cviii LIFE OF IZAAK WALTON. [1683, 



fact. Thus, in his preface to the collected edition of the Lives of 

 Donne, Wotton, Herbert, and Hooker, he says, "When I look 

 back upon my education and mean abilities, it is not without 

 some little wonder at myself that I am come to be publicly in 

 print ; " and in his dedication of that work he resigns all claim 

 " to acquired learning or study." 



Walton's opinion of ancestry and honours, like his sentiments 

 on most other subjects, was liberal and just. When alluding to 

 the antiquity of Angling, he says, " As I would rather prove my- 

 self a gentleman, by being learned and humble, valiant and 

 inoffensive, virtuous and communicable, than by any fond ostenta- 

 tion of riches, or wanting those virtues myself boast that these 

 were in my ancestors (and yet I grant, that where a noble and 

 ancient descent and such merit meet in any man, it is a double 

 dignification of that person) ; so if this antiquity of angling, which 

 for my part I have not forced, shall, like an ancient family, be 

 either an honour or an ornament to this virtuous art which I 

 profess to love and practise, I shall be the gladder that I made an 

 accidental mention of the antiquity of it." Nor is there less truth 

 in the following reflection upon hereditary titles : " Bare titles 

 are noted to have in them nothing of reality ; for titles not 

 acquired, but derived only, do but show us who of our ancestors 

 have, and how they have achieved that honour which their de- 

 scendants claim, and may not be worthy to enjoy. For if those 

 titles descend to persons that degenerate into vice, and break off 

 the continued line of learning, or valour, or that virtue that 

 acquired them, they destroy the very foundation upon which that 

 honour was built; and all the rubbish of their degenerousness 

 ought to fall heavy on such dishonourable heads ; ought to fall so 

 heavy, as to degrade them of their tides, and blast their memories 

 with reproach and shame." ^ 



It was impossible for a man of Walton's talents and sensibility 

 to live through the events, which distracted this country for nearly 

 twenty years, without adopting very decided political opinions. It 

 has been already observed, that he adhered with unshaken 

 fidelity to the cause of royalty, which he considered was identified 

 with that of religion. This has been partly attributed to his 

 constant association with the most eminent divines of the Church 

 of England ; but it is probable that he would, under any circum- 

 stances, have followed that course, because the most striking 

 characteristic of his mind was veneration, from which feehng 



6 Life of Sanderson, ed. Zouch, ii. 157. 



