The Learned Lady in England, 1650-1760Reynolds, Myra
History
The Learned Lady in England, 1650-1760
Reynolds, Myra
Women -- Education -- Great Britain; Women -- Great Britain; Women authors, English
The one lady of Elizabethan days whose fame justly exceeds that of
any of her predecessors is Mary Sidney (1561-1621),[52] sister of
Sir Philip Sidney. At sixteen she married Henry Herbert, Earl of
Pembroke, and the twenty-four years of her married life were passed
at his estate, Wilton House, in Wiltshire. Her brother Philip was
often at Wilton and her more important literary accomplishments are
closely bound up with his work. It was at Wilton that he wrote _The
Countess of Pembroke's Arcadia_ which he dedicated to his "dear ladie
and sister." The brother and sister translated together the whole
book of Psalms into English verse. Psalms 44-150 are attributed
to Lady Pembroke. In 1592 she published two translations from the
French, Du Plessis Mournay's _Le Excellent Discours de la Vie et de
la Mort_; and Robert Garnier's _Marc Antonie_, a tragedy. Before 1600
she had also translated _The Triumph of Death_ from the Italian.
In 1593 she brought out her brother's _Arcadia_ on which she had
done most careful editorial work. She had also a taste for science.
Aubrey, in his _Brief Lives_, says of her: "She was a great chymist,
and spent yearly a great deale in that study.[53] She kept for her
laborator in the house Adrian Gilbert (vulgarly called Dr. Gilbert),
half brother to Sir Walter Ralegh, who was a great chymist in those
dayes.... She also gave an honourable pension to Dr. Thomas Mouffett,
who hath writ a booke _De insectis_. Also one ... Boston, a good
chymist ... who did undoe himself by studying the philosopher's
stone."
But while Lady Pembroke takes undoubtedly a high rank as translator
and editor, her fame does not rest chiefly on this work. When
Nicholas Breton compared her to the Duchess of Urbino he brought
forward her essential claim to distinction, which is that she
understood, valued, and befriended the literati of her day. Aubrey
says: "In her time Wilton House was like a College, there were so
many learned and ingeniose persons. She was the greatest patronesse
of witt and learning of any lady in her time." The most extravagant
eulogies were addressed to her from girlhood to old age. No such
chorus of praise had been accorded any other woman except the queen.
But it must be noted that this adulation is mainly for Lady Pembroke
as the patroness of letters. Only incidentally are her own scholastic
attainments commended. It was as a lover of wit and learning, as a
dispenser of favors, that Lady Pembroke, the typical great lady of
Elizabethan days, expressed her interest in learning, rather than
as herself a scholar; and it was as an intelligent and open-handed
patroness that she received highest recognition.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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