James Crichton

James Crichton Poems

James Crichton Biography

James Crichton, known as the Admirable Crichton (19 August 1560 – Mantua, 3 July 1582), was a Scottish polymath noted for his extraordinary accomplishments in languages, the arts, and sciences. One of the most gifted individuals of the 16th century, James Crichton of Clunie (Perthshire; although some sources maintain his birthplace was Dumfries), was the son of Robert Crichton, Lord Advocate of Scotland, and Elizabeth Stewart, from whose line James could claim Royal descent. Educated at St. Andrews University from the ages of ten to fourteen, during which time he completed requirements for both his bachelor's and master's degrees, James was taught by the celebrated Scottish politician and poet George Buchanan (1506–1582). It was apparent from his earliest days that James was an unusually gifted prodigy, which may have been due to a gift for perfect recall. By the age of twenty, he was not only fluent in, but could discourse in (both prose and verse) no fewer than twelve languages, as well as being an accomplished horseman, fencer, singer, musician, orator and debater. Noted for his good looks as well as his refined social graces, some consider him to have come closest to the ideal of the complete man. Leaving Scotland, Crichton travelled to Paris, where he continued his education at the Collège de Navarre. It was in the French capital that he first came to prominence by challenging French professors to ask him any question on any science or liberal arts subject in Hebrew, Syriac, Arabic, Greek, Latin, Spanish, French, Italian, English, Dutch, or Slavonic. It is said that throughout the course of one extremely long day, French scholars failed to stump Crichton on any question they threw at him, no matter how abstruse. Thereafter he spent two years as a soldier in the French army before travelling to Italy in 1579, winning acclaim in Genoa, Venice, and Padua by repeating his exploit of challenging Italian scholars to intellectual discourse and debate. Once, he is alleged to have bested a professional gladiator in a brutal fencing match. In Venice in 1580, Crichton befriended the printer Aldus Manutius, who introduced him to the Venetian intellectual community, where the young Scot made an enormous impression on humanist scholars. In Padua in 1581, he clashed with a number of scholars over their interpretation of Aristotle while demonstrating that their mathematics were flawed. Perhaps tiring of intellectual duels, the following year Crichton entered the service of the Duke of Mantua, and may have become tutor to the Duke's headstrong son Vincenzo Gonzaga (although some sources suggest that Crichton served only as a member of the ducal council, and did not actually teach the prince). What is beyond dispute is that while in the Duke's employ, Vincenzo Gonzaga became hugely jealous of Crichton, probably from a combination of his father's strong regard for the young prodigy as well as Crichton replacing Vincenzo as the lover of the prince's former mistress. On the night of 3 July 1582, after leaving this lady's dwelling, Crichton was attacked in the street by a gang of masked ruffians. He bested all but one with his sword until the last man removed his mask to reveal the group's ringleader, Vincenzo Gonzaga. Tradition holds that, on seeing Vincenzo, Crichton instantly dropped to one knee and presented his sword, hilt first, to the prince, his master's son. Vincenzo took the blade and with it stabbed Crichton cruelly through the heart, killing him instantly. James Crichton of Cluny was then in his twenty-second year. Much of Crichton's posthumous reputation comes from a romantic 1652 account of his life written by Sir Thomas Urquhart (1611–1660). There is little or no contemporary evidence for many of the stories surrounding him. That said, his existence is supported by a few letters and his actual abilities were probably impressive. A historical novel entitled Crichton was published by the English writer William Harrison Ainsworth in 1836. The 'Admirable Crichton' was mentioned as an exemplar in W. M. Thackeray's Vanity Fair [1847]. James Crichton's sobriquet was later employed by fellow Scot Sir James Barrie as the title of his 1902 satirical play, "The Admirable Crichton", about a butler whose savoir-faire far exceeds that of his aristocratic employers. A memorial to him can be found in the church of St Bride's in Sanquhar and in the church of San Simone in Mantua. He is also the namesake of the James Crichton Society at St Andrews University which publishes a monthly academic journal.)

