gov- v

Feminine beauty is another “natural” attribute of women that

This “effeminatenesse” is a pliability and lack of emotional

imagery adopted by and projected onto Queen Elizabeth, her image

kingly authority by casting the queen not as a joint ruler but as a

are similarly ambivalent. To imagine Elizabeth as a tender, merciful

Goodman calls Mary a Jezebel in order to emphasize her crime

God condemns them as “blasphemers, idolaters, and cruell mur-

same meanings Goodman did: England “murthereth the sainctes, it

vengeance on the “mischievous Marys,” Knox asserts that both

Recorde, the wycked Jesabell,

Gosynhyll goes on to elaborate this final point: women’s physi-

is echoed by Spenser in Book V of The Faerie Queene, when, describ-

The Problem with Elizabeth’s Mercy

Hunsdon bewails the danger to the kingdom and to Elizabeth her-

The cardinal, bishops, and churchmen who “bewitched” her are to

guidance. This led to a struggle during Elizabeth’s reign between the

by acting mercifully Elizabeth believed she would be more beloved

remained merciful despite having been treated unmercifully in the

French prayers “connect Elizabeth’s tranquil, divinely endorsed gov- v

contempt of Gods holy name and Religion revenged, murder with

Nothing maketh so trusty the bondservant, as to remember he hath

Like Seneca and other classical authorities, Dering advocates clem-

doubted of by hazarding of Battayle against desperat Men.”99 She

And truly as we have byn allwayes of our awne Nature inclined to

in the weeks following the collapse of the rebellion in England,

toward the Scottish Queen.”107 Elizabeth anticipated such libels as

If any there live so wicked of nature to suppose that I prolonged this

In another version of this speech, Elizabeth suggests that some will

“magnanimity” instead. Mueller suggests that the crisis over Mary

Mercy’s meaning is contested here, as it so often is in the rhetoric of

as attempts to shape public opinion. Peter Lake and Steven Pincus

Literary representations of mercy, and particularly Elizabeth’s

juxtaposed with moments in which pity is manipulated, abused, and