OU T L INES
ENGLISH LITERATURE
BY
THOMAS B;SHAW, B.A.,
BROFESSOR OF ENGLISH LITERATURE IN THE IMPERIAL ALEXANDER
LYCEUM OF ST. PETERSBURG.
A NEW AMEtICAN EDITION,
WITH
A SKETCH OF AMERICAN LITERATURE,
BY
HENRY T. TUCKERMAN,
AUTHOR OF ", CARACTERISTICS OF LITERATURE," ETCO
NEW YORK:
SHELDON & COMPANY, PUBLISHERS,
498 & 500 BROADWAY.
18, 66.




Entered, according to the Act of C(ongress, in the year 1852, by
BLANCHARD AND LEA,
m the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States in ald
for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.
ZREHYMPED BY J. PAtUW,




.AMERICAN PUBLISHERS' NOTICE.
[N presenting a new edition of the "OUTLINES OF ENG.
iaSH LITERATURE," the publishers have thought that a brief
sketch of what has been accomplished by the authors of
this country would render it more complete and more suitable for the use to which it has been applied, as a classbook in many of our best seminaries and academies. They
have, therefore, induced Mr. TUCKERMAN to undertake that
task, which he has executed upon the same general plan
as that adopted by the author. The present edition is
therefore presented in the hope that it will be found even
more worthy than the former of the wide popularity which
the work has acquired.
PHILADELPHIA, June, 1852.
(iii)




TO THE READER.
THE author of the following pages has been engaged,
during some years, as Professor of English Literature in
the Imperial Alexander Lyceum of St. Petersburg; and,
both in the discharge of his duties there and in his private
teaching, he has very frequently felt the want of a lManucal,
concise but comprehensive, on the subject of his lectures:
The plan generally adopted in foreign countries, of allowing the pupil to copy-the lecturer's manuscript notes, was
in this case found to be impracticable; and the oftenrepeated request of the students to be furnished with some
elementary book, as a framework or skeleton- of the course,
could only be met by a declaration, singular as the fact
might appear, that no such work, cheap, compendious, and
tolerably readable, existed in English.  The excellent volumes of Warton are obviously inapplicable to such a purpose; for they only treat of one portion of English literature
— the poetry; and of that only down to the Elizabethan
age.  Their plan, also, is far too extensive to render them
useful to the general student.  Chambers's valuable- and
complete' Cyclopaedia of English Literature' is as much too
voluminous as his shorter sketch is too dry and list-like;
while the French and German essays on the subject are not
only limited in their scope, but are full of very erroneous
critical judgments.
Induced by these circumstances,,the author has encdea(iv)




TO THE READER.                    V
soured to pruduce a volume which might s~erve as a useful
outline Introduction to English Literature both to the English and the foreign student.  This little work, it is needless
to say, has no pretensions whatsoever to the title of a complete Course of English Literature: it is merely an attempt
to describe the causes, instruments, and nature of those
great revolutions in taste which form  what are termed
"Schools of Writing."  In order to do this, and to mark
more especially those broad and salient features which ought
to be clearly fixed in the reader's mind before he can profitably enter upon the details of the subject, only the greater
names - the greater types of -each period - have been examined; whilst the inferior, or merely imitative, writers have
been unscrupulously neglected: in short, the author has
marked only the chief luminaries in each intellectual constellation; he has not attempted to give a complete Cata.
logue of Stars.
This method appears to unite the advantages of conciseness and completeness; for; should the reader push his
studies no farther, he may at least form clear ideas of the
main boundaries and divisions of English literature; whilst
the frequent change of topic will, the author trusts, render
these pages much less tiresome and monotonous than a
regular sytematic treatise.
He has considered the greater names in English literature
under a double point of view: first, as glorified types and
noble expressions of the religious, social, and intellectual
physiognomy of their times; and secondly, in their own
individuality: and he hopes that the sketches of the great
Baconian revolution in philosophy, of the state of the Drama
ander Elizabeth and James the First, of the intellectual
character of the Commonwealth and Restoration, and of the
romantic school of fiction, of Byronism, and of the present
tendencies of poetry, may be found - however imperfectly
executed - to possess some interest, were it only as the first
1*




TO THE READER.
attempt to tre'at, in a popular manner, questions hitherto
neglected in elementary books, but which the increased intelligence of the present age renders it no longer expedient to
pass over without remark.
The work was written in the brief intervals of very active
and laborious duties, and in a country where the author
could have no access to an English library of reference:
whatever errors and oversights it may contain on minor
points will, therefore, he trusts, be excused. The only merits
to which it can have any claim are somewhat of novelty in
its plan, and the attempt to render it as little dry - as readable, in short —as was consistent with accuracy and com.
prehensiveness.




CONTE N TS.
CHIAPTER I.
THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE.
PAW
Britons - Their Oriental Origin - Cesar's Invasion, B. c. 60.- Traces
of the Celtic Speech in Britain — Analysis of English - Saxon
Tongue - Disuse of Saxon Inflection - The English Th - The
English W — Pronunciation - Latin Element — Origin of English
Language - Norman Conquest - William the Conqueror - Monasteries - Twelfth Century - Saxon Chronicle - Norman FrenchLayamon — Thirteenth Century - Robert of Gloucester - Neologism - Fourteenth Century - Mannyng - Wickliffe and Chaucer -
Gower - Hermit of Hampole- Pleadings in English —Trevisa,
Translation of Higden- Mandeville - Fifteenth Century - Lydgate
- Statutes in English - Sixteenth Century - Reformation - Cheke
- Skelton - Surrey and Wyatt - Berners - Ascham - Spenser -
Chaucerism - Euphuism - Seventeenth Century - Protectorate -
Gallicism - Restoration - Eighteenth Century - Proportion of
Saxon. in English............................................................. 2.
CHAPTER II.
CHAUCER AND HIS TIMES.
age of Chaucer -His Birth and Education - Translation in the Fourteenth Century- His Early Productions - His Career- Imbued
with Provenpal Literature - Character of his Poems - Romaunt of
the Rose- Troilus and Cresseide - Anachronism- House of Fame
Canterbury Tales - Plan of the Work - The Pilgrims — Proposition of the Host - Plan of the Decameron - Superiority of
Chaucer's Plan - Dialogue of the Pilgrims - Knight's Tale -
Squire's Tale - Story of Griselda - Comic Tales - The two Prose
Tales - Rime of Sir Thopas - Parson's Tale - Language of Chaucer - The  Flower and  the  Leaf................................................  4
(Vii)




i111                        CONTENTS
CHAPTER III.
SIDNEY AND SPENSER.
Elizabethan Era- Ages of Pericles, Augustus, the Medici, Louis
XIV.- Chivalry- Sidney - His Arcadia - His Style - SpenserShepherd's Calendar- Pastoral - Spenser at Court - Burleigh and
Leicester - Spenser's Settlement in Ireland -The Faery Queen -
His Death - Criticism on the Faery Queen- Style, Language, and
Versification.......0..5......................................   65.CHAPTER  IV.
BACON.
His Birth and Education -View of the State of Europe- His Career
— Impeached for Corruption - His Death - His Character - State
of Philosophy in the Sixteenth Century- Its Corruptions and Defects- Bacon's System - Not a Discoverer - The New Philosophy
-Analysis of the Instauratio: I. De Augmentis; II. Novum Organum; III. Sylva Sylvarum; IV. Scala Intellectius; V. Prodromi;
VI. Philosophia Secunda — The Baconian Logic - His Style- His
Minor Works..................................................  77
CHAPTER V.
ORIGIN -OF THE ENGLISH DRAMA.
Comparison between the Greek and Medisival Dramas -Similarity of
their Origin - Illusion in the Drama- Mysteries or Miracle Plays
- Their Subject and Construction - Moralities - The Vice —Interludes - The Four P.'s - First Regular Dramas - Comedies -
Tragedies - Early English Theatres - Scenery - Costume - State
of the Dramatic Profession.................................................... 95.CHAPTER  VI.
MARLOW AND SHAKSPEARE.
~Marlow  His Career and Works - His Faustus - His Death - Contemporary Judgments on his Genius- Shakspeare - His Birth,
Education, and early Life - Traditions respecting him - His Marriage - Early Studies - Goes to London- His Career- Death and
Monument - Order of his Works- Roman Plays - His. DictionCharacters.............................................1....................  11]0




CONTENTS.                              Is
CHAPTER VII.
THE SHAKSPEARIAN DRAMATISTS.
Ben Jonson - The Humours - His Roman Plays - Comedies- Plots
-Beaumont and Fletcher- Massinger - Chapman - Dekker -
Webster -Middleton- Marston - Ford- Shirley......................  17
CHAPTER VIII.
THE GREAT DIVINES.
Theological Eloquence of England and'France -The Civil WarPersecution of the Clergy — Richard Hooker-His Life and Character- Treatise on Ecclesiastical Polity - Jeremy Taylor - Compared with Hooker -  His Life - Liberty of Prophesying- His
other Works -  The Restoration- Taylor's Sermons -  Hallam's
Criticism — Taylor's digressive Style - Isaac Barrow -His immense Acquirements -  Compared to Pascal- The English Universities........................................................................  4
versite.                                                         140
CHAPTER IX.
JOHN MILTON.
His Poetical Character- Religious and Political Opinions - Republicanism -  His. Learning -  Travels in Italy-  Prose WorksAreopagitica - Prose. Style - Treatises on Divorce - His Literary
Meditations - Tractate on Education - Passion for Music - Paradise Lost —Dante'and Milton compared — Study of RomanceCampbell's Criticism - Paradise Regained - Minor Poems - Samson Agop-'tes........................................................t....... 
CHAPTER  X.
BUTLER AND DRYDEN.
oa airmmonwealth, and the Restoration - Milton and Butler - Sub
jeat and Nature of Hudibras - Hudibras and Don Quixote- State
of Society at'the Restoration - Butler's Life — John Dryden -
French Taste of the Court-Comedies and rhymed Tragedies -
Life and Works of Dryden - Dramas - Annus Mirabilis - Absalom
and Achitophel - Religio Laici - Hind and Panther - Dryden's
later Works - Translation of Virgil -  Odes - Fables - Prefaces
and Dedications -Juvenal - Mac Flecknoe...........................  72




CONTENTS.
CHAPTER XI.
CLARENDON, BUNYAN, AND LOCKE.
IAGA
Clarendun's Life -- History of the Rebellion - Characters - John
Bunyan -  The Pilgrim's Progress - Allegory - Style - Life of
Bunyan — Locke- The New Philosophy- Practical Character of
Locke's Works - Life - Letters on Toleration - Essay on the
Human Understanding — Theory of Ideas-Treatises on Government- Essay on Education.....................................,....   198
CHAPTER XII.
THI WITS OF QUEEN ANNE'S REIGN.
Artificial School — Pope's early Studies- Pope compared to Dryden
-Essay on Criticism - Rape of the Lock - Mock-heroic Poetry -
Temple of Fame, &c. - Translation of Homer — Essay on Man -
Miscellanies - The Dunciad - Satires and Epistles - Edward
Young - English' Melancholy - The Universal Passion - Night
Thoughts — Young's Style- His Wit................ i..........  208
CHAPTER XIII.
SWIrT AND THE ESSAYISTS.
Coarseness of Manners in the 17th and 18th Centuries- Jonathan
Swift - Battle of the Books - Tale of a Tub - Pamphlets - Stella
and Vanessa - Drapier's Letters - Voyages of Gulliver - Minor
Works - Poems - Steele and Addison - Cato - Tatler - Spectator
- Samuel Johnson - Prose Style - Satires - London, and The
Vanity of Human Wishes - Rasselas - Journey to the Hebrides -
Lives of the Poets - Edition of Shakspeare — Dictionary — Rambler
and  Idler.............................................................................   229
CHAPTER XIV.
THE GREAT NOVELISTS.
History of Prose Fiction - Spain, Italy, and France -The Romance
and the Novel — Defoe- Robinson Crusoe - Source of its CharmDefoe's Air of Reality- Minor Works - Richardson - PamelaClarissa Harlowe- Female Characters -Sir Charles Grandison -
Fielding - Joseph Andrews - Jonathan Wild - Tom Jones - AmeUl - - Smollett - Roderick Random- Sea Characters - Peregrine




CONTENTS.                            xi
PAGE
Pickle - Count Fathom - Humphry Clinker- Sterne - Tristram
Shandy, and the Sentimental Journey — Goldsmith- Chinese Letters -  Traveller and Deserted Village - Vicar of Wakefield -
Comedies- Histories.26.....................1............. 251
CHAPTER XV.
THE GREAT HISTORIANS.
David Hume - As Historian - As Moralist and Metaphysician -
Attacks on Revealed Religion   William Robertson -Defects of
the "Classicist" Historians -Edward Gibbon - The Decline and
Fall - His Prejudices against Christianity - Guizot's Judgment
on  Gibbon.......................2......................... 278
CHAPTER XVI.
THE TRANSITION SCHODL.
Landscape and Familiar Poetry - James Thomson - The Seasons -
Episodes - Castle of Indolence - Minor Works - Lyric Poetry
Thomas Gray - The Bard, and the Elegy - Collins and Shenstone
-The Schoolmistress - Ossian - Chatterton and the Rowley
Poems - William Cowper - George Crabbe - The Lowland Scots
Dialect and Literature - Robert Burns................................. 290
CHAPTER XVII.
SCOTT AND SOUTHEY.
Walte? Scott - The Lay of the Last Minstrel - Marmion - Lady of
the Lake - Lord of the Isles - Waverley - Guy Mannering -
Antiquary - Tales of my Landlord - Ivanhoe - Monastery and
Abbot - Kenilworth - Pirate - Fortunes of Nigel - Peveril -
Quentin Durward - St. Ronan's Well - Redgauntlet - Tales of
the Crusaders - Woodstock- Chronicles of the Canongate - Anne
of Geierstein - Robert Southey - Thalaba and Kehama, - Madoc
- Legendary Tales - Roderick - Prose Works and Miscellanies.. 815
CHAPTER XVIII.
MOORE, BYRON, AND SHELLEY.
Moore    Translation of Anacreon-  Little's Poems -  Political
Satires - The Fudge Family - Irish Melodies -Lalla lRookh -




CONTENTS.
PAGN
Epicurean - Biographies. Byron: Hours of Idleness, and English
Bards - Romantic Poems - The Dramas- Childe Harold -Don
Juan -Death of Byron.  Shelley: Poems and PhilosophyQueen Mab, Prometheus Unbound, Alastor, &c. - The CenciMinor Poems and Lyrics.................................................... 841
CHAPTER XIX.
THE MODERN NOVELISTS.
Prose Fiction- The Romance: Walpole, Mrs.- Radcliffe, Lewis,
Maturin, and Mrs.. Shelley - James, Ainsworth, and Bulwer
The Novel: Miss Burney - Godwin - Miss Edgeworth - Local
Novels: Galt, Wilson; Banim, &c. - Fashionable Novels: Ward,
Lister, &c. - Miss Austen- Hook - Mrs. Trollope - Miss Mitford - Warren - Dickens - Novels of Foreign Life: Beckford,
Hope, and Morier - Naval and Military Novels: Marryat and
Robert Scott.......................................................................  868
CHAPTER  XX.
THE STAGE, ORATORY, POLITICS, THEOLOGY, METAPHYSICS,
AND JOURNALISM.
Comedy in England - Congreve, -Farquhar, &c. - Sheridan - The
Modern Romantic Drama - Oratory in England: Burke - Letters
of Junius - Modern Theologians: Paley and Butler - Blackstone
- Adam  Smith - Metaphysics: Stewart - Bentham - Periodicals: the Newspaper, the Magazine, and the Review- The Quarterly and Blackwood- The Edinburgh, and the New Monthly —
The Westminster - Cheap Periodical Literature.........................   397
CHAPTER XXI.
WORDSWORTH, COLERIDGE, AND THE NEW POETRY.
Wordsworth and the Lake School - Philosophical and Poetical Theories - The Lyrical Ballads - The Excursion - Sonnets - Coleriuge -  Poems and Criticisms -  Conversational Eloquence -
Charies Lamb —  The Essays of Elia - Leigh Hunt - KeatsHood - The Living Poets -- Conclusion................................. 41




CONTENTS.                            xiii
A SKETCHII OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.
CHAPTER  I.
Literature in the Colonies imitative- Relation of American to English Literature -Gradual Advancement of the United States in
Letters- Their first Development theological —Writers in this
Department — Jonathan Edwards - Religious Controversy- TWilliam E. Channing — Writings of the Clergy —Newspapers and
School Books - Domestic Literature- Female Writers - OratoryRevolutionary Eloquence - American Orators - Alexander Hamilton - Daniel Webster and'others- Edward Everett -American
History and Historians - Jared Sparks - David Ramsay - George
Bancroft -  Hildreth - Elliot Lossing - William  H. Prescott —
Irving - Wheaton- Cooper - Parkman....................... 43,t
CHAPTER II.
Belles Lettres - Influence of British Essayists - Franklin - Dennie
- Signs of Literary Improvement - Jonathan Oldstyle - Washington Irving - His Knickerbocker -- Sketch-Book - His other Works
- Popularity - Tour on the Prairies - Character as an Author 
Dana - Wilde - Hudson - Griswold - Lowell - Whipple - Tick- e
nor - Walker - Wayland - James -Emerson - Transcendentalists - Madame Ossoli - Emerson's Essays - Orville Dewey -  Humorous Writers - Belles Lettres - Tudor - Wirt  Sands - Fay
- Walsh - Mitchell - Kimball -American Travellers - Causes of
their Success as Writers - Fiction - Charles Brockden BrownHis Novels - James Fenimore Cooper —I-His Novels - Their Popularity and Characteristics — Nathaniel Hawthorne - His Works
and Genius -Other American Writers of Fiction....................... 48
CHAPTER  III
POETRY.
Its essential Conditions - Freneau and the early Metrical Writers -
Mumford - Cliffton - Allston, and others - Pierpont - Dana -
Hillhouse - Sprague - Percival - Halleck - Drake - Hoffman -
Willis - Longfellow- Holmes - Lowell - Boker - Favorite Single
Poems - Descriptive Poetry - Street - Whittier, and others -i
Brainard — Song-Writers.- Other Poets -- Female Poets — Bryant 468
2








OUTLINES
OF
GENERAL LITERATURE.
CHAPTER I.
THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE.
Blitons-Their Oriental Origin-Ceesar's Invasion, B.c.' 60-Traces of the
Celtic Speech in English-Analysis of English-Saxon Tongue-Disuse of
Saxon Inflections —he English Th —The English T —PronunciationLatin Element-Origin of English Language-Norman Conquest-William
-Monasteries-Twelfth Century-Saxon Chronicle-Norman FrenchLayamon-Thirteenth Century-Robert of Gloucester-Neologism-Four.
teenth Century-Mannyng-Wickliffe and Chaucer-Gower-Hermit of
Hampole-Pleadings in English-Trevisa, Translation of Higden-Mandeville-Fifteenth Century-Lydgate-Statutes inll English-Sixteenth Century - Reformation — Cheke - Skelton — Surrey and Wyatt- BernersAscham-,Spenser-Chaucerism-Euphuism-Seventeenth Century-Protctorate-Gallicism - Reutoration — Eighteenth Century-Proportion ot
Saxon in English.
THE most ancient inhabitants of the British islands were the Celts,
Cymry, or Britoms, as they are variously styled.  That these rude
and savage tribes were offshoots from the-mighty race whose roots
nave struck so doep into the soil of most countries of Western and
Southern Eur-op%, there can be no doubt. Antiquaries may be undecided as to the origin of this venerable family of mankind, or as to
the period. at which it first migrated into Europe; but it is impossible
not to believe that it formed one of the primary divisions of the
human race; and there is very strong probability, from many noteworthy circumstances, that it originally came from the eastern regions
of the globe.
In their mysterious and venerable system of theistic philosophy
there are to be found so many points of resemblance with various
tecondite doctrines which we know to have been current from the
remotest ages in the interior of India, that it is very difficult to beliere such resemblances to be entirely accidental; particularly when
(2-)




26            OUTLINES OF GENERAL LIUERATURE.    [CHAP. I
we reflect that many of these dogmas-the transmigration of the soul,
for instance-were parts of a creed not at all likely to have arisen
spontaneously among so rude'and savage a people as we know the
Celts to have been.  The extraordinary reverence paid by the Druids
to the oak; their adoption of the mistletoe as an emblem of the immortality of the soul; the peculiar virtues which they.attached to the
number. three; the magic powers which they imagined to reside in
certain rhythmical and musical combinations; their addiction to the
study of astronomy; and the singular peculiarity of a religious caste
among them-these, among many other coincidences, would seem. to
claim  for the Celts an evident, though perhaps remote, Oriental
origin: an opinion further strengthened by the analogies which exist'between some of the most ancient Indian dialects and the language
of the Britons.
It was with this singular people that the Romans came in contact;
and seldom had' Cesar's iron veterans encountered a more desperate
and obstinate -foe.  WATith the history of that long contest we have
nothing to do at present; it is sufficient for our purpose to sketch, as
briefly and rapidly as possible, the results of the struggle. Such of
the Britons as were spared by the Roman sword, by the not less fatal
influence of Latin corruption, and the fierce intestine convulsions
which decimated their ranks, were gradually driven back from the
southern and central parts of Britain to take refuge in the inaccessible fastnesses of their mountains, A glance at the map will suffice
to explain this; for we shall see the descendants of the ancient British
race still occupying those parts of the country to which their ancestors
had retired.  In all districts of England and Scotland distinguished
by any considerable tract of mountains, the Celtic blood has remained
more or less pure, the Celtic language unchanged, and strong traces
of the Celtic manners, language, and superstitions still prevail.  It
is, however, singular to remark how invariably the Celtic race has
continued to diminish wherever it has been exposed to contact with
the Teutonic tribes: thus the once purely Celtic population of Cornwall has gradually lost its individual character, and has almost ceased
to exist; in Wales and in the Highlands of Scotland, two districts in
which, and particularly in the former, the British blood has been least
exposed to foreign admixture, the ancient race is yet slowly losing its
marked peculiarities; and the day will probably come when the wild
mountain' fastnesses, which formed an insuperable barrier to the
Roman sword and to the Saxon battle-axe, will have ceased to resist
the silent spread of Teutonic commerce and Teutonic civilization.
The fate of the Celtic race in Britain has somewhat resembled that
of the aboriginal tribes of the American continents: slowly but surely
lave they retired and contracted before the invading nations; and
possibly in future ages the harp of the Bard and the claymore of the'ennaqhie will be picturesque but unsubstantial recollections, such




OSJ,. M.j   TRACES OF CELTIC SPEECH IN ENGLISH.              2
as exit of the feathered tunic of'the Mexitlan or the chivalric scalpingtuft of the Sioux.
Words are the pictures or reflections of things; and- the genius,
character, and capabilities of a nation can in no way be so well studied
as in its langaage.  From  the earliest periods of our history the
Celtic race has existed over the whole or a notable portion of the
British islands; the British language, and, in some cases, no other,
is spoken over a considerable extent of these countries-in Wales, in
the Highlands of Scotland, in Ireland, and in the Isle of Man; some
among these tribes possess large collections-of very'ancient and curious
poems written in the respective dialects of the great Celtic speech;
and yet, notwithstanding all this, the number of Celtic words which
have taken root in the English language is so incrediby small that
it can hardly be said to have exerted any influence whatever on the
composite speech now used in the country. A large proportion, too,
even of these scanty transplantations has taken place at a compara-'ively recent period, and the words so adopted have generally been
lransferred by poets and writers of fiction-Scott, for example-who
found the Celtic expression either more picturesque and forcible than
the equivalent which already existed in English (of Norman or Saxon
origin), or else a lively and characteristic image for some object or
idea peculiarly Celtic. Of the former kind we may adduce the words
I' cairn," " cromlech," and of the latter the word " clan."  " Clan,"
it is evident, expresses an idea so exclusively Celtic that it forms a
perfect and untranslatable sign of that idea; while " cairn," though
by no means peculiar to' the Celts, and defining a mode of honourable
burial universal in former ages (as testified by the x#ao; of the Greek
heroic age, by the tumulus of the Etruscan peoples, and by the barrows of the Teutons), was nevertheless adopted as being a more local
and exact image of the same hero-burial among the Celts.
-WTith regard to the paucity of Celtic words which have retained a
place in modern English, a Russian would remark something analogous in the history of his own language.  The Tartars, in spite of
two centuries and a half of complete and universal domination in,Russia, have left hardly any traces of'their language in the present
Slavonic dialect of Russia; and the few words of Tartar origin that
might be cited generally express articles of dress, equipment, food,
tic., for which the Russians had no proper equivalent.  In this case
wo we may note the difference of circumstances which tended to pre
vent any fusion between the conquered and conquerors: the abhor
rence with which the Russian people-always extremely bigoted —-:egarded rapacious and haughty oppressors of a different religion, and
oM utterly barbarous habits.  It is to be remarked, too, that the Tartar
language is destitute of any literature at all comparable, in point of
richnesb or antiquity, to the Celtic poems-a barrenness which the
RusslalL rIux have contrasted with his own majestic, flexible, and,. 




28           OUTLINES O0 GENERAL LITERATURE.         [CHAP. 1.
abundant idiom. Compare with this scanty and meagre transfusion
of Tartar words the immense and permanent influence of the Moors
upon the language, sentiment, and character of Spain, during the
glorious dominion of the Mahommedans in Granada, and we shall
see that, while the Moorish or Arab element forms an integral, permanent, and essential ingredient in the language of the country, the
communication between the conquering and conquered nations must
be rated, in the case of Britain and of Russia, so much lower as to
be considered comparatively insignificant.'During the Roman occupation of the isles of Britain-an occupation which extended over a period of 470 years, i. e. from 60 B.c. to
A.D. 410-there can be no doubt but that a considerable part of the
indigenous population submitted to the victorious invaders, and continued to occupy their estates in the Roman provinces of Britain,
paying tribute, as was natural, to the Roman government. We know,
too, that the officers and soldiers of the Roman legions permanently
stationed in Britain freely intermixed, and even allied themselves,
by marriage and otherwise, with the now half-civilized British population which surrounded their military posts; and we may consequently speculate upon what would have been the consequence had
they continued to maintain their footing in Britain. In the process
of time there would have arisen -a new mixed population, partaking
in some measure of the qualities, of the blood, and perhaps also of
the vices, of its double origin; and, what is of more importance to
our present subject, the language spoken at the present day by the
descendants of such a creole race would have resembled the French
or the Spanish; that is to say, it would have been a dialect bearing
the physiognomic character of some one of the numerous Ronzanz
languages, all of which are the result of efforts, more or less successful, of a rude Celtic or Gaulish nation to'speak' the Latin, with which
they were only acquainted by practice and by the ear.
In this barbarous, but useful and improvable dialect, some words
of the ancient Gaulish or Celtic would remain; and in point of
proximity to the Latin-its fundamental element-it would resemble
the language of classical Rome to a greater or to a less degree exactly
in proportion as the communication with the Romans was closer or
more relaxed. lFurther, if the language of the conquerors happened
to be, as was the case with that of Rome, an inflected and highly
artificial tongue, the new dialect would be distinguished, like the
modern French or the Italian, by an almost universal suppression of
all inflected terminations indicating the various modifications of
meaning, which modifications would thereafter be expressed by independent particles-by prepositions, by pronouns, by auxiliary verbs.
But the supposition which has just been made was not to be verified
m thc modern language of the country: such a species of corrupt
Latinity was not destined to become in our times the spoken dialect




CHAP. I.]   TRACES OF CELTIC SPEECH IN ENGLISH.
of the British islands; and, small as is the influence upon our present
speech of the pure Celtic aboriginal tongue, the corruption of that
tongue by the admixture of Latin (or rather the corruption of the
Latin by the admixture of Celtic forms) was to be no less completely supplanted by new invasions, and by new languages originating in
different and distant regions.  It is undoubtedly obvious that a very
large part of the modern English vocabulary, and even many forms
of English grammar, are to be traced to the IRomanz dialect.. and
therefore must be considered as having arisen from a corrupted Latinity, such as we'have been describing as likely to have been employed by Gallic or Celtic tribes imperfectly acquainted with Latin.
It would, however, be a fatal mistake to consider that these, or even
any part of them, came from any such Romanz dialect or lingua
frcanca ever spoken originally in Britain.  They are, and without
any exception, not of British growth, but were introduced into the
English language after the Norman invasion of the country in 1066
We have said that the traces existing in the modern English of
the aboriginal Celtic are exceeding few and faint: it is, however.
proper to except one class of words —we allude to the names of places.
In the long period of anarchy and bloodshed which intervened between the departure of the Romans and the arrival of the Saxon
hordes in 449, and the gradual foundation in England of the Eight
Kingdoms, the country must be conceived to have gone back rather
than advanced in the career of civilization.  The Saxons, we know,
who were during a long period incessantly at war, as the Romans had
been befor6 them, with the Picts, the Scots, and the Welsh, strenuously endeavored to obliterate every trace of the ancient language,
even from the geography of the regions they had conquered: and it
is singular to observe an Anglo-Saxon king, himself the member of
a nation not very far removed from its ancient rudeness and ferocity,
stigmatising as barbarous the British name of a spot to which he had
occasion to allude, as known " barbarico nomine Pendyfig," by the
barbarous —this was the British-name of Pendyfig.  National
hatred is perhaps the longest-lived of all things: and it is curious to
observe the mutual dislike and contempt still existing between the
Celtic and the Saxon race, and the Irish peasant of the present day
expressing, in words which 1300 years have not deprived of their
original bitterness, his detestation of the Sassenagh-the Saxon. A
moment's inspection of the map of'England will show the immense
number of places which have retained, in whole or in part, their
original Celtic form: we may instance the terminating syllable don
with which many of these names conclude, and which is the Celtic
dun, signifying a fortified rock.  The Irish Kil, which begins somany names of places, is nothing more than a corruption of the Celtie
Caille, signifying a forest; and the Caer, frequently found in the.beginning of Welsh, Copnish, and Armorican names, and which the




80           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.         [CHAP. 1.
Bretons have so often preserved in the initial syllable Ker (as
Kerhoit), is evidently nothing but Caer, the rock or stone.
From what has been suggested, then, upon the subject of the
Celtic language, the reader will conclude that, for all practical purposes of analogy or of derivation, it has exerted no appreciable influence on the modern speech of the country.  Scme few words indeed
have been adopted into English from the tongue of. the aboriginal
possessors of the country, but so few in number, and so unimportant
in significatian, that it will be found to have borrowed as much from
the language of Portugal, nay, even from those of China and Iindostan, as it has derived from the ancient indigenous tongue.
The English language, then, viewed with reference to its component elements, must be considered as a mixture of the Saxon and of
the Romanz or corrupted Roman of the middle ages:. and before we
can proceed to investigate the peculiar character, genius, and history
of such a composite dialect, it will be essential to establish with some
degree of correctness-first, in what proportions these two elements
are found in the compound substance under consideration; and second,
what were the periods and what were the influences during and
through which the process of amalgamation took place.
In examining the relative proportions of two or more elements
forming together a new dialect, it would certainly be a very simple
and unphilosophical analysis which should consist of simply counting
the various vocables in a dictionary and arranging them under the
various languages from which they are derived, then striking a balance.between them, and assigning as the true origin of the language the
dialect to. which the greater number should be found to belong. No;
we must pay some attention to the- nature and significance of the
vocables themselves, and also to the degree of primitiveness and
antiquity of their meaning; nor must we neglect, in particular, to
take into the account the general form and analogies of the composite
language viewed as a whole. It is evident that that dialect must be
the primitive or radical -one from which are derived the greatest
number.of vocables expressing the simpler ideas and the most universally known objects-such objects and ideas, in short, as cannot
but possess equivalents in every human speech, however rude its
state or imperfect its development.
Following this important rule, we shall find that all the primary
ideas, and all the simpler objects, natural and artificial) are expressed
in English by words so evidently of Teutonic origin-nay, so slightly
varied from Teutonic forms-that a knowledge of the German will'
render them instantly intelligible and recognizable. Such for instance,
are the words "man," "woman" (wif-man; i. e. female man), "sun,",' moon," "earth;" the names of the simpler colours, as "green,"
"reed," "yellow" (note that "purple" —a compound colour —is de.
rived from the. Greek), "brown," &c.; the commcler and simplex




CHAP. I.]               SAXON TCNGUE.                        8.1
acts of life, "to run," "to fly," " to eat," " to sing," &..; the primary and fundamental passions of our nature, and the verbs which express those passions as in activity, "love," "fear," "hate,' &c.; the
names of the ordinary animals and their cries, as "horse," "hound,"
"sheep," "to neigh," "to bark," "to bleat," "to low," &c.; the
arts and employments, the trades and dignities of life, "to read," "to
write," " seamen,''" king," " miller," " earl," " queen'," &c.; and
the most generally known among artificial objects, as "house,"
"boat,"'door."  It is worthy of remark how universally applicable
is this principle of antiquity or primitiveness: thus, those religious
objects and. ideas which are of the simplest and most obvious character are.represented in English by words derived from the Teutonic
dialects, while the more complicated and artificial-what we may call
the scientific or technic-portion of the religious.vocabulary, is almost
in every case of. Latin or Greek derivation: thus, " God," "fiend,"
"wi'ked," "righteous," "hell," "'-faith," "hope," &c., are all pure
Sa )n words; while "predestination," "justification," "baptismn,"
&c., will generally be found to come from other sources.  So generally, indeed, is this principle observable in the English language;
that we may in most cases decide, ci priori, whether the equivalent
for a given object or idea be a Saxon or a Latin word, by observing
whether that object be a primitive and simple or a complex and arti
ficial one.
-It must not, however, be inferred from this that the Saxon language was a rude and uncultivated mode of speech: such a notion
would be in the highest degree unjust and unfounded. Like all the
languages of the Teutonic stock, the Anglo-Saxon was distinguished
for its singular vigour, expressiveness, and exactness, and in particular for the great facilities it afforded for the formation of compound
words.
We may remark that most of the Saxon compound words have
ceased to exist in the modern English: in short, the tenidency of our
remarks is to show, not that the Saxon was incapable of expressing
even the most complex and refined ideas, but that, by a curious
fatality, those words have generally given place, in the tongue of the
present day, to equivalents drawn from the Latin and Greek origins.
That this substitution (for which we shall endeavor to assign a reason)
of Latin and Greek derivatives for words of Saxon stock has been
injurious in some cases to the expressiveness, and in all to the vigour,
of the modern idiom, no one can deny who compares the distinctness
of the older words, in which all the elements would be known to an
English peasant, with the somewhat pedantic and far-fetched equiva.
lents: for instance, how much more picturesque, and, let us add, intelligible, are the words "mildheartedness," "deathsman," "mo0on,
ling," than the corresponding "mercifulness," "executioner," and;lunatic" I




82           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.            [CHAP. I
But perhaps the most singular transformation undergone by thi
Saxon language, in the course of its becoming the basis of the English
is the annihilation of all, or nearly all, its inflections. The, tongue of
our Saxon ancestors was distinguished, like the modern Germanone of the offshoots of the same great parent stock-by a considera
ble degree of grammatical complexity; it possessed its declensions,
its cases, its numbers, and in particular its genders of substantive and
adjective, indicated by terminations, as in almost all the languages
aver spoken on the earth.
The whole of this elaborate apparatus has been rejected in our
present speech, in the same manner as a great portion -of it has been
rejected by.the Italian, Spanish, and French languages in their process of descent from the Latin.  The English language presents,
therefore, the singular phenomenon of a dialect derived from two
distinct sources, each characterized by peculiarities of inflection, yet
itself absolutely or nearly without any traces of the method of inflection prevalent in either the one -or the other of those sources.
Among the singularities of the English pronunciation which place,
as it-were, upon the threshold of the language so many unexpected
obstacles in the way of the foreigner, there are two or three always
found peculiar difficulties by all, and particularly by Germans, who
discover, in other respects, so many analogies between their language
and our own. These are, among others, the sound, or rather the two
distinct sounds, of the th.  A very little explanation would suffice to
render at all events the theoretical part of this difficulty very easy and
intelligible to them; for they would then discover that the th which
they so bitterly complain of represents the sound of two different and
distinct letters in the Saxon alphabet, which were most injudiciously
suppressed, their place being supplied by the combination th, which
exists in almost all the European languages, but which is pronounced
in none of them  as in the English.  The Saxon letters in question
are - and p, and are nothing more than S and - (the Saxon d and
t) followed by an aspirate, indicated by the cross line; and which
are both most absurdly represented in English by th, the pronuncia.tion of which varies, as-in the words "this" and "thin;" to assign
the right sound being an effort of memory in the learner. Now the
Saxon words in which is found the character b are almost invariably
observed to exist in German with the simple b, and those containing
p, with either b. or tt-; a circumstance tending strongly to prove that
it is the Germans who have lost the ancient aspirated sound of the
two letters or combinations. (for it is of no consequence whether they
were anciently written by the Germans with one' character or two),
and that, consequently, the English alone, of all the Teutonic races,
have preserved the true ancient pronunciation in this particular.
The same conclusion may be arrived at, we think not unfairly, with
reference to the English w, the letter corresponding to which in Ger




CHAP. I.]       DISUSE OF SAXON INFLECTIONS.               33
man, viz. tV, seems to have lost not only its true name, but also,
which is of much more. importance, even its correct sound.*
If the German pronunciation of tr be the correct and original one,
either the t or the f is a superfluous and unnecessary letter.  We
think it, therefore, not improbable that in this, as well as in the preceding instance, it is.the English language alone which, in spite of a
thousand fluctuations and a thousand caprices in orthography and
etymology, has preserved the genuine pronunciation of these very
important letters: we say very'important, for it is only sufficient to
reflect on the immense number of words in German, English, and, in
short, all the Teutonic languages into the structure of which enter
one or the other of these letters, to be convinced that the th, the d,
and the w play a most considerable part.
The pronunciation of every language must obviously depend principally upon the sounds assigned to the various vowels, and consequently the learner, when he finds that in English almost all the
vowels have a name and a power totally different from what they bear.
in all other tongues, is apt to lose all courage, and to despair of using,
in the acquisition of English, the most powerful instrument with
which he can be armed; namely, the analogy existing between the
original and the derived dialects.  He finds, for instance, that.the
English vowels a, e, i, and u, have quite different names and sounds
from the same characters in French and German; and his ear, perpetually tantalised by analogies of sound which do not exist, is very
apt to become incapable of perceiving those which do. So generally,
indeed, is this difficulty experienced, that it may be laid down as an
almost universal principle, that in all words derived from a foreign
source, and naturalized in the English vocabulary, one of two results
is invariably found to take place; viz. either the pronunciation of
the original word is changed, or its orthography: in other terms, the
word is made to submit either to the pronunciation of the English
letters, when its original spelling is retained, or the spelling is altered,
so as to make another combination of English letters express the
original sound of the word.  In the case, however, of derivatives
from languages of the Teutonic stock, these changes of orthography
ought by no means to be considered as involving such great difficulty
as is generally attributed to them; and in a majority of cases they
will be found much less capricious than is usually supposed.  One
considerable portion of the above difficulty arises from the- circumstanute that there exists in German a much greater number of dipththongal combinations than have been retained, in a written form, in
the English; and thus we are frequently obliged to represent such
Combinations by means of our limited number of vowels, in giving
*The Germans pronounce w as v in English.




34            OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.          [CHAP.to the same vowels a different power, and- consequently assigning to
each letter a number of distinct. and often very dissimilar sounds.
As an example of this, let us take the word 9?annn, which id
so faithfully reflected in the English man, that the:identity of
meaning in the two cases is instantly and inevitably perceived; in
the plural, however, of the English form, the a of the singular is
changed into e, forming an exception to the usual manner of. expressing the plural of a substantive by the addition of s. Now:it is obvioll that the e of the plural number of the word men is nothing else
inan an attempt to represent in English the somewhat complicated
combination of vowels in the German plural 9tainner, i. e. maenner,
of which sound the English e, though not an exact, yet is'the best
representation of which the case would admit.  Of thislkind of representation the examples are innumerable, and they will -go far to
explain, if not to palliate, the alleged caprice of the English' pronunciation. *Again, in that multitude of words which exist in nearly
similar forms (though it must be confessed under great differences in
point of pronunciation) in the French and English languages, and
which have a common Latin origin, it will be universally found that,
however great be the difference of pronunciation, the orthography in
the English form is in general so little changed from the original
Latin as' to be immediately recognizable.  Indeed, it is very curious
to remark that the orthography of almost the whole of this large class
of words is in English absolutely much more correct-that is, much
closer to the Latin-than in the French, the Italian, or even than in
the Spanish itself;' so much so indeed as to induce a linguistic student
unacquainted with the history of the language rather to suppose that
these words came into modern English either directly from the Latin,
or that they were incorporated into our speech through some separate
and independent channel, than that they had been (as threy undoubtedly were) first filtered, so to speak, through the French'and Italian
idioms. It is strange that this large stream of words seems to have
purified itself from foreign admixtures as it descended from  the
antique Latin through the various Romanz idioms which have become
the several languages of modern Europe; so much so, that the Latin
words in our present speech may be'said, at least as far as their
orthography is concerned, to have reached among us a greater purity
than they have in French, Italian, or even in Spanish.
"Nothing can be more difficult," says the judicious and accurate
Hlallam, "than to determine, except by an arbitrary line, the commencement of the English language; not so much, as in those of the
continent, because we are in want of materials, but rather' frori an
opposite reason —the possibility of tracing a very gradual succession
of verbal changes that ended in a change of denomination,  For
when we compare the earliest English of the thirteenth century with
the A.nglo-Saxon of the twelfth, it seems hard to pronounce why it




cHAP. I.]              LATIN ELEMENT.                        35
should pass for a separate language, rather than a modification or
simplification of the former.  We must conform, however, to usage,
and say that the Anglo-Saxon was converted into English —1, by
contracting or otherwise modifying the pronunciation and orthography of words;: 2, by omitting many inflections, especially of the noun,
and consequently making more use of articles and auxiliaries; 3, by
the introduction of French derivatives; 4, by using less inversion and
ellipsis, especially in poetry. Of these, the second alone, I think,
can be considered as sufficient to describe a new form of language;
and this was brought about so gradually, that we are not relieved of
much of our difficulty, whether some compositions shall pass for the
latest offspring of the mother, or the earliest fruits of the fertility of
the daughter."
With respect to this excellent and comprehensive judgment, it is
only necessary to remark, that in tracing practically the application
to the English language of the first of these processes by -which
Hallam' explains the. gradual transition from the Anglo-Saxon into
English, they are found universally taking place in the transformation of an inflected into an uninflected language, or even into one less
completely and regularly inflected: a very long list has been made,
nay, an almost complete vocabulary might be compiled, of words in
the French language which differ from their Latin roots only in thiir
having lost the final syllable, expressive in the Roman tongue, of
case, of gender, oir of tense. A very few instances will suffice: if we
compare, for example, the old French hom and hornoms with the Latin
hom-o and homn-ines, we shall find that only as much of the Roman
inflection has been retained as was indispensable to the required dis.
~tinction of singular and plural. In other respects the word was truncated-and it is of no consequence whether this contraction took
place gradually or suddenly-until nothing remains but the significant
or radical syllable horm.
In tracing from the momentous epoch of the Norman invasion the
gradual developement of the English language, it will be by no means
necessary to enter into any very minute details of philological archreology: our task will be more agreeably, and certainly not less profitably fulfilled, if we content ourselves with accompanying,:with due
reverence and a natural admiration, the advance of that noble language along the course of centuries: we shall see it, springing from
the distant sources of barbarous and unpolished but free and vigorous
generations, at one time rolling harshly, like a mountain streamlet,
over the rugged bed of Saxon antiquity, then slowly and' steadily
gliding onward in a calmer and more majestic swell, receiving into
its bosom a thousand tributary currents, from the wild mountains of
Scandinavia, from the laughing valleys of Provence and Languedoc,
from the storied plains of Italy or the haunted shores of Greece, from
the sierras of Andalusia and the Moorish vegas of Granada —tilL
3




36           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.           [CHAP. I..
broadening and strengthening as it rolls, it bears upon its immeasura..
ble breast the solidest treasures of human wisdom and the fairest
harvests of poesy and wit.
It is by no means to be supposed that the invasion of the Normans
under William was the first point of contact between the Saxon and
French races. in England, and that it is to that event that we must
attribute the first fusion: on the contrary, it is well established that
for. a long time previous to this epoch the nobles and the court of
England had affected to imitate French fashions, and even sent their
youth to be partially educated in the latter country.  Between the
sovereign houses of Great Britain and Normandy, in particular, there
were too many relations of blood and alliance of ancient standing to
allow us to be surprised at this. This imitation of French customs,
dress, and language was not likely to- be very palatable to the English
of the pure Anglo-Saxon stock, and we accordingly find that a good
deal of ridicule was cast by the lower orders on such of their countrymen as showed too great a taste for the manners of the other side'of the Strait of Dover. They had a species of proverbial saying
with respect to such followers of outlandish fashions, which is not
destitute of a certain drollery and salt: " Jacke," they said, " woud
be a gentilman if he coud bot speke Frenshe."  It is known, too,
that in the first part of his English sovereignty William had in vain
exhausted his patience and fatigued his ear in the attempt to learn
the Anglo-Saxon language; and it was not until after his return
from Normandy, after a nine months' absence from England, that he
began to employ, for the suppression of the language and nationality
of his new kingdom, those severe measures which have rendered his
name so memorable. It would be'superfluous to allude to these at
any length; the institution of the curfew, the forced employment.of the Norman language in all public -acts and pleadings, the compulsory teaching of Norman in the schools — all these are well-known
measures, and sufficiently prove William's conviction that no hope
was left of subduing the national obstinacy by fair or gentle means,
and that nothing remained but proscription and violence.
In spite of these ominous proceedings, however, the. sacred flame
of letters was still kept alive in the monasteries: the superiors of
these institutions, it is true, were almost universally changed, the
recalcitrant Saxons being displaced to make way for Norman ecelesiastics, but under the monk's gown there often beat the stern Saxon
heart, and the labouring brain was often working with patriotic fer.
your under the unmarked cowl. The chroniclers of this period were
in many cases Saxons, and -in their rude but picturesque narratives
we find the most ineffaceable marks of the hatred felt by the great
body of the nation against the haughty conquerors.  In these monasteries were taught rhetoric, theology, physic, the civil and canon
law; and it is in them also that were nursed the schoolbdivinity and




vHAP. 1.]          SAXON CHRONICLE, 1150.                  37
dialectics which form so striking a feature in the intellectual physiognomy of the middle ages.
The year 1150 is generally assigned as the epoch at which the
Saxon language began that process of transformation or corruption
by which it was ultimately changed into English.  This change, as
we have specified above, was not the effect of the Norman invasion,
for hardly any new accession of French words is perceptible in it for
at least a hundred years from this time: it may be remarked that
some few French words had' crept in before this period, and also a
considerable Latinising tendency may be remarked; but the changes
of which we are speaking are rather of form than of matter, and are
generally referable to one or other of the various causes which have
been assigned a few pages back in the clear and emphatic words of
Hallam. 
In the year 1150 the Saxon Chronicle-that venerable monument
of English history-comes to an abrupt conclusion. This chronicle
(or rather series of chronicles, for it was evidently continued by a
great number of different writers, and exhibits an immense variety
if style and language) is intended to give an account of the English
annals from A. D. 1; and though the earlier portion, as might be
expected, is filled with trivial and improbable' fables, the accuracy
and importance of the work, as a historical document, becomes immeasurably greater as it approaches the period when it was discontinued; the description of the more recent events, and the portraits
of contemporary personages, bearing in many cases evident marks
of being the production of men who had been the eyewitnesses of
what they paint.
The French language was still spoken at court; and there is a
curious anecdote exemplifying the profound ignorance of our English
kings respecting the language and manners of the larger portion of
their subjects.  WMe read that Henry II., who ascended the throne
in 1154, having been once addressed by a number of his own subjects
during a journey into Pembrokeshire, in a. harangue commencing with
the words "Good Olde Kynge i" he turned to his courtiers for an
interpretation of these words, whose meaning was totally unknown
to him.
Towards the latter -end of this century, viz. in 1180, Layamon
wrote his translation of Wace's metrical legendary romance of Brut;
and nothing will give a more distinct idea of the diffioulty encounlered by philologists in fixing the exact period at which the Saxon
merged into the English, than the great variety of decisions founded
upon the style of this work; some of our niost learned antiquarians,
among whom is the accomplished George Ellis, deciding that the
language of Layamon is "a simple and unmixed, though very barbarous Saxon,'" while others, who are followed by Campbell, consider
it to be the first dawning )r daybreak of English. Where so learned




88            OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.          [CHAP. 1,
and accurate a person as Ellis has hesitated, it becomes every one to
avoid anything like dogmatism; but the truth. probably is, that the
language of Layamon is to be considered either as late Saxon or as
very early English, according as. the philologist is inclined to attribute
the change from one language into the other to a modification taking
place in the form or in the matter of the Saxon speech.
*At the beginning of the reign of Henry:III., in'1216, the English
language had made considerable progress, though it had not even yet
begun to be spoken at court: and it mthst be regarded at this period
as a harsl' but vigorous and expressive idiom, containing in itself tihe
seeds or capabilities of future perfection.  This century, too, is characterised.by the circumstance of Latin having begun to fall into
disuse; the learned adopting their. vernacular language as a medium
for their thoughts. The increasing neglect of the Latin is to be
attributed to the secret but extensive spread of those doctrines which
afterwards took' consistency at the Reformation.  Recent investigations. have assigned to one very curious monument of old English a
different and much earlier date than had been previously fixed for it:
we allude to the beautiful song beginning "Sumer ys ycumen in,"
&c. This venerable relic has been usually attributed to the fifteenth
century, but there can be-little doubt as to its being really the production of the thirteenth.  It was probably composed about the year
1250, and the language, when divested of its ancient and uncouth
spelling, differs so little from the English of the present day as to
have caused the. error to which we have alluded. About 1280 was
written the-work of Robert of Gloucester, and it is extraordinary to
observe how great a change had taken place between this time and
the appearance of Layamon, a hundred years earlier. We are now
rapidly approaching a period when the language may be said to have
acquired some solidity; for at the beginning of the following century
we find complaints in a great multitude of writers against neologisnm
and innovations in language-an infallible sign that some standard,
however imperfect, and some rules, however capricious, had begun
to be applied to the. idiom-now rapidly rising into a written, and
consequently regular, language.  In the year 1303, Robert Mannyng, in his' Handlyng of Sinne,' an English translation of Bishop
Grosteste's'Manuel.des Pes Pesches,' protests repeatedly against
foreign and outlandish innovations: "I seke," says this venerable
purist, "no straunge Ynglyss."  In what consisted. the innovations
against which he desires to guard —whether the "strange English"
was corrupted by an admixture of French words,.of Latinisms, or of
Grecisms —it is obviously very difficult to ascertain.  This century
is one of the most important in the history of the literature, and
Consequently in that of the language also. It was in this century
t.hat Wickliffe, in popularising religion, tended also so powerfully to
popularise language: it was in this century, too, that the Father of




OCAP I.]'           FOURTEENTH CENTURY.                     39
English Literature, the immortal Chaucer himself, introduced the
elegance, the harmony, the learning, and the taste of the infant
Italian muse, assimilating and digesting, by the healthy energy of
genius, what he took, not as a plagiarist, but as a conqueror, from
Petrarca and from Boccaccio. Gower, too, who was born shortly
before the year 1340, mainly helped to polish and refine the language
of his country; and though, for want of that vivifying and preserving quality, that sacred particle of flame, which we designate by
the word genius, his works are now obsolete, and consulted less for
any merit of their own than to illustrate his great contemporary, the
smoothness and art of his versification had doubtless a considerable
influence in developing and perfecting the language.  It was in the
reign of Edward III. that the Lombard character was first disused in
charters and public acts, and to this reign also must be assigned the
oldest instrument known to exist in the English language.  In- the
middle of this century wrote Richard Rolle, the Hermit of Hampole,
in whose dull ethical poem, the'Prikke of Conscience,''Stimulus
Conscientiae'-we find the same dread of innovation that was expressed forty years earlier by Robert Mannyng, or Robert de
Brunne, as he was otherwise denominated. The Hermit of Hampole
exhibits the strongest desire to make himself intelligible to lewed or
unlearned folk: "I seke no straunge Inglyss, bot lightest and, communest." We cannot pass this epoch without'an allusion to Langlande's'Vision of Piers Plowman,' a long and rather confused
allegorical poem, containing many striking invectives against the
corruptions of the Romish priesthood, and in particular a most
singular prophecy of the severities which were afterwards exercised
against the monastic orders by Henry VIII. at the suppression of
the religious houses.  In 1350, or about that year, the character
called Old English, or Black Letter, was first used; and though the
language of this period was disfigured by the most barbarous and
capricious orthography, it is surprising how similar it is, in point of
structure and intelligibleness, to the English of the present day.
Twelve years after this, by the wisdom and patriotism  of King
Edward III., the pleadings before the tribunals were restored to the
vernacular language - an irrefragable proof of the universal prevalence of the native speech, and of the diminished influence of the
Norman French. It is curious to remark how absolutely identical
has remained the speech of the mob even from so remote a period tc
the present day. The following is a passage from a species of
political pasquinade disseminated in the year 1382, and gives a very
fair specimen of the popular language of the day: we have mo.
dernized the spelling; and, with this precaution, there is not a word
or an expression which differs materially from the language of the
people in the nineteenth century:-" Jack Carter prays you all that
you m ake a good end of that ye have begun, and do well, and still
o0*




40           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.           [CIIAP. I.
better and better; for at the even men near the day.  If the end be
well, then all is well. Let Piers the ploughman dwell at home, and
dight (prepare) us corn. Look that Hobbe the robber be well chas.
tised. Stand manly together in truth, and help the truth, and the
truth shall help you."
In 1385 the Latin chronicle of -Iigden (attributed, to the year
1.365) was translated into English by John de Trevisa.  It appears
that, in the interval which had elapsed since the original was written,
the custom of making children in. grammar-schools translate their
Latin into French had been, principally through the patriotic efforts
of a certain Sir John Cornewaill, almost universally discontinued:
"so that now," to use the words of Trevisa, "the yere of our Lordcle
1.385, in all the grammere scoles of Engelond, children leaveth
Frensche, and construeth and lerneth in Englische."
Another strong. proof of the growing spread and importance of
the English. language at this period is to be found in the circumstance.that our earliest traveller, Sir John Mandeville, who had written in
Latin and in French the interesting account of his long wanderings,
should have thought fit to give to the world an English version of
the same curious work.
In his translation of. Higden, Trevisa avoids what he calls " the
old and ancient Englische;" and the same author gives a most
terrifying description of the barbarous dialects and pronunciation
prevalent in the remoter parts of the country. " Some use," says he,
in words ludicrously responsive to the sounds he describes, " strange
wlaffing, chytryng, harring, garring, and grysbytyng. The languages
of the Northumbres, and specyally at Yorke, is so sharpe, slytyng,
frotyng, and unshape, that we sothern men may unnethe (hardly)
undirstonde that language." And even to the present day the inhabitants (even in neighbouring counties) of distant and retired or "uplandish" districts can hardly understand each other's speech. According to the learned Ritson, the year 1388 was signalised by the
restoration to the English language of parliamentary proceedings-a
great and important advance for the vernacular idiom: and a singular
circumstance, bearing a similar tendency, is to be remarked in the
fact that both the present king, Henry IV., and his son and successor, Henry V., made their wills in English, a thing certainly not
customary among the nobles of the period: the conduct therefore of
the two sovereigns proves that they were desirous of setting an
example of a more general use of the language of the people.
Henry V. ascendeded the throne in 1413, and he ever exhibited
an enlightened care of the national language; a care worthy of the
heroic sovereign who had so splendidly illustrated his reign by his
achievements in France.  The Victor of Azincour appears to have
fostered and protected the language of his country.  There still
exists a letter addressed by this great sovereign to the Company of




CHAP. 1.].          IXTEENTH CENTURY.                    41
Brewers in London, containing the following remarkable expressions:
"The English tongue hath in modern days begun to be honourably
enlarged and adorned, and for the better understanding of the people
the common idiom is to be exercised in writing."  It also appears
by the same document that many of the craft to whom the letter is
addressed "had knowledge of reading and writing in the English
tongue, but Latin'and French they by no means understood." Here,
then, we see the revolution gradually becoming' complete, and the
English idiom finally succeeding in supplanting, at least for the
common business of life, the French and the Latin.
In the following century, and at the beginning of the reign of
Henry VI., flourished the poet Lydgate, and also the learned Sir John
Fortescue, Chief Justice of the King's Bench, one of the first important prose-writers in the language. King James of Scotland, who holds
an honourable place among English poets, was assassinated at Perth
in the year 1437.  The language must still be considered as advancing, in spite of the civil contentions which agitated England during
a considerable part of this century. We may remark that the Gothic
letters ceased to be used during this period; and in 1483, at the
beginning of the reign of Richard III., the statutes were recorded
in English, having been till now written in the Norman French.
As an example of the gradual change that had taken place in the
language, we may mention the fact that Caxton modernised Trevisa
in 1487-Trevisa, who had himself, just a hundred years before, so
strenuously endeavoured to avoid the old English: "thus the whirligig of time," as the Clown says in'Twelfth Night,' "brings about
his revenges."
In 1509 commenced the long and eventful reign of Henry VIII.,
and the recognition, on the part of the sovereign and the government, of the principles of the Reformation.  The court, as well as
the nation in general, was distinguished in this age for learning and
intellectual activity; and we find a very considerable advance in the
cultivation of the vernacular language. Among the remarkable men
who adorned this period it would be impossible to omit mentioning
Sir John Cheke, who first introduced into England a profound and
enlightened study of the Greek language.
Cheke is also entitled to the grateful memory of after generations
by the wise and accurate attention which he paid himself, and incul*
cated upon others, to the' purity of his own language. One of the
most curious and valuable specimens of the writing and criticism of
this time is a letter written by him to his friend ioby, containing
remarks upon the latter's translation of the'Cortegiano' of Castigli.
one, a very favourite book of this period. We cannot forbear quoting
a few passages from this excellent composition of Cheke, as well on
account of the weight and value of the sentiments, as on that of the
language in which they are conveyed. It should be remarked that




42           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.           [CHAP. 1.
Sir Thomas Hoby had requested- Cheke's opinion of his work:"Our own tongue should be written clean and pure, unmixed and
unmangled with borrowing of other tongues; wherein, if we take
not heed, by time, ever borrowing and never paying, she shall be
fain to keep her house as bankrupt.  For then doth our tongue
naturally and praisably utter her meaning when she borroweth no
counterfeitness of -other tongues to attire herself withal; but used
plainly her own, with such shift as nature, craft, experience, and
following of other excellent, doth lead her unto; and if she wants at
any time (as, being imperfect, she must), yet let her borrow with
such bashfulness that it may appear that, if either the mould of our
own tongue could serve us to fashion a word of our own, or if the
old denizened words could content and ease this need, we would not
boldly venture on unknown words. This I say not for reproof of
you, who have scarcely and necessarily used, where occasion seemeth,
a strange word so as it seemeth to grow out of the matter, and not
to be sought for; but for my own defence, who might be counted
overstraight a deemer of things if I gave not this account to you, my
friend, of my marring this your handiwork." We find at this time
innumerable complaints of the vast quantity of foreign words imported, from a thousand different sources, into the English tongue;
and it is curious to observe the struggles made, and made in vain, by
the purists of this period, to establish some model or standard of
style.  In spite (or, perhaps, even in  consequence) of these difficulties, the language was undoubtedly fixed and consolidated in the
sixteenth century more effectually, perhaps, than in any other period
of equal duration; for we must reflect that in this age also is included
the whole splendid reign of Elizabeth.
As specimens of the most familiar and idiomatic English-the
English of the lower orders —we may cite the wild and witty pasquinades of Skelton, who attacked Wolsey with such persevering temerity.
The translation of the Scriptures is by many supposed to have strongly and beneficially influenced the language of this age, but Barrington attributes (and in our opinion justly) a much greater power of
purifying and fixing the idiom to the publication of the statutes in
English.  Those noble and illustrious friends, Lord Surrey and Sir
John Wyatt, had a powerful influence in the adorning of their native
tongue, no less than Lord Berners, the translator of the Chronicles
of Froissart.  In the works of Roger Ascham, the learned preceptor
of Elizabeth, we find the same dread of neologisms; in short, almost
every author of the times seems to be on his guard against that torrent of Italianisms, Gallicisms, and Spanish terms, which was soon
to invale the language -"taffeta phrases, silken terms precise."
Arthur Golding, who wrote in 1565, thus complains:"Our English tongue is driven almost out of kind,
Dismember'd, hack'd, maim'd, rent, and torn,
Deficed, patch'd, marr'd, and made in scorn:"




CHAP. I.]          SEVENTEENTH <EN ruRY.                    43
and Carew, about 1580, informs us that, "within these sixty years we
have incorporated so many Latin and French words as the third part
of our language consisteth in them."  Spenser, in order to give (as
a multitude of poets, ancient and modern, have striven to do) an air
of antiquity to the language of his' Faery Queen,' in harmony with
the romantic chivalry of its subject, set the example-unhappily
followed by many writers who had no such excuse as the English
Ariosto-of reviving the obsolete diction of Chaucer; and Shakspeare, with that intuitive good taste which characterises the higher
order of genius, levelled the keen and brilliant shafts of his ridicule
against the fantastic Euphuism or Italianated pedantry of the court,
exactly as Rabelais has gibbeted in immortal burlesque the " Pindarizing" Latinity of the pedants of his day, and Moliere has so cruelly
immortalized the conceited jargon of the H6tel de Rambouillet.
The influence, at this period, and even down to the end of the
reign of James I., of Italian manners and literature, was very great;
an influence which was occasionally mingled with the somewhat
similar tone of Spanish society: but this was afterwards to give place
to a decided tendency towards a French taste in language, dress, and
so on.  During the stormy interval occupied by the Republic and
Protectorate, men were too much occupied with graver and more
pressing interests to cultivate literature with great ardour or success;
and even had this period been one of tranquil prosperity, the gloomy
fanaticism of the times would have forbidden us to expect any improvement in the language.  At a period when British senators
would rise in Parliament to expound the Epistles of St. Paul, when
the stage was suppressed, and serious propositions were made to
paint all the churches black to typify the gloom and corruption that
reigned within them, it was natural to find the style of writers as
mean as was the condition of most of the rulers, as narrow as their
intolerance, and as extravagant as their doctrines; and perhaps one
of the true causes of Milton's adoption of the singularly artificial,
learned, and involved way of writing which characterises his prose
works, was his contempt for the ignorance of most of the republican
party, whose political opinions he shared, while he abhorred their
vices and despised their bigotry.
Phillips, the nephew and pupil of Milton, in the preface to his'Theatrum Poetarum,' a work which is without doubt deeply tinged
with the literary taste and opinions of the author of the' Paradise
Lost,' complains of the gradually increasing French taste which
characterised our literature when he wrote, i. e. in 1675, in the reign
of Charles II.  "I cannot but look upon it as a very pleasant
humour that we should be so compliant with the French custom as
to follow set fashions, not only in garments, but in music and poetry... Now, whether the trunk-hose fashion of Queen Eliza.
beth's days, or the pantaloon genius of ours, be best, I shall not be




.44          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.    [CHAP. I.
hasty to determine."  The cause of the great influx of Gallicisms
which took place at the Restoration is undoubtedly to be found in
the long exile of Charles II. during the stormy period of the Republic.  Charles, and the few faithful adherents who composed his
court, passed many of those years in France; he was indeed a pensioner of Versailles.  He there naturally acquired a taste for the
artificial and somewhat formal refinements of French literature, much
more active and permanent than any which he might have retained
for the vernacular literature of that nation which had brought his
father to the block and compelled himself to encounter all the vicissitudes of poverty and exile.  At his return to the kiingdoil of his
ancestors, it was the court which gave, in a great measure, the tone
to the rest of the nation; and it is from this epoch, consequently,
that we must date the commencement of that long influence exerted
on English byFrench manners and modes of thinking.
This infiuence is very perceptible in all'our writers during the
reigns of William, Anne, and the three first Georges: it is to this
that we must attribute that faintness, dimness, and commonplace
good sense which characterises, with occasional splendid exceptions,
the prose; and that unimaginative and monotonous classicism which
marks the courtly school of poetry, and which was not to be supplanted by anything truly national and vigorous, till the glorious outburst of new forms and modes of thought and expression in that
splendid epoch illustrated by the contemporary names of Lord Byron;
Scott, and Wordsworth.
As to the elementary constitution of the English language as'spoken and written in the present day, the following calculations
may be found curious and instructive, and perhaps they may give a
better notion of the present'"condition of the language than more
general description. It has been ascertained that the English now
consists of about 38.,000 words, of which 23,000, or nearly fiveeighths, are Anglo-Saxon in their origin; and that in our most
idiomatic writers about nine-tenths are Anglo-Saxon, and in our least
idiomatic writers about two-thirds. As examples of the most completely idiomatic authors, we may instance the immortal De. Foe,
and among those who are least Saxon perhaps Gibbon'may, without
injustice, be adduced. There can be no doubt, however, that the
Anglo-Saxon element is slowly but perceptibly diminishing; and the
Learned Sharon Turner considers that one-fifti of-the Saxon languagt
has ceased to be used.




THE AGE OF CHAUCER.                       45
CHAPTER II.
CHAUCER AND HIS TIMES.
Age of Chaucer-His Birth and Education -Translatzon ill the Fou:teenth
Century - His Early Productions - His Career - Imbued with Prcvengal
Literature-Character of his Poems-Romaunt of the Rose-Troilus and
Cresseide - Anachronism - House of Fame - Canterbury Tales- Plan of
this Work - The Pilgrims - Proposition of the Host - Plan of the Decamerotn-Superiority of Chaucer's Plan-Dialogue of the Pilgrims-Knight's'Pale - Squire's Tale-Story of Griselda - Comic Tales - The two Prose
Tales-Rime of Sir Thopas-Parson's Tale-Language of Chaucer-The
Flower and the Leaf.
NEITHER the plan nor the extent of the present volume.will
permit us to give a detailed history of all the productions, nor.
indeed, even a list of all the names, which figure in the annals of
English literature. It will be our aim to direct the reader's attention
upon those great works and those illustrious names which form, as it
were, the landmarks of the intellectual history of the country, and
which gave the tone and colour to the various epochs to which they
belong; exerting also, according to circumstances, an influence more
or less powerful on contemporary and succeeding generations. And
by this method we hope to give a clearer idea of the scope and character of English literature than we could expect to afford them by
a more elaborate and detailed work, the materials for which are so
abundant, that it would require not a volume but a library to develop
them as they deserve.
We consider, therefore, the age of Chaucer as the true startingpoint of the'English literature properly so called. In Italy letters
appear to have revived after the long and gloomy period characterised
by the somewhat false term  of "the dark ages," with astonishing
rapidity.  Like germs and seed; of plants which have lain for centuries buried deep in the unfruitful bowels of the earth, and suddenly brought up by some convulsion of nature to the surface, the
intellect of -Italy burst forth, in the fourteenth century, into a tropical luxuriance, putting out its fairest flowers of poetry, and its
olidest and most beautiful fruits of wisdom and of wit.  Dante died
seven years before, and Petrarch and Boccaccio about fifty years
after, the birth of Chaucer, who thus was exposed to the strongest.
and directest influence of the genius of these great men.. How great
that influence was, we shall presently see.  The great causes, theL,
which modified and directed the genius of Chaucer were-first, the
new Italian poetry, which then suddenly burst forth upon the world,
like Pallas from the brain of Jupiter, perfect and consummate in its




46            OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERtATUR.        [CHAP. Cr.
virgin strength and beauty; second, the now decaying Romanz or
Provengal poetry; and third, the doctrines of the Reformation, which
were beginning, obscurely but irresistibly, to agitate the minds of
men; a movement which took its origin, as do all great and permanent revolutions, in. the lower depths of the popular heart, heaving
gradually onwards, like the tremendous ground-swell of the equator,
until it burst with resistless strength upon the Romish Church in
Germany and in England, sweeping all..before it.  Wickliffe, who
was born in 1324, only four years before Chaucer, had undoubtedly
communicated to the poet many of his bold doctrines: the father of
our poetry and the father of our reformed religion were both attached
to the party of the celebrated John of Gaunt, and were both honoured
with the friendship and protection of that powerful prince: Chaucer
indeed was the kinsman of the Earl, having married the sister of
Catherine Swinford, first the mistress and ultimately the wife of
"time-honoured Lancaster;" and the poet's varied and uncertain
career seems to have faithfully followed all the vicissitudes of John
of Gaunt's eventful life.
Geoffrey Chaucer was born, as he informs us himself, in London;
and for the date of an event so important to the destinies of English
letters, we must fix it, on the authority of the inscription upon his
tomb, as having happened in the year 1328; that is to say, at the
commencement of the splendid and chivalrous reign of Edward III.
The honour of having been the place of his education has been
eagerly disputed by the two great and ancient universities of Oxford
and Cambridge; the former, however, of the two learned sisters having
apparently the best established right to the maternity-or at least
the fosterage —of so illustrious a nurseling.  Cambridge founds her
claim upon the circumstance of Chaucer's having subscribed one of
his early works "'Philogenet of Cambridge, clerk."  He afterwards
returned to London, and there became a student of the law. His
detestation of the monks appears, from a very curious document, to
have. begun even so early as his'abode in the grave walls of the
Temple;' for we find the name of Jeffrey Chaucer inscribed in an
ancient registar as having been fined for the misdemeanour of beating
a friar in Fleet Street.
The first efforts of a revival of letters will always be made in the
path of translation; and to this principle Chaucer borams no exception. He was an indefatigable translator; and the whole of many —
nay,, a great part of all-his works bears unequivocal traces of the
prevailing taste for imitation.  How much he has improved upon
his models, what new lights he has placed them in, with what skill
he has infused fresh life into the dry bones of obscure authors, it
will hereafter be our business to inquire. Hle was the poetical pupil
of G ower, and, like Raphael and Shakspeare, he surpassed his master:
(3rower always speaks with respect of his illustrious pupil in the art




CIIAP. IL.]     CHAUCER'S EARLY PRODUCTIONS.                   47
of poetry; and, in his work entitled I Confessio Amantis' places in
the mouth of Venus the following elegant compliment:"And grete wel Chaucer, when ye mete,
As my disciple and my po6te:
For in the flowers of his youth,
In sundry wise, as he'well couthe,
Of ditees and of song6s glade
The which he for my sak6 made," &c.
-These Lines also prove that Chaucer began early to write; an.
probably our poet continued during the whole course of his eventful
life, to labour assiduously in the fields of letters.
His earliest works were strongly.tinctured with the mannei, nay,
even with the mannerism, of the age. They are much fuller of
allegory than his later productions; they are distinguished by a
greater parade of scholarship, and by a deeper tinge of that amorous
and metaphysical mysticism which pervades the later Provenqal
poetry, and which reached its highest pitch of' fantastical absurdity
in the.Arrets d'3lmour of Picardy and Languedoc. As an example
of this we may cite his' Dream,' an allegorical composition: written
to celebrate the nuptials of his friend and patron John of Gaunt,
with Blanche, the heiress of Lancaster.
Chaucer was in every sense a man of the world: he was the ornament of two of the most brilliant courts in the annals of Englandthose of Edward III., and his successor Richard II. He also accompanied the former king in his expedition into France, and was taken
prisoner about 1359, at the siege of Retters; and in 1367 we find
him receiving from the Crown a grant of 20 marks, i. e. about'2001.
of our present money.
Our poet, thus distinguished as a soldier, as a courtier, and as a
scholar, was honoured with the duty of forming part of an embassy
to the splendid court of Genoa, where he was present at the nuptials
of Violante, daughter of Galeazzo Duke of Milan, with the Duke
of Clarence.  At this period he made the acquaintance of Petrarch,
and probably of Boccaccio also: to the former of these illustrious
men he certainly was personally known; for he hints, in his' Canterbury Tales,' his having learned from him the beautiful and pathetic
tale of the Patient Griselda:" Learned at Padua of a worthy clerke
Francis Petrarke, the laureate poet,
Highte thys clerke, whose rhethorique sweet
Enlumined al Itale of poesy."
It was during his peregrinations in France and Italy that Chaucer
drew at the fountain-head those deep draughts from the Hippocrene
of Tuscany and of Provence which flow and sparkle in all his compositions. It is certain that he introduced into the English language
an immense quantity of words absolutely and purely French, and
4




48           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CHAP. II.
that he succeeded with an admirable dexterity in harmonizing the
ruder sounds of his vernacular tongue; so successfully, indeed, that
it may be safely asserted that very few poets in'any modern language
are more exquisitely and uniformly musical than Chaucer. Indeed,
he has been accused, and in rather severe terms, of having naturalized
in English "a waggon-load of foreign words."
In 1380 we find Chaucer appointed to the office of Clerk of the
Works at Windsor, where he was charged with overlooking the
repairs about to made in St. George's Chapel, then in a ruinous
condition.
In 1383 Wickliffe completed his translation into the English language of the Bible, and his death, in the following year, seems to
have been the signal for the commencement of a new and gloomy
phase in the fortunes of the poet.  Chaucer returned to England in
1386, and, the party to which he belonged having lost its political
influence, he was imprisoned in the Tower, and deprived of the
places and privileges which had been granted to him. Two years
afterwards he was permitted to sell his patents, and in 1389 he
appears to have been induced to abandon, and even to accuse, his
former associates, of whose treachery towards him he bitterly complains.
In reward for this submission to the government, we afterwards
find him restored to favour, and made, in the year 1389, Clerk of
the Works at Westminster.  It is at this period that he is supposed
to have retired to pass the calm evening of his active life in the green
shades of Woodstock, where he is related to have composed his
admirable' Canterbury Tales.' This production, though, according
to many opiniofis, neither the finest nor even the most. characteristic
of Chaucer's numerous and splendid poems, is yet the one of them
all by which he is now best known: it is the work which has handed
his name down to future generations as the earliest glory of his
country's literature; and as such it warrants us in appealing, from
the perhaps partial judgments of isolated critics, to the- sovereign
tribunal of posterity. The decisions of contemporaries may be swayed
by fashion and prejudice; the criticism of scholars may be tinged with
partiality; but the unanimous voice of four hundred and fifty years
is sure to be a true index of the relative value of a work of genius.
Beautiful as are many of his other productions, it is the' Canterbury Tales' which have enshrined Chaucer in the penetralia of
England's Glory Temple; it is to the wit, the pathos, the humanity,
the chivalry of those Tales that our minds recur when our ear is
struck with the venerable name of Chaucer.  In 1390 we find the
poet receiving the honourable charge of Clerk of the Works at
Windsor; and, two years later, a grant from the Crown of 201. and
a tun of wine annually. Towards the end of the century which his
illustrious name had adorned, he appears to have fallen into some




CHAP. II.]    CHARACTER OF CHAUCER'S POEMS.                 49
distress; for another document is in existence securing to the poet
the protection of the Crown (probably against importunate creditors);
and in 1399 we find the poet's name inserted in the lease of a house
holden from the Abbot and Chapter of Westminster, and occupying
the spot upon which was afterwards.erected Henry VII's Chpel,
now forming one of the most brilliant ornaments of Westminster
Abbey.  In this house, as is with great probability conjectured,
~haucer died, on the 25th of October, 1400, and was buried in the
&bbey,: being the first of that long, array of mighty poets whose'ones repose with generations of kings, warriors, and statesmen
)eneath the "long-drawn aisles" of our national Walhalla.
In reading the works of this poet the qualities which cannot fail
to strike us most are-admirable truth, freshness, and livingness of
his descriptions of external nature; profound knowledge of human
ife in the delineation of character; and that all-embracing humanity.,)f heart which makes him, as it makes the reader, sympathise with
ll God's creation, taking away from his humour every taste of bit.;erness and sarcasm. This humour, coloured by and springing from
Universal sympathy, this noblest humanity-we mean humanity in
the sense of Terence's: "homo sum; humani nihil a me alienum
puto" —is the heritage of only the greatest among mankind; and is
but an example of that deep truth which Nature herself has taught
as, when she placed in the human heart the spring of Laughter fast~
by the fountain of Tears.
We shall now proceed to examine the principal poems of Chaucer,
in the hope of presenting to our readers some scale or measure of the
gradual development of those powers which appear, at least to us, to
have reached their highest apogee or exaltation in the'Canterbury
Tales.'
In the first work to which we shall turn our attention, Chaucer
has given us a translation of a poem. esteemed by all French critics
the noblest monument of their poetical'literature anterior to the time
of Francis I.  This is the'Romaunt of the Rose,' a beautiful mixture of allegory and narrative, of which we shall presently give an
outline in the words of Warton.  The'Roman de la Rose' was
commenced by William de Lorris, who died in 1260, and completed,
in 1310, by Jean de Meun, a witty and satirical versifier, who was
one of the ornaments of the brilliant court of Charles le Bel.
Chaucer has translated the whole of the portion composed by the
-former, together with some of Meun's continuation; making, as he
goes on, innumierable improvements in the text, which, where it harmonizes with his own conceptions, he renders with singular fidelity.
"The difficulties and dangers of a lover, in pursuing and obtaining
the object of his desires, are the literal argument of the poem.  This
design is couched under the allegory of a rose, which our lover, after
frequent obstacles, gathers in a delicious garden.  He traverses vast




50             OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.                 [CHAP. II
ditches, scales lofty walls, and forces the gates of adamantine castles.
These enchanted holds are all inhabited by various divinities; some
of which assist, and some oppose, the lover's progress." The English
poem is written, like the French original, in the short rhymed octo.
syllabic couplets so universally adopted by the Trouveres, -a measure
well fitted, from its ease and flowingness, for the purpose of long
narratives.  We have said that the translation is in most cases very
close; Chaucer was so far from desiring to make his works pass for
original when they had no claim to this qualification, that he even
specifies, with great care and with even a kind of exultation, the
sources from whence his productions are derived.  Indeed, at such
early periods in the literature of any country, writers seem to attach
as great or greater dignity to the office of translator than to the more
arduous duty of original composition; the reason of which probably
is, that in the childhood of nations as well as of men learning is a
rarer, and therefore more admired, quality than imagination.
The allegorical personages in the'Romaunt of the Rose' are
singularly  varied, rich, and  beautiful.   Sorrow, Envy, Avarice,
Hate, Beauty, Franchise, lRichesse, are successively brought on the
stage.  As an example of the remarks we have just been making,
we will quote a short passage from the latter part of Chaucer's trans.
lation, i. e. from that portion of the poem composed by John of
Meun: it describes the attendants in the palace of Old Age: we will
print the original French beside the extract:Travaile et douleur la hdbergent,  "With her, Labour and eke Travaile
Mais ils la lient et la chargent,  Lodgid bene, with sorwe and wo.
Que Mort prochaine luy prdsentent,  That never out of her court go
En talant de se repentir;          Pain and Distress, Sekenesse and Ire,
Tant luy sent de lldaux sentir;    And Melancholie that angry sire,
Adoncq luy vient en remembrance,   Ben of her palais Senatoures;
En cest tardifve presence,         Goning and Grutching her herbegeors.
Quand il se voit foible et chenue."  The day and night her to tourment,
With cruel death they her present,
And tellen her etliche and late,
That Deth standith arinid at her gate."
Here Chaucer's improtements are plainly perceptible;. the introduction of Death, standing armed at the gate, is a grand and sublinme
thought, of which no trace is to be found in the comparatively flat
original; not to mention the terrible distinctness with which Chaucer
enumerates Old Age's Senators, Pain, Distress, Sickness, Ire, and
Melancholy; and her grim chamberlains, Groaning and Grudging.
The next poem which we shall mention is the love-story entitled' Troilus and Cresseide,' founded on one of the most favourite legends
of the Middle Ages, and which Shakspeare himself has dramatized
in the tragedy of the same name. The anachronism of placing
the scene of such a history of chivalric love in the heroic age
of the Trojan War is, we think, more than compensated by the
pathos, the nature, and the variety which characterize many of the
a.ncient romances. on. this subject.  Chaucer informs us that his au



(HAP. LI.]    CHAUCER: TROILUS AND CRESSEIDE.                   51
thority is Lollius, a mysterious personage very often referred to by
the writers of the Middle Ages, and so impossible to discover and
identify that he must be considered as the Ignis Fatuus of antiquaries.
"Of Lollius," says one of these unhappy and baffled investigators,
"it will become every one to speak with deference." The whole
poem is saturated with the spirit not of the Ionian rhapsodist, but
of the Provencal minstrel. It is written in the rhymed ten-syllabled
couplet, which Chaucer has used in the greater part of his works.
In the midst of a thousand anachronisms, of a thousand absurdities,
this poem contains some strokes of pathos which are invariably to be
found in everything Chaucer wrote, and which show that his heart
ever vibrated responsive to the touch of nature.
Though we propose, in a future volume,, to give such specimens
and extracts of Chaucer as may suffice to enable our readers to judge
of his manner, we cannot abstain from citing here a most exquisite
passage: it describes the bashfulness and hesitation of Cressida before she can find courage to nlake the avowal of her love:"And as the newe-abashed nightingale
That stinteth first, when she beginneth sing,
When that she heareth any herdis tale,
Or in the hedgis any wight stirring,
And after siker doth her voice outring;
Right so Cresseide, when that her drede stent,
Opened her herte and told him her entent."
We may remark here the extraordinary fondness for the song of
birds exhibited by Chaucer in all his works. There is not. one of the
English poets, and certainly none of the poets of any other nation,
who has shown a more intense enjoyment for this natural music: he
seems to omit no opportunity of describing the "doulx ramaige" of
these feathered poets, whose accents seem to be echoed in all their
delicacy, their purity and fervour, in the fresh strains of " our Father
Chaucer:"-'Sound of vernal showers
On the twinkling grass,
Rain-awakened flowers,
All that ever was
Joyous, and clear, and fresh, thy music doth surpass!"'We have mentioned the anachronism of plan in this poem; it
abounds in others no less extraordinary. Among these, he represents
Cresseide as reading the Thebaid of Statius (a very favourite book
of Chaucer), which he calls' The Romance of ~,hebis;' and Pandarus
endeavours to comfort Troilus with arguments of predestination taken
from Bishop Bradwardine, a theologian nearly contemporary with the
poet.
The'House of Fame,' a magnificent allegory, glowing with all
the "barbaric pearl and gold" of Gothic imagination, is the next
4*




52           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.    [CHAP. II.
work on which we shall remark.  Its origin was probably Provencal,
but the poem which Chaucer translated is now lost.  We will condense- the argument of this poem from Warton:-" The poet, in a
vision, sees a temple of glass decorated with an uncountable number
of golden images.  On the walls are engraved stories from Virgil's
Eneid and Ovid's Epistles.  Leaving tiis temple, he sees an eagle
with golden wings soaring near the sun.  The bird descends, seizes
the poet in its talons, and conveys him to the Temple of Fame, which,
like that of Ovid, is situated between earth and sea.  He is left by
the eagle near the house, which is built of materials bright as polished
glass, and stands on a rock of ice. All the southern side of this rock
is covered with engravings of the names of famous-men, which are
perpetually melting away by the heat of the sun. The northern
side of the rock was alike covered with names; but, being shaled
from the warmth of the sun, the characters here remained unmeited
and uneffaced.  Within the niches formed in the pinnacles stood all
round the castle'All manere of minstrellis,
And gestours, that tellen tales
Both of weping and eke of game;'
and the most renowned harpers   Orpheus, Arion, Chiron, and the
Briton Glaskeirion.  In the hall he meets an infinite multitude of
heralds, on whose surcoats are embroidered the arms of the most
redoubted champions. At the upper end, on a lofty sbhrine of carbuncle, sits Fame. Her figure is like those of Virgil and Ovid.
Above her, as if sustained on her shoulders, sate Alexander and
Hercules.  From the throne to the gates of the hall ran a range of
pillars with' respective inscriptions. On the first pillar, made of lead
and iron, stood Josephus the Jewish historian7 with seven other
writers on the same subject. On the second, made of iron, and
painted with the blood of tigers, stood Statius.  On another, higher
than the rest, stood Homer, Dares Phrygius, Livy, Lollius, Guido
of Colonna, and Geoffrey of Monmouth, writers on the Trojan story.
On a pillar of'tinnid iron clere' stood Virgil; and next him, on a
pillar of copper, appeared Ovid. The figure of Lucan was placed
upon a pillar of iron'wrought full sternly,' accompanied by many
Roman historians.  On a pillar of sulphur stood Claudian.  The
hall is filled by crowds of minor authors. In the mean time crowds
of every nation and condition fill the temple, each presenting his
claim to the queen. A messenger is sent to summon Eolus from his
cave in Thrace, who is ordered to bring his two clarions Slander and
Praise, and his trumpeter Triton. -The praises of each petitioner are
then sounded, according to the partial or capricious appointment of
Fame..; and equal merits obtain very different success.  The poet
then enters the house or. labyrinth of Rumour.  It was built of wil-;ow twigs, like a cage, and therefore admitted every sound.  From




CHIAP. II.]     CHAUCER: CANTERBURY TALES.                    53
this house issue tidings of every kind, like fountains and rivers from
the sea. Its inhabitants, who are eternally employed in hearing or
telling news, raising reports, and spreading lies, are then humourously described: they are chiefly sailors, pilgrims, and pardoners.
At length our author is awakened by seeinga venerable person of
gTeat authority; and thus the vision abruptly terminates." Fromn
the few lines we haue quoted, it may be seen that this poem, like the'Romaunt of the Rose,' is written in the octosyllabic measure.
Though full of extravagances, exaggerations of the already too
monstrous personifications of Ovid, this work extorts our admiration
by the inexhaustible richness and splendour of its ornaments; a
richness as perfectly in accordance with Middle Age art, as it is extravagant and puerile in the tinsel pages of the Roman poet. That
multiplicity of parts and profusion of minute embellishment which
forms the essential characteristic of a Gothic cathedral is displaced
and barbarous when introduced into the severer outlines of a Grecian
temple or a Roman- amphitheatre.
It now becomes our delightful duty to speak of the' Canterbury
Tales;' and we can hardly trust ourselves to confine within reasonable limits the examination of this admirable work, containing in
itself, as it does, merits of the most various and opposite kinds.  It
is a finished picture, delineating almost every variety of human character, crowded with figures, whose lineaments no lapse of time, nu
change of manners, can render faint or indistinct, and which will re.
tain, to the latest centuries, every stroke of outline and every tint of
colour, as sharp and as vivid as when they came from the master's
hand.  The Pilgrims of Chaucer have traversed four hundred and
fifty years -- like the Israelites wandering in the Wilderness - arid
periods of neglect and ignorance, sandy fiats of formal mannerism,
unfertilised by any spring of beauty, and yet "their garments have
not decayed, neither have their shoes waxed old."
Besides the lively and faithful delineation - i. e. descriptive delineation-. of these personages, nothing can be more dramatic than
the way in which they are set in motion, speaking-and acting in a
manner always conformable to their supposed characters, and mutually
heightening and contrasting each other's peculiarities. Further yet,
besides these triumphs in the framing of his Tales, the Tales themselves, distributed among the various pilgrims of his troop, are, in
almost every case, masterpieces of splendour, or pathos, or of
drollery.
Chaucer, in the Prologue to the' Canterbury Tales,' relates that
he was about to pass the night at the " Tabarde" inn in Southwark,
previous to setting out on a pilgrimage to the far-famed shrine of St.
Thomas of Kent- i. e. Thomas'a Becket-at Canterbury.  On
the evening preceding the poet's departure there arrive at the
hostelry -




5t            OUTL: NES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.    [CHAP. II.
"Wel nine and twenty in a compagnie
Of sondry folk, by avanture y-falle
In felawship, and pilgrimes wer they alle,
That toward Canterbury wolden ride."
The poet, glad of the opportunity of travelling in such good company, makes acquaintance with them all, and the party, after mutually promising to start early in the morning, sup and retire to rqst.
Chaucer then gives a full and minute description, yet in incredibly
few words, of the condition, appearance, manners, dress, and horses
of the pilgrims.  He first depicts a Knight," brave in battle, and
wise in. council," courteous, grave, religious, experienced; who had
fought for the faith in far lands, at Algesiras, at Alexandria, in
Russia; a model of the chivalrous virtues:"And though that he was worthy, he was wise,
And of his port meke as is a mayde.
He was a veray parfit gentle knight."
He is mounted on a good, though not showy), horse, and clothed in a
simple gipon or close tunic, of serviceable materials, characteristically
stained and discoloured by the friction of his armour.
This valiant and modest gentleman is accompanied by his son,'a
perfect specimen of the damoyseau or "bachelor" of this, or of the
graceful and gallant youth of noble blood in any period. Chaucer
seems to revel in the painting of his curled and shining locks- " as
they were laid in presse"- of his tall and active person, of his
already-shown bravery, of his "love-longing," of his youthful accomplishments, anid of his gay and fantastic dress. His talent for,
music, his short embroidered gown with long wide sleeves (the fashion
of the day), his perfect horsemanship, his skill in song-making, in
illuminating and writing, his hopeful and yet somewhat melancholy
love for his "lady,""So hote he loved, that by nightertale
He slept no more than doth -the nightingale —"
nothing is omitted; not a stroke too few or too many.
This attractive pair are attended by a Yeman or retainer. This
figure is a perfect portrait of one of those bold and sturdy archers,
the type -of the ancient national character; a type which still exists
in the plain independent peasantry of the rural districts of the land.
He is clad in the picturesque costume of the greenwood, with his
sheaf of peacock arrows bright and keen stuck in his belt, and bearing in his hand "a mighty bowe"- - the far-famed "long-bow" of
the English archers- the most formidable weapon of the Middle
Ages, which twanged such fatal music to the chivalry of France at
Poictiers and Agincourt.  His " not-hed," his "brown visiage,"
tanned by sun and wind, his sword and buckler, his sharp and well.
eqaipped dagger, the silver medal of St. Christopher on his breast,




ClHAP. II.]     CHAUCERI: CANTERBUIRY TALES.                   55
the horn' in the green baldric   how  life-like does he stand before us!
These three figures are admirably contrasted with a Prioress, a
lady of noble birth and delicate bearing, full of the pretty affecta-.tions, the dainty tendeirnesses of the "grande dame religieuse."  Her
name is " Madame Eglantine;" and the mixture, in her manners and
costume, of gentle worldly vanities-and of ignorance of the world;
her gaiety, and the ever-visible difficulty she feels to put on an air
of courtly hauteur; the ladylike delicacy of her manners at table,
and her fondness for petting lap-dogs,"Of smale houndes had she, that she fed
With rosted flesh, and milk,- and wastel-bread,
But sore she wept if on of hem were dead,
Or if men smote it with a yerde smert,
For al was conscience, and tender herte,"this masterly outline is most appropriately framned (if we may so
speak) in the external and material accompaniments-the beads of.
"smiale cor1ll" hanging on her arm, and, above all, the golden brooch
with its delicate device of a "crowned A," and the inscription J.mor
vincit omnia. She is attended by an inferior Nun and three Priests.
The monk follows next, and he, like all the ecclesiastics, with the
single exception of the Personore or secular parish priest is described.
with strong touches of ridicule; but it is impossible not to perceive
the strong and ever-present humanity of which we have spoken as
perhaps the most marked characteristic of Chaucer's mind.  The
Monk is a gallant, richly-dressed, and pleasure-loving sportsman,
earing not a straw for the obsolete strictness of the musty rule of
his order. HEis sleeves are edged with rich fur his hood fastened
under his chin with a gold pin headed with a "love-knot," his eyes
are buried deep in his fleshy rosy cheeks, indicating great love of
rich fare and potent wines; and.yet the impression left on the mind
by this type of fat roystering sensuality is rather one of drollery and
good-fellowship than of contempt or abhorrence.
Chaucer exhibits rich specimens of the various genera of that
vast species " Monachus monachans," as it may be classed by some
Rabeloesian Theophrastus. The next personage who enters is the
Frere, or mendicant friar, whose easiness of confession, wonderful
skill in extracting money and gifts, and gay discourse are most
humorously and graphically described. He is represented as always
carrying store of knives, pins, and toys, to give to his female penitents, as better acquainted with the tavern than with the lazar-house
or the hospital, daintly dressed, and "lisping somewhat" in his
speech, " to make his English swete upon the tongue.":
This "worthy Limitour" is succeeded by a grave and formal personage, the Merchant: solemn and wise is he, with forked beard and
pompous- demeanour, speaking much of profit, and strongly in favour




56           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.    [CIHAP. I.
of the king's right to the subsidy " pour la saufgarde et custodie del
mer," as the old Norman legist phrases it. He is dressed in motley,
mounted on a tall and quiet horse, and wears a " Flaundrish beaver
hat."
The learned poverty of the Clerke of Oxenforde forms a striking
contrast to the Merchant's rather pompous "respectability."  He
and his horse are "leane as is a rake" with abstinence, his clothes
are threadbare, and he devotes to the purchase of his beloved books
all the gold which he can collect from his friends and patrons, devoutly
praying, as in duty bound, for the souls-of those
"Who yeve him wherewith to scolaie."
Nothing can be more true to nature than the mixture of pedantry
and bashfulness in the manners of this anchoret of learning, and the
tone of sententious morality and formal politeness which marks his
-language.
We now come to a " Serjeant of the Lawe," a wise and learned
magistrate, rich and yet irreproachable, with all the statutes at his
fngers' ends, a very busy man in reality, " but yet," not to forget
the inimitable touch of nature in Chaucer, "he seemed besier than
he was."  He is plainly dressed, as one who cares not to display his
importance in his exterior.
Nor are preceding characters superior, in vividness and variety, to
the figure of the " Frankelein," or rich country-gentleman, who is
next introduced: his splendid and hospitable profusion, and the epicurean luxuriousness of the man himself,/are inimitably set before
us.  "It snewed in his house of mete and drink."
Then come a number of burgesses, whose appearance is classed
under one general description. These are a Haberdasher, Carpenter,
Webbe (or Weaver), Dyer, and TapiserAlle yclothed of o livere,
Of a solempne and gret friaternite,"that is, they all belong to one of those societies, or mestiers, which
play so great a part in the municipal history of the Middle Ages.
The. somewhat cossu richness of their equipment, their knives hafted
with silver, their grave and citizen-like bearing-all is in harmony
with the pride and vanity, hinted at by the poet, of their wives,-who
think "it is full fayre to be ycleped Madame."
The skill and critical discernment of the Cook are next described:
" Well could he know a draught of London ale," and elaborately
could he season the rich and' fantastic dishes which composed the
"carte" of the fourteenth centnry. He joins the pilgrimage in hope
that his devotion may cure him of a disease in the leg.
A turbulent and boisterous Shipman appears next, who is described
with minute detail. His brown complexion, his rude and quarrelsome manners, his tricks of trade, stealing wine "from  Burdeux




CHAP. II.]      CHAUCER: CANTERBURY TALES.                   57
ward, while that the chapman slepe," all is enumerated: nor does
the poet forget the -seaman's knowledge of all the havens "from
Gothland to the Cape de Finistere," nor his experience in his profession: "In many a tempest had his berd be shake."
-He is followed by a Doctour of Phisike, a great astronomer and
natural magician, deeply versed in the ponderous tomes of Hippocrates, Hali, Galen, Rhasis, Averrhoes, and the Arabian physicians.
His diet is but small in quantity, but rich and nourishing; " Ahis study
s -but little on the Bible;" and he is humorously represented as
particularly fond of gold, "for gold in phisike is a cordiall."
Next to the grave, luxurious, and not quite orthodox Doctor enters
the "Wife of Bath,'" a daguerreotyped specimen of. the. female
bourgeoise of Chaucer's day; and bearing so perfectly the stamp and
mark of her class, that, by changing her costume a little to the
dress of the nineteenth century, she would serve as a perfect sample
of her order even in the present day. She is equipped with a degree
of solid costliness that does not exclude a little coquetry; her character is gay, bold, and not over rigid; and she is endeavouring, by long
and frequent pilgrimages, to expiate some of the amorous errors of
her youth.  She is a substantial manufacturer of cloth, and so
jealous of her precedency in the religious ceremonies of her parish,
that, if any of her female acquaintance should venture to go before
her on these solemn occasions," so wroth was she, that she was out
of alle charitee."
Contrasted with this rosy dame are two of the most beautiful and
touching portraits- ever delineated by the hand of genius-one " a
pour Persoune," or secular parish priest; and his brother in simplicity,
virtue, and evangelic purity, a Plowman.  It is in these characters,
and particularly in the "Tale" put into the mouth of the former,
that we most distinctly see Chaucer's sympathy with the doctrines
of the Reformation: the humility, self-denial, and charity of these
two pious and worthy men, are opposed with an unstudied, but not
the less striking pointedness, to the" cheatery and sensuality which
distinguish all the monks and friars represented by Chaucer. So
beautiful and so complete is this noble delineation of Christian piety,
that we will not venture to injure its effect by quoting it piecemeal
in this place, but refer our readers to the volume of extracts, in
vhich the whole of Chaucer's Prologue will be found at length.
Then we find enumerated a Reve, a Miller, a Sompnour (an officer
in the ecclesiastical courts), a Pardoner, a Manciple, and "myself,"
that is, Chaucer.
The Miller is a brawny, short, red-headed fellow, strong, boisterous and quarrelsome, fiat-nosed, wide-mouthed, debauched; he is
dressed in a white coat and blue -hood, and armed with sword and
buckler.
His conversation and conduct correspond faithfully with such an




isS          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.    [CHAP, mI
appearance  he enlivens the journey by his skill in playing on- the
bagpipe.
The Manciple was an officer attached to the ancient colleges; his
duty was to purchase the provisions and other commodities "for the
consumption of the students; in' fact, he was a kind of steward.
Chaucer describes this pilgrim as singularly adroit in the exercise of
his business, taking good care' to advantage himself the while.
Another of the most elaborately painted pictures in Chaucer's
gallery is the " Reve," bailiff, or intendant of some great proprietor's
estates. He stands'before'us as a slender, long-legged, choleric individual, with his beard shaven as close as possible, and his hair ex
ceedingly short. He is a severe and watchful manager of- his master's estates, and had grown so rich that he was able to come to his
lord's assistance, and "lend him  of his owen good."  His horse is
described, and even named, and he is described as always riding
" the hinderest of'the route."
Nothing ecan surpass the nature and truthfulness with which
Chaucer has described the' Sompnour. His face is fiery red, as cherubim were painted, and so covered with pimples, spots, and discolorations, that neither mercury, sulphur, borax, nor any purifying
ointment, could'cleanse his complexion. I He is a great lover of
onions, leeks, and garlic, and fond of "strong win as red as blood;"
and when drunk he would speak nothing but Latin, a few terms of
which language he had picked up from the writs and citations it was
his profession to serve. He is a great taker of bribes, and will allow
any man to set at nought the archdeacon's court int the most flagrant
manner "for a quart of wine."
The last of the pilgrims is the " Pardonere," or seller of indulgences from Rome. He is drawn to the life singing, to the bass of
his friend the Sompnour, the song of " ome hither, love, to me."
The Pardoner's hair is "yellow as wax," smooth and thin, lying on
his shoulders: he wears no hood, " for jollite,"-that is, in order to
appear in the fashion.  His eyes (as is often found in persons of
this complexion   note Chaucer's truth to nature) are wide and
staring like those of a hare; his voice is a harsh treble, like that of
a goat; and he has no beard. Chaucer' then enumerates the various
articles of the Pardoner's professional budget; and certainly there
never was collected a list of droller relics: he has Our Lady's veil.
a morse! of the sail of St. Paul's ship, a glass full of pigges bones,'
and a pewter cross crammed with other objects of equal sanctity
With the aid of these and the hypocritical unction of his address, h
could manage, in one day, to extract'from poor and rustic people
more money than the Parson (the regular pastor of the parish) could
collect in two months.
The number of the pilgrims now enumerated will be found by
Bny one who takes the trouble to couut them  to amount to thirty.




CHAP. iI.]      CHAUCER: CANTERBURY TALES.                  59
one, including Chaucer; and the poet describes them setting out on
their journey on the following morning. Before their departure,
however, the jolly Host of the Tabarde makes a proposition to the
assembled company. He offers to go along with them himself, on
condition that they constitute him a kind of master of the revels
during their journey; showing how agreeably and profitably they
could beguile the tedium of the road with the relation of stories.
He then proposes that on their return they should all sup together
at his hostelry, and that he among them who shall have been
adjudged to have told the best story should be' entertained at the
expense of the whole society. This proposal is unanimously adopted;
and nothing can be finer than the mixture of fun and good sense
with which honest Harry Bailey, the Host, sways the merry sceptre
of his temporary sovereignty.
This then is the framework or scaffolding on which Chaucer has
erected his Canterbury Tales. The practice of connecting together
a multitude of distinct narrations by some general thread of incident
is very natural and extremely ancient. The Orientals, so passionately
fond of tale-telling, have universally — and not always very artifi.
cially-given consistency and connection to their stories by putting
them into the mouth of some single narrator: the various histories
which compose the Thousand and One Nights are supposed to be
successively recounted by the untiring lips of the inexhaustible
Princess Scheherezade; but the source from whence Chaucer more
immediately adopted his framing was the Decameron of Boccaccio.
This work (as it, may be necessary to inform our younger readers)
consists of a hundred tales divided into decades, each decade'occu.
pying one day in the relation.  They are narrated by a society of
young men and women of rank, who have shut themselves up in a
most luxurious and beautiful retreat on the banks of the Arno, in
order.to escape the infection of.the terrible plague then ravaging
Florence.
If we compare the plan of Chaucer with that of the Florentine,
we shall not hesitate to give the palm of propriety, probability, and
good taste to the English poet.  A pilgrimage was by no.means an
expedition of a mournful or solemn kind, and afforded the author the
widest field for the selection of character from all classes of society,
and an excellent opportunity for the divers humors and oddities of a
company fortuitously assembled.  It is imposible, too, not to feel that
there. is something cruel and shocking in the notion of these young
luxurious Italians of Boccaccio whiling away their days in tales of
sensual trickery or sentimental distress, while without the well.
guarded walls of their retreat thousands of their kinsmen and fellow
citizens were writhing in despairing agony. Moreover, the similarity
of rank and age in the personages of Boccaccio produces an insi.
pidity and want of variety: all these careless voluptuaries are repe5




60           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CHAP. IL.
titions of Dioneo and Fiammetta: and the period of ten days adopted
by the Italian has -the defect of being purely arbitrary, there being
no reason why the narratives might not be continued indefinitely.
Chaucer's pilgrimage, on the contrary, is- made to Canterbury, and
occupies a certain and necessary time; and, on the return of the
travellers, the society separates as naturally as it had assembled;
after giving the poet the opportunity of introducing two striking and
appropriate events-their procession to the shrine of St. Thomas at
their arrival in Canterbury, and the prize-supper on their return to
London.
Had Chaucer adhered to his original plan, we should have had a
tale from each of the party on the journey out, and a second tale
from every pilgrim on the way back, making in all sixty-two-or, if
the Host also contributed his share, sixty-four.  But, alas! the poet
has not conducted his pilgrims even to Canterbury; and the tales
which. he has made them tell only make us the more bitterly lament
the non-fulfilment of his original intention.
Before we -speak of the narratives themselves, it will be proper to
state that.-our poet continues to describe the actions, conversation,
and deportment of his pilgrims: and.nothing can be finer than the
remarks put into their mouths respecting the merits of the various
tales; or more dramatic than the affected bashfulness of some, when
called upon to contribute to the amusement of their companions, and
the squabbles and satirical jests made by others.
These passages; in which the tales themselves are, as it were,
incrusted, are called Prologues to the various narratives which they
respeotively precede, and they add inexpressibly to the vivacity and
movement of the whole, as in some cases the tales spring, as it were,
spontaneously -out of the conversations.
Of the tales themselves it will be impossible to attempt even a
rapid summary: we may mention, as the most remarkable among
the serious and pathetic narratives, the Knight's Tale, the subject
of.which is the beautiful story of Palamon and Arcite, taken from
the Teseide of Boccaccio, but it is unknown whether originally
invented by the great Italian, or, as is far more probable, imitated by
him  from some of the innumerable versions of the "noble story"
of Theseus current in the Middle Ages.  The poem is full of a
strange mixture of manners and periods: the chivalric and the heroic
ages appear side by side: but such is the splendour of imagination
displayed in this immortal work, so rich is it in magnificencee in
pathos, in exquisite delineations of character, and artfully contrived
turns of fortune, that the reader voluntarily dismisses all his chronology, and allows himself to be carried away with the fresh and
sparkling current of chivalric love and knightly adventure.  No
reader ever began this poem without finishing it, or ever read it once
without.returning to it a second time.  The effect upon the mind is




CHAP. II.]      CHAUCER: CANTERBURY TALES.                   61
like that of some gorgeous tissue, gold-inwoven, of tapestry, in an
old. baronial hall; full of tournaments and battles, imprisoned
knights, and emblazoned banners, Gothic temples of Mars and
~Venus, the lists; the dungeon and the lady's bower,. garden and
fauntain, and moonlit groves.  Chaucer's peculiar skill in the delineation of character and appearance by a few rapid and masterly
strokes is as perceptible here as in the Prologue to the Tales: th'
procession of the kings to the tournament is as bright and vivid
piece of painting as ever was produced by the "strong braine" or
nlediaeval Art: and in point of grace and simplicity, what can be
finer than the single line descriptive of the beauty of Emilie -so
suggestive, and therefore so superior to the most elaborate'portrait-" Up rose the sun, and up rose Emelie"?
The next poem of a serious character is the Squire's Tale, which
indeed so struck the admiration -of Milton —himself profoundly penetrated by the spirit of the Romanz poetry-that it is by an allusion:
to the' Squire's Tale that he characterizes Chaucer when enumerating
the great men of'all ages, and when he places him beside Plato,
Shakspeare, ~Eschylus, and his beloved Euripides: he supposes his
Cheerful Man as evoking Chaucer:-:"And call up him who left half told
The story of Cambuscan bold."
The imagery of the Squire's Tale was certainly well calculated to
strike such a mind as Milton's, so gorgeous, so stately, so heroic, and
imbued with all the splendour of Oriental literature, for the scenery
and subject of this poem bear evident marks of that Arabian influence which colours so much of the poetry of the Middle Ages, and
which probably began to act upon the literature of Western Europe
after the Crusaldes.'In point of deep pathos-pathos carried indeed to an extreme and
perhaps hardly natural or justifiable pitch of intensity —we will now
cite, among the graver tales of our pilgrims, the story put into the
mouth of the Clerke of Oxenforde.  This is the story of the Patient
Griselda-a model of womanly and wifely obedience, who comes victoriously out of the most.cruel and repeated ordeals inflicted upon
her conjugal and maternal affections.  The beautiful and angelic
figure of the Patient-Wife in this heart-rending story reminds us of
one of those seraphic. statues of Virgin Martyrs which stand with
clasped hands and uplifted, imploring eye, in the carved niches of aGSothic cathedral-an eternal prayer in sculptured stone,Patience on a monument,
Smiling at Grief!"
The subject of this tale is, as we mentioned some pages hack, inve2nted
by Boccaccio, and first seen in 1374, by Petrarch, who was so struck




62           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.    [CHAP. II.
with its beauty that he translated it into Latin, and it is from this
translation that Chaucer drew  his materials.  The English poet
indeed appears to have been ignorant of -Boccaccio's claim to the
authorship, for he makes his "Clerke" say that he had learned it
from  "Fraunceis Petrarke, the laureat po6te."  Petrarch himself
bears the strongest testimony to the almost overwhelming pathos of
the story, for he relates that he gave it to a Paduan acquaintance of
his to read, who fell into a repeated agony of passionate tears. Chau
-er's poem is written in the Italian stanza.
Of the comic tales the following will be found the most excellent:
The Nun's Priest's Tale, a droll apologue of the Cock and the
Fox, in which the very absurdity of some of the accompaniments
confers one of the highest qualities. which a fable can possess, viz.
so high a degree of individuality that the reader forgets that the persons of the little drama are animals, and sympathizes with them as
human beings; the Merchant's Tale, which, like the comic stories
generally, though very indelicate, is yet replete with the richest and
broadest humour; the Reve's Tale, and many shorter stories distributed among the less prominent characters. But the crown and
pearl of Chaucer's drollery is the Miller's Tale, in which the delicate
and penetrating description bf the various actors in the adventure
can only be surpassed by tae perfectly natural yet outrageously ludicrous catastrophe of the intrigue in which they move.
There is pertainly nothing, in. the vast treasury of ancient or modern humorous writing, at once' so real, so droll, and so exquisitely
enjou6 in the mannner of telling.  It is true that the subject is not
of the most delicate nature; but, though coarse and plain-speaking,
Chaucer is never corrupt or vicious: his improprieties are rather the
fruit of the ruder age in which he lived, and the turbid ebullitions
of a rich and active imagination, than the cool, analysing, studied
profligacy-the more dangerous and corrupting because veiled under
a false and morbid sentimentalism- which defiles a great portion of
the modern literature of too many civilised countries.
It is worthy.of remark that all the tales are in verse with the exception of two, one of which, singularly enough, is given to Chaucer
himself.  This requires some explanation.  When the poet is first
called upon for his story, he bursts out into a long, confused, fantas.
tical tale of chivalry, relating the adventures of a certain errant-knight,
Sir Thopas, and his wanderings in search of the Queen of Fairie.
This is written in the peculiar versification of the Trouveres (note,
that it is the only tale in which he has adopted this measure), and is
full of all the absurdities of those compositions. When in the full
swing of declamation, and when we are expecting to be overwhelmed
with page after page of this " sleazy stuff," - for the poet goes on
gallantly, like Don Quixote, " in the style his books of chivalry had
caught him, imitating, as near as he can, their very phrase,"-he is




CIAP. II.]      CHAUCER: CANTERBURY TALES.                    63
suddenly interrupted by honest Harry Bailey, the Host, who plays
the part of Moderator or Chorus to'Chaucer's pleasant comedy. The
Host begs him, with many strong expressions of ridicule and disgust,
to give them n6 more of such "drafty rhyming," and entreats him
to let them hear something less worn-out and tiresome. The poet
then proposes to entertain the party with "a litel thinge in prose,"
and relates the allegorical story of Meliboeus and his wife Patience.
It is evident that Chaucer, well aware of the immeasurable superiority of the newly revived classical literature over the barbarous and
now exhausted invention of the Romanz poets, has chosen this ingenious method of ridiculing the commonplace tales of chivalry; but
so exquisitely grave is the irony in this passage, that many critics
have taken the' Rime of Sir Thopas' for a serio-us composition, and
have regretted it was left a fragment!
The other prose tale (we have mentioned Meliboeus) is supposed
to be related by the Parson, who is always described as a model of
Christian humility, piety, and, wisdom; which does not, however,
save him from the terrible suspicion of being a Lollard, i. e., a heretical and seditious revolutionist.
This composition hardly can be called a "tale," for it containi
neither persons nor events; but it is very curious as a specimen of
the sermons of the early.Reformers; for a sermon it is, and nothing
else-a sermon upon the Seven Deadly Sins, divided and subdivided
with all the pedantic regularity of the day. It also gives us a very
curious insight into the domestic life, the manners, the costume, and
even the cookery, of the fourteenth century.  Some critics have contended that this sermon was added to the Canterbury Tales by Chaucer at the instigation of his confessors, as a species of penitence for
the light and immoral tone of much of his writings, and particularly
as a sort of recantation, or amende Honorable, for his innumerable
attacks on the monks.  But this supposition is in direct contradiction
with every line of his admirable portrait of the Parson; and, however natural it may have beenfor the licentious Boccaccio to have
done such public penance for his ridicule.of the "Frati," and his
numberless sensual and immoral scenes, his English follower was
"made of sterner stuff." The friend of John of Gaunt, and the
disciple of Wickliffe, was not so easily to be worked upon by monastic
subtlety as the more superstitious and sensuous Italian.
The language of Chaucer is a strong exemplification of the remark.
we made in our first chapter respecting the structure of the English
language. The ground of his diction will be ever found to be the
pure vigorous Anglo-Saxon English of the people, inlaid, if we may
so style it, with an immense quantity of Norman-French words. We
may compare this diction to some of those exquisite specimens of
incrusting left us by the obscure but great artists of the Middle
5*




64           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [C HAP. I1.
Ages, in which the polish of metal or ivory contrasts so richly with
the lustrous ebony.
The difficulty of reading this great poet is very much exaggerated:
a very moderate acquaintance with the French and Italian of the
fourteenth century, and the observation of a few simple rules of pronunciation, will enable any educated person to read and to enjoy. In
particular it is to be remarked that the final letter e, occurring in so
many English words, had not yet become an e mute; and must constantly be pronounced, as well as the termination of the past tense,
ed, in a separate syllable.  The accent also is more varied in its po.
sition than is now common in the language.  Read with these pre.
cautions, Chaucer will be found as harmonious as he is tender, mag
nificent, humorous, or sublime.
Until the reader is able and willing to appreciate the innumerable
beauties of the Canterbury Tales, it is not to be expected that he can
make acquaintance with the graceful though somewhat pedantic'Court of Love,' an allegorical poem, bearing the strongest marks
of its Provencal origin; or with the exquisite delicacy and pure
chivalry of the' Flower and the Leaf;' of which latter poem Campbell speaks as follows, enthusiastically but justly: —" The Flower
and the Leaf is an exquisite piece of fairy fancy.  With a moral that
is just sufficient to apologise for a dream, and yet which sits so lightly
on the story as not to abridge its most visionary parts, there is, in
the whole scenery and objects of the poem, an air of wonder. and
sweetness, an easy and surprising transition, that is truly magical."
pWe cannot conclude this brief and imperfect notice of this great
poet without strongly recommending all those who desire to know
something of the true character of English literature to lose no time
in making acquaintance with the admirable productions of "our
father Chaucer," as Gascoigne affectionately calls him: the difficulties
of his'style have been unreasonably exaggerated, and the labour
which surmounts them will be abundantly repaid. "It will conduct
you," to use the beautiful words of Milton, " to a hill-side; laborious
indeed at the first ascent, but else so smooth, so green, so full of
goodly prospects and melodious sounds on every side, that the harp
of Orpheus was not more charming."




ELIZABETHAN ERA.                       6&
CHAPTER  ITI.
SIDNEY AND SPENSER.
Elizabethan Era-Ages of Pericles,.Augustus, the Medici, Louis XVI.-.
Chivalry-Sidney-the Arcadia-His Style-Spenser-Shepherd's Calendar
-Pastoral-Spenser at Court-Burleigh and Leicester- Settlement in Ireland-the Faery Queen-Spenser's Death-Criticism of the Faery Queen —
Style, Language, and Versification.
IN the history of most countries the period of the highest literary
glory will generally be found to coincide with that of some very
marked and permanent achievements in commerce or in war.  Nor
-is this circumstance surprising.  Those men who. best can perform
great actions are in general best able to think sublime thoqghts.  It
was not. a fortuitous assemblage, in the same country and at the same
period, of such minds as those of Eschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides,
that has made us assume the age of Pericles as the culminating
point of Athenian literature.  No! the defeat of the Persians cannot but be considered as having a great deal to do with the existence
of that splendid period.
In the same way the -far-famed age of Louis XIV. "was undoubtedly
prepared, if not produced, by the long religious wars of the Reformation, the national enthusiasm being also raised by the brilliant
exploits of French arms in Germany and Flanders.
That period in the history of English letters which corresponds to
the epochs to which we have alluded is the age of Elizabeth. It is
the -Elizabethan era which represents, among us, the age of Pericles,
that of Augustus, that of the Medici, that of Leo, that of Louis; nay,
it may be asserted, and without any exaggerated national vanity,
that the productions of this one era of English literature may boldly
be opposed to the intellectual triumphs of all the other epochs
mentioned, taken collectively.'
In this case, as in the others, a gigantic revolution had taken place,
recent indeed, but not so recent as to leave men's minds under the
more immediate action of party spirit and political enmity.  The
intellect of England had lately been engaged in a struggle for its
liberty and its religion; it had had time to repose, but not to-be enfeebled: it-now started on its race of immortality, glowing, indeed, from
the arena, but not weakened; its muscles strung with wrestling, but not
exhausted. During the actual ardour of any great political struggle.
men's minds are naturally too intent upon the more immediate and
personal question, and their views too much narrowed and distorted
by prejudice and polemics, for any great achievements in general




66           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CHAP. III.
literature to be expected; but it is in the period of tranquillity
immediately succeeding such great national revolutions that the
human intellect soars aloft with steadiest, broadest, and sublimest
wing into thp calmer empyrean of poetry or philosophy"Above the smoke and stir oi this dim spot
Which men call Earth."
The great revolution to'which we have been alluding is, we nardly
need say, the Reformation; the doctrines of which were first solidly
established in England under the sceptre of Elizabeth, and in whose.
vehement struggles was'trained that generation which was to be
adorned by Sidney, by Spenser, and by Ralejgh.
The other condition, too, which we have specified as necessary to
the production of a great and immortal era in literature, viz. a high
degree of military glory, was certainly to be found in this reign: we
need.only mention the annihilation of the Spanish Armada.
In England, at all periods of our history, literature, speaking
generally, has almost always emanated from the people, and consequently has always talked the language of the people, and addressed
itself to the people's sympathies; and this is the reason of the
greater vital force which it must be allowed to possess. Homer and
Shakspeare will ever be. read with increasing ardour and veneration,
and this because their works reflect, not so much a period or a nation,
as the universal heart of man-the same in every climate and in
every age.
Besides this fortunate circumstance there were also certain influences at work, peculiar to that brilliant period, and calculated to -produce and foster the rapid development which then took place.   We
have seen the tone of the Italian poetry first infused, so to speak,
into English literature by Chaucer and Gower, and the immense
influx of classic ideas and classic language which flowed in at that.
time.  At first, however, the crasis (to use a term of the old m edicine) between the dissimilar and discordant elements-the ancient
Saxonism, the modern classicism, and the romantic spirit of the
chivalrous literature-was not, as might have been expected, perfect
or complete; and it was not till the time of Elizabeth that the
amalgamation of these elements was sufficiently brought about to
produce a harmonious and healthy result. The spirit of the Reformation, also-an inquiring, active, practical, and fervent spirit-was
necessary to complete the unioni of these discordant ingredients.
Chivalry, indeed, as a political or social system, had ceased to
exist at the period of Elizabeth: that is to say, chivalry no longer
exerted any very perceptible influence on the relations of men with
the state or with each other.  But though it no longer existed as an
active and energetic influence, modifying either social life or political
relations; though it no longer gave any tone to the general physiogno.




CItAP. IIn]         SIDNEY: THE ARCADIA.                      67
my of the times, its moral influence still existed with powerful though
diminished force: it still perceptibly modified. the manners of the
court and of the higher classes; the idol was indeed cast down from
the altar, but a solemn and holy atmosphere of sanctity still breathed
around the walls of the temple; the pure, the ennobling, the heroic
portion of the knightly spirit yet- glowed with no decaying fervour
in the hearts of such men as Essex, Raleigh, Sidney; and found a
worthy voice in the sweet dignity of Spenser's song.'Though the joust and.tournament had degenerated from  their
ancient splendour (and this because they were no longer so necessary
as of old); and had become the idle pageant of a magnificent court,
many of the gallant tilters -of Whitehall had not forgotten the principles of the chivalric character-" high thoughts, seated," to use the
beautiful language of Sidney, "in a heart of courtesy."
Of this majestic period the brightest figure is that of Sir Philip
Sidney, the most complete embodiment of all the graces and virtues
which.can adorn or ennoble humanity. He was at once the Bayard
and the Petrarch of English history, a name to -which every Briton
looks back with pride, admiration, and regret.  Noble of birth, beautiful in person, splendid and generous, of a bravery almost incredible,
wise in council, learned himself, and a powerful and generous protector of learning —in him seem to be united all the solidest gifts
and the most attractive ornaments of body and of mind. The throne
of Poland, to which he was elected, could hardly have conferred additional splendour upon so consummate a character; and we almost
approve of the jealous admiration of Elizabeth, who prevented him
from mounting that throne, that she might not lose the "jewel of her
court."  Very brief, indeed,, was the career of this glorious star
of the Elizabethan firmament, but the brightness of its setting was
well worthy of its rising arid meridian ray; and the field of Zutphen
was sanctified by those words which can hardly be paralleled in the
history of ancient or modern heroism: "this man's necessity is greater
than mine."  But the hand which faintly motioned the cup to the
lips of the dying soldier was the same which wrote the knightly
pages of the  Arcadi,' and touched the softest note of " that small
lute" which "gave ease to Petrarch's pain," and drew from the son'.
net a tender melody not unworthy of the poet of Arqua.
There are few productions of similar importance whose character
and merits have been so much misrepresented by modern ignorance
and superficial criticism as Sidney's great work, the romance of the'Arcadia.'
Disraeli has collected, in his'Amenities of. Literature,' a large
number of depreciating criticisms made by various authors on the'Arcadia' of Sidney.  Walpole pronounced it "'a tedious, lamentable, pedantic, pastoral romance;" Gifford affirms "that the plan is
poor, the incidents trite, the style pedantic;" Dunlop complains that




68           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CHAI In.
it is "extremely tiresome;" yet this book was the favourite andmodel in the age of Shakspeare! Shakspeare has in a thousand exquisite places imitated the scenes, the manners, and even the diction
of the'Arcadia;' Shirley, Beaumont, and Fletcher turned to it as
their'text-book; -Sidney enchanted two later brothers in Waller and
Cowley; and the world of fashion in Sidney's age culled their phrases
out of the'Arcadia,' which served them as a complete'Academy of
Compliments.'
Disraeli then goes on to show that modern critics, misled by the
title of this prose romance, which Sidney injudiciously adopted from
Sannazzaro, have generally concluded, without taking the trouble of
reading it, to consider it as a pastoral, similar to that multitudinous
class of fictions so popular in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries,
and of which the' Galatea' of Cervantes is a well-known specimen.
The fact is, however, that the lrcadian or pastoral parts of Sidney's
work are merely supplementary, forming no essential portion of the
narrative; being, in short, merely interludes of shepherds' introduced
dancing and reciting verses at the close of each book.  There can be
no doubt but that the scenes and sentiments described with such a
sweet luxuriance of beautiful language were reflections of true events
in Sidney's own chivalrous life, and transcripts from his own gentle
and heroic heart.  We cannot better conclude our notice on this
work than -by a selection from the remarks of Disraeli:-" He de.
scribes objects on which he loves to dwell, with a peculiar richness
of fancy: he had shivered his lance in the tilt, and had managed the
fiery courser in his career; and in the vivid picture of the shock between two knights we see distinctly every motion of the horse and
aorseman. But sweet is his loitering hour in the sunshine of luxuriant, gardens, or as we lose ourselves in, the green solitudes of the
forests which most he loves. There is a feminine delicacy in whatever alludes to the female character, not merely courtly, but imbued
with that sensibility which St. Palaye has remarkably described as'full of refinement and fanaticism.'  And this may suggest an idea,
not improbable, that Shakspeare drew his fine conceptions of female,sharacter from Sidney. Shakspeare solely, of all our elder dramatists,
has given true beauty +'  woman; and Shakspeare was an attentive
reader of the'Arcadia.'"
Besides this romance, which, though in prose, partakes more
markedly of the character of'poetry, Sidney was the author, as we
have hinted above, of a considerable number of Sonnets, some of
very singular beauty, and of a shiort treatise entitled'The Defense
of Poesie,' the nature of which is perfectly expressed in the title.
The beauty of our author's prose style is no less conspicuous in this
work than the deep feeling which he exhibits for the value and the
charms of poetry.  The language, indeed, is'itself poetry of no
nean order, and in this work, no less than in the. Arcadia,' we do




CIIAP. III.]        - SIDNEY   SPENSER.                       69
find in every line reason to confirm the judgment of Cowper, who
was keenly alive to Sir Philip's merits, and who thus qualifies his
style:"Sidney, warbler of poetic prose."
Ile was mortally wounded by a musket-ball in the left thigh at the
skirmish at Zutphen, September 22, 1586, and died on the 15th
of October following, in his thirty-second year, and was buried in St.
Paul's. To do, in so short a life, so much for immortality, is the lot
of few; of still fewer to excite, in dying, such universal sorrow as
that which followed Sidney to the grave; for in him the court lost
its chiefest ornament, learning its steadiest patron, genius its boldest
defender and firmest friend, and his' country her most illustrious
child
"The courtier's, soldier's, scholar's eye, tongue, sword:
The expectancy and rose of the fair state,
The glass of fashion, and the mould of form,
The observed of all observers."
The greatest English poet after Chaucer, Edmund Spenser, was
born in Londofn about the year 1553, that is, a year before. Sidney,
and educated at Pembroke College, Cambridge. On leaving the
University he retired (it is supposed in the quality of a private tutor)
to the North of England, in which retirement he composed the first
production which attracted notice to his. youthfulkgenius.  This was'The Shepherd's Calendar,' a long poem divided into twelve parts or
months, and consisting of pastoral dialogues of a plaintive and amatory character.  The Italian taste then prevalent i'n Europe, and
which filled the literature of every country with imitations, more or
less frigid, of the Arcadianisms of Guarini and Sannazzaro, is per-.
haps more perceptible in Spenser than any author, even of the
" Italianated" Elizabethan age;. and it is singular to observe how
universally this manner was adopted in the early essays of the young
poets of the day.  "Babes," says the Scripture, "are fed with
milk;" and it seems natural that the romantic. genius of youth
should nourish itself on the pure but somewhat insipid delicacies of
the poetical " Golden Age."  Eager to give to the form of his work
the originality which was necessarily wanting to its design, Spenser
rejected the rather worn-out Corydons and Tityruses of the classical
idyllists, and gave to his shepherds and his scenery as much of an
English air as he could by adopting English names and describing
English nature: t}he same result also was aimed at in.the language,
into which he strove to infuse the spirit of the antique, and at the
same time of a rustic simplicity, by adopting.a great deal of the now
almost obsolete. diction of Chaucer.  His shepherds, however, are
not much inferior in point of nature and probability to the general
run of pastoral personages-to the disguised courtiers who pipe and
sing in Virgil's Mantuan shades, or the masquerading pedants of the




70           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   rCHAP. III.
modern Italian school; in short, to none of these sham shepherds,
always excepting the admirable rustics of Theocritus.  The subjects
of the various poems of the'Shepherd's Calendar' are the same which
form the curta supellex of ordinary pastorals: the hinds of Spenser
are sufficiently " melancholy and gentlemanlike," and pour out their
melodious complaints without exciting any very deep -sympathy in
the reader.  They remind us of young, thoughtful scholars, who
have, "for very wantonness," put on the garb of rustics, and whose
elegant and graceful thoughts are breathed in -the language not of the
field but of the study.
This work, besides exercising the youthful poet's powers of diction
and harmony, acquired for him the admiration and friendship of the
learned Gabriel Harvey, who, though fantastical in his literary tastes,
and though for a time infecting Spenser with his own enthusiasm for
his metrical whimsies, was of the greatest use to his modest and sensitive friend. The projects to which we have alluded were, among
others, nothing less than the employment of the classical or syllabic
mode of versification in English poetry.  He has left us some most
inimitable specimens of dactylic and iambic measures, which furnish
a ludicrous proof of the inherent absurdity of the project.  Spenser,
too, has perpetrated some monstrous "classicisms" of this nature;
and these show that not even the exquisite ear of the most harmonious of our poets could render bearable the application of the prosody
of quantity to a language essentially accentual in its metrical character.
This curious'literary folly, however, was at this period exceedingly
epidemic; for similar attempts were made, and with exactly as much
success, to naturalize the Greek and Roman metres in the Italian,
Spanish, and even the French languages.  In German, however,
the innovation has lasted (and with tolerable success) down to the
present day.
It was to Harvey that Spenser is supposed to have owed his intro.
duction to Sir Philip Sidney, at whose ancestral seat of Penshurst
the poet passed perhaps the brightest years of his unhappy life.
We have stood beneath "Spenser's Oak" in the beautiful park of
that venerable place, and dreamed of the hero and the poet-both
still so young, yet with thQ halo of immortality already on their
front, seated, "in  colloquy sublime," beneath those murmuring
boughs. It was here that Spenser completed his' Shepherd's Calendar,' dedicating it, under the title of'The Poet's Year,' to his young
patron, " Maister Philip Sidney, worthy of all titles, both of learning and chivalry."   Through the medium  of Sidney the poet
obtained the protection of the great Earl of Leicester, the favourite
of Elizabeth, and uncle of "Maister Philip;" and through Leicester.Spenser acquired the notice of his royal mistress.
Our youthfil poet now became a courtier, and forms one star —




CRAP. III.]            SPENSER AT COURT.                       71
and one of the brightest too-of that glorious galaxy which gave
such splendour to the court of the "Maiden Queen."
But in leaving the green solitudes of Penshurst for the splendours
of the court, Spenser was destined to exchange his freedom and his
happiness for a chain only the heavier because it was of gold.  He
forgot the profound truth concealed in that oracular verse of the poet
which so truly describes the proper atmosphere for a lettered life,"Flumina amem sylvasque, inglorius;"and he paid for his mistake, the heavy penalty of a life embittered
by court disappointments, and finished in affliction.
Though early distinguished by the favour of Elizabeth, his life at
court seems to have been a nearly uninterrupted succession of mortifications and disappointments.  The very favour of the Earl of
Leicester, powerful as it was, was not omnipotent, and in courts, as
in the fairy tale, the talisman or charmed weapon, given to the
adventurous knight by a friendly magician, often proves the very
cause of his being attacked by a hostile enchanter.  The very patronage and protection of Leicester naturally drew upon Spenser the dislike and suspicion of Lord Burleigh, then Chancellor and highly
favoured by Elizabeth; and the poet, in innumerable passages, of his
works, has alluded to the discouragement and coldness he experienced
at ile hands of the great lawyer.  One stanza, indeed, describing
the miseries of court dependence, has passed ineffaceably into the
memoiry of every reader of English poetry. It is so painfully
beautiful and so evidently sincere-written, as it were, with the very
heart's blood of the poet-that we cannot forbear quoting it here:"Full little knowest thou who hast not tried,
What hell it is in suing long to bide;
To lose good days that might be better spent;
To waste long nights in pensive discontent;
To speed to-day, to be put back to-morrow;
To feed on hope, to pine with fear and sorrow;
To have thy prince's grace, yet want her peers';
To have thy asking, yet wait many years;
To fret thy soul with crosses and-with cares;
To eat thy heart in comfortless despairs:
To fawn, to crouch, to wait, to ride, to run,
To spend, to give, to wait-to be undone."
At length, however, Spenser received (in 1580) the appointment
of secretary to Lord Grey de WVilton, whom he accompanied to Ireland, and under whose orders the poet seems to have distinguished
himself as a man of business, for he was soon afterwards rewarded
with a grant from the Crown of 3000 acres of land in the county of
Cork, an estate which had previously formed part of the domains
belonging to the Earls of Desmond, but which had been forfeited to
the Grown. This is one of the numerous instances of Elizabeth's
ingenious policy; for she thus rewarded a faithful servant with a gift
6




72   -       OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  LCnAP. rt.
of land which cost her nothing, and which the recipient (or "undertaker," as he was termed) was bound by his contract —to inhabit and
keep in cultivation.  A territory, however, recently devastated by
contending armies with fire and sword, was a gift rather splendid in
appearance than profitable in reality; and perhaps the principal
advantage derived by.Spenser from this'donation was the necessity
it imposed upon him of residing on his estate, and the leisure which
it enabled him to dedicate to his literary pursuits.  IHe took up- his
abode in the ancient castle of Kilcolman, situated in the midst of
his beautiful but unproductive domain, and it is' here that he composed the greater part of his immortal work-the poem of'The
Faerie Queene.' The scenery by which he was here surrounded is
remarked for its beauty even in beautiful Ireland; and it may not be
fanciful to speculate-how far the natural loveliness of the spot is
reflected and reproduced in the rich pictures which fill the pages of
the poem.
It was here that the poet was visited by Raleigh, then a young
man, beginning, as Captain of the Guards, that extraordinary and
brilliant career which has rendered his name so. illustrious at once
for learning and for enterprise.  To Raleigh-a kifdred spirit —
Spenser communicated his literary projects, and read to him the
unfinished can'tos of the.' Faerie Queene.' Among the various -friendships and meetings recorded among great men, there is perhaps none
on which we reflect with such interest as this: how delightful is it
to picture to ourselves the Ariosto of England and the colonizer of
Virginia seated together on the banks of Mulla, exchanging thoughts
bright with immortality,
"amongst the coolly shade
Of the green alders, by the Mulla's shore!"
The "Shepherd of the Ocean," as Raleigh was styled in Spenser's
poetical nomenclature, replaced for the bard, in some degree at least,
the irreparable loss infficted. by the early death of Sidney-perhaps
the severest blow inflicted on the sensitive heart of the poet during
the earlier part of his career: the death of his youthful patron cast
a gloom over the whole of his too short existence.
In 1590 Spenser returned to England in order to present to
Elizabeth- the first part of the'Faerie Queene;' and, insatiable as
was that great sovereign in the matter of praise and adulation, with
the exquisite tribute of'Spenser's Muse she must have been profoundly gratified.'All the learning and genius of an age remarkable
for learning and genius were exhausted in supplying the Maiden
Monarch with incessant clouds of elegant and poetical incense; and
among all the worshippers in the temple none were certainly more
devoted or more capable than Spenser. The annals of court adulation are in general among the most humiliating pages of human folly




CHAP. nI.j   SPENSER: UIS RETURN TO LONrON.                 73
and absurdity; but the age of Elizabeth was singular and fortunate
in one respect: the greatness of the sovereign's character was not
unworthy of the sublimest strains of panegyric, and the greatest
among poets-for Shakspeare and Spenser both praised, in deathless
verse, this extraordinary ruler-found in the achievements and the
wisdom of their patroness a subject which they could adorn, but
hardly exaggerate. The queen expressed her approbation of the
poem by conferring on the author a pension of 501. per annum-in
estimating which reward we must consider the much higher value of
money at that period: and Spenser then probably returned to Ireland; for in 1595 he published his pastoral of' Colhn Clout,' and in
1596 the second part of the'Faerie Queene.' It must not however
be supposed that the poet had no occupation during this period
excepting such as he found in the strenua inertia"-the laborious
abstraction of a literary life: he was employed actively and uninterruptedly in the service of the state; for, after passing through many
subordinate employments, we find him about this time, Clerk of the
Council for the province of Munster, and exhibiting the knowledge
he had acquired of the character and prospects of the conquered
nation in his interesting prose work entitled'A'View of the State
of Ireland.' This book, the production of one Who was at the same
time a poet and a statesman, bears every mark of its author's double
quality: -it gives a most curious and evidently faithful description of
the manners of the Celtic inhabitants of the country, and contains
many wise hints for the subjection and civilizing of that warlike
race.  It is true that some of the fieasures recommended by Spenser
are of a violent and coercive character; but we should be unwise to
expect in a writer of the sixteenth century a tone of mildness and
toleration unknown in politics previous to the nineteenth.
During the whole of Spenser's residence in Ireland, he appears
to have made frequent voyages to his own country, and seems to
have been agitated by an incessant and feverish disconttenltment-dissatisfied probably with the very reward conferred upon him by the
queen-a roward which condemned him to reside in a barbarous and
disturbed country, and deprived him of the pleasures and society of
the court. This honourable banishment under the disguise of advancement was perhaps an ingenious contrivance of the profound and
tortuous policy of Spenser's great opponent, Burleigh, who thus
removed the dangerous fascinations of Spenser's manners and genius
far from the sphere of the court, and thus deprived the party of
Leicester of a hold upon Elizabeth's capricious and impressionable
vanity.
In 1597 Spenser retired for the last time to Ireland, and shortly
afterwards the flame of popular discontent, communicated qrore the
furious outburst which, under the name of "Tyrone's Rebellion,"
had been raging for some years in Ulster, swept over his retreat at




74           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CHAP. m.
Kilcolman Castle, and drove Spenser, a heartbroken and ruined manl
to die in sorrow and distress in London. In his offices of Clerk of
the Council, and afterwards of Sheriff of Cork, Spenser had probably
given but too much grounds for the accusation of injustice and oppression brought against him by the Irish, and exaggerated by the
natural indignation of a proud and savage people uneasy under a
recent yoke.  In October, 1598, the Castle of Kilcolman was attacked and burned by the insurgents, and Spenser, with difficulty
saving himself and his wife -from the fury of the victors, escaped to
England. In the hurry of leaving his blazing residence, however,
either from the imminence of personal danger or from one of those
frightful mistakes so likely to happen at such terrifice moments, the'oet's infant child was left behind, and perished with- the house.
Spenser reached London, ruined, heartbroken, and despairing, and,
after lingering for three months, he died, in King Street, Westminster, on the 16th of January, 1599.
~He was buried in Westminster Abbey, near the tomb of Chaucer.
The following is an account of the principal poems of Spenser, at
least of such as are not alluded to in the foregoing pages: -' The
Tears of the Muses,' and'Mother Hubbard's Tale,' published in
1591;'Daphnaida,' 1592; The'Amoretti' and'Epithalanium' —
two works descriptive of his courtship and marriage, the latter one
of the noblest'hymeneal songs in any language - in 1595; and the' Elegy on Astrophil,' a lament on the death of the illustrious Sidney,
at the same period. -VWe have hinted that the'Fairy Queen' was
given to the world in detached portions and at long intervals of time:
the dates of these various publications are nearly as follows: —
Boolis I., IL., and III. appeared together in January 1589-90; IV.,
V., and VI. in 1596.
The design of the whole poem, if completed, would have given us
one of the most splendid works- of romantic fiction in which Chivalry
ever pronounced the oracles of Wisdom: and we may judge, by the
unfinished portion of this Palace of Honour, what would have been
the gorgeous effect of the whole, majestic structure.  Spenser supposed the Fairy Quee:n to appear in a vision to Prince Arthur, who,
awaking deeply enamoured, resolves on seeking his unearthly mistress
in Faeiy Land.  The poet then represents the Fairy Queen as
holding her solemn annual feast during twelve days, on each of which
a perilous adventure is undertaken by some particular knight; each
of the twelve knights typifying some moral virtue.  "The first," to
use the words of Chambers's abridgment of the plan, " is the Redcross Knight, expressing Holiness; the second, Sir Guyon, or Temperance; and the third, Britomartis,'a lady knight,' representing
Chastity.  There was thus a blending of chivalry and religion in the
design of the'Faery Queen.' Besides his personification of the
allstract virtues, the poet made his allegorical personages and their




CHAP. III.]      SPENSER: THE FAERIE QiEEN.                     75:
adventures represent historical characters and events.  TIe queen,
Gloriana, and the huntress, Belphoebe, are both symboJical of Queen
Elizabeth; the adventures of the Redcross Knight shadow forth the
history of the Church of England; and the distressed knight is
JIenry IV. The Fourth, Fifth, and Sixth Books -contain the legend
of Cambel and Triamond, or Friendship; Artegal, or Justice; and
Sir Calidore, or Courtesy. A double allegory is contained in these
cantos, as in the previous ones: Artegal is the poet's friend and
patron, Lord Grey; and various historical events are related in the
knight's adventures. Half of the original design was thus finished;
six of the twelve adventures and moral virtues were produced: but
unfortunately the world saw only some fragments more of the
work.)"
Even were we not fully aware of the great general influence
exerted on the age of Elizabeth by the taste for Italian poetry, we
should be easily enabled to trace its effect in modifying the genius
of Spenser.  The' Faery Queen' is written in a peculiar versification
to which we have given the name of the " Spenserian stanza."  It
is really nothing more than the Italian " ottava rima," or eight-lined
stanza, to which Spenser, in order to give to the English the " linked
sweetness long drawn out" of the "favella Toscana," most wisely
added a ninth line, whose billowy flow admirably winds up the
swelling and varying music of each stanza. This measure is as
difficult to write with effect in English as it is easy in Italian, a language in which the rhymes are so abundant, and the rhythmic
cadence so inherent, that it requires almost an effort to avoid giving
a metrical form  even to prose:'and Spenser has wielded this comnplicated instrument with such consumnmate mastery and grace, that
the rich abundant melody of his versification alinost oppresses the ear
with its overwhelming sweetness.  Like the soft undulation of a
Tropic sea, it bears us onward'dreamily with easy swell and falls, by
wizard islands of sunshine and of rest, by bright phantom-peopled
realms and old enchanted cities.
The genius of- Spenser is essentially pictorial.  There are no
scenes, soft or terrible, which ever glowed before the intellectual
gaze of the great painters which have more reality than his; like the
gallery so exquisitely described by Byron: —
"There rose a Carlo Dolce, or a Titian,
Or wilder group of savage Salvatore's;
There danced Albano's boys, and here the sea shone
With Vernet's ocean lights; and there the stories
Of martyrs awed, as Spagnoletto tainted
His brush with all the blood of all the sainted.
There sweetly spread a landscape of Lorraine;'There Rembrandt made his darkness equal light;
Or gloomy Caravaggio's gloomier stain
Bronzed o'er some lean and stoic anchorite."
6*




76           OUTLIINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CrAP. III
"His command of imagery," says Campbell, the truth and beauty
of whose criticisms will form  our best apology for adopting them
instead of our.own, "is wide, easy, and luxuriant.  He threw the
soul of harmony into our verse, and made it more warmly, tenderly,
and magnificently descriptive than it ever was before, or, with a few
exceptions,. than it has ever been since. It must certainly be owned
that in description he exhibits nothing of the brief strokes and robust
power which characterise the very greatest poets; but we shall nowhere find more airy. and expansive images of visionary things, a
sweeter tone of sentiment, or a finer flush in the colours of language,
than in this Rubens of English poetry."
But perhaps the best and most comprehensive'criticism upon'Spenser's merit is that recorded by Pope in one of his letters to
Spence:-" After my reading a canto of Spenser two or three days
ago to an old lady between seventy and eighty, she said that I had
been showing her a collection of pictures.  She said very right."
The chief defect of this admirable poet is one almost inseparable
from allegory in general, and particularly allegory so complicated as
that of Spenser, where the feigned resemblance often represents
several distinct and different types or objects.  It cannot be denied
that there is a great want of human interest in the' lFaery Queen,'
and that the events of his drama have frequently no perceptible connection with each other or bearing upon the supposed catastrophe.
Moreover, there is no bond of interest uniting  the several cantos' of
the poem, for they are separate and detached adventures, performed
by different and unconnected characters, and very feebly linked
together by their being supposed to be undertaken at the commanwd
of Gloriana.  Arthur is, it is true, the nominal hero, but he is soon
forgotten by the reader; and his reappearance at the end of the poem
would hardly suffice to incorporate into one living body the "' disjecta
membra poetin" scattered through the various exploits of the twelve
knights.  In fact, criticism can only enlarge here the definition of
Pope's old lady, and say, that the cantos of Spenser, admirably beautiful as they are, glowing with the most varied colours of fancy and
ima.gination, want, like the pictures in a gallery, a mutual dependence
and connection.
Exquisitely diversified, too, as is the melody of Spenser's verse
~ind manner of treatment, we cannot disguise from ourselves a feeling
that it is injured by some tinge of that lusciousness and dilatation
perceptible in the style of Tasso and Ariosto, whose writings it so
much resembles. This over-sweetness and luxuriance seems inseparable from  the genius of the. Italian language, but harmonizes less
naturally with the less sensuous character of our Northern poesy.
In the innumerable allegories which people the enchanted scenery
of Spenser, we are sometimes shocked with those incongruous details
which make us laugh in the engravings of the emblematic Otto




CHAP. IV.]   BACON-HIS BIRTH AND EDUCATION.                  77
Venius, where either the attribute distinguishing the moral quality
to be personified is so dark and: far-fetched as to be absolutely unintelligible without explanation, or where it is of a nature unfit for the
purposes of art.  Those who are acquainted with the works of Rubens (the pupil of Venius), to whom Spenser has been so well compared by Campbell, will be at no loss to understand: our meaning.
Like many great poets of ancient and modern times, Spenser
sought to give vigour and solemnity to his language by a plentiful
adoption of archaisms, words, and expressions consecrated by their
having been employed by older authors.  Virgil gave an air of antiquity and simplicity to the Eneid by using multitudes of venerable
words employed by Ennius.  Spenser imitated Chaucer; just as La
Fontaine gave naivete and edge to his sly satire by an infusion of
the admirable expressions of Villon and Rabelais: and we hardly
agree with those critics who have complained of our poet's freedom
in this respect. If the rough but time-honoured stones taken from
the Cyclopean walls of old Ennius be allowed to give dignity to the
graceful Ionic edifice of Virgil, we do not see why the simple diction
of Chaucer should not harmonize well with the rich- elegance of the'Faery Queen'- the rather that the latter work is, after all, a Tale
of Chivalry- a Romance.
CHAPTER IV.
BACON.
_His P;rth and Education-' View of the State of Europe'-His Career-Im.
peached for Corruption-Death-His Character-State of Philosophy in the
Sixteenth Century-Its Corruptions and Defects-Bacon's System-Not a
Discoverer-The New Philosophy-Analysis of the Instauratio: I. De
Augmentis; II. Novum Organum; 1II. Sylva Sylvarum; IV. Scala Intel.
lectfis; V.-Prodromi; VI. Philosophia Secunda —The Baconian Logic —
Style-His Minor Works.
FRANCIS BACON, the Luther of Philosophy, was born in London
on the 22d of January, 1561. He was the son of Sir Nicholas
Bacon, a distinguished lawyer and Lord Keeper of the Privy Seal in
the reign of Queen Elizabeth.  The subject of our present remarks
was sent, while yet a boy of thirteen, to the University of Cambridge;
and though it appears to have been customary at this period to begin
the public part of education much earlier than is now usual, we can
hardly be wrong in deeming that Bacon must have given proofs of a
most precocious intellect, when we learn that when hardly sixteen he
had formed distinct notions respecting the defects of the, Aristotelian




78           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. IV.
system of philosophy, and had no doubt already conceived the out.
line of that gigantic plan of destruction and innovation which has
made his name immortal. After remaining four years at Cambridge
he went abroad, and travelled in France, probably intending to pass
several years in acquiring practical experience in the various courts
of the continent; but the death of his father, in 1579, suddenly recalled him to England; not- however before he had given proof of the
success with which he had employed his time in foreign countries,
by the production of a most -sagacious and valiuable essay' On the
State of Europe.'. The political knowledge exhibited in this little
treatise, and the profound wisdom and acuteness displayed in it, would
astonish us, as the work of on& hardly entered upon the period of
adolescence, if any manifestation of intellect' could surprise us on the
part of this astonishing person.  It is obvious that he had already
felt the mysterious vocation of genius-that secret oracle which points
out to the highest order of minds the true path which Providence
intended them to pursue, a path from which they never deviate with
impunity. Bacon so strongly felt that the true bent of his character
would lead him to consecrate his future life to sublime and solitary
meditation, and was so proudly and justly confident in the yet unexircised strength of his intellect, that he entreated Burleigh, the
powerful favourite and Chancellor, to procure him from the state
some provision which would enable him to prosecute his studies in
uninterrupted leisure.
Burleigh, however, refused to accede to a proposition which must
bave appeared then, as it would now, so extraordinary and unusual;
and the young philosopher was obliged to devote himself to the study
of the law, which hle pursued with industry and success. Bacon's
-after career affords a melancholy example of the danger of neglecting
that inward voice which calls, as we have said a few lines back, the
sublimer intellects among mankind to the true sphere of their exertions, whispering to the mental, as the Demmon of Socrates to the
moral, ear the true direction of the course.
While studying the law in Gray's Inn, Bacon sketched out- the
first plan of the' Instauration,' and probably had decided upon the
general purport and arrangement of the great works which contain
his conclusions. The rest of his personal career may be described in
a few words: the task is a melancholy and humiliating one. He
rapidly passed through the inferior dignities.of the law and of the
state, being appointed queen's counsel in 1590, and in 1593 chosen
member of parliament for the county of Middlesex.  Both in the
courts of law and in the House of Commons he was distinguished
for the vastness of his knowledge and for the brilliancy of his eloquence; but he was also notorious, even in that age, for his subserviency to the most iniquitous despotism of the court.  Having on
one occasion (we select. a single example from among many) advo.




CHAP. IV.]        BACON'S. POLITICAL CAREER.                  79
cated before the Commons, with all the power which marked his
mind, a measure of a popular tendency, he was weak enough, on the
first intimation of his independence having displeased the sovereign,
to renounce, with shameless facility, the convictions which he had
just before be'en asserting, and even to apologise for having entertained them.  But this great man was reserved for yet deeper degradation.  His political conduct continued to present a worthy continuation to this lamentable commencement.  Obeying every fickle
current of court favour, he first deserted the party of the Cecils (i. e.
of his first protector and kinsman Burleigh) for that of the unfortunate Essex, who, failing in obtaining for his new proselyte the dignity
of attorney-general, rewarded his apostacy with the gift of an estate
at Twickenham worth two thousand pounds.
Bacon's attachment to Essex was as mercenary as had been his
adherence to Burleigh, and, on the disgrace and impeachment of the
Earl, the great lawyer showed a base eagerness to aid the overthrow
of the unhappy and illustrious victim, exhibiting a ferocious violence
hardly exceeded in the long and black annals of mercenary tribunals
and subservient advocates.  In order to gratify the court, Bacon
crowned his apostacy by composing a'Declaration of the Treasons
and Practices of the Earl of Essex.'  In the foul descent from baseness to baseness which marks the whole of Bacon's political career, we
cannot find any extenifating circumstances, except indeed such as transfer his guilt from deliberate depravity to a servile calculation of interest.
It is consoling indeed to reflect that there has been in no part of
human conduct so great an improvement in point of morality as in
the change which has taken place in political relations from the sixteenth century to the present day.  The fatal prevalence of that
atrocious and infernal policy which is systematised with such a hideous
minuteness in the pages.of Machiavelli, had extended itself from the
petty Italian states, where it first appeared, to all the countries of
Europe; and that dreadful sophism that "we may do evil that good
may come" had destroyed the natural barriers between right and
wrong in public affairs.  It is but a poor excuse to say that Bacon
was no worse than many of his contemporaries; still less to attempt
to palliate ingratitude and cowardice by alleging that Bacon deserted
his benefactors and attacked the fallen without the inducement of
passion and animosity: the avarice, the ambition, the cool calculation
of profit, which was the cause of such wretched servility, is certainly
not less able to excite our contempt, than a similar conduct dictated
by sincere hatred or a natural depravity would be capable of inspiring
us with detestation.  The truth is that Bacon, though not personally
avaricious, was cursed with that passion for state, splendour, and
magnificence which is so frequently found in a highly imaginative
character; and being always plunged in difficulties, he took, with
that unscrupulousness too common at the period when he lived, the
shortest way to supply his incessant needs.




80           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CHAP. IV,
In 1603, at the beginning of the reign of James I., Bacon was
knighted, and appointed successively king's counsel, solicitor-general,
and attorney-general-(the last dignity having been attained in 1613),
and he fully justified whatever confidence the court could have placed.in his subserviency and pliability: so far indeed had he forgotten the
great principles of the law whose unworthy minister he was, that he
-assisted in inflicting on a certain Paacham, an aged and obscure clea.
gymanjaccused of treason, the cruelties of the torture, in order to
extort- confession by a means in no way countenanced by the English constitution.  It was at this period that Bacon married the
daughter of a wealthy alderman, and seems in this, as well as so
many other acts of his life, to have consulted interest.  He still continued to advance in his carreer of ambition, and in 1619 reached the
highest dignity to which an English subject can aspire, having been
named in that year Lord High Chancellor, with the title of Baron.Verulam.  This rank he afterwards exchanged, by the protection of
Villiers - the vain and haughty favourite of James- for the still
more exalted style of Viscount St. Aiban's. In this advance he
probably received from Villiers the hire for some new act of
obsequiousness to the favourite's power, for he allowed the minister to interfere in and control the exercise of his high judicial
functions-a crime of which he was accused before parliament, and
of which (together with many minor instances of corruption) he
proclaimed himself guilty in a confession written with his own
hand.  On being asked, by a committee sent for the purpose from
the House of Lords, whether he confessed the authenticity and the
truth of this humiliating avowal, he is reported to have said, with
an expression of sorrow and repentance "which under any other
circumstances would have been deeply touching, "It is my act, my
hand, my heart; I beseech your lordships,. press not upon a broken
reed." Being fully convicted of these grave charges, he was deprived by parliament of the office he had so unworthily prostituted,
nnd sent, with the dark stain of a just condemnation upon him, to
finish his life in retirement and disgrace.
He retired to his estates, and, devoting the remainder of his life
to those grand speculations which have survived his follies and his
crimes, and let us hope also to repentance for his past errors, he died
in 1626, deeply in debt, leaving, as he says himself, with a noble
sense of the services he had rendered to the human race, " his name
and memory to foreign nations, and to mine own country after some
time is passed over."
It is singular enough that the death of this great philosopher
should. nave been caused by a cold caught in performing a physical
experiment, and that he should have been, not the apostle only, but
also the martyr of science.  It is related that, travelling by Highgate, near London, ir wintry weather, he was struck with the idea




cuHAP. IV.]      BACON'S CHARACTER-DEATH. 
that flesh might be preserved by means of snow as well as by salting:
he bought a fowl, and, descending from  his coach, assisted with his
own hands in making an immediate trial of the project by stuffing
the hen with snow; and in doing this he is said to have received a
chill, which, aggravated by his being immediately put into a damp
bed at Lord Arundel's house, caused his death in a very few days.
l.But even when his end was approaching, the great philosopher, with' the ruling passion strong in death," could not forbear communicating
to a friend, in a letter which he dictated, being too-ill to write himself, that his experiment "had succeeded excellently."
A monument was erected over his grave by his faithful friend and
disciple, Sir Thomas Meautys, who was buried  at his master's feet:
and this-monument, executed after the design of Sir Henry Wotton,
a man imbued with a taste for Italian art, has a peculiar interest as
being a portrait of the philosopher, who is represented in his usual
dress seated in an attitude of profound meditation; and the work bears
the appropriate inscription, " Sio sedebat."
Of Bacon's personal manners and demeanour all that we know is.
calculated to give us a most extraordinary idea of the charms of his
conversation and the amiability of his character.  Ben Jonson,
himself so remarkable for his own wonderful stores of learning and
powers of. conversation, and who was, too, no very indulgent critic,
has expressed his admiration of Bacon's eloquence and ready wit.
It is consoling to find that, while the conduct of the politician. presents
so many points for the severest reprobation of the moralist, the
character of the man was as attractive as *his intellect was sublime.
Bacon was a most profuse and generous master to his dependants;
and his flagitious avidity for money may be as justly attributed to an
easiness of temper, preventing him from being able to say "no" to
a petitioner, and to those habits of inattention to small matters which
so often accompany the literary character, as to the darker vices towhich.they might be ascribed by severer judges. Osborn, a contemporary writer, most probably gives the result of. personal experience
in the following description of Bacon's conversational powers:-" In
all companies he did appear a good proficient, if not a master, in
those arts entertained for the subject of every one's discourse.  His
most casual talk deservethto be written.  As I have been told, his
earliest copies required no great labour to render them competent for
-the nicest judgment. I have heard him entertain a country lord in
he proper, terms relating to horses and dogs; and at another time
out-cant a London chirurgeon. Nor did an easy falling into argument appear less an ornament in him.  The ears, of his hearers
received more gratification than trouble; and were no less sorry when
he came to conclude, than displeased with any who did interrupt
him."  The learned and amusing Howell calls him "a man of
recondite science, born for the salvation of learning, and, I thbink




82            OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CEtAP. IV.
the eloquentest that was born in this isle."  But of his eloquence
we shall be able to give a more exact idea when we come to speak
of the style of his writings.
In order to form even an approximative notion respecting the
nature and importance of the immense revolution produced in
science by the writings of Bacon, it is indispensable to have
some general idea of the state of science when he wrote. Vague,
general, and superficial eulogiums have done real injury to the fame
of this great man; for they have propagated very false notions
respecting the nature of the revolution he effected, and respecting
the means by which that revolution was brought about. Among
other vulgar errors of this nature, one of the most dangerous is that
which consists in considering Bacon as a discoverer, and attributing
to him the invention of analysis.  This is degrading a-great man to
the level of a quack.  "Bacon's philosophy," as D'Alembert profoundly says, "was too wise to astonish;" and as to the inductive
method of discovering truth, that is as old as Aristotle, or rather as
old as human reason itself.
The simple account of the great Baconian innovation will be substantially as follows. The Aristotelian method had reigned in all
the schools and universities of Europe from the period of the revival
of letters in the fourteenth century; nay, it may be considered as
having existed during the whole period of the dark ages; and thus
to have continued in action, with various degrees, it is true, of cultivation and extension, uninterruptedly from the time of Aristotle him-,
self. The acute and disputatious spirit of the /ancient Greeks, so
ingenious, so inquisitive, so paradoxical, was calculated to abuse the
opportunity for idle and fruitless speculation afforded by the general
tone of the Aristotelian logic; and this word-catching and quibbling
- -in short, this habit of arguing to abstract conclusions on insufficient
premises-was not likely to diminish among the schools of Alexandria and Byzantium. The perverted ingenuity of the Lower Empire
was still further sharpened by the part which the Orientals now began
to play in philosophy. The wildest fantasies and irregularities of
Eastern subtlety were thus added to the Greek passion for paradGx
and sophistry, and it was in this state, debased with these admixtures, that the schools of the middle ages received the philosophy of
the Stagyrite. Now the monastic spirit was characterised by all the
various peculiarities together.  It was as dreamy and fantastical as
the Oriental genius, as subtle and disputative as the Greek, and. as
sophistical in its ton~e as the Alexandrian speculations: and to all
these sources of corruption was added another, more dangerous than
any we have mentioned, in the circumstance of the Aristotelian
philosophy being made part of the ecclesiastical system-that is to
say, the alliance bet'ween the theology of Rome and the philosophy of
the Lycaeum.




CHAP. IV.]  PHILOSOPHY IN THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.            883
Ortholoxy having once taken under her fatal protection a particular system of philosophy, the consequences were equally injurious to
the one and the other; for the Church of Rome was thus not only
compelled to recognise by her adherence, and protect by her authority,
the most false conclusions of the sophical system, but deprived herself (through her assumption of infallibility) of the power of ever
renouncing any conclusion, however absurd, which she had once
sanctioned. On the other hand, the philosophical system, thus
unnaturally connected with religious orthodoxy, became at once timid
and extravagant, appealing not to sense and reason for the support
of its deductions, but to tradition and authority, and maintaining its
supremacy, not by arguments, but by persecution and violence, by
the sword, the dungeon, and the stake.
There are few episodes in the great drama of past ages more,
wonderful, and at the same time more melancholy, than the spectacle
afforded by the intense mental activity of the middle ages. What
laborious and powerful intellects were there, wasting their energies
on the vainest of empty speculations! Incessantly they argued and
concluded —but their arguments proved nothing, and their conclusions
were but idle phrases:
"They found no end, in wandering mazes lost."
We are not, however, to suppose that, at a period of such profound
and universal agitation as that which preceded the Reformation, the
Aiistotelian philosophy, though defended by all the thunders of
orthodoxy, could pass unquestioned, and meet with universal adhesion.  No; there were bold spirits who dared to question the soundness of its principles, and examine their reasonableness on grounds
of common sense. The great dispute between the Nominalists and
Realists, by accustoming men to hear the boldest speculations upon
abstract subjects, prepared the way for the ultimate overthrow of the
system which had so long reigned triumphant over the mind. Luther,
in attacking the. Romish Church, most undoubtedly struck a heavy
though indirect blow against the system of philosophy supported by
that Church; and in the enormous outburst of activity which
characterises that wonderful epoch many speculators had revolted
against the tyranny exercised on human thought under the usurped
and much-abused name of Aristotle.  In the sciences particularly,
there were many great men, who, "falling upon evil days and evil
tongues," have come down to, posterity as mountebanks, as visionaries,
or as impostors, but who, had they lived at a more auspicious time
would probably command our veneration as lights of science and
benefactors to their kind: Cornelius Agrippa, Paracelsus, Roger
Bacon, Giordano Bruno, Cardan, and Campanella.
A vain reliance on the supposed adequate power of human ratiocination kept the philosophers of the Middle Ages reasoning incessantly
7'




84-          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CHAIIP. IV.
in a circle, or diverting their attention from the only rational object
in philosophy; that is, as the very word implies, "a love for, or
search after, truth." They knew not, or they despised, the immense
practical and physical benefits which might flow from a well-directed
inquiry into the laws of nature; and it was reserved for the intellect
of an Englishman-" divini ingenii vir, Franciscus Bacon de Veru*lamio," as he is styled by Leibnitz -to show that science is only
valuable in proportion as it is practical and productive.
The principal defect of the Aristotelian method was the habit
which it encouraged of generalising. too rapidly upon insufficient
grounds: that is, of applying some principle or law of nature to phenomejna of similar, but not identical, conditions.  In short, its essential vice was a neglect of the great rule which teaches us to observe
with particular care the points of resemblance and dissimilitude existing between individual phenomena; or classes of phenomena.  The
knowledge possessed by the ancients with respect to the true properties of bodies and the nature of physical operations was vague and
limited enough; though we cannot be surprised at this imperfection
of knowledge at a period when the mechanical aids to observation
were in so primitive a state. For want of instruments they transferred to pure reason those duties which can only be effectually performed by accurate observation and patient experiment. These remarks will perhaps appear to possess more weight when we reflect
that in those sciences independent of experiment, and whose deductions are to be arrived at by the sole exercise of the ratiocinative
faculty unaided by practical trials, the intellect of the ancient world
had advanced so far that modern ages have made little or no additions
to the mass of human knowledge.  In geometry, for example, a
science which investigates abstract properties of space, and which
consequently is independent of experiment, modern times have hardly,
if at all, extended the frontiers beyond the limits reached by the
schools of Alexandria.
But we have hitherto spoken of the ancient philosophy in its pure
and normal state; we must not forget the corruptions to which it
was in its very nature exposed., and under which it ultimately succcumbed. The- grand and sublime speculations of Aristotle, exhibiting,
as we have seen, a noble but misplaced confidence in the omnipotence
of human reason, degenerated in the Middle Ages, and under the
influences which we have essayed to indicate, into a mere spirit of
empty subtlety and ingenious trifling; a system  at once of timid
servility-to precedent and prescription, and rash and illogical general.
ization: it was still
"Uncertain and unsettled,
Deep versed in books, and shallow in itself,
Crude or intoxicate, collecting toys
And trifles for choice matters, worth a sponge,
As children gathering pebbles on the shore."




-CAP. IV.]         BACON NOT A DISCOVERER.                    8
The old philosophy, which in its youth and vigour had never been
fruitful, gradually fell into dotage as its age advanced, and its latest
period of existence was characterized by the same weakness which
accompanies in man extreme old age-a senile and senseless garrulity,
a perpetual recurrence of the same worn-out topics, and a stiff and
obstinate assertion of its own infallibility: —
" Everlasting dictates crowd her tongue,
Perversely grave or positively wrong."
Bacon has most profoundly and acutely compared old systems to
children: "quippe qui," he says, "ad garriendum prompti sint,
generare non possint."
Our great philosopher was the first to perceive clearly the two predominant vices of the older method -its sterility and its stationary
character; and, he was the first -to discover- a remedy for these defects.
His own system  is characterized above all its other merits by the
qualities of utility and capability of progressive development. It is,
in short, eminently and essentially practical;j the great reformer
rightly considering that utility is the only measure of excellence in
any science.  He never pretended to.be a discoverer, and as invariably
disclaimed that title, rendering ample justice to the merits of the
great men who had devoted themselves to science, and expressing
his conviction that the unproductive state of science was not to be
attributed to any want of intellect in the philosophers who had preceded him, but simply and solely to a radical defect in their method.
"Francis Bacon thought in this manner: The knowledge whereof
the world is possessed, especially that of nature, extendeth not to
magnitude and certainty -of works." This is the key to'Bacon's
whole system, and this must excite our gratitude for the eminently
practical character of his mind. It. is this circumstance which has
given value and vitality to what he has produced., How fortunate
is it for the destinies of science that Bacon. was a man of active life,
occupied during his whole existence with real interests! -it was thus
that he not onlysaw, with the clear and steady eye of common sense,
the exact state of the disease which it.was his. aim to cure, but was
enabled to avoid pedantry and vain speculations in the administering
of the remedy.  "There is not anything in being or action," to use
his own comprehenisive words, "which could not be drawn and collected into contemplation and doctrine."
It now. remains to examine the means. which he adopted to bring
about this immense revolution in the empire of human thought. We
shall find that his great principle was to. show how universally the
previous systems neglected the middle links in that vast chain of
facts connecting-the general principle or law of nature with the remote
and individual phenomena.  "Axionata infima non multfum ab experientig nuda discrepant: suprema verb illa et generalissimt (qum
habentur) notionaria sunt et abstracta, et nil habent solidi. At media




86           OUTLINES OF -GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CHAP. I7,.
sunt axiomata illa vera et solida et viva, in quibus humance res et
fortunae sitme sunt, et supr' heec quoque, tandem ipsa illa generalissi.
ma., talia scilicet quxe non. abstracta sint, sed per hbec media vcre
limitantur." The vice of the older philosophy was the passing from
one of the extremes of this chain, abruptly, and," per saltum," to
the other.
As we have already mentioned, Bacon has never preferred any
claim to the character of a scientific discoverer; his mission was a
more exalted and a vaster one: the object of his works was to " note
the deficiency" in the various species of knowledge composing the
philosophical systems of the world; to distinguish with accuracy
which among the various lines taken by investigation were capable
of leading to certain, useful, and productive results; then to establish
the method to be pursued in following those preferable lines when
once ascertained; and finally to give examples or specimens of his
own method applied and put in action.
In contemplating this gigantic scheme, it is impossible to admire
sufficiently the genius which has traced with prophetic accuracy the
paths of sciences which were not then in existence; the union of
good sense and enthusiasm in that mind, which, while limiting in one
direction the advance of human knowledge, encouraged us to push
on, in another, to a development s6 remote as to be even yet undefined; or the rich and masculine eloquence in which these sublime
thoughts are communicated.
The great project which has immortalised the "Lord Chancellor
of human nature" was conceived at a very early age.  "Such noble
ideas are most congenial to the sanguine spirit of youth," as Hallam
justly remarks, "and to its ignorance of the extent of labour it undertakes." Bacon himself mentions, as one of his earliest productions, a work bearing the somewhat ambitious title' Temporis Partus
Maximus,' which is now lost to us, but which probably contained the
germ or embryo of his system. We will now give a short account
of his great productions, in the hope of thus rendering his philosophy
more intelligible in its unity to our readers-a precaution which has;been too much neglected by those who have written on the subject,
and who have treated tBacon's works rather as separate and independent treatises, than as parts of one vast edifice or creation.
In 1597 appeared the first edition of his Essays, a little work on
miscellaneous subjects, which contains perhaps more of wisdom,
novelty, and profound remark than any book of equal size that was
ever composed.  The subjects of these short treatises are often of a
most trite and ordinary kind, but yet it is impossible to read them,
even for the fiftieth time, without being struck by some new and
original remark, or seeing some thought placed in a new and original
light. 7' The Essays," says Stewart, "are the best known and most
popular of all his works.  It is one of those where the superiority
of his genius appears to the greatest advantage; the novelty and




CHAP. IV.]           THE NEW  PHILOSOPHY.                       8,
depth of his reflections often receiving a strong relief from the trite.
ress of the subjecct.  It may be read from beginning to end in a few
hours; and yet, after the twentieth perusal, one seldom  fails to remark in it something unobserved before.  This, indeed, is a characteristic of all Bacon's writings, and is only to be accounted for by the
inexhaustible aliment they furnish to our own thoughts, and the
sympathetic activity they impart to our torpid faculties."
The best way which we can follow to give a clear idea of Bacon's
gigantic plan for, the restoration of philosophy will be to present our
readers with a sort of programme of the whole system  of works in
which he develops the various parts of his project; and this, arranged
in a tabular form, will, we think, avoid the danger so very natural
for persons to fall into with respect to the details of Bacon's great
intellectual temple. That so vast a design could ever have been
projected by a single person is more wonderful than that some partsof the work were never executed. We have, however, enough to
prove with what justice the learned men of all countries have united,
during a period of nearly two centuries and a half, in considering
Bacon as the father of experimental philosophy. Having given this
conspectus or synopsis, we shall proceed to examine more in detail
the various works composing the great Verulamian Cycle, and thus
we hope to unite the advantages of brevity and distinctness.  We
shall see that, as these works appeared successively, though each
forming, as it were, one stone of the Baconian edifice, there were
necessarily to be expected many repetitions of ideas previously
enounced, and many anticipations of future arguments.
Our synoptical arrangement will be as follows:
The Instauratio.
I. De Augmentis Scientiarum.
i. De Pruerogativis Instantairum.
ii. *Adminicllla Inductionis.
iii. *Rectificatio Inductionis.
iv. *Variatio Inquisitionis pro natumt
subjecti.
I   Novurn  Organ~um.       V. *De Prerogativis Naturarum qua.
Mo                                     tenus ad Inquisit.
vi, *De Terminis Inquisitionis.
vii. *Deductio ad Praxin.,  viii. *De Paracevis ad Inquisitionem.
ix. *De Scalh Axiomatum.
III. Sylva Sylvarum.
IV. Scala Intellectus.
V. *Prodromi.
i VI. *Philosophia Secunda.
[The articles marked with an asterisk were never executed.]
7* 




88            OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CIIAPr IV.
We will now make a few remarks on the nature and subjects of
the above works, which together form  the whole system  of the
Baconian philosophy.  The author, before commencing the construction of his edifice, begins by what may be called clearing the ground
on which it is to stand.  The treatise'De Augmentis' is mainly a
Latin version of an English book'On the Proficience and Advancement of Learning,' which had, appeared in 1605.  It contains the
outline of the whole system, and points out the defects perceptible
in the methods previously employed in the investigation of truth.
It would however be a great mistake to consider the' De Augmentis'
as a mere translation of the treatise just alluded to; it is in many
respects almost a new work; not more than two-thirds of the whole,
being translated, while the remaining third contains the result of
fresh speculations.  Much, however, as the'De Augmentis' is
superior to its, English predecessor, Bacon did not intend it, at least
in the form under which we have it, to form the first treatise of the'Instauratio.'  That place was to be occupied by a book,'De Partitionibus Scientivm,' intended to exhibit the actual state of human
knowledge when he wrote, and to show its deficiencies. This general
summary of human science must therefore be considered, though not
as altogether wanting in the' Instauratio,' yet as but very imperfectly
supplied by the treatise'De Augmentis.'
The second part was to discuss,. as he himself expresses it, "the
science of a better and more perfect use of reason in the investigation of things, and of the true aids of the understanding;" this
being the new logic, the inductive method, in which what is eminently
called the Baconian philosophy conists.  This is very well expressed
in the title which the author has given to his work, "Organum"
signifying literally "instrument."  The treatise which we possess
under the title of'Novum  Organum' is rather i collection of
materials for the work than the book itself, as Bacon intended it to
stand second in his list.  He calls it'Partis Secundme Summa,
digesta in Aphorismos;' and it contains the heads or propositions of
the projected work.  It is subdivided into nine distinct portions, of
which Bacon has given us the titles and the general object, though
only the first of these subdivisions contains any development of the
idea.  The first of these treated of what in his picturesque language
he calls "prerogative instances," that is, of what phenomena are to
-be selected for investigation, as most likely to conduce, by the speculations to which they give rise, to the advantage of the human
species.  This singular term' prmrogative," is not used in the ordinary English sense of the same word, but contains an allusion to the
"prmrogativa centuria" of the Roman people, i. e. the first tribes
whose votes were taken at the elections of the Comitia, and whose
decision was supposed to influence the suffrages of the rest of the
citizens. Of these instances fifteen are used to guide the intellect,




CHAP. IV.]             THE INSTAURATIO.                      89
five to assist the senses, and seven to correct the practice. And here
we may remark a striking instance of Bacon's wonderful mind.  In
all former theories of logic we had been taught to detect and guard
against certain fallacies or false reasonings, arising from a wrong
employment of words or a vicious arrangement of the various parts
of an argument. Bacon goes farther than this, and has tracked, so
to say, these fallacies to their true origin —not in the abuse or imperfections of language, but to the innate weaknesses of the human
mind itself.  The former dialecticians, like inexperienced physicians,
contented themselves with applying local or topical remedies to the
external and merely symptomatic -efflorescence of the disease, while
Bacon, gifted with a larger spirit and a deeper insight into nature,
attacks the evil in its internal and invisible source, not cleansing the
surface only, but purifying the blood.  He has classed the general
causes of logical error under four heads, in a passage universally
quoted for its brilliancy and truth. These errors of reasoning he
calls idola, a term often rather absurdly rendered in English by the
word " idols," but which would be much more correctly represented
by the expression "images," or, as Bacon himself phrases it, "false
appearances"-phantoms of the mind, in short. These are idola
Tribus, idola Specuis, idola Fori, and idola Theatri; against all of
which it behoves us to be upon our guard.  By fallacies of the
Tribe, Bacon indicates the natural weaknesses to which every human
being is liable.; those of the Den or Cavern are the errors into
which we are betrayed by peculiar dispositions and circumstances;
the fallacies of the Market-place are those false conclusions arising
from the popular and current use of words which represent things
otherwise than as they really are; and the idola of the Theatre, the
errors proceeding from  false systems of philosophy and incorrect
reasoning. It will be seen, from this as well as from a'thousand
other instances, how high is the ground on which Bacon philosophises, not merely attempting, as all before him had done, to regulate
and correct the expression of reason, but aspiring to purify the very
atmosphere of thought itself. To proceed with our analysis of the'Novum  Organum,' the second subdivision treats of the aids to
induction; the third, of the correction of induction; the fourth, of
varying the investigation according to the nature.of the subject;
fifthly, of prerogative natures -i. e. what objects shall be first
inquired into; sixthly, of the boundaries of inquiry; seventhly, on
the -application of inquiry.to practice, and what relates to man;
eighthly, on the preparations (paraskeuis) for inquiry; and lastly,
on the ascending and descending scale of axioms.
The. third division of the' Instauratio' was to contain a complete
system of Natural History; not however of that science to which
the name of Natural History is at present confined, but Bacon
implies in that term an inquiry into the. properties of all physica:




90           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. IV.
bodies, and a faithful and accurate register of all the phenomena that
have ever been -observed in man's dealing with natural substances.
In the title given to this part of the work,' Sylva Sylvarum,' Bacon
probably used the word sylva in the sense which the ancient philosophers of the Epicurean school attached to it-a sense originating in
the similar signification assigned to its Greek radical'yT, that is,
primary matter, capable of being modified by a plastic force. It
would be absurd to suppose that the outline here sketched in by
Bacon could be. filled up by any single hand, during any single life,
in any age of mankind.  He had previously published as a separate
work his' Centuries of Natural -History,' containing about a thousand
miscellaneous facts:and experiments: and he has given a hundred
and thirty particular histories which ought to be drawn up for this
great work. A few of these he has given in a sort of skeleton, as
samples rather of the method of collecting the facts than of the facts
themselves; namely, the History of the Winds, of Life and Death,
of Density and Rarity, of Sound and Hearing.
The fourth part, called' Scala Intellectus,' is also wanting, with
the exception of a few introductory pages.  "By these tables,' says
Bacon, "we mean not such examples as we subjoin.to the several
rules of our method, but types and models, which place before our
eyes the entire process of the mind in the discovery of truth; select-. ng various and remarkable instances."
We now come to the fifth part of the'Instauratio,' in which
Bacon had designed to give a specimen of the new philosophy which
the hoped to raise after a due use of his natural history and inductive
method, by way of anticipation or sample of the whole.'He calls
it' Prodromi sive Anticipationes Philosophike Secunde;' and though
the work does not exist as he projected it, we possess various fragments of this part under the titles of'Cogitationes de Natura
Rerum,''Cogitata et Visa,''Filum Labyrinthi,' and a -few more;
being probably all that he had reduced to writing. The last portion
of Bacon's colossal plan was to be a perfect system of philosophy,
deduced by a legitimate, sober, and exact inquiry according to the
method whose principles he had established. This consummation,
however, of his new system Bacon well knew was beyond his own
mighty powers to execute; indeed he expresses his conviction that it
was altogether beyond the sphere of human thought.  " To perfect
this last part is above our powers and beyond our hopes.  We may,
as we trust, make no despicable beginnings; the destinies of the
human race must complete it - in such a manner perhaps, as men,
looking only at the present,- would not readily conceive. For upon
this'will depend, not only a speculative good, but all the -fortunes of
mankind, and all their power."  "And with an eloquent prayer,"
continues Hallam, from whose excellent view of the Baconian philovophy the foregoing remarks are condensed -" with an eloquent




CHAP. IV.]              BACON'S STYLE.                        91
prayer that his exertionsmay' be rendered effectual to the attainment
of truth and happiness, the introductory chapter of the' Instauratio,'
which announces the distribution of its portions, concludes. Such
was the temple, of which Bacon' saw in vision before him the stately
front and- decorated pediments, in all their breadth of light and harmony of proportion, while long vistas of receding columns and
glimpses of internal- splendour revealed a glory that it was not
permitted to him to comprehend."
As the reader will easily conclude from the titles of the various
parts of the'Instauratio,' the work was (with the few exceptions
specified above) published in Latin; the original conceptions of its
immortale author having been translated, under his immediate inspection, by Herbert, Hobbes, and other persons, "masters of the Roman
eloquence." The Latin style in which it is written is admirably
adapted to the subject, and a worthy vehicle for such majestic conceptions; it is in a high degree concise, vigorous, and accurate,
though by no means free from obscurity, and of course in no way to
be considered as a model of pure Latinity.  In reading Bacon,
either in his vernacular or more learned dress, we feel perpetually
conscious of a peculiarity, inevitably accompanying the highest
genius in its manifestations: -we mean that in him  the language
seems always the flexible and obedient instrument of thought; not,
as it is in the productions of a lower order of mind, its rebellious
and recalcitrant slave. All authors below the greatest seem to use
the mighty gift of expression with a certain secret timidity, lest the
lever should prove too ponderous for the hand that essays to wield
it: or, rather, they resemble the rash student in the old legend, who
-was overmastered by the demons which he had unguardedly evoked.
There is, perhaps, no author so metaphorical as Bacon; his whole
style is saturated with metaphor; the very titles of his books are
frequently nothing else but metaphors of the boldest character; and
yet there is not one of these figures of speech by which we do not
gain a.more vivid, clear, and rapid conception of the idea which he
desires to convey. With him such expressions, however beautiful,
are never merely ornamental: like some of the most exquisite deco.
rations of Grecian and of Gothic architecture, what appears introduced into the design for the mere purpose of adornment will ever
be found, when closely examined, to give strength and stability to
the structure, of which it seems to inexperienced eyes a mere unessential and unnecessary adjunct.
It would be superfluous here to devote more than a passing notice
to one objection which has been brought against the originality of
the Baconian system of philosophy, and against the importance of
the reformation which it produced in human science.  The methods
recommended by Bacon, say the objectors, have always been more or
less in use from the very infancy of human knowledge.  The art of,vu~uM~VLVI   UVJIC LILYCIV Y-t~-~-YI-Vy




92            OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CnlAP. IV.
induction, and of advancing from particular to general cases in the
investigation of the laws of nature,.was certainly employed and repeatedly insisted on long before the Verulamiam method was in
existence.   We have in another place strongly insisted on the
absurdity of considering Bacon as an inventor in the proper sense of
the word: what he did was not to teach us a philosophy, but to
-show us how to philosophise,; and the immeasurable importance of
what he did will best be appreciated by a simple comparison of the
progress made in real knowledge during the twenty-two centuries
which have elapsed since the,time of Aristotle, and the acquisitions
made in the- two hundred and nineteen years since the death of
Bacon.
It is.. quite true that Bacon, as he was not a discoverer in the art
of investigating truth in general, so neither did he make any specific
discoveries in any particular department of science. lie was not a
mathematician, nor an astronomer, nor a naturalist, nor a metaphysician; and in this respect we might be disposed to echo the
ironical criticism  of his contemporary Harvey, who, competent
enough himself to perceive Bacon's deficiency in. the practical and
technical parts of natural science, complained that the author of
the'Instauratio' "wrote philosophy like a Lord. Chancellor."  No!
the true obligation which the human race must ever feel, to the
latest generations, to Bacon is'that he did what no man else perhaps
was ever sufficiently gifted to do; that, seated as it were on the pinnacle of his sublime genius, he saw distinctly, and mapped out accurately, all that can ever be an object of human investigation; that
his far-darting and all-embracing intellectual vision took in at once
the whole expanse of the domains of philosophy; nay, that it pene-.
trated into the obscurity which brooded over the distant and unexplored regions of the vast country of the mind, and traced, with
prophetic sagacity, the paths that must be followed by future discoverers, in ages yet unborn.
With his own notions on physical subjects, there were mingled
many of the prejudices and erroneous ideas prevalent in his day;
but such is the essential and invariable justness of the -rules which
he has laid down for the conduct of investigation, that these false
conclusions may be swept away,, and, replaced by facts more accurately observed, without any weakening of the system  which he
originated.  To apply the admirable comparison of. Cowley, Bacon,
though himself not free from the errors of his time, yet clearly
foresaw the gradual disappearance of those errors: —
"Bacon, like Moses, led us forth at last:
The barren wilderness he pass'd
Did on the very border stand
Of the bless'd promis'd land,
And from the Pisgah-height of his exalted wit
Saw it himself and show'd us it."




CHAP. IV.]   BACON'S INTELLECTUAL CHARACTER.                 9;
At the same time, gifted as he was with "the vision and the
faculty divine," by which he could thus anticipate centuries, and
behold "not as through.a glass darkly, but face to face," sciences
which had no existence when he wrote, nothing is more admirable
than the common sense which distinguished Bacon's divine-intelligence.  The ruling and vital principle, the very life-blood of the
new philosophy, is. the indispensable necessity of accurate and com-.
plete observation of nature, anterior and preliminary to any attempt
at theorizing and drawing conclusions.  Yet, though he was the
apostle of experiment, he has no less foreseen and warned us against
the ill effects that would follow.the rash generalization founded upon
particular and imperfect observation - effects which have been very
perceptible in modern science, and.whick have tended to give to the
knowledge of later days an air of superficiality little less dangerous
than the more visionary and sophistical tone which characterizes the
ancient systems.
But above all, what strikes us as the most admirable peculiarity
of Bacon's philosophy is the spirit of utility which runs through and
modifies the whole design.  We do not mean utility in the low and
limited sense of a care for the development of man's merely physical
comforts and advantages; the exercise and cultivation of the. highest
faculties of our being, the enlarging of our sphere of intellectual
pleasures, the strengthening of our moral obligations, the refining
and elevating of our perception of the beautiful - all these Bacon
has treated, fad would have exhausted, had they not been as infinite
as the soul itself.  On many of these subjects -on the beau ideal,
for example — it will be hardly too much to say that he has left.
nothing for future speculators.
Another peculiarity which we cannot forbear noticing, as forming
one of the striking features of Bacon's intellectual character, is the
circumstance that his writings will not be found in any high degree
apophthegmatic: that is, the reader will not be likely to meet with
many of those short, extractable, and easily remembered sentences,
or gnomai,. which pass from mouth to mouth as weighty maxims, or
separate masses of truth - the gold coins, if we may so style them
of the intellectual exchange. Many such are undoubtedly to be
found in his pages, but they are certainly less plentiful in Bacon than
in other great writers; but we shall generally find these passages so
embedded and fixed in the. argument of which such propositions form
a part, as not to be extracted without manifest loss to their value and
significancy. In consequence of this, Bacon is one of those authors
who must be read through to be correctly judged and worthily
appreciated. Nor will any aspiring and truly generous mind begrudge
the labour which will attend this exercise of the highest faculties
with which God has endowed it; it is surely no mean privilege to
be thus admitted into the laboratory and workshop of the new philo.



94           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. IV.
sophy, and to behold-no indifferent spectator-the sublime alchemy
by which experience is transmuted into truth.
Among the minor works of the illustrious Chancellor it may not
be improper to mention two or three of the principal. We shall
specify, first, a very curious treatise'On the Wisdom of the Ancients,' being an attempt to explain the classical mythology, by a
system of moral and political interpretation, much less founded on
probability than calculated to elevate, in our eyes, the degree of
knowledge possessed by the pagan world. The following is the judgment, respecting this work, attributed to Balzac, from one of whose
letters it is supposed to be a quotation: " Croyons done, pour l'amour
du Chancelier Bacon, que toutes les folies des anciens sont sages, et
tous leu-rs songes mysteres; et de celles-l qui sont estimees pures
fables, il n'y en a pas une, quelque bizarre et extravagante qu'elle
soit, qui n'ait son fondement dans l'histoire, si l'on en veut croire
Bacon, et qui n'ait et6 deguis~e de la sorte par les sages du vieux
temps, pour la rendre plus utile aux peuples."  Another work is
entitled the'Felicities of the Reign of Queen Elizabeth;' and a
third is a production of greater importance, a'History of King
Henry VII.,' written probably in a courtly desire to gratify King
James, who was, as everybody knows, ambitious of the reputation
of the pacific glories of a wise and tranquil administrator, and whose
character in this respect would find a flattering parallel in the unwarlike reign of the politic Henry. Besides these, he is the author of a
philosophical- fiction entitled' The New Atlantis.'    t
The glory of Bacon, as he himself had predicted, rose gradually
-but steadily on the literary horizon of Europe.  It may however be
complained (and this is not a circumstance to be wondered at) that'his works were often rather vaguely eulogized than accurately studied:
the profound nature of their subject, and the vastness of their design,
were likely to have much limited the number of their readers; and
in consequence many erroneous opinions became prevalent, not only
respecting the true value of the Baconian revolution in science, but
even respecting the nature of the system itself. It is unnecessary to
say, that what the great philosopher gained in this way from vague
and unintelligent praise he lost in true glory, which' can only be
founded on justice. It was reserved for various illustrious metaphysicians of the Scottish school "to turn," in Hallam's words,' that
which had been a blind veneration into a rational worship."  These
profound and elegant writers, Reid, Stewart, Robison, and Playfair,
by clothing the philosophy of Bacon in the language of the nineteenth century, have deprived it of whatever repulsive and difficult
features it may have retained from its being written in a dead
language, and from its somewhat complicated arrangement and subdivisions; while some of the greatest among modern experimental
philosophers have been proud to draw, from practical observations




CHAP. V..]     ORIGIN OF TIlE ENGLISH DRAMA.                  95
and more recent improvements of astronomy and otacr branches of
physics, new illustrations of the justness of Bacon's predictions, new
conclusions clearing up obscure passages, and new proofs of the truth
of his system.  It is delightful to see. experiment thus the willing
handmaid of theory, and Herschel paying practical worship at the
shrine of Bacon,
CHAPTER V.
ORIGIN OF THE ENGLISH DRAMA.
Comparison between the Greek and Medinval Dramas —Similarity of their
Origin-Illusion in the Drama-Mysteries or Miracle-Plays —Their Subject
and Construction - Moralities - The Vice - Interludes - The Four P.'sFirst Regular Dramas-Comedies-Tragedies-Early English Theatres -
Scenery-Costume-State of the Dramatic Profession.
THERE are very few aesthetic subjects upon which more controversy has been raised than upon the respective merits of various
schools of the Drama: and certainly there are not many which have
excited more critical asperity than the long-vexed question as to the
comparative merits of the two great dramatic schools, to which
Schlegel has assigned the not inapposite titles of Classical and Romantic.  But both parties seem to have forgotten the similar origin
and history of the two schools which they represent as so different,
nay, even as so opposed; and to have pretty generally overlooked the
important fact that the peculiarities of structure which respectively
characterise the two classes of productions, so falsely considered as
antagonistic, are reallyr not essential or inherent, but arise from
merely technical or superficial circumstances.  Thus, for example,
the Greek tragic drama was originally a religious ceremony, and,
however modified, never entirely lost that sacred character. The personages of the Attic stage were almost always to a certain degree
mythic: that is, they were almost invariably heroic; invested, either
by antiquity, by the greatness of their exploits, or their immediate
relations with the deities, with something of a religious character;
and it is easily conceivable that, with such a people as the Greeks,
the boundary-line between the god and the hero was not very distinctly traced: Theseus, for instance, was very little less a god than
Hermes, and Apollo very little more divine than Orestes; there were
indeed many characters, frequently produced on the Athenian stage,
who, like Hercules, obviously partook of the two qualities.  Thus
the Attic tragedy always retained a good deal. of the historico-mythio




96           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.'[CltAP. V.
character-a character which pervaded even the technical details of
its construction, performance, and mise en scene.
Indiscriminate admiration, however, has discovered beauties in
merely accidental and unimportant peculiarities, and has attempted
to derive from the necessary laws of art rules which were founded
upon circumstance or convenience. Thus, because the Greek-theatres
were of colossal dimensions, and consequently uncovered, enthusiastie
critics have discovered beauty and grandeur in the contrivances em
ployed to exaggerate the size of the actor and increase the sound of
his voice:-because their construction, and also the imperfection of
the arts of mechanism, together also perhaps with some prejudices
connected with the gravity and. even sacredness of these spectacles,
precluded them from changing the scene, attempts have been made
to prove that the fixed scene-or unity of place-is an' essential law
of the dramatic art, and that consequently the modern plays are
necessarily and demonstrably barbarous. It is exceedingly curious
to observe with what ingenuity the so-called classical critics have defended the-adherence to the Three Unities in dramatic composition.
Their reasoning has all along been founded upon the supposition,
that in the dramatic art the source of pleasure is to be found in illusion, and that consequently the preservation of the unities is necessary.  Now, we will not maintain in this place the very false and
low view of the true nature and object of art. involved in this supposition; we will not show its fallacy when applied to painting, to
music, to sculpture, or show that illusion-or rather delusion, a
cheating of the senses-is never at all contemplated in works of any
degree of excellence; we will not repeat the obvious fact that illusion,
properly so called, never was ahd never can be attained, or even approximatively reached, in any dramatic work whatever, and that,
even could it be attained, the result would be precisely subversive of
the only conceivable efd of the drama, viz. the production of pleasure
We will go at once to the point, and say that this principle of illusion,
as an object to be attained by the dramatist, was never at all recognised by the Greeks themselves. It is true that the Apollo or the
Venus might be rendered by a coating of rose-pink much more like
a man and a woman; but the object of the sculptor was to elevate
and gratify our imagination, and not to cheat our eye.  Had the
latter been the aim of sculpture, a wax doll would be a finer production than the noblest marble that ever breathed under the chisel of,
Phidias.
We have only to read a Greek play to see that nothing can be less
artificial as a contrivance for producing mere illusion. The formality
and regularity of the language, the simple and straightforward
character of the dialogue, the lyric portion or chorus, written in a
different dialect and more splendid imagery than the. rest of the
work, the total neglect of probability and even possibility in thn




CtHAP. V.3           THE GREEK DRAM.%,'~    97
arrangement of the events, time and space perpetually annihilated,
and every conceivable rule of human conduct and prudence inces.
santly violated-all these things sufficiently prove to us that the.
great Greek dramatists never so much as contemplated the possibility
of producing what we call illusion.
No man,. we flatter ourselves, ever admired more fervently than
we do the admirable genius and exquisite taste which characterise
the Greek tragedies: their dignity, their pathos, the wonderful depth
and acuteness of the remarks with which they are crowded, the daz.
zling splendour of the lyric portions so nobly contrasted with the
pure marble-like severity of the dialogue, the rich descriptions (put
into the mouth of the messenger in most of them) of the terrible
catastrophe with'which they conclude, and -which the Greeks did not
permit to take place on the stage, from a scruple founded, we are
persuaded, not on a principle of taste, but of religion-these are
merits which we can allow with enthusiastic readiness; but they are
merits very distinct from that principle of illusion which has been
considered as having guided the mighty art of IEschylus, of Sophocles, and of Euripides.
If we examine into the early history of that Romantic' Drama
which has become universal over the whole of modern Europe, and
which has in our own century finally expelled the so-called Classicism
from its last entrenchments on the stage of France, we shall see how
singularly its'origin and first development resembled the rise of the
Grecian Tragedy. Both species of composition were at first purely
religious; both were performed on solemn occasions in temples; both
were distinguished for the simplicity of their structure, and for a total
neglect of the much-vaunted principle of illusion; both were accompanied by a certain proportion of lyric declamation, executed by a
number of persons who occupied a middle or intermediate position
between the principal dramatic characters on the stage (the protagonists) and the audience who witnessed the solemn show.
The food, the pabulum, of the dramatic art was in the two cases
as different as were the religion, the manners, the modes of thought
and action at the two periods which we have thus contrasted.  The
Greek dramatist drew his materials from the rich storehouse of pagan
mythology, the black annals of his ancient kings, and the legends of
his national heroes: in these he found ample materials for his
scenes; and the whole was bound together by one pervading princi
ple, in the highest degree moving and sublime-the over-ruling and
incessant action of the dramatic fate. These grand and awful
events were familiar to the audience from their infancy; they
were calculated to gratify to the highest degree the national vanity
and patriotic enthusiasm: every Athenian felt himself the countryman, many the descendants, of Theseus or of (Edipus; and when
we reflect upon the intensity of the patriotism which characterised




98           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.    [CHAP. V
the citizens of the little republics of Greece, together with the
delicate sense of the beautiful which seemed peculiarly innate in
the Hellenic character, we shall find that their dramatists were as
amply provided with materials for their art as with rewards for its
triumphant exercise.
In the Middle Ages the external manifestations of the art were
all changed, but the art itself remained the same. The rude populations of chivalric Europe, the serfs of England, France, and Germany,
could have felt but very imperfectly any sentiments addressed to
their patriotism. Ignorant, barbarous, and oppressed, how could men
love their country, who could not call their wives and children their
own?  How could men, reduced to. a mere brutish state of animal
obedience, feel their hearts swell within them at the mimic representation of great exploits? As to the mere abstract perception of the
beautiful, such a feeling could not exist in their minds.  What
strings were left in the human heart undeadened and capable of
responding to the touch of genius? We answer, the sense of wonder.
Catholicism, with all its miracles, its legends, its enthusiasm, had
supplanted the paganism of classical antiquity. We are not inclined
to consider the credulity of the ancients, at least at the period when
the Greek drama reached its highest pitch of splendour,' as very
deeply seated, or likely to modify very profoundly the character of
the Athenian people. Their credulity was rather of the imagination;
that of the Middle Ages was of the heart.  What a difference
between the airy grace and sensuous allegory of the pagan mythology,
where belief was merely a matter of assent, involving no practical
change of conduct, and offering no promises, or very faint ones, of a
future, existence, with that deep, all-pervading, and solemn religion
which offered to the oppressed serf of the Middle Ages his only
consolation in this life, together with his mighty hope and onlooking
to the next!  The very.superstitions, too, of the time, the huge
mass of striking and yet fantastic imagery which composed a world
of legend, exhibit an example of the fact that in depriving the
human mind of some-of its senses (as takes place in those of the
body) we only add intensity and power to those we leave behind.
The religious dramas of the Middle Ages were nothing but an
embodiment of Christianity as it appeared to the simple imagination
of those rude times. They were often little else but the narration
of some biblical or legendary miracle,.rudely dramatised, and often in
the language of Scripture.  They are supposed to have originated in
the recitals of pilgrims, returning from their long wanderings in
distant and unknown lands with an abundant stock of wonders, perilous adventures and hair-breadth'scapes, gorgeous descriptions of the
magnificence. of the.East, enthralling tales of persecution and wild
idolatries.  With these the "palmer graye" would collect a crowd
about him, and keep his simple hearers listening with umwearied




CHAPr. v.]    THE MEDIIE VAL DRAMA: MYSTERIES.               9
wonder hour after hour; just as the professed tale-teller of the East
enchants his grave and bearded audience in the coffee-houses of
Damascus, or the ragged improvvisatore of Naples enchains his circle
of boatmen and lazzaroni. That such tales should have by degrees
taken a dramatic form is not surprising; still less so that the Church
should have very soon perceived the efficacy of such representations,
not only as instruments of instruction for the people, but also as a
means for extending the authority of the priesthood, and increasing
the revenues of the ecclesiastical institutions.  The people were
unable to read, and their ideas respecting the Scriptural history were
exceedingly imperfect; and the priests of the Middle Ages were far
too well acquainted with the human heart not to know the truth of
the Horatian precept -
" Segniiis irritant animum demissa per aures,
Quam qua sunt oculis submissa fidelibus."
The Church therefore encouraged, as far as possible, the strong taste
early developed for the religious dramas, viewing them as at once a
powerful medium of religious instruction, and as an inexhaustible
source of profit and influence; and we find them used as a very
important mechanism for raising the immense sums destined to the
support of the crusades. At first they were of a purely religious
character; the subjects were always either events of the biblical
history itself, or else extracts from the legends of the saints. The
representation of these dramas was very early taken, by the profound
policy of the hierarchy, out of the hands of the laity; and the performance was carried on in the church itself, the actors being priests,
and the splendour of the spectacle augmented by the use of the rich
vestments and ornaments of the clergy.
Here we may clearly see the singular resemblance existing between
the Greek tragedy and the religious plays of the Middle Ages.
Both were; performed in a sacred spot; the subjects of both were
drawn from what was considered, at the respective periods, to be most
holy and venerable; both were placed before the spectator with the
greatest magnificence attainable; and the spirit of mingled patriotism
and religion, which it was the object of the Greek theatre to excite,
was certainly little inferior in intensity to the credulous and simple
awe with which the rude audiences of Catholic times must have
witnessed the great mysteries of their religion represented before the
altar of a cathedral. In fact, we cannot but remark that the very
name of this species of spectacle is strongly corroborative of the
truth of our parallel; they were called " mysteries" and "nmiracles."
Even the division of the stage recalls something of the rigour and.
complexity of the Greek scene: it was.divided into three platforms;
the upper being reserved for the appearance of God, angels, and,
glorified spirits; the next below it, to the human personages of the'
8*




100          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [OCRAP. V.
drama; and the lowest, devoted to the devils, being a representation
of the yawning mouth of hell -the "alta ostia Ditis"-a black and
gloomy cavern, vomiting flames and sulphureous smoke, through
which incessantly ascended the howling of the damned, and by which
the evil spirits made their exits and their entrances, rising to tempt
and torture humanity, or plunging back with the bodies of their
victims.  In all these peculiarities it is impossible not to be struck
with the resemblance between the drama of the Middle Ages and
that of classical antiquity. Nor can we fail to remark the innumerable traces left by the religious dramas upon- the art of this period.
The much-agitated question of the meaning of the singular title
given by Dante to his great work could hardly have been raised had
the critics remembered that the comnmedia of the-'" gran padre Alighier" is nothing else but a mystery in a narrative form; and that
the three divisions of Hell, Purgatorv, and Paradise correspond
exactly with the three stages of the religious dramas.
The subjects of these dramas were generally taken from the most
striking and pathetic passages of the Bible history: the Creation,
the Deluge,- the Fall of Man, the Sacrifice of Abraham, the - Massacre of the Innocents, the Crucifixion; no subject appears to have
been too solemn or too vast for the attempt of this bold but barbarous art.  They never shrank from introducing upon the stage the
most sublime personages; the Deity himself, the Saviour, the
patriarchs, all figfire in these singular dramas. They seem not to
have felt that species of awe which would now prevent an author
from presenting, in a visible form, such impersonations-an attempt
which not even the genius of Goethe could succeed in rendering
successful. At such early periods, when the critical faculty had not
yet dried up in man the springs of wonder and belief, there could
have been neither real nor imaginary disrespect in this freedom.
They followed as closely as they could the march, and even the language, of the Scriptural narration, and would probably have felt it
as derogatory to the dignity of their subject to omit any detail of the
Bible history, as we should find it dangerous, or even reprehensible,
to follow those details with too great a fidelity.
These compositions were for the most part written, as might be
~ expected, in the popular metre of the various countries which pro-'duced them  -for it must not be forgotten that such representations
were the favourite amusement of mankind in all the countries of
Europe during a very long period.  Germany, France, Italy,.Portugal, and Spain —in short, there is not any country which does not
possess a large collection of. these singular productions.
They were sometimes of inordinate length, and in many cases
lasted even several days: there is one in existence, on the subject
t*f the Creation,: which occupied in the performance a period as long
as the event which it represented, and consequently- the spectators




CHAP. V.]   THE MEDIIEVAL DRAMA  MYSTERIES.                  101
of this mystery gratified their wonder during a period of six successive days.  We may inquire how the authors of these productions
could have succeeded in introducing any thing ludicrous and comic
into dramas whose principal action was so solemn and supernatural.
Ludicrous scenes, however, they were obliged to have; for the
people were in far too rude a state to be able to sit listening for so
long a time to purely religious and moral declamation.  To attain
this end they hit upon the happy expedient of making the Devil the
never-failing comic character in those cases where the nature of the
subject precluded the possibility of introducing a mere human
buffoon. The devil was the butt and clown of the performance,
and, being generally represented in a light at once terrific and contemptible, this circumstance has probably originated the very curious
part played in the popular legends by the Father of Evil. The
malignant spirits, in all systems of mythology and popular belief,
with the single exception of Christianity, are presented in colours
darkly and tremendously sublime, and certainly their agency is
never represented as accompanied by circumstances in any way mean
or ridiculous.  Christianity, however, the vital principle of which is
the victory of truth over the powers of evil, has originated the popular character of a malicious and ugly fiend, whose machinations are
defeated by a very moderate degree of ingenuity and address.  How
far the obscurer superstitions of paganism which still remained-in
the popular imagination may have conduced to this curious anomaly,
it is not at present our object to inquire: it is not improbable that
it arose in some measure from an ancient belief, propagated by many
of the Christian fathers, that the deities of the various pagan mythologies were in reality evil spirits allowed for a time to mislead and
delude the human race; and also the first propagators of Christianity, finding the notions of polytheism so deeply and ineradicably
implanted in the mind of man, contented themselves with representing as malignant the nature of those beings whose existence they
could not disprove, and were probably themselves very little inclined
to deny. -The devil, therefore, of popular belief-not the haughty
and beautiful creation of Milton, but the hideous demon, the
"lubber fiend," of Ariosto, with his horns and hoofs and tail -was
the comic character of the mysteries; to which, wherever possible,
they added other buffoons of a like ludicrous colour, generally selected among the wicked human personages of the drama. Thus,
in the miracle-play of the'Massacre of the Innocents,' the satellites
of Herod-his knights as they are called with a laughable anachronism, and who are represented as swearing by "Mahound," or
Mahomet —are exposed to the alternate laughter and detestation ot
the audience. Nor did these old authors neglect those broad and
general subjects of satire presented by human weaknesses, and which
are found in Wte writings of all periods. The quarrels of matrimony,




102          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CHIAP. V.
and the miseries undergone by henpecked husbands, as they are
subjects of all ages, and "come home to the business and bosoms of
men," have excited the laughter of mankind in every epoch: undoubtedly there were s~olding wives before the flood, but it is curious
to see a virago forming one of the "'dramatis personae" in a miracleplay on the subject of the Deluge. In the very singular drama to
which we have just alluded, "Noe's Wif" is a character of a purely
comic nature, and is represented, in a scene by no means devoid of
coarse drollery, as refusing to enter the ark unless she is allowed to
bring with her "her gossips every one," whom she swears (by St.
John!) that sbe loves with great- affection.  In a German mystery,
which we believe has been printed, Cain and Abel are introduced as
examined by the Almighty, in the presence of Adam, as to their
proficiency in the "Lord's Prayer." Abel is prompted by our
Saviour, and gets through his task pretty respectably; but Cain, who
is secretly instigated by the devil standing behind him to say the
prayer backwards, is very properly and condignly flogged, having
previously received divers cuffs from  his father foi refusing to take
his hat off! We see, therefore, that the humour of these pieces,
however natural and enjoue, was of no very refinud character; the
pathetic passages, it is fair to add, sometimes reach a high degree of
excellence. In an English mystery on the st-bject of Abraham's
sacrifice, the scene between the father and the son *is exceedingly
tender and beautiful, and the speech of Isaac, in particular, of very.
great merit. In short, these works show that the heart of man,
however imperfect be his civilization, has always some chords which
vibrate responsive to the touch of nature.
We have hitherto been speaking of the mystery or miracle-play
in its pure and-original form, as a representation exclusively religious
in its subject and in the mode and place of its performance.. It will
now be our business to trace, as rapidly as possible, the changes by
which it was gradually transformed into the romantic drama of modern times. It may easily be conceived that so favourite and so' profitable a species of entertainment as the stage could not long be
monopolised by the Church.  In the mind of man there has ever
been an inherent taste for dramatic impersonations; there is no age
so rude, no country so barbarous, as not to possess some amusement
of a dramatic nature; indeed, it may be said that the very rudeness
of an age is itself a measure of what may be called its dramatic sensibility.  Children, as we see, are perpetually acting; and the childhood of nations is like that of individuals; at that period the imagination is in the highest degree excitable; while at the same time the
judgment and the comparing faculty are not yet developed.
The mysteries then, from being a purely- religious exhibition, gradually degenerated into the moralities, a species of entertainment
which is one strp farther towards the embodiment of imaginary per



CHAP. v.]   THE MEDIEVAL DRAMA: MORALITIES.                 103
sonages. In these pieces the historical or theological characters of
the Scripture were supplanted by personifications of abstract qualities
-the virtues, the vices, the sentiments of human nature.  In the
morality, instead of Moses, of Adam, of the Holy Spirit, we have
Tustice, Mercy, Temperance, Folly, Gluttony, and Vice.  In fact,
this last character, whose language and costume were ludicrous, enters
into the composition of every morality as the clown or buffoon. We
are not, however, to suppose that the devil was dismissed: in spite
of the less religious character of the morality as compared with the
mystery, Satan was far too droll a personage to be thus cashiered -
he is retained; and the greater part of the comic scenes consist of
dialogues between the Devil and the Vice, the latter of whom is
generally represented as baffling and beating his infernal antagonist,
who, however, sometimes enjoys his revenge, and carries off the Vice
at the end of the piece. It should be remembered that the Vice
was habited in the motley, and wore the coxcomb, of the jester of
this period, and armed with the wooden sword which figures on the
stage even down to the present day as the wand of Harlequin.
Indeed, Harlequin himself, and that other pleasant Italian, Pulcinella-the universal type, under some name or other, of popular
drollery and satire-are supposed by the learned to trace their pedigree to the moralities of the Middle Ages: so few in number are the
forms under which the human mind embodies its creations.  The
old Italian comedy, the ancient Spanish comedy, in fact all the dramatic types of modern Europe, bear indisputable traces of a very
high antiquity indeed; nay, some antiquaries have even gone so far
as to see in Arlecchino, in Pulcinella, in the clown of the English
stage, and in the Gracioso of the Spanish, the principal characters
of the Atellan farces, which the Romans laughed at so heartily, and,
not stopping even here, have considered this pleasant family of drolls
as representing various personages in the celebration of the mysteries
of Eleusis, and the yet remoter worship of the Cabiri!
The subjects of the moralities were, as the name implies, of an
ethical nature, intended to inculcate principles of virtue; and however imperfect, as a means of exciting sympathy and interest in the
spectator, were the cold impersonations of abstract ideas which composed their "dramatis personae," these works are by no means deficient either in ingenuity of plot, or in the occasionally skilful delineation of character. They were generally performed either by students
at the universities, or by the great municipal bodies in towns, to
celebrate some solemn festival, or to do honour to some exalted personage. In the former case they were often in Latin; and in the
latter-that is, when produced by the members of the trades, mestiers,
or craft-corporations of the cities -they were either acted on a temporary stage erected in the open air, or on a moving platform on
wheels; thus forming part of those spler did processions of which we
read so much.




1.04         OUTLINES OF GENERALI LITERATURE.    [CHAP. V.
Among the more remarkable of these compositions which have
come down in the English language to our times, it will be necessary
meiely to cite the titles of two or three; as the name of the piece
will give us in general a pretty good idea of its subject and contents.' Lusty Juventus,' in which the hero, a personification of the abstract
idea of youth, is seduced by the various passions and vices, and protected by the opposing virtues. Other examples will be found in'Impatient Poverty,''Hit the Nail on the Head,''The Hog.hath
lost his Pearl,' &c. &c.  These moralities imperceptibly merged into
another species of drama, less ambitious in its construction, less regular in its plot, and admitting a good deal more drollery and humour.
These were the interludes, which formed a favourite entertainment in
the days of Henry VIII., and which were much shorter and of a
much merrier character than the solemn and scholastic morality.
Of: these a noted and most prolific author was John Heywood, a
sort of jester at the court of the king just mentioned, and whose wild
farces exhibit extraordinary powers of humour and even wit. Heywood was an enthusiastic Catholic,, and his rude dramas bear innumerable marks of that great war of polemics and ridicule which
preceded the Reformation.  In times of religious dissension, every
province of literature, even the least fitted to. be made the scene of
religious warfare, is invaded by the contests of theology; and a cornplete collection might be made of moralities and interludes of this
time, written to maintain the.opinions of the Catholics on one side,
and of the Reformers on the other, in which plentiful volleys of ridicule and abuse are directed by the author against the partisans of the
opposite Church. As -the name implies, the interlude is properly a
short dramatic scene, intended to be performed in the intervals of
some greater ceremony or festival- It was originally represented in
the pamses unavoidably occurring during the representation of the
solemn morality, or, as a kind of entr'acte, in the vacant intervals
which frequently took place in the long festivities of the Middle
Ages.  It is thus that at the present day dramatic representations
are introduced in China to enliven the guests between the courses of
their interminable banquets; and the interlude, we know, was frequently performed in the great halls of our ancestors on festival
occasions. These representations were almost always of a broadly
comic character, and were frequently, like the satiric dramas of the
Attic stage, a species of parody or burlesque upon the graver action
of the piece in the intervals of which they were performed. One
of the irollest of these dramatic caricatures is entitled'The Four
P's:' it is in a rude kind of jingling, doggrel verse, and represents
a species of match made by its four interlocutors-the four. P's, from
whence it takes its title-a pedler, a pilgrim, a'poticary, and a pardoner-as to who can tell the greatest lie: after a good deal of asonishing mendacity, the pardoner asserts, as if accidentally, that he




HRAP - v          FIRST REGULAR DRAMAS.                     105
never new a woman out of temper; and this being unanimously agreed
to be the greatest lie ever heard, the prize is awarded to the assertor
of so tremendous a falsehood.
It is obvious that the dramatic art was now upon the very verge
of the regular Comedy and Tragedy; and the process of gradual
improvement can be traced no farther from the allegorical personages
of the morality to the creation of specific human characters and the
representing of actual human life.'We have now reached the period
of the first regular comedies, properly so called; the excellence of
which, it is but proper to remark, was such as to give noble earnest
of the splendid triumphs in this way of writing which the English
titerature was.destined afterwards to achieve. Probably in the reign
~f IHenry VIII., but certainly not later than 1551, Nicholas Udall?roduced his' Ralph Royster Doyster,' the first comedy in the lanxuage, in which the ingenuity of the plot, the nature of the characters, and the ease of the -dialogue are all carried to a high degree of
perfection.  The dramatis personae are all taken from middle life,
and the play give's us a most admirable picture of the manners of
the citizens of London at this period.  It is written in a very loose
and conversational species of rhymed couplet, and was probably
performed by the scholars of Westminster, of which school the
author was master. About ten years afterwards we meet with another comedy, long supposed to have been the earliest in the language:
this is'Gammer Gurton's Needle,' and is a rich piece of rustic
drollery, the plot turning upon the loss of a; needle with which
Gammer (commere?) Gurton was mending the breeches of her man
Hodge, and which loss is attributed by a beggar-the clever and
rascally intrigant of the piece -to the dishonesty of a neighbour,
between whom and Mistress Gurton there occurs a most admirable
scolding scene.  After a considerable period of consternation, misunderstanding, and quarrelling in all quarters (for we must think
that a needle at this period, and in a remote village, was a serious
loss), and after we have been amused with Hodge's terrors in a scene
where the Beggar proceeds to call up the Devil in order to discover
the needle, the missing article is found, sticking in the breeches, by
Hodge, who roars out with mingled pain and delight when its prick
announces the recovery of the long-lost little implement. This droll
production is full of a real verve and rude richness of language, and
the characters are delineated with broad strokes of truth and a rustic
animation.  It was the work of John Still, who ultimately became
Bishop of Bath and Wells, and was probably acted at the university.
Its versification - for it is, like its predecessor, in rhyme - is rather
more loose and irregular than that of' Ralph Royster Doyster,' and
is an excellent vehicle for the rustic shrewdness and broad humour
which distinguish it.  This curious play has been compared to the
famous comedy of'Patelin,' which was one of the earliest comb




106          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.    [CHAP. V
efforts of the French stage, but we think the English piece superior
in point of vigour and naturalness.
While comedy, as we have just seen, appears to have made a very
striking and rapid advance in this period of English literature, it is
singular enough that the earliest tragedies in our language should
exhibit all the poverty, stiffness, and formality of manner consequent
upon a close imitation of the classic models.  The early dramatic
authors, although they had sense and taste enough to look for the
materials of their comedy into the abundant mine of oddity and
humour offered by the domestic life of their own country, did not
venture, in their tragic delineations, to cast off the rigid yoke of
classic form and precedent.  The tragedy of'Ferrex and Porrex,'
written by Thomas Sackville, afterwards Earl of Dorset, and Thomas
Norton, was acted by the students of the Inner Temple before Queen
Elizabeth in the year 1561.  It is considered to be the earliest
tragedy in the language. Its subject is founded upon a legend of
the almost fabulous epochs of British history, and the leading incident resembles that of the story of Eteocles and Polynices, which
has again been repeated by Schiller in his'Braut von Messina;' a
tale, singularly enough, found in the annals of various nations and
distinct periods.'Ferrex and Porrex' exhibits in all its details a
servile adherence to the technical forms of the classic drama, in the
fewness of the persons, the uniform gravity and philosophic stateliness of the language, and, above all, in the retention of the chorus.
Nothing can be more striking than the contrast between the formal
solemnity of the dialogue of this play-the perpetual severity of
the style-the apophthegms with which it is crowded"Dry chips of short-lung'd Seneca-"
the intense care to preserve a tone of regal dignity which prevails
throughout the work, and the freedom, richness, and idiomatic
humour which distinguish the comedies written previous to its appearance-qualities which were afterwards recalled to tragedy by the
great authors of the Shakspearian school.
After'Ferrex and Porrex' we pass rapidly over a long list of
works all more or less characterised by the same classical stiffness
and adherence to dramatic dignity, and which were in almost every
case either direct adaptations from other languages, or, when founded
upon events in the early history of the country, always composed
upon the same classical models. After enumerating a few of them
we will proceed to give an idea of the mechanism of the theatres at
the dawning of our dramatic literature, and the general condition of
the art previous to the appearance of Shakspeare: — Damon and
Pythias,' written by Richard Edwards, and acted at Oxford in 1566j
the comedy of'The Supposes,' taken from'I Suppositi' of Ariosto,
tand'Jocasta,' a tragedy, imitated from Euripides;'Tancred and




IHAP. vr.]       EARLY ENGLISH THEATRES.                   107
Gismunda, acted in 1'568;'Promos and Cassandra,' ten years
afterwards, written by George Whetstone; and a number of historical
plays, as'The Troublesome Reign of King John,''The Famous
Tictoeiies of Henry V.,''The Chronicle History of Leir, King of
England,' and a multitude of others, chiefly valuable as being the
mine from which Shakspeare afterwards extracted his materials.
These works'were generally performed before the court, and must be
considered as the first rude and imperfect essays of that grandes
dramatic school which forms the chief literary glory of the reigns
of Elizabeth and James I.
It is singular to remark that, while the theatres of this period
were of the rudest construction and the appliances for producing the
illusion of the scene were yet in a most imperfect state, the dramatic
profession should have numbered in its ranks men who carried'their
art to a pitch of splendour which succeeding ages have neither equalled nor approached.  It seems as though the very insufficiency of the
material contrivances only tended to make these great men rely upon
their own genius to produce impressions upon the imagination of
their audience more vivid and intense than the ~rude theatre of the
time could hope to make upon their senses. The actors of this
time, who were in many cases dramatic authors also, generally associated themselves into a sort of joint-stock company, and either travelled about the country, performing in the houses of the nobility, and
for the amusement of the people on temporary stages in the yards
of inns, or established themselves in some of the numerous theatres
of London. These latter buildings, though erected expressly for the
performance of plays, retained many peculiarities traceable to the
custom of acting in inns. They were uncovered, excepting over the
stage; and the scenery, if it deserves the name, was of the rudest
description, and consisted generally, till the time of Davenant at the
Restorati6n, of nothing but a few curtains of tapestry or painted
canvas, suspended so as to give the actors the power of making their
exit and entrance, as if into a room, square, forest, street, &c.  As
the Elizabethan dramas are remarkable for the frequent supposed
changes of scene which take place in them, the spot presented to the
audience was indicated by the simplest expedient; a placard was
fixed to one of the curtains, bearing the name of the city or country
supposed, and this'placard was changed for another at a change of
scene: if, for exaimple, the action was to be, imagined in Padua, an
inscription with the word "Padua" was suspended in view of the
audience; should the scene be supposed to take place in a palace, a
throne and canopy, called a "state," would be pushed forward; if in
a tavern, the production of a table with bottles and glasses upon it
-if in a court, a combination of the "state," with a table -bearing
pens and ink, were all that was necessary to give the hint or sugges.
tion to the imaginative minds of an Elizabethan audience.''W
9




108          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.    [CHAP. V.
know, from innumerable passages of the old dramatists, that it was
customary for the "gallants," dandies, or raffines of the period, to
sit during the performance on chairs placed on the stage in full view
of the audience, smoking their pipes and exhibiting the splendour of
their dress, and scrupling not to criticise aloud the drama which was
going forward-a circumstance which must have still further injured
the probability of the scene. At the-back of the stage was erected
a species of balcony or scaffolding of various platforms, on which
appeared the persons who were supposed to speak from a window,
from the wall of a besieged city, and so forth; and there were also
permanent projections in various parts of the stage, behind which
the actors might retire, in order unobserved to overhear and see
what was going on —a dramatic expedient so much used in the
theatre of every country and period.
It must not be forgotten, by any one who desires to form a correct
idea of the Elizabethan stage, that the female parts were acted by
boys, no woman having appeared as a performer in England until the
Restoration, when the possibility that the other sex could represent
fictitious characters seems first to have been demonstrated in Italy,
whence the example was rapidly followed in England and elsewhere.
This circumstance is calculated to immeasurably increase our wonder
and admiration at Shakspeare's genius, the profoundest, most delicate,
and most inimitable of whose delineations- are often his female
characters, and who has never fallen into that coarseness of allusion
and indulgence in double entendre which defiles the scenes of even
the greatest of his illustrious contemporaries.  Mean as was the
scenery of the Elizabethan theatre, it would be an error to suppose
that the dresses were in the same degree poor and unvaried. The
actors appear to have exhibited great splendour of personal decoration, wearing, in plays of all ages and countries, the costume of their
own time and nation —a costume, however, the anachronisms. of
which were not likely to have greatly shocked the uncritical audiences
of the day. It is true that the universal employment, on the stage,
of a contemporary costume has led many of the authors into the
commission of trifling breaches of chronological or geographical correctness, giving, in Massinger, watches to Spartan senators, and
arming Romans with the Spanish rapier of the sixteenth century;
but, after all, the importance of such errors is in general much over.
rated by the critics, and they make but little impression upon the
truly imaginative and excitable spectator, who seldom stops to verify
dates and judge the niceties of costume.  Be this as it may, the
manly, graceful, and splendid Costume of the reign of Elizabeth
appears to have been generally employed, as it still is retained (in
oiu  opinion with great propriety) in all those plays of imaginative
character, the scene and age of whose supposed action is incapable
of being strictly assigned and particularised.




CHAP. v.]   STATE OF THE DRAMATIC PROFESSION.                109
The literary and even -the personal career of most of the great
dramatists of this period is in many respects so much the same, and
also tends in so great a degree to throw light upon the true character of their works, that we will make a few general remarks on this
subject before entering into any critical or biographical details: by
so doing also we hope to give a clearer notion of our national stage
at this vigorous and brilliant period of its existence.  The immortal
men who have illustrated this portion of our literature were, in a
great majority of cases, persons of academical education-in some
instances, -as in those of Ben Jonson and Chapman, they were
distinguished for their learning, even in a learned age. In a multitude of instances, too, they were young men of violent passions and
desperate fortune, who rushed up to the capital from their academic
retirement of Oxford or Cambridge, and thought to find in the
theatre the source of a rapid and turbid glory, and perhaps the means
for indulging, with little exertion to themselves, in the riotous pleasures of the town, elevated the while by the spirit of freedom and
intellect which prevailed in the theatrical circle. They almost all of
them began their career as actors, and it is to this circumstance that
we must attribute some of the peculiar excellences of their way of
writing. It made them- consummate masters of what is called
"stage-effect," the art of placing their.characters in the most
striking and picturesque situations, though at the -same time it
tended to increase that taste for violent exaggeration and inconsistent
passion which forms one of their evident defects.  They were not
calm, contemplative scholars, building up, in the silence of their
study, structures of elaborate and artificial character; but menactive; suffering, enjoying men; who had mingled in the serious
business of life, and painted its smiles and its tears, its grandeur
and its littleness, from incessant and personal observation.  They
wrote, too, for an audience eager for novelty, thirsting and hungering
for strong, true passion —an audience composed, not of the court,
but of the body of the people.  On reading the dramas of this
period we cannot understand how human sensibilities could bear the
shock of such terrible pathos as we find in these wonderful workssagony piled upon agony till it becomes almost too powerful when
read; what then must it have been when represented with all the
graces of delivery!  The truth is, that "there were giants in those
Aays," and the spectators cared not how painfully their sympathies
vere awakened, provided they were moved strongly, naturally, and
directly.
The language, too, in which these terrible or playful scenes were
written, was a medium admirably suited to the purpose and to the
time: it wag in the highest degree rich, varied, tender, and majestic;
adorned with all the graces'of classical imagery, but without a trace
of pedantry or formality.  The great object of these writers wa.*




110           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CHAP. VI
Passion; as Dignity had been the principal aim  of the Greel
dramatists. They therefore directed all their efforts to a faithful
delineation of Nature, and made their scene a true mirror of Life
itself, mingling the grave and the merry, the serious and the comic,
in the same play, the same scene, and even in the same speech.
And thus they have produced a constellation of immortal works,
which, like the creations of the greatest among them all,'"were not
for an age, but for all time;" and which, notwithstanding the great
and grievous faults with which their excellences are contrasted, will
be read with still increasing ardour and admiration through age after
age, because in them Art has been but the interpreter and -handmaid
of Nature!
CHAPTER VI.
MARLOW  AND SHAKSPEARE.
Marlow: his Career and Works - His Faustus - His Death- Contemporary
Judgments on his Genius. Shakspeare: His Birth, Education, and Early
Life-Traditions respecting Him -His Marriage-Early Studies-Goes to
London-His Career-Death and Monument-Order of his Works-Roman
Plays - His Diction - Characters.
The remark which we made in the preceding chapter respecting
the general character and career of the great dramatists of the
Elizabethan era will be found to apply so universally as to render it
unnecessary for us to give biographical details of individuals whose
life was, for the most part, a constant alternation of squalid poverty
and of temporary success.
The profession of playwright at the period we are considering was
held in but low esteem; in fact, was not raised in any perceptible
degree above the occupation of the actor.  It will be found, indeed,
that most of the great authors we are speaking of were themselves
actors, as well as writers for the stage; and this circulnstance undoubtedly tended to give their productions some of those peculiarities which
so strongly distinguish this school of dramatists from any other which
ever existed in the world. The peculiarities so communicated were,
as might naturally be expected, both good and evil.  Writing for an
audience of the most miscellaneous character, and addressing themselves at the same time to the learned and the ignorant, to the refined
and to the illiterate, they were obliged to seek for mnattei adapted to
every taste; now gratifying the most elegant tastes of the courtly and
scholarlike noble, and then, in the same play -- often in the same




A'EHAP. VI.]     PEELE, NASH, GREENE, LODGE.                111
scene —tickling the coarser fancy of the rude and jovial artisan.. It
is in some measure, therefore, to the popularity of the drama as a
favourite amusement, at this period, of all ranks, that we owe much
of what is most grand, most airy, and most romantic, in the Elizabethan theatre, and also, it cannot be denied, a good deal of the
irregularity that characterises these wonderful compositions -their
strange mixture of elevated passion and mean buffoonery; much of
their sublimity, and much also of their meanness.
It should be carefully borne in mind that the above remarks apply
universally (though of cburse not in the same degree or proportion)
to all the dramatists of the Shakspearian or Elizabethan school, some
being distinguished for pathos, some for sublimity, others for sweetness of fancy and a " Sicilian fruitfulness" of beautiful diction and
harmony. Passing, therefore, over John Lyly, the affected euphuist
and fantastical innovator on the language of the court, but whose
dramas are distinguished by an exquisite grace and Grecian purity
of construction, and whose songs in particular are models of airiness
and music, we come to Peele, Nash, Greene, and Lodge, the immediate predecessors of Marlow, who was himself, so to speak, the forerunner and herald of Shakspeare.
The luxuriant fancy of his' David and Bethsabe,' and the kingly
amplification of his'Edward I.,' would have given Peele's name no
mean place on the national Parnassus; the " gall and salt" of Nash's
vigorous satire would have preserved his memory in the admiration
of his country; Greene's "happy talent, clear spirit, and lively
imagination" would have saved him from that oblivion whence his
works are seldom recalled but by the painful commentator on Shakspeare; and the romantic spirit and woodland freshness of Lodge's
graceful muse might have earned him a lasting niche in " Fame's
proud temple."  But all these bright intellects were quenched and
swallowed up in the immeasurable splendour of their great successor.
At noon we know,-as well. as at midnight, the stars are in the sky,
but we can only see them in the absence of the sun.
The dates of the birth and death of the above dramatists are as
follows: —Lyly, born 1554, died some time after 1600; George
Peele, a fellow-actor and shareholder with Shakspeare in the Blackfriars Theatre, died before 1599; Nash, born in Suffolk, 1564, and
died, "after a life spent," as he pathetically says himself, "in
fantastical satirism, in whose veins heretofore I misspent my spirit,
and prodigally conspired against good hours," also about 1600;
Greene died in 1592; and Lodge, who at the end of his life is supposed to have renoumceld the stage, and become a physician of
eminence, is reported to have died in London of the plague in 1625,
While these authors had been gradually but imperceptibly improving and developing the infant drama of England, we now come
to the great writer who performed for our stage nearly the same
9.*




112          OLTLIN:E0  OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CrHAP. VI.
offices as were rendered to that of Greece, according to the well.
known dictum of Horace, by 2Eschylus:
"Et docuit magnumque loqui, nitique cothurno."
This was Christopher Marlow.  Born at Canterbury, about the year
1562, he received a learned education at Bene't College, Cainbridge;
and is supposed to have been attracted by the reputation he had obtained by his first dramatic essay, the tragedy of' Tamburlaine,' to
embrace the profession of actor. The play to which we have just
alluded was calculated, from the wild oriental nature of its subject,
to give a too free current to Marlow's natural tendency to bombastic
fury of declamation, and gigantic monstrosity and exaggeration of
sentiment.  Jonson has left on record his admiration for "' Marlow's
mighty line," as he so nobly expresses the peculiar character of this
dramatist's wild and swelling spirit; and the Eschylus of the English stage, like his great Athenian prototype, seems to have impressed
his contemporaries with a most exalted respect for his sublime and
irregular genius. Indeed it may easily be conceived that, as grandeur and force are the qualities most likely to strike the imagination
of the public at a period when art is in its infancy, so the too often
accompanying faults of, tumidity and exaggeration are generally perceptible at such a period. The biting raillery of Aristophanes has
shown, no mercy to the extravagance, obscurity, and bombast of 2Es.
chylus; and we cannot, therefore, be surprised to find the deeper and
more delicate raillery of Shakspeare fixing upon the absurdities of
Marlow's gigantic dramas.  The two greatest works of this powerful
writer are undoubtedly the'Faustus' and the'Jew of Malta,' the
latter of which was produced before 1593.  We trust we shall be
excused for attempting to give some account of the first of these extraordinary works, when we mention the'obligations incurred by
Goethe to the' Faustus' of Marlow, obligations which the patriarch
of Weimar never failed to acknowledge.  As in the'Faust' of
Goethe, Marlow's hero is a learned man of Wittenberg, who, finding
the vanity of those studies which have made him the glory and envy
of all Germany, makes a compact with the Evil One that he may
enjoy, in exchange for' his eternal salvation, a certain period of youth,
beauty, and sensual indulgence.  It must be confessed that, in the
grandeur and vastness of the satire on human follies, in the tenderness of the pathetic scenes, in the admirable conception of the character of Margaret. — that'daisy, dew-besprent with tears, and blooming so sweetly at the mouth of an infernal abyss of sin and misery
which yawns to engulf it-and, above all, in the complete creation
of that wondrous Mephistophiles, the German bard has shown a
power not approached by- the old English bard. In the pictures,
however, of terror; despair, and unavailing remorse, and particularly
in the terrific scene when Faustus is expecting the approach of the




CHAP VI.]            MARLOW: ISIS DEATH.                     113
demon to claim performance of the dread contract,-in these, and in
a rich glow of classic imagery, and in the appropriate colouring of
gloom and horror thrown over the whole action, we must be pardoned
if we think our countryman superior.  The'Jew of Malta' is the
portraiture of revenge and hatred embodied in the common type of
the Jewish character as it appeared to the popular imagination of the
sixteenth century; that is, under a form at once-terrific, odious, and
contemptible. Not among the least astonishing proofs of Shakspeare's
divine and prescient mind is the fact that, living at a period when
the Jews were still persecuted, and when popular prejudice-that in.
destructible monster -still believed the calumnies of the Middle
Ages, and fancied that the Jews sacrificed a Christian child. at the
Passover, and practised the forbidden arts of magic and necromancy,
that Shakspeare should have been victorious over the prejudices which
still enchained the mind even of the learned Marlow, and should have
given us, in Shylock, the portrait, the living image, of "an Israelite
indeed,"-not the absurd bugbear of the Elizabethan stage, with his
red nose, his impossible riches, and equally impossible crimes, but a
real breathing man, desperately cruel and revengeful it is true, but
cruel and revengeful on what seem to him good grounds, and only so
far a Jew as not the less to remain a human being like ourselves.
Nothing can surpass the absurdity of Marlow's plot in this play-an
absurdity hardly compensated by occasional passages of majestic
though somewhat tumid declamation.  Few things, for instances can
be finer than the dying speech of Barabas, the Jew" Die life, fly soul, tongue curse thy fill, and die!"or his comparison of himself to the ominous and obscene bird"The sad-presaging raven, that tolls
The sick man's passport from her hollow beak,
And in the shadow of the silent night
Doth shake contagion from her sable wings."
Marlow's life was as wild and irregular as his genius, and his
death at once tragic and deplorable. It is related that in an unworthy brawl, in a place and with a person (according to sorie
accounts a serving-man) as disreputable as the occasion, he endeavoured to use his dagger on the person of his antagonist, who, seizing
Marlow's wrist, gave a different direction to the poniard; the weapon
entered Marlow's own head, "in such sort,". to use the words of
Anthony Wood, "that, notwithstanding all the means of surgery
that could be brought, he shortly after died. of his wound."
He was buried at Deptford on the 1st of June, 1593, and nauny
dramas have come down to us bearing the impress of his genius, and
several, indeed, ascribed to his name: but such was the prevalence
of his style when he- wrote, and so universal at this period was the
custom for several dramatists to work together or successively at the




114           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CXIAP. VI.
same piece, that it is very difficult to affiliate with certainty the
dramas of the Elizabethan age, except those of Shakspeare.
The finest, perhaps, of these works is the'Edward II.,' which
contains many passages of deepest pathos.  As a proof of the high
reputation enjoyed by Marlow among his contemporaries, we will
quote the spirited lines of Drayton: —
"Next Marlow, bathed in the Thespian springs,
Had in him those brave translunary things
That the first poets had; his verses were
All air and fire, which made his verses clear:
For that Jfine madness he did still retain
Which rightly should possess a poet's brain."
In taking our leave of this great and brilliant genius, we cannot
but regret that his untimely death deprived his works of the regu.
larity which time and experience would probably have given to them;
and whether we speak of. him as a man or as an author, we may very
well apply to him the lines pronounced in his own tragedy by the
scholar over the mangled limbs of Faustus:"Cut is the branch that might have grown full straight;
And burned is Apollo's laurel bough,
That sometime grew within this learned man."' There is a great deal of melancholy truth in that profound verse
of the modern poet,
"The'-world knows nothing of its greatest men:"
and this verity will especially apply to that class of which we would
desire the most minute details —the Poets. Of Homer we know so
little that his very existence and'personality have been brought in
question; respecting Virgil we possess only a few vague and cold
notices; of the private life, and, above all, the intellectual life, of'
Milton, we possess no information but what we can glean from his
writings; and of a greater yet than these - Shakspeare - all the
details which we possess may be condensed into a few lines, and are
principally derived from the most frigid and unattractive of all
sources, legal documents, the poet's will holding among these the
most forward place.
William Shakspeare or Shakespeare was born, as everybody knows,
in the little town of Stratford, on the Avon, in Warwickshire, in the
month of April, 1564., He was baptized on the 26th, which has
originated the poetical, and certainly not very improbable tradition,
that the greatest of Englishmen was born on the 23rd of April, the
qnniversary of St. George, the tutelary saint of his country. His
father was a dealer in wool (not a butcher, as was l1:,Lg ignorantly
supposed), and had at one time been in flourishing circumstances,
for he had occupied the office of high-bailiff, or chief municipal dignitary, in his native town, but he appears, notwithstanding his having
married an heiress possessed of some little fortune, to have gradually




CHAP. VI.]      SHAKSPEARE: HIS EARLY LIFE.                   115
sunk into great distress, and ultimately to have received charity from
the corporation of which he had once been a prominent member.
"Genius," as Washington Irving prettily says, "delights to nestle
its offspring in strange places;" and it is a proud distinction of
England that its literature should number among its brightest names
so large a proportion of men born in the humblest ranks of society.
It is beneath low roofs, and few are humbler than that venerable
one at Stratford, that the cradles of our greatest men' were rocked;
it is by poor firesides that their genius budded and expanded; and
this is the reason why our literature, more than that of any other
country, echoes the universal sentiments of the human heart, and
speaks a language intelligible to every country and every age.
Of Shakspetre's childhood and education nothing is accurately
known; perhaps the poverty of his father, by preventing him giving
his son more than very limited and rustic instruction, enabled the
boy's intellect to develop itself naturally and gradually, unstiffened
and uncrippled by the too early discipline of a schoolmaster- thrLt
discipline which, like the swathing and swaddling-bands of the injua.
dicious nurse, so often cripples and deforms what it is intended -o
render strong and beautiful.  His early years were probably passrd
amid the smiling scenery surrounding Stratford, marking, with prophetic eye, every tint of cloud and stream, every feature of external
beauty, and laying up a store of observations on the passions, the
sentiments, and the oddities of human character,"While he was yet a boy,
Careless of books, yet having felt the power
Of Nature, by the gentle agency
Of natural objects then led on to feel
For passions that were not his own, and think
(At random and imperfectly indeed)
On man, the heart of man, and human life."
There can be, little doubt of Shakspeare having at some early
period of his life been employed as clerk to some country attorney;
for he shows in all his works a technical acquaintance with the
phraseology of the English law —an acquaintance, indeed, which
could only have been acquired by actual practice: this circumstance
is also further proved by some of the few passages in the writings of
his contemporaries in which men.tion is made of the great dramatist.
His life at Stratford, according to the vague and imperfect traditions subsisting after his death in his native place, was idle, and
perhaps even riotous: careful investigation has shown the impossibility of the events assigned by the well-known anecdote of the deerstealing in'Sir Thomas Lucy's park at Charlecote, as the immnediate
cause of his quitting Stratford and first adventuring in the career of
London life.  However reluctant we may be, in our eagerness to
know the details of such a life, we must resign this picturesque
story of the youthful Shakspeare's woodland misdemeanour, and




116          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CHAP. VI
seek for some other cause of his leaving Warwickshire.  This is to
be found in the register of the poet's marriage with Anne Hathaway,
the daughter of a small farmer residing a.t Shottery, a village about
a mile from Stratford.  On the 28th of November, 1582, Shakspeare obtained at Worcester a licence of marriage, permitting the
ceremony to take place withl once asking of the banns, a circumstance
which shows that this important act of life was accompanied with
great hurry and precipitation, the more obviously so as Shakspeare
was at this time a minor, and consequently unable to enter legally
into'any contract for himself. In this document, therefore, we find
the names of two persons as sureties' for the bridegroom, who was,
it must be observed, seven years younger than his wife.  All this
precipitation, however, is explained by the register of baptisms in
the church of Stratford, by which it appears that the poet's daughter Susanna was christened on the 26th of May, 1583, or only six
months after the marriage. In a year and a half two other children,
twins, were born to the poet, who had no offspring afterwards.
Finding himself thus, at the early age of nineteen, a husband and a
father, and probably perceiving that the obscurity of a retired
village was no sphere for his intellectual powers, our poet about this
time betook himself to London, there to commence his brief career
of glory.  Educated so imperfectly as he must have been, it is only
to solitary and intense, though perhaps desultory study, that he
could have owed that extensive acquaintance with books which he
undoubtedly possessed; and it is therefore fair to conclude that he
had been a diligent reader before he left his native place.  In the
employment of classical images, for example, Shaks~eare shows no
inferiority to any of that great number of dramatists at this period
who were men of academical education; many of them indeed men
of distinguished learning.  His writings abound in passages indicating a very extensive and accurate acquaintance with classical imagery, and at the same time his splendid imagination has imparted to
such allusions a vivacity, a brilliancy, and a glory not to be found in
any other author.  Much controversy has been raised with respect
to Shakspeare's scholarship, and minute and ingenious investigation
has been employed not only to determine how far he was acquainted
with the literature of Greece and Rome, with the'Italian, Spanish,
and French languages, but even to ascertain what books he had
read; and while some have considered his acquirements as unusually
great, others have thought to exalt his glory by denying him even
moderate share of learning. The truth is, however, probably between these two extremes; and when we reflect that many of the
*great autnors of antiquity, with whose th/oughlts he was evidently
familiar, were translated, when he wrote, into English, we may be
justified in considering him to have had a tolerable- acquaintance
with Latin and French, two languages which enter largely (though




CHIAP.; VI.]  SHAKSPEARtE-HIS ARRIVAL IN LONDON.            117
in a comparatively impure state) into the legal phraseology of
England.
Plutarch, for example, had been translated into English, and Chap.
man's grand version of I-Iomer had doubtless rolled its majestic har.
monies over the ear of Shakspeare: this was enough for such a mind,
whose assimilative power was so immense. With such intellects the
slightest hint is sufficient: from the mere ruins and imperfect frag.
ments of the Beautiful, they can build up a perfect and complete
edifice, even as' the, eye of Cuvier, from a tooth, from a fragment of
bone of some antediluvian reptile, could reconstruct the whole system
of animal life which had passed away for ever. Of all the attempts
in modern literature to reproduce the manners and sentiments of the
classical periods, Shakspeare's are by far the most successful-: we
need only refer to.the characters of Coriolanus, of Cleopatra,, of Caesar,
of Ulysses;- while in the employment of classical imagery no poet has
ever exhibited such mastery and grace.
Shakspeare's first introduction to London life and to the theatrical
profession has been as much misrepresented by tradition as the cause
of his leaving his native town. The legend goes, that the poet, on.
his first arrival in the metropolis, was reduced to such distress as to
hold horses at the door of the theatres, and that he thus ultimately
obtained his introduction "behind the scenes."  This, however, like
the story of the deer-stealing, is a tale totally without foundation.
We have seen in a former chapter that the companies of actors were
occasionally in the habit of going about t'he country, and. performing.
at the houses of the nobility: it was very possible for Shakspeare to
have gratified that youthful desire which so many of us have felt for
a peep into the enchanted world of' the stage, long before he even
thought of going to seek his fortune in London.  This is the more
probable as Thomas Green, an actor of note at the time, was..a native
of Stratford, and, some have supposed, a kinsman of the poet; and
Richard Burbage, the greatest tragedian of the day, and perhaps one
of the greatest actors rhom England ever produced, was a Warwickshire man. W5e know also that the actors were frequently in the
habit of visiting Stratford, and the probability is, that it was by
Green's invitation that Shaklspeare first joined a troop of players.
That he was possessed of poetical genius could not have been unknown even at this time, as it is difficult to believe that his first
works-the'Venus and Adonis' and the' Lucrece'-were not comrn
posed during his residence at Stratford. These two works, though
disfigured by that Italian taste which was prevalent at the time, and
though containing passages of a somewhat too warm complexion for
the stricter taste of the present day, are full of the softest harmony
and the most luxuriant imagery: the youthful fancy of the poet
seems to run riot in the richest profusion: these works bear all the
markis, and exhibit all the defects, of youth — but it is of the youth
nf a ShalSDoeare.




118-         OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CHAP. VI.
Our poet, then, became a- member (and of course a share-holder
also) of the Blackfriars theatre, and seems to have steadily and rapidly
risen in reputation among'his comrades, for in November, 1589,
Shakspeare's name is inserted eleventh in a list of fifteen proprietors;
in 1596 his name is fifth in a'list -of eight shareholders; and in 1603
it was second in the new patent granted by James I. As he increased
in fame and importance at his theatre he gradually became proprietor
of the wardrobe and stage-properties, which, together with the shares
he previously possessed, were valued at 14001., a sum equivalent to
nearly 70001. of our present money. He was also a large proprietor
in the Globe.theatre, and his annual income is calculated at at least
15001.  As an actor he is said not to have exceeded mediocrity,
though this is hardly in accordance with the tradition of two or three
of the parts which he is said to have performed, and which would bv
no means be intrusted to an indifferent actor. These are Hieronymo,
in the' Spanish Tragedy,' to which we have alluded in another place;,he Ghost in his' own' Hamlet;' and Adam in'As You Like It,'characters, we repeat, which would now never be placed in the hands
of inferior talent.  Besides this, it is impossible to read the admirable
directions to the players in the second scene of the third act of'Hamlet' without being convinced that no man ever possessed so
delicate and profound an appreciation for the true excellences of the
histrionic art, or could so well communicate its precepts.' From the
list of characters just enumerated, it will be seen that Shakspeare's
line, as it is called, was the old men of the mimic world, or what is
denominated on the French stage the peres nobles.
It was in the -interval between his coming up to London and the
year 1611 that he produced. the thirty-seven plays which form the
first folio edition; and he appears to have always retained the intention of retiring, as soon as he had acquired a competency, to his native
place. As he grew richer he purchased land in Stratford, and became
the proprietor of New Place, the principal house in the town, in the
garden of which there long was to be seen a mulberry-tree, said to
have been planted by.his own illustrious hand. Will our readers
believe that this tree was actually cut down by order of a clergyman
of Stratford, under the pretext of its attracting so many curious pilgrims to the spot, which had. fallen into the possession of this clerical
Vandal! Shakspeare continued during his whole residence in Lon
don to pay annual visits to Stratford, and about 1612 he retired alto
gether to New Place, to pass the evening of his glorious life in that
calm and dignified retirement which he had so nobly earned.  There
is something touching in this desire of our great poet; something
well in accordance with his divine genius in this tender recollection
of his birthplace, this returning in honoured manhood to those wellremembered scenes of infancy which had greenly dwelt in his remuembrance, and over which he was to past, till time ihall be no




CHAP. VI.J   SHAKSPEARE: ORDER OF HIS WORKS.                 119
more, the magic of his name.  In this retirement, so beautiful by
nature, and so hallowed by the most tender recollections in the society
of his childhood's friends, and among the quiet home-scenes of pastoral England, the poet passed four years of what must appear to us
felicity as unmingled as ever fell to the lot of man; and on the 23d
of April, 1616, he died, having just completed his 52d year. Who
ever, in so short a life, did so much for immortality? His widow
survived him seven years: his two daughters were married, and one
of them had three sons, but these latter all died without issue, and
consequently, as the poet's only son, Hamnet, died young, there now
exists no lineal descendant of the poet. Shakspeare was buried in
the parish-church of Stratford, and over the place of his interment
there has been erected a mural monument in the Italian taste of the
day, being a half-length of the poet, seated, with a pen in his hand,
and bearing a laudatory inscription in Latin verse. This bust is undoubtedly a portrait, and was originally painted to imitate'life, so that
it gave an idea of the complexion, colour of the eyes, hair, &c., of
the original. Malone, more barbarous than a churchwarden, however,
covered this most interesting work with a thick coat of white paint,
from which it has not been and cannot be rescued.  Shakspeare appears in this portrait to have been singularly handsome: the outline
of the face is regular and oval; the extraordinary height, breadth,
and peculiar airy lightness of the forehead in particular makes it one
of those heads which, once seen, never can be forgotten. This is
perhaps the most remarkable peculiarity of the head, and this is perceivable in all the portraits. The forehead is really vast, and yet
singularly light-a worthy temple for such lovely and majestic oracles.
The hair, which is divided on the top of the head, is, like his beard,
of an auburn or golden sunny brown; his complexion is healthy, and
the expression of the whole face is in perfect accordance with what
we learn of his generous, gentle character.         zThere is very little doubt but that Shakspeare's literary career as
a dramatic author was in no -respects different from what we have
described as almost universal at the period.  He began by the rearrangement of old plays, and it was probably while engaged in this
mean and almost mechanical employment that he felt the first electric flash of that admirable genius which was afterwards to burn
with such a steady splendour in his great dramas. Many of the
works which came into the world with the passport of his name, nay,
some which have found a place in the editions of his collected works,
were, in reality, only re'chafze's made by him, or older works to
which his pen had only added some scene, character, or speech. Of
the former of these two kinds we may instance the'Yorkshire
Tragedy,p and'Ardeit of Feversham;' and of the latter,'Pericles,'
and.' Titus Andronicus.'  A reference to any edition. of Shakspeare
will inform the reader tLat the two former plays are not included in
10




120           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CHAP:. VI
the ooet's works, and that the two latter are.  We find then in this
matter that the editors have acted with partiality; for whatever claims'Pericles' and' Titus' possess to the honour of being called Shakspeare's might be safely maintained by the two other dramas.  Con.
sequently either'Pericles' and'Titus' ought to be excluded from
the list of our poet's productions, or the'Yorkshire.Tragedy,''Arden of Feversham,' and several others, ought to. be admitted.
The chronology of the plays.has been investigated by the commentators with a painful and laudable minuteness; but we perhaps hardly
possess sufficient data to enable us to demonstrate with any degree
of certainty the order of their production. This is much to be
regretted, as our ignorance deprives us of the' pleasure and improvement to. be obtained from tracing the gradual development of Shakspeare's genius and art. It seems to us probable that' Othello' and the'Tempest' were among the last of these wonderful productions, and
the'Two Gentlemen of Verona,' the' Comedy of Errors,' and'Love's Labour's Lost,' were among the first. It should be remarked,
however, that our opinion is founded chiefly on internal evidence of
style and treatment, a criterion not always to be depended on.
The sources from whence Shakspeare drew the materials for his.
works were in every respect. the same as those to which we have
already alluded. It would be highly interesting to read the old
plays of which he made so copious a use, and to remark what were
the rude hints of character, what the coarse draughts and outlines
of passion, which he has transformed into such impersonations as
Lady Macbeth, as Jaques, as Ariel.  The most essential peculiarity
of his genius appears that intuitive and instantaneous certainty with
which he threw himself, so to say, into a character, and perceived 
all the limits of its- personality.  The personations of all other
dramatists appear like bas-reliefs, or pictures, presenting but one
surface to the- eye of the intellectual spectator; those of Shakspeare
resemble statues, which may be viewed from all points equally well,
without losing any of their likeness to reality. But why should we
limit our words? are they not' rather living, moving beings, with
flesh and blood and passions like our own? In reading the dramatic
works of all other men, you may admire the truth'with which
the character is conceived, and the skill with which it is set in motion,
but you feel that it is created for a particular purpose, and set before
you in a particular light. In Shakspeare you seem, on the contrary,
to perceive depth beyond depth of personal identity or individuality,
stretching far beyond human ken, and losing itself in the unfathomed
abysses of the heart of man. It is as when you fix your eyes upon
the vastnesses of the summer sky, or upon the deeper purple of a
tropic ocean,-your gaze seems.to die away in the immeasurable
profound.  It will not seem too much to say of Shakspeare's characters; that there is not one, among the thousand figures which people




CHAP. VI.]        SHAKSPEARE: HIS WORKS.                    121
his living scenes, to which you might not assign (from the elements
given by the poet in any number of speeches, small or great, put
into its mouth) a whole train of antecedent events, and possible
development of character.  And this is one of the most marked and
admirable peculiarities of our poet  In the works of other dramatists, the personages, conceived with what vividness you will, seem,
so to say, ready made, and set in motion for the nonce; while Shakspeare's seem to be acted upon during the course of the events, and
to be modified and changed just as real men and women perpetually
are in their intercourse with the world and with each other.  Where
this wonderful creator gained the knowledge of human nature, and
experience of human motives, which have presented him to posterity
rather as something divine than as a mere mortal artist, it is impossible to learn.
The naturalist knows that the details of creation are inexhaustible;
and Linnuus, when he told his scholars that there were more wonders
and mysteries in turf covered by his foot than the longest life of the
most laborious botanist would suffice to describe or to explain, but
expressed the difficulty encountered by the critic who attempts to
examine the vast and inexhaustible dominions of Shakspeare's creation. The three great subdivisions, then, may be stated as follows:
-1, Plays founded bn subjects of classical antiquity; 2, Plays founded
on the' history, either legendary or authentic, of modern countries;
and 3, Dramas on romantic stories, such as the innumerable novels
of Spain and Italy.  Of the plays which take for their materials
antique personages and manners, the most remarkable are'Julius
Caesar,''Antony and Cleopatra,''Timon of Athens,''Coriolanus,'
and' Troilus and Cressida.'  In these works the spirit and tone of
thought of the antique world is most admirably seized, and delicate
and subtle distinctions are made between the manners of different
epochs of Roman history. For instance, the language, turn -of
thought, and local colouring are exquisitely and profoundly Roman,
both in' Coriolanus,'' Antony,' and' Julius C(msar;' yet the reader
is conscious that the Romans in' Coriolanus' are as different from
the Romans of the other two plays as was the Roman people at the
two different epochs in question. In' Coriolanus' every line breathes
the simple, fervid patriotism of the republic, its rude manners, its
severe virtues; while in the other plays we feel that the Roman
republic has ceased to exist, and the monarchic, civilized, corrupt
tone of manners has already come into existence.'Timon of Athens' has been finely called "the Lear of private
life;" and certainly never was there composed a grander or more
impressive picture of profuse indiscriminate friendship punished by
its natural offspring, ingratitude. The over-loving and over-confiding
spirit of Timon, soft, effeminate, thirsting for universal attachment,
daegenerates into the bitterest misanthropy - like luscious wrine




122           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. VIt
which, soured, becomes the sharpest vinegar; and what other poet
but Shakspeare could have ventured to give, in one drama, two
characters' of misanthropy, like Timon and Apemantus, so alike
externally, yet so strongly contrasting: the one a manhater from
nature, the other made so by circumstances?  If the misanthropy
of Timinon be (as we have just ventured to image it) the sweet and
potent wine turned sour in the sunshine of a too luxuriant prosperity,
that of the Cynic is rather the poor.and acid fruit of a cold and
barren and unloving nature, which no prosperity could render rich or
generous.
We need not speak here of the wonderful life, fervour, and animation which pervade all these plays, and the lifelike reality with which
the poet places us amid the stirring scene. Here is- no idle declamation, no parade of classical propriety; and yet how admirably are
the great characters delineated and relieved against the moving background of inferior interests and passions! How exquisite are those
little glimpses into private life, afforded us, as if by accident, yet with
such consummate skill, amid the tumult and fermentation of great
events-the domestic scenes in' Coriolanus,' the revelries, the quar.
relling, and reconciliations of Cleopatra! The play of' Troilus and
Cressida,' though disfigured in parts by some singular anachronisms,
is invaluable for the truly.Homeric delineations\of Ulysses and Agamemnon.  Can anything in the way of pure rhetoric be finer, more
skilful, than the speech of Antony over the body of Caesar, or than
the harangue of Ulysses in the' Troilus?'  We have here the very
essence and soul of classicism, and we have too, what the ancients
have not given us —the household and private physiognomy of their
times. Shakspeare and Homer are absolutely the only men who
have ever succeeded in representing what is heroic without once
losing sight of what is truly natural and moving.  As to the
language of these and all his plays, it would be useless to speak of
its beauty here; we could but repeat, and perhaps weaken in repeating, the enthusiastic admiration of all who have been able to judge
of this kind of merit: of all authors Shakspeare is the most natural
and unforced in his style, and yet there is none whose words are
either so musical in their arrangement, so striking and picturesque in
themselves, or contain so many thoughts.  Sometimes, indeed, we
meet with paragraphs in which every important word is not only
admirable, as conveying, strengthening, or adorning the meaning, but
is itself an image new, bold, true, and vigorous in the highest degree.
We open our Shakspeare at hazard: for instance, the following -'Thou desperate pilot, now at once run on
The dashing rocks thy sea-sick weary bark" —
where the bark, by the "fine madness" of the poet, is made "weary"
and "sea-sick."  Again; where }Eneas says to the trumpeter,




vC!AP. V-.]         SHAKSPEARE: HIS WORKS.                       123
"Trumpet, blow loud,
Send thy brass vozce through all these lazy tents" -
where the epithet "brass" is transferred from  the instrument to its
sound, and the "tents" said to be "lazy," instead of their inhabitants; or the "vagabond flag," that
"Goes to and back, lackeying the varying tide;'
and a thousand others in this-and in all the-plays.'"the quick comedians
Extempore shall stage us; Antony
Shall be brought drunken forth, and I shall see
Some squeaking Cleopatra boy my greatness."
But why multiply- examples?  Every page of Shakspeare would
furnish us with many instances of such intensifying of expression,
where some happy word conveys to us a whole train of ideas, condensed into a single luminous point as it were —words so new, so
full of meaning, and yet so unforced and natural, that the rudest
mind perceives almost intuitively their meaning, and yet which no
study could improve or imitate.  It is this which constitutes the
most striking peculiarity of the Shakspearian language; it is this
point in which his treatment, his manner, differs from  that of all
other authors, ancient or modern, English or foreign, who ever wrote;
it is this which, while it justifies the almost idolatrous veneration of
his countrymen, makes him of all authors the most untranslatable.
All have observed the simplicity and homeliness which distinguish
the images of this great poet, and particularly in passages of intense
passion; and the time has arrived when critics of all countries unite
in appreciating the true grandeur and nature of such images, which
are precisely those most likely to suggest themselves in moments of
the greatest agitation.  The time, we say, is past when a false and
artificial system of so-called propriety can find fault with Lady Macbeth's'terrific image"Nor Heaven peep through the blanket of the dark,
To cry, Hold, hold!"or that admirable picture of tranquillity and silence, presenting itself,
it should be remembered, to the imagination of a tired soldier: "not
a mouse stirring."
What a terrible train of guilty thoughts, of horror and unavailing
remorse, in that short dialogue between Macbeth and his wife, beginning with the words" Iacb. I have done the deed: - Didst thou not hear a noise?
Lady ZIiacb. I heard the owl scream, and the crickets cry.
*Did you not speak?
lIacb.           When?
Lady M1acb.              Now..lacb.                         As I descended?
10*




124           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CIIA P. VI.
Lady llhcb. Ay.
MIacb. Hark!Who lies i' the second chamber?
But we dare not trust ourselves to quote. In Shakspeare the various
excellences of the art are so wonderfully mingled, that it is seldom
easy to quote one passage as a specimen of mere beautiful imagery,
another of grand declamation, another of wit, another of humour,
and so on.  Admirable as the passages are in themselves, they are
still more so in their places, forming strokes of character and touches
of truth and nature.
Of all authors Shakspeare is the one who has least imitated or
repeated himself.  All other dramatists-nay, all other menconscious of successful power in some particular line of development,
have failed to resist the natural temptation which leads us to do
often what we know we do well.  Let us imagine any other dramatist capable of conceiving such a character as Hamlet, as Lear, as
Othello, or as Falstaff.  Would he not assuredly have delighted
to repeat such grand creations, and show us these admirable figures
in different lights and attitudes?  Yet in Shakspeare, when once
these terrible or humorous personages havt quitted the scene, and
finished that long life of woe or of merriment, condensed, by the
poet's art, into the three short hours of dramatic existence, they disappear for ever —we hear- no more. of them-they vanish as completely as real men would have done, and leave, like real men, no
exactly similar beings behind them.
Dealing with the universal sentiments and passions of mankind,
this author has given us, in many places, different portraits of the
same passion; but these delineations are as distinct and as dissimilar
in Shakspeare as they are in nature.
How many portraits have we of jealousy, for example! Yet who.'cannot distinguish the jealousy of Othello from that of Leontes, that
of Posthumus from that of Ford, and a thousand other instances?
The jealousy is as different as the man, yet always as true to reality.
What an infinite multitude of fools are to be found in Shakspeare!
yet no two are the least alike.  We may follow an ascending scale
of silliness through as many gradually and imperceptibly rising
varieties of the genus, extending from almost complete imbecility to
the highest degree of intellect, tinctured with that slight shade of
fantastic mental distortion from which the human mind is hardly
ever free.  What a range of character from Audrey, Aguecheek, or
Silence, to Jaques! And why stop here?  Why not to Lear himself, to Hamlet, to Falstaff?  It is absolutely impossible to ascribe
any important speech in Shakspeare to the wrong person: and this
is perhaps one of the most difficult points of the dramatic art-a
point which has never been reached by any author lut Shakspeare,
and sometimes by Moliire.




CHAP. VI.]      SHAKSPEARE: HIS CHARACTEIRS.                12b
Wonderful, too, as is the individuality and originality of the more
passionate or humorous characters, Shakspeare has succeeded in
giving, -by light, imperceptible, infallible touches, quite as much
reality and personality to a class of personages which in the works
of all other writers of. fiction are generally found uniform, and
even fade-we mean the delineations of young men and women,
the heroes and heroines of comic or romantic adventures.  Even
Fielding, Scott, and Dickens, though possessing the far greater
facilities afforded by narrative fiction, have seldom succeeded in rendering such characters interesting in themselves; that is, independently of the circumstances which surround them.  Compare the
Sophia and the Tom Jones of the first, the Waverley and the Miss
Wardour of the second, the'Nicholas Nickleby and the Miss Maylie
of the third, with Rosalind and Orlando, with Helena, with Ileronay, even with such secondary characters as Margaret, as Mariana,
as Laertes, as Lorenzo —and we shall see that, while the elegant,.and sometimes even delicate, creation of the romancer owes all its
hold on our sympathies to the trials to which it is exposed, and to
the patience and energy with which it undergoes them, the characters of the greatest of dramatists possess a real and distinct individuality, as subtly though not as strongly marked as that which
divides Lear from Falstaff, or Isabella from Beatrice.
The great art of Shakspeare, as a portrayer of character and
passion, seems to consist in his manner of making his personages,
accidentally, involuntarily, nay, even in spite of themselves, express
their own character, and admit us, as it were, into the inmost recesses
of their hearts. And this is especially'true of his passion. In the
dramatists of the French classical school, in particular, the characters
are very apt to give us -in noble and sounding verse, it is true,
admirably reasoned and majestically harmonized —a description of
the feelings which affect them. They, in short, say-" I am terrified," "I' am angry," "I am in love."  This Shakspeare's men and
women, like real men and women, never do. Hamlet, asked by his
mother what is the dreadful object on which his eyes are fixed, does
not break out into a long tirade descriptive of it, but paints his own
terror, and the spectre which causes it, in one line:"On him, on him! Look you, how pale he glares!"
And this method (if it be not rather an intuition) is perceivable in
every scene and every character: it is found in the lightest as in tha
most solemn, in the most' splendid as in the most pathetic scenes.
The development of the fable in Shakspeare is generally conducted
with that natural yet unrestrained coherence which is found in the
real dramas of human life.  The events, it is true, are often hurried
towards the close of the drama, and trifling and unexpected circumstances, arising in the course of the action, often completely change




126          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CHAP. VI.
what we. should imagine-had been the author's previous plan.' But
does not the same thing perpetually happen in the world? Is it not
a profound truth that the most insignificant events perpetually modify the most important actions? Does not experience show us that
truth is stranger than fiction, that no event can be called unimportant
excepting according to its consequences, and that no intellect is sufficiently vast and penetrating to trace all the consequences springing
from even the most trivial act of our lives?
In point of art, it cannot be denied that Shakspeare has sometimes
hurried over the latter part of his dramas, and cut, with violence and
improbability, the Gordian knot of' an intrigue which he had not
time or perhaps patience to untie; but this defect is principally
observable in those plays which internal evidence induces us to assign
to the early period of his career.  In many of the greatest works
the dramatic complexity is as skilfully and completely resolved as the
catastrophe is morally complete. What, for example, can be more
complete than the resolution of the fable in'Lear' and in'Othello'?
The latter play, indeed, may be considered as a miracle of consummate constructive skill. There is not a scene, a speech, a line, which
does not evidently bear upon and contribute to the catastrophe; and
that catastrophe is in the highest degree terrible and pathetic.
Of all the thousand errors prevalent respecting the genius and the
works of.Shakspeare, and which the industry of a respectful and
affectionate and loving criticism has not yet entirely-dispelled, perhaps
the most fatal was a spirit of patronizing admiration and wondering
approval, which seemed to consider his dramas as astonishing productions of an irregular and barbarous genius. Let it be to the
eternal honour of Coleridge that he was the first to lead the way to
a truer and more just appreciation of the poet of humanity, and to
have shown his countrymen that the criticism which considered these
-wonderful creations as the work of accidental genius (absurd and
contradictory as must appear such a collocation of the twio words)
was the mere dream of pedantry and ignorance.  " What!" he says
with a noble indignation, "does God perform miracles in sport?"  Is
it conceivable that these wonders of intellect and imagination-these
worlds of fancy, redolent of beauty, of life, of a glorified reality"All that is most beauteous —imaged there
In happier beauty; more pellucid streams,
otn ampler ether, a diviner air,
And fields invested with purpureal gleams;
Climes which the' sun, who sheds the brightest day
Earth knqws, is all unworthy to survey"that a.1l this subtle music of humanity, all this deep knowledge of
the human heart-its passions, its powers,. its aspirations -could be
the result of accident -of a happy genius in an age of barbarism?
— that the woolstapler's son of Stratford could have created, by acci.




CHAP. VII ]   THE SHAKSPEARIAN DRAMATISTS.                 127
dent, Juliet and Cordelia, Imogen and Miranda, Katherine and Cleo.
patra, Perdita and Ophelia?-that it was accident which reflected on
the never-dying page of the dramatist of the Blackfriars the thunderous gloom of Lear's moral atmosphere, the fairy-peopled sunshine
of Prospero's-enchanted isle, the moonlit stillness of the garden at
Belmont, the merry lamp-light of the Boar's Head ini Eastcheap,
or the warm English daylight of Windsor?  No! such an opinion
would be no less absurd (we had almost written blasphemous) than
the sceptic's fancy that this earth was the result of blind chance and
a. fortuitous concourse of atoms.
From the works of Shakspeare may be gleaned a complete collection of precepts adapted to every condition of life and to every con,
ceivable circumstance of human affairs.  The wisest and best of
mankind have gone to him for maxims of wisdom and of goodness
-maxims expressed with the artlessness and simplicity of a casual
remark, but pregnant with the thought of consummate experience
and penetration: from him the courtier has learned grace, the moralist prudence, the theologian divinity, the soldier enterprise, the king
royalty: his wit is unbounded, his passion inimitable, his splendour
unequalled; and over all these varied glories he has throwp a halo
of human-sympathy no less tender than his genius was immeasurable
and profound, a light reflected from the most gentle, generous, loving spirit that ever glowed within a human heart: the consummate
union of the Beautiful and the Good.
CHAPTER VII.
THE SHAKSPEARIAN DRAMATISTS.
Ben Jonson: The Humours —His Roman Plays-Comedies —Plots. Beau
mont and Fletcher-Massinger-Chapmanl-Dekker —Webster-Middleton
-Marston - Ford - Shirley.
VVE now come to a galaxy of great names, whose splendour, albeit
inferior to the unmatched effulgence of Shakspeare's genius, yet conFpires to glorify the reigns of Elizabeth and James.  The literary
triumphs of this wonderful epoch are principally confined to the
dramna, which "heaven of invention" was, to use the- beautiful expression of one of these playwrights, "studded as a frosty night with
stars; " and deeply indeed do we regret that our space will only permit us to give a very short and cursory notice of the individual
members of this admirable class of writers
"those shining stars, that run
Their gloricus course round Shakspeare's golden sun.'




Et8         OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. VIL
The first of these illustrious dramatists whom we shall notice is
Ben Jonson, a mighty and solid genius, whose plays bear an impress
of majestic art and slow but powerful elaboration, distinguishing them
from the careless ease and unpremeditated abundance so strongly
characterising the drama'of this period.  He was born in 1574, ten
years after Shakspeare, who honoured him with his close friendship
and well-merited protection.  He was undoubtedly one of the most
learned men of this or indeed any age of English literature; and he
brought to his dramatic task a much greater supply of scholastic
knowledge than was possessed by any of his contemporaries. Educated at Cambridge, he adopted the stage as his profession when
about twenty years of age, and when he had already acquired very
extensive knowledge of the world, and experience in various scenes
of "many-coloured life," in the university and even' in the camp:
for Ben had served with distinguished bravery in the wars of the
Low Countries.  As an actor he is. reported to have completely
failed, but it was at this period that he began to exhibit, in the literary department of his profession, that genius which has placed his
name next to that of the greatest. Like all his contemporary dramatists, Jonson began by repairing and adapting older plays, and his
name is connected, like that of so many of the dramatic debutans of
this period, With several of such recastings; for example, with that
of' Hieronymo,' &c. It was not till 1596 that he produced his first
original piece, the admirable comedy of'Every Man in his Humour,'
which gave infallible proof that a new and powerful genius had risen on
the English stage. This comedy was brought out (considerably altered
from its first sketch,) at the Globe theatre, in 1598, and in some degree,
it is related, through the instrumentality of Shakspeare, who acted a
principal part in the piece. It was soon evident that Jonson had cut
out for himself a new path in the drama; and he rapidly attained, and
steadily preserved, the highest reputation for genius and for art.  In
fact, Jonson, during the whole of his life, occupied a position at
the very head of the dramatists of the day —a position perhaps even
superior to that of Shakspeare himself. Nor is this wonderful.
The qualities of Jonson's peculiar excellence were more obvious and
appreciable than the delicate and, as it were, coy merits of the great
poet, whose works, possessing all the depth and universality of nature,
require no less study, subtlety, and discrimination in him who wvould
understand them as they deserve. All, on the contrary, could admire
Jonson's wonderful knowledge of real life, his vast and accurate observation of human vices and follies, his somewhat rough but
straightforward and vigorous delineations of character, and the epigrammatic condensation of a strong and masculine style, armed with
a11 the weapons of classic rhetoric, and decorated with the splendours
of unequalled learning. Jonson was, in short, a great comic dranlatirt; and it will be found that the chief excellence even of his two




CHAP. v I.]     BEN JONSON: HIS CHARACTERS.                 129
tragedies is less of a tragic than of a comic kind, and that they
please us rather by their admirable delineations of manners than by
those pictures of passion and sentiment which it is the legitimate
province of tragedy to present. The peculiar excellence ef this great
writer lay in the representation of the weaknesses and affectations of
common and domestic life —in the delineation of what were then
called the "humours," a word which may be explained to mean
those innate and peculiar distortions and deformities of moral physiognomy with which nature has stamped the characters of individuals
in every highly artificial and civilized state of society, and which are
afterwards exaggerated and rendered inveterate by vanity and affectation. In delineating these obliquities of character Jonson proceeded
philosophically, we may even say scientifically: he appears to have
carefully and minutely anatomised the follies and foibles of humanity,
and to have accumulated in his comic or satiric pictures (for his comedy
is of the satiric kind) every trait and. little stroke of the particular
folly in question, with a most consummate skill and industry; frequently concentrating in one character not only all the moral phenomena which his own vast and accurate observation could supply, aided
as that-was by a systematic and elaborate classification, but often exhausting all the touches left us in the moral portraits of the historiam
and satirists of antiquity.
His Roman plays, indeed,' Catiline' and' Sejanus,' the two tra
gedies of which we have spoken, and the comedy of'Poetaster,
nay be considered as absolute mosaics of language, of traits of cha.
racter and points of history, extracted from the works of Tacitus, of
Sallust, of Juvenal, of Horace-in short, the quintessence of Roman
literature. Yet such is Jonson's skill, and so perfect a harmony was
there betweensthe vigorous, majestic, Roman character of his own
mind, and the tone of. the literature which he studied so profoundly,
that this mosaic, though composed of an infinite number, Of distinct
particles, has the most absolute. unity of effect. Nay, more, he has
done the same thing in those comedies which have for their subject
modern domestic life and modern manners; and he has managed to
introduce, in the portraiture of the ludicrous and contemptible persons of English citizen life in the sixteenth century, the strokes of
humour and character taken from the delineations of Roman manners
executed by the great satiric artists of the time of the Comsars. This
is undoubtedly a point of consummate skill in rendering available the
stores of a species of learning which we should at first sight consider
rather as an encumbrance thah a useful instrument; but it arises also)
in some measure from that classical tone of character which we have
attributed to. Josson: he was, indeed,
More an antique Roman than a Dane."
It must, however, be confessed that Jonson's characters are some



130          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. VII.
times too elaborate, too scientific, and overloaded with details which,
though individually true and comic, are never found concentrated in
one person. He has' therefore been accused, and not unjustly, of
painting, not men and women, but impersonations of their leading
follies and vices.  And in this respect a parallel between Jonson and
Shakspeare would be exceedingly unfavourable to the former.  Both
have given us admirable portraits, for example, of braggarts; of coxcombs, and of fools; but while' Shakspeare's are real men and women
with real individuality of their own, but in whom the bragging, the
coxcombry, the -folly happen to be remarkable features, the comic
characters of Jonson cannot be separated'from the predominant folly
ridiculed. We might conceive Parolles becoming a modest and sensible man, Osric a plain-spoken and downright ~etizen, and Slender
or Aguecheek transformed by some miracle into reasonable beings,
and something of them would remain; but imagine Bobadil cured
of his boasting, Sir Fastidious of his courtly puppyism, or the exquisite Master Stephen of his imbecility, and nothing would be left
behind.
In the construction of his plots Jonson is immeasurably superior
to all- the other-dramatists of th'e period.  Naturally haughtty and
confident in his' own genius, and entertaining, too, a much higher
opinion than was common at the time of the gravity and importance
of the dramatist's office, he scorned to found his plays upon the substructure of the Italian novelist or the legends of Mliddle Age history;
and consequently we are never offended in his dramas with that improbability of incident, inconsistency of character, hurried and ii]perfect development, which is the principal structural defect of mnost
of the dramatic works of this period - a defect, indeed, from which
Shakspeare's productions are by no means free.- His plots jonson
always invented himself; and some of them are perfect models of
complicated yet natural intrigue.  It has been justly said that the
comedy of the'Silent Woman,' of the'Alchemist,' of'Volpone,'
are inimitable as series of incidents, natural, yet interesting, gradually
and necessarily converging to a catastrophe at once probable and unexpected.
The language of this great dramatist is in the highest degree.
vigorous, picturesque, and lively: it possesses, it is true, little or
none of that sweet and flowing harmony, that living and transparent
grace; which makes the golden verses of our Shakspeare absolutely
superior to the fa;r-famed diction. of the Greek poets; but it is an
admirably strong and flexible medium for his acute and: masterly exhibition of character; and though in general.not much elevated above
the level of weighty and powerful prose, sometimes rises to a consi-'derable pitch of rhetorical splendour.  It must be confessed that
~Jonson wants that deep sympathy with human nature which is the
true source of grace of language, as it is of tenderness of thought;




CHAP. VII.]      BEN JONSON: HIS COMEDIES.                   131
but there is often to be found in himn a kind of gallant bravery of
language, a splendour of imagery, recalling to us the dusky glow of
his great prototype Juvenal, with whose genius the literary character
of Jonson has many points of resemblance. Both writers describe
the follies of their kind in a contemptuous and sarcastic spirit, and
their crimes with a powerful but somewhat too declamatory invective;
and both appeared to have less sympathy with virtue than detestation
for vice: they were both, too, inclined to treat with indifference, if
not with contempt, the virtues and graces of the female charactera sure sign of hardness of mind.  Jonson's two Roman plays,  Catiline' and' Sejanus,' are of course founded on the history, the former
of Sallust, and the latter of Tacitus.  Though presenting a noble
and impressive copy of the terrible outlines of their subject, it may
be objected that the principal characters in each are so unmixedly
hateful or contemptible, that they are unfit for the purposes of the
tragic dramatist. The senate scene in the latter, and the character
of Tiberius, are very grandly conceived, and the assembly of conspirators in' Catiline,' together with the description of the battle and
the death of the hero, related by Petreius, are among the finest declamatory passages in English poetry.  These two dramas are in
verse.
Of the comedies the finest, in point of richness of character, are'Every Man in his Humour,' the' Alchemist' (the scenes of which
are in London), and'Volpone.' In the first the characters are
numerous and admirably delineated; the interest of the second rests
upon the jovial villany and cunning sensuality of the hero; and the
third contains some richly-contrasted touches of vulgar knavery and
self-deluding expectation, wrought up with astonishing vivacity. We
have already spoken of the excellence of plot which characterises
the' Silent Woman,' though the chief personage is a character so
rare as to be, if not impossible, at least so improbable that nothing
but its exquisite humour can reconcile us to it.'Bartholomew
Fair' is full of satire and animation, but would have little interest
for a reader of the present time, being a satire upon the Puritans;
and of the other pieces some are merely local and temporary attacks
on individuals, as the' Poetaster,'' Cynthia's Revels,' and the' Tale
of a Tub,' while others are generally considered inferior in merit:
we may instance the'Magnetic Lady,' the'Staple of News,' and
thc' New Inn.' The comedies are written, some entirely in prose,
someu in mingled prose and verse. It would be unjust not to state
that, though the above remarks will be found to apply generally to
Jonson, he has occasionally attained to a high degree of fanciful
elegance of language and a singular delicacy of harmony. Many
passages may be cited, particularly from his Masques, his unfinished
pastoral comedy of the' Sad Shepherd,'-a most exquisite fragment
1-1




132          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.    [CHAP. VII.
-and all his songs, which have seldom been equcilecd for flowing
elegance.
In spite, therefore, of his faults, both as a man and as an author
-his arrogance, his intemperance, his sarcastic and sometimes coarse
humour, his pedantry and his pride-we must ever hold him to have
been a great and a good man; grateful, generous, valianj free-spoken,
with something of the old Roman spirit in him, a mighty artist, and
a man of a gigantic and cultivated genius; and we may reverently
echo the beautiful words of the epitaph which long remained insecribed
upon his grave"   rare Ben Jonson!"
lie died, in poverty, in 1637, and was buried, in a vertical position,
in Westminster Abbey.
There is a far stronger resemblance between the leading features
of Shakspeare's dramatic manner and that of the two illustrious
authors of whom it is now our delightful duty to speak —Beaumont
and Fletcher, the twin stars of the English literary sky. These two
men, each of distinguished birth and considerable fortune, and bound
by the closest ties of friendship, present the rare and admirable
picture of a pair of friends, uniting, during a long period of author.
ship, their powers in the joint production of a multitude of admirable
works, in which the respective excellences of each were so intimately
mingled, that it is almost impossible to trace the pen of either separately from that of the other.
"They still have slept together,
Rose at an instant, learn'd, play'd, eat together;
And wheresoe'er they went, like Juno's swans,
Still they went coupled and inseparable."
And there are no works in the whole range of literature which givn
such noble pictures of the friendship of elevated and generous spirits
as the twin-born dramas of these illustrious fellow-labourers.
They wrote under the immediate influence of the Shakspearian
manner, and were obviously imitators of the great poet-not servile
copyists, but free and enlightened followers. They were exceedingly
prolific as authors, the editions of their works consisting of fifty-two
pieces, the greater part of which were composed in partnership.
This association was -only dissolved by the death of Beaumont, who
died, before he had completed his thirtieth year, in March, 1615;
his companion Fletcher surviving him till 1625, when he died in the
great plague, ten years after his brother dramatist, than whom he
was ten years older.- They appear, as we have said, to have. set
Shakspeare before them as their model, not however in his vaster
and completer developments of tragic passion, or in his deep-searching analysis of character, nor even in his rich and genial creations,of humour; but rather that phase of his dramatic art in which he




CHAP. VII.]       BEAUMONT AND FLETCHER.                    133
has ventured into the airy world of graceful and imaginative fiction:
not, in short, such characters as Macbeth, Othello, Falstaff, Hamlet,
or Shylock; but rather the persons which people the fairy isle of
Prospero, or the sunny gardens of Illyria. They are in particular
admired for the fresh, and vigorous, and courtly pictures they have
given of youthful generosity and friendship, and for the occasionally
happy portraits of love and innocent confidence; nor must we forget
the many admirable figures of loyal and military devotion to be found
in many exquisite characters of war-worn veterans.
In their plots they are even more careless and irregular than
Shakspeare; never scrupling to commit the most outrageous offences
against consistency of character and probability of event, and appearing to rely mainly on their skill in presenting striking and picturesque situation, and their mastery over every varied tone of
majestic, airy, and animated dialogue.
"There are," says Campbell, speaking of these two dramatists,
"such extremes of grossness and magnificence in their dramas, so
much sweetness and beauty interspersed with views of nature either
falsely romantic or vulgar beyond reality; there is so much to animate and amuse us, and yet so much that we would willingly overlook, that I cannot help comparing the contrasted impressions which
they make to those which we receive from visiting some great and
ancient city, picturesquely but irregularly built, glittering with spires
and surrounded by gardens, but exhibiting in many quarters the
lanes and hovels of wretchedness. They have scenes of wealthy
and high life, which remind us of courts and palaces frequented by
elegant females and high-spirited gallants, whilst their noble old
martial characters, with Caractacus in the midst of them, may inspire
us with the same sort of regard which we pay to the rough-hewn
magnificence of an ancient fortress.'
The prevailing vices of these great but unequal writers are, first,
the shocking occasional indelicacy and coarseness of their language,
and, ~econdly, the frequent inconsistency of their characters.  With
respect to the former, it is no excuse to say that it is partly to be
attributed to the custom of the female parts being at this period
universally represented by boys; nor is it much palliation to consider
this licentiousness of speech as the vice of the times. It is true that
the charge. of indecency may safely be maintained against nearly all
the writers of this wonderful period, and we know that the stage
has a peculiar tendency to fall into this error; but Shakspeare has
shown us that it is very possible to avoid this species of pruriency,
and to portray the female character not in its warmth only and its
tenderness, but also in its purity.  The most singular thing is; that
many of the more indelicate scenes, and much of the coarsest language in Beaumont and Fletcher, will be found to have been composed with the express purpose of exhibiting the virtue and purity




134           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [cHAP. Vir.
otf their heroines.  It cannot however be denied that it is but an
inartificial and dangerous mode of exalting the triumph of virtue, to
represent it as in immediate contact with the coarsest and nlost
debasing vice. Nor is that Juvenalian manner of satire either to be
imitated or approved which consists in elaborate description of immorality, however strong may be the tone of its invective, and
however elevated the height from which its thunders may be hurled
The precepts of good sense will coincide with the Duke's answer t,
Jaques in'As You Like It:'"Jac.                 Give me leave
To speak my mind, and 1. will through and through
Cleanse the foul body of the infected world,
If they will patiently receive my medicine.
Duke. Fie on thee! I can tell what thou wouldst do,Most mischievous foul' sin in chiding sin;
For thou thyself' hast been a libertine;
And all the embossed sores and headed evils,
That thou with licence of free foot hast caught,
Wouldst thou disgorge into the general world."
The other main vice of Beaumont and Fletcher is the extraordiwary and monstrous inconsistency of the characters.  Nothing is
more common in their plays than to see a valiant and modest youth
become, in the course of a few scenes, and without any cause or
reason, a coward and a braggart; and the devoted and loyal subject
of the first act metamorphosed into the traitor and assassin of the
third; the pure and high-born princess transformed into the coarse
and profligate virago. In order to exalt some particular virtue in
their'heroes, these writers sometimes represent them as enduring indignities and undergoing trials to which no human being would
submit, or the very' submission to which would render impossible
the existence of the virtue in question.
In spite of the general truth of the-foregoing remarks, our readers
must not be surprised to learn that the' plays of these dramatists
abound in many exquisite portraits of female heroism and magnanimity.  Indeed, the principal defect of their female characters (at
least of those which are really striking and attractive) is that they
seem to be conceived in a spirit too romantic and ideal, and are, as
Campbell well expresses it, "rather fine idols of the imagination
than probable types of nature:" but it would be unjust to forget
that the polluted stream of such base and monstrous conceptions as'The Island Princess,' and' Cupid's Revenge,' flows from the,same
Source  as the pure and sparkling fountain of'Philaster,' of'The
Double Marriage,' of'The  IMaid's Tragedy,' and of'Bonduca.'
We do not mean that even these latter works are free from objectionable
passages; but what is revolting might easily be cleared away, and
would leave much to elevate the fancy and to purify the heart.
Beaumont and Fletcher have been justly praised by all the critics,




CHAP. VII.]         MASSINGER-CHAPMAN.                      135
from Dryden downwards, for their beautiful delineations of youthful
friendship, and for -the ease, grace, and vivacity which distinguish
their dialogue, particularly such dialogue as takes place between
high-spirited and gallant young men.  In this they probably drew
from themselves.                                              E
Their comic characters, though generally very unnatural, and
devoid of that rich internal humour-that luce di dentro, as the
Italian artists phrase it-which makes Shakespeare's so admirable,
are written with a droll extravagance and fearless verve which seldom
fails to excite a laugh. The Lieutenant, who has drunk a love-potion,
and is so absurdly enamoured of the old king; Piniero, Cacafogo,
La Writ, the hungry priest and his clerk, and a multitude of others,
though fantastic and grotesque caricatures, are yet caricature executed
with much freedom and spirit.
According to the ancient tradition, Beaumont is said to have possessed more judgment and elevation, Fletcher more invention and
vivacity.  How far this can be proved by comparing those works
written conjointly by the two illustrious fellow-labourers, with those
composed after Beaumont's death by his surviving friend, it is difficult to determine.  We think it may be safely concluded that Beaumont possessed more markedly the tragic spirit, Fletcher the vis
conzica-one of the best of the comic pieces being Fletcher's' Rule.
a Wife and have a Wife.'
We must now pass rapidly over a number of mighty yet less
illustrious names, which in any other age, and in any other country,
would have been secure of immortality. The works of these' dramatists, so admired in their own day, and possessing all the qualities
likely to render them permanently popular, have been long condemned
(that is, during the whole period intervening between the civil wars
and the beginning of the present century) to an obscurity and
neglect incredible to those who are acquainted with their various
and striking merits, and inexplicable to all who are ignorant of the
capricious tyranny of popular taste.
Disinterred from the dust and cobwebs of two hundred years, and
brought to light by commentators and philologists eager to explain
the works of the greatest among their glorious army, these authors
have gradually attracted the attention of the general reader in
England, and may now be considered'as finally and solidly established
in popular and national admiration.  Strange! that the very genius
which eclipsed them all, and threw them as if for ever into the
abyss of neglect and "the portion of weeds and out-worn faces,"
should have been, inan after age, the indirect means of restoring to
them that heritage of glory which they appeared to have irredeemably
forfeited!
The next name to which we shall invite the reader's attention is
that of Philip Massinger, a man who passed his life in struggling
11*~




1136         OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. VI1
with poverty and distress.  He has left us a considerable number of
dramas, the greatest part of them in that mixed -manner so general
at this time, in which the passions exhibited are of a grave and
elevated character, the language rich and ornamented, and yet the
persons and events hardly to be called heroic. Of these works the
finest are'The City Madam,'' The Great Duke of Florence,''The
Bondman,''The Virgin Martyr,' and'A  New Way to Pay Old
Debts.' - In the first and last mentioned of these plays the author
nas given a most -striking and powerful'picture of oppression, and
the triumphant self-glorifying of ill-got wealth.  The character of
Sir Giles Overreach in the one, and that of Luke in the other, are
masterpieces. In expressing the dignity- of virtue, and in showing
greatness of soul rising superior to circumstance and fate, Massinger
exhibits so peculiar a vigour and felicity, that it is impossible not to
conceive such delineations (in which the poet delighted) to be a
reflection of his own proud and patient soul, and perhaps, too, but
too true a memorial of " the rich man's scorn, the proud man's contumely," which he had himself undergone.  In the tender and
pathetic, Massinger had no mastery; in the moral gloom of guilt, in
the crowded agony of remorse, in painting the storm and tempest of
the moral atmosphere, he is undoubtedly a great and mighty artist;
-and in expressing the sentiments of dignity and virtue, cast down
but not humbled by undeserved misfortune, he is almost unequalled.
His versificationi though never flowingly harmonious, is skilful and
learned, an appropriate vehicle for the elevation of the sentiments;
and in the description of rich and splendid scenes he is peculiarly
powerful and impressive.  The soliloquy of Luke in his brother's
counting-house, when the long-despised "'poor- relation" suddenly
finds himself the possessor of enormous wealth, and the gorgeous
description-in which he enumerates the gold and jewels and "skins
of parchment" in which his newly-acquired power is condensed, and
his long-desired vengeance on his oppressors —all this is conceived
in a dramatic spirit of the highest order. Massinger was born about
1.584, and'died in great poverty in March, 1640.
In reviewing the long succession of squalid lives and early and
obscure deaths which composes the biography of the dramatic school
of Elizabeth, it is very gratifying to meet with an illustrious poet
whose existence was as tranquil as. his productions were excellent.
This was George Chapman, one of the most learned men of his age,
and the author of the finest translation of Homer in the English
language. Deeply imbued with the spirit of Greek poetry, and baptised, so to say, in the fire of its earliest and most heroic inspirations
-in the works of Homer and of IEschylus — Chapman has infused
into his dramas, and particularly into those written on classical subjects, far more of the true Greek spirit than will be found in a
thousand of those pale and frigid centos which go under this name- of




ECHA. VII.].DEKKAR-WEBSTER.                       137
regular classical tragedies; and would be an unanswerable reply to
the prejudices and ignorance of those foreign critics who so glibly
accuse the' British drama of irregularity and barbarism.  The life
of this great and learned man was worthy of his genius, "preserving," to use the words of Oldys, "in his conduct, the true dignity
of poesy, which he compared to the flower of the sun, that disdains
to open its leaves to the eye of a smoking taper."  He died, at the
age of seventy-seven, in 1634.
We will pass over Dekkar, a most prolific and multifarious  dramatist, whose productions, however, are difficult to examine and appreciat3, from his- having generally written in partnership with other
playwrights.  He appears to have been by no means destitute of
imagination, of pathos, or of humour; though his genius has always
appeared to us rather lyric than dramatic. He was celebrated in his
own day for his literary warfare with Jonson, whom he attacked in
his'Satiro-mastiS;' his finest passages are marked by great felicity
of idea, and a delicate music of expression.  He died in 1638.
John Webster, a mighty and funereal genius, is the next author
we shall mention.  We can compare his mind to nothing so well as
to some old Gothic cathedral, with its arches soaring heaven-way-d,
but carved with monsters and angels, with saints and fiends, in grotesque confusion.  Gleams of sunlight fall here and there, it is true,
through the huge window, but they are coloured with the sombre
dyes of painted glass, bearing records of human pride and human
nothingness, and they fall in long slanting columns, twinkling silently
with motes and dusty splendour, upon the tombs of the mighty;
lighting dimly up now the armour of a recumbent Templar or the
ruff of some dead beauty, and now feebly losing themselves amid the
ragged coffins and scutcheons in the vaults below. His fancy was
wild and powerful, but gloomy and. monstrous, dwelling ever on the
vanities of earthly glory, on the nothingness of pomp, not without
many terrible hints at the emptiness of our trust, and many bold
questionings of human hopes of a hereafter.  "His phantasms appear often, and do frequent cemeteries, charnel-houses, and cliurches,
where the devil, like -an insolent champion, beholds with pride the
spoils and trophies of his victory over Adam." Death is indeed his
Muse; not the rose-crowned deity of the ancients, the brother of
sleep, the bringer of repose, the winged genius with the extinguished
torch, but the hideous skeleton of the monkish imagination, the
"' grim anatomy," with his crawling blood-worms, and all the loathsome horrors of physical corruption.
His most striking plays are'The White Devil,''The Duchess of
Malfy' (Amalfi),'Guise, or the Massacre of France,' and'The
Devil's Law-case.' In the second of these works, a tragedy in which
pity and horror are carried to an intense and almost unendurable
pitch, the death of the innocent and beautiful heroine is most power



138-         OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHIAP. VII.
fully conceived: his simple, direct, straightforward pathos is in the
highest degree tragic and affecting; but his plots are totally extravagant, crowded with supernumerary horrors; and if he is occasionally touching and graceful, such passages resemble less the growth
of a rich and generous soil, than the pale flowers which sometimes
bloom amid the rank and obscene herbage of a crowded burial-ground,
springing from fat corruption and watered with hopeless tears. This
strange and powerful genius was contemporary in his life and death,
as it is supposed, with Dekkar, and these two dramatists wrote many
pieces together.
Our space will only allow us to make a brief allusion to Middleton
and Marston, the former of whom is remarkable for the use he has
made in one of his plays of the popular witch or sorceress of his
country's superstition, a circumstance to which some critics have
attributed the original conception of Shakspeare's wondrous supernatural machinery in Macbeth.  Middleton's witches are, however,
nothing more than the traditional mischievous old women, described,
it is true, with great vigour and spirit, while those of the greater
bard are, as Charles Lamb finely says, "foul anomalies, of whom we
know not whence they are sprung, nor whether they have beginning
or ending. As they are without human passions, so they seem to
be without human relations. They come with thunder and lightning, and vanish to airy music. This is all we know of them.
Except Hecate, they have no names; which heightens their mysteriousness."
Marston is chiefly remarkable for a fine tone of moral satire: some
of his invectives against vice and folly are grand abundant, outpourings of Juvenalian eloquence, not without some of Juvenal's grim
mirth and grave pleasantry.
We must confess that our favourite among the minor Elizabethan
dramatists-that is, after Shakspeare, Jonson, and Fletcher-is John
Ford.  Of a melancholy and pensive character -witness the strong
portrait sketched by a contemporary hand"Deep in a dump John Ford alone was got
With folded arms and melancholy hat!'sufficiently learned to enrich his scenes with many beautiful images
borrowed from the ancients; possessing an ear for the softest harrnony, and a heart peculiarly sensitive to pure and elevated emotion,
this dramatist has depicted the passions, and particularly the love,
of youth and innocence, with a tenderness and force which almost
equals Shakspeare himself. Ford's instrument is of no great compass, but its tones are unmatched for softness, and he makes it " discourse most eloquent music."  His finest plays are'The Lover's
Melancholy,''The Brother and Sister,''Love's Sacrifice,''The
Fancies, Chaste and Noble,' and, above all, the admirable tragedy




CIHAP. VII.]           1ORD - SHIRLEY.                      139
of' The Broken Heart.' Do not these exquisite and fanciful titles
seem to give earnest of purity, grace, tenderness, chivalrous love, and
patient suffering?  And the reader will not be disappointed.  We
do not mean to say that Ford is not sometimes coarse, sometimes,
licentious, and sometimes extravagant. Unfortunately the audiences
of that -age required an intermixture of comic scenes, even in the
most serious dramas; and Ford's genius was the very reverse of
comic. With no humour in his soul, he seems, when trying to write
his comic scenes (which are, with few exceptions, base and contemptible in the extreme), to have determined by a violent effort to renounce his own refined and modest character, and like a bashful man,
who generally becomes impudent when he attempts to conquer his
natural infirmity; he rushes at once from the airiest and most courtly
elegance to the vilest and meanest buffoonery. But in his true
sphere, what dramatist was ever greater?  What author has ever
painted with a more delicate and reverent hand the innocence, the
timid ardour of youthful passion"le speranze, gl' affetti,
La data fe, le tenerezze; i primi
Sgambievoli sospiri, i primi sguardi"? —
and, who has ever approached him  in the representation of the
patience and self-denial of that noblest and most unselfish of passions-of the undying constancy of breaking hearts-in all the
more divine and ethereal aspects of the sentiment?  In the last
play which we have spoken of, the pathos is absolutely carried so far
that it oversteps the true limits of dramatic sufferance; nay, almost
trangresses the bounds of human endurance.  How confident must
he have been in his own mastery over every manifestation of the
passion which he has so delighted to portray, to have ventured in
one drama two such characters as Penthea and Calantha! Ford has
also never failed to interest us in a class of personages which it is
very difficult to render attractive-the characters of hopeless yet
unrepining lovers.  We need only mention Orgilus and the noble
MTlalfato.
We now come to the last of these great dramatists, James Shirley.
lie was a man of learned education, who was at first destined for the
clerical profession, but, disappointed in his hopes, took refuge in
those two inevitable asylums of indigent erudition, first the school,
and afterwards the theatre.  His life was full of adventure, for it
extended over a most busy period, namely from 1596 till after the
Restoration.  He had indeed passed through many Vicissitudes, for
he had fought in the civil wars on the royalist side; and his name
forms the connecting link between the two periods of dramatic art,
so widely different, one of which is typified in Shakspeare,. and the
other in Congreve.  His works are praised for the elegance, nature,
good sense, and sprightliness of their comic language; for the purity




140         OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. VII..
of -the characters, particularly the female ones; and for the ease and
animation of his plots.  He has not much pathos, it is true, nor
mnuch knowledge of the heart; but there are few dramatists whose
works give a more agreeable and unforced transcript of the ordinary
scenes of life, conveyed in more graceful language.  His humour,
though not very profound, is true and fanciful, and his plays may
always be, read with pleasure, and often with profit.  His best
dratmas are'The Brothers,''The Lady of Pleasure,' and'The
Grateful Servant.'
CHAPTER VIII.
THE GREAT DIVINES.
Theological Eloquence of England and France-The Civil IWar-Persecution
of the Clergy - Richard Hooker - His Life and Character - Treatise on
Ecclesiastical Polity - Jeremy Taylor - Compared with Hooker-His Life
-Liberty of Prophesying -His other works -The Restoration-Taylor's
Sermons-Hallam's Criticism-Taylor's Digressive Style-Isaac BarrowHis inimense Acquirements -Compared to Pascal -The English Universities.
IN the department of Christian philosophy, and particularly in
that subdivision of theological literature which embraces the eloquence
of the pulpit, England has generally been considered inferior to many
other European nations, and to France in particular. So splendid
indeed are the triumphs of reasoning and of eloquence-which are
recalled to the remembrance of every cultivated mind at the mention
of such illustrious names as Pascal, as Bossuet, as Bourdaloue, that
the general reader (above all, the Continental one) is apt to doubt
whether the Church of England has been adorned by any intellects
comparable to these bright and shining lamps of Catholicism.  We
hope that we shall not be considered presumptuous if we endeavour
to show that Great Britain does possess monuments of Christian
eloquence equal -or at least not inferior to the immortal productions
of these great men, and, at the same time, if we attempt to explain
how it has happened that the triumphs of English divinity are not
so generally known and appreciated as those of the great French
theologians.  This latter circumstance will be found to proceed not
only from the much more universal study throughout Europe of the
French language as compared to the English (a. partiality which, it
must be confessed, is now daily wearing away), but also in some
measure from  the points of difference in many matters of religious




CHAP VIII.]        THEOLOGICAL LITERATURE.                    14
belief and ecclesiastical discipline existing between the Anglican
Church and that of Rome.
There is, in short, a much greater apparent accordance, in these
points, between the opinions of most of the Continental Churches
and those of Rome, than exists between Romanism and the Churchl
of England. Add to this, too, the'more imposing and dazzling
character of the French'style, particularly that of the French pulpit,
at the splendid epoch so brilliantly adorned by these admirable productions, and we shall not be at a loss to attribute to its real cause
the comparative neglect experienced by the works of Hooker, Taylor,
Barrow, South, and Stillingfleet.
In instituting a general comparison between the productions of
the French and English intellect, few persons have failed.to remark
one very striking point of dissimilitude, if not even of contrast; and'
this is, that the former will be found to possess their chief and
characteristic beauties externally, while those of the latter are not
to be perceived or appreciated without a greater degree of study and
examination.  We do not mean, by the use of the word "external,"
in any way to imply that the productions of French genius do not
possess merits as real and as solid as those which adorn any literature
in the world; we wish to express that those merits lie nearer to the
surface and are brought more prominently forward in the great
trophies of French intellect than in those of the British mind.
Whether we examine the drama of the two countries, their eloquence
or their poetry, we shall almost invariably find that, while the merits
and peculiar graces of the Gallic intellect are conspicuously and prominently placed as it were in the foreground of the picture, the
British Muse is of a coyer and more retiring temper, and only yields
herself to ardent and persevering pursuit -
"' With sweet, reluctant, amorous delay."
This deep and internal character of our literature arises in a great
measure from that Teutonic element which plays so important a part
in every development of English nationality —in the literature of
the country, in its language, in its social condition, and in its political
institutions.  The regular and beautiful forms of classical literature
— simple, severe, intelligible as the proportions of the Grecian architecture   which the French have generally ilade their models, are
certain at the very first view to strike, to please, and to elevate; while
the English literature -  and no portion of it more justly than the
one now under our consideration-may rather be compared to the artful wildness, the studied irregularity of some Gothic cathedral.  Its
proportions ale less obvious, its outline less distinct; its rich and
varied ornaments can only be understood, and its multiplicity of parts
can only be harmonized into a beautiful and accordant whole, by the
spectator who will pass some time and exert some patience in study.




142          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. VIII.
ing it, and whose eye must first overcome the mysterious gloom
which pervades the solemn fabric.
But these remarks will be better substantiated by a comparison of
the great works of theologic eloquence which we are about to examine in detail. Those qualities which we have already spoken of as
characterising all the literary productions of the period of Queen
Elizabeth will be found impressed upon no part of that literature
with greater distinctness than upon this.  Richness, fertility, tlviversality are stamped upon all the writings of this unequalled era; and
richness, fertility,- and universality are the distinctive features of the
style of the three great divines whom we have selected from  a very
large multitude as embodying in the highest degree the peculiar merits of their era-an era Which, it is proper to remark, extended from'the middle of Elizabeth's reign down to the period of the Restoration, and even some time beyond it.
The innumerable discordant, sects into which the nation was split
during the Commonwealth were much more calculated to encourage
wild speculations in doctrine and fantastical innovations in practice
than to promote the true interests of religion; and, with that narrow
and persecuting bigotry which so strongly contrasted with their professions of universal toleration, the fanatics united all their efforts
against the established Chuirch of the country. Bitter as were their
enmities towards qne another, the thousand sects could at least find.
one point in which they were all agreed; and this was the annihilation of a Church whose riches and dignity excited at once their envy
and their rapacity, while the learning and virtue of its most distinguished defenders: must have been felt by them-bigots at once and
fanatics as they were - as a tacit reproach upon their own blatant
ignorance and plebeian ferocity.
A multitude of the regular clergy were driven from their pulpits,
and persecuted with every ingenuity that triumphant malice could
devise: many men, venerable for their virtues and illustrious for their
learning, were hounded like wild beasts from the tranquil retreats of
their universities and the industrious obscurity of their parishes.
The Church of England underwent a fieirce and unrelenting ordeal,
and, in passing through that fiery trial, showed that all the severities
of a tyrannical and fanatic government might indeed oppress, but
could never humiliate it. It was in imprisonment, in exile, and in
poverty that that Church strung its nerves and strengthened itself
for its noblest exploits; it was when crushed beneath the armed foot
of military fanaticism that it gave out, like the fragrant Indian tree,
its sweetest odours of sanctity and its most precious balm of Christian
doctrine; and lot it be recorded to the glory of these much-tried and
illustrious victims, that when the storm of tyranny had passed away,
and the Anglican Cdhurch was once more restored to its holy places,
i. used its victory mercifully, as it had supported its affliction pa



CHAP. VIII.]          HOOKER: HIS LIFE.                     143
tiently.  It had suffered persecution, and it had learned forgiveness.
The three great men whose works we propose to examine occupy
a period extending between the years 1553 and 1677, or rather more
than a century-a century filled with vicissitudes of the gravest import to the fortunes of the English Church. We should not have
ventured to take a view of this part of our subject embracing so long
a period of time, and necessitating the consideration of so many, so
various, and so important works, but from the reflection that these
men and their productions bear one stamp and possess a singular resemblance in mode of thought and tone of language; they all belong,
intellectually if not chronologically, to the Elizabethan era.
The first of them in point of time is Richard Hooker, born near
Exeter in 1553, and enabled, by the wise benevolence of the.venerable Jewel, Bishop of Salisbury, to study at the University of
Oxford, where he speedily distinguished himself for his vast learning
and industry, no less than by a simplicity and purity of character
almost angelic.
Having attracted the notice of Bishop Sandys, he was made tutor
to that prelate's son, who, together with Cranmer, a descendant of
the archbishop, enjoyed the benefit of Hooker's superintendence, and
who ever afterwards retained for his wise and simple preceptor