The Best Poem Of James Crichton

To Gaspar Visconti

I.

When her fair land with grief o'erspread,
Insubria mourn'd her primate dead;
When Borromeo to the tomb
Was borne mid all-pervading gloom;
When dimm'd with tears was every eye,
When breathed one universal sigh
The sorrowing lyre for him who slept,
I first—a Scottish minstrel—swept.


II.

The night is pass'd, and dawn awakes,
Bright Cynthius through the vapour breaks,
And Lucifer, with cheering beams,
From out his golden axle gleams.
Where late upon the raging sea
The wild winds rush'd tumultuously ;
And the frail bark by surges toss'd,
Her tempest-braving helmsman lost,
Her timbers strain'd, her canvass riven,
Wide o'er the weltering waste was driven ;
While her pale crew, with fear aghast,
Gazed (as they deem'd) on heaven their last!
With shrieks their hapless fate bewailing!
With prayers the threatening skies assailing!—
—A change is wrought!—hush'd are the gales,
A soft and summer calm prevails ;
And the glad ship in safety glides
Over the gently-rolling tides.
In troops, o'er ocean's broad expanse,
Day's rosy harbingers advance;
Bland Eolus careers the wave,
Fierce Notus hurries to his cave;
Young Titan from the waters springs,
With new-born lustre on his wings;
And over all things shines that sun,
Whose light a thousand vows have won.


III.

Io! with shouts the decks resound!
Io! another chief is found!
Another leader hath been sent
To rule the Christian armament: .
Whose firmness and undaunted zeal
Ensure uninterrupted weal!
Whose voice the Roman Rota sway'd,
Whose laws that synod sage obey'd;
Whose hand will guide, with equal ease,
Religion's bark through stormy seas:
Whose power in exhortation shown,
Whose wisdom I myself have known;
When, by his eloquence subdued,
In admiration lost I stood.
Rejoice, thrice happy Lombardy!
That such a chief is given to thee!
A chief, so free from aught of sin,
Virtue might be his origin;
Whose heavenly purpose onward tending,
Whose resolution calm, unbending,
Shall lead thee through the shades of night
To realms of everlasting light.


Iv.

Haste, Milanese ! your primate greet!
Prelates! your leader fly to meet!
Run, maidens! youths! let each one bring
Some gift, some worthy offering!
Surrounding nations hail your choice,
Surrounding nations loud rejoice;
Like him, whom ye have lost, was none
Save him your choice has fall'n upon!


V.

A father fond, a ruler wise,
Gaspar, in thee we recognise;
Thy name, Visconti, seems to be
An earnest of prosperity.
To us them art in our distress
As manna in the wilderness.
Inhospitable Caucasus,
Sarmatian Boreas rigorous,
Seize on the caitiff, who denies
Thy all-acknowledged charities!
A glory art thou, and a star,
A light, a pharos seen afar!
And, clothed with majesty divine,
Shalt prove the pillar of thy line.
High rectitude and prescience
Are thine, and wide beneficence;
A Numa in thy sanctity,
A Cato in thy gravity,
Augustus in nobility!
Hence the High Pontiff Gregory,
Who holds of paradise the key,
For thee earth's chains hath cast aside,
For thee heaven's gate hath open'd wide;
Milan's white robe hath round thee spread,
Her mitre placed upon thy head.


VI.

In thy bless'd advent all men see
Of peace a certain augury;
All tongues are clamorous in thy praise,
All prayers are for thy length of days.
Amid the crowd I, Crichton, born
On Caledonian shores forlorn,
Not all unknown, congratulate
Thee, Caspar, on thine honour'd state.
Perpetual happiness be thine!
Thy bright, approving smile be mine!
Nor let thy taste, severe, disdain,
Primate, this welcome-breathing strain.

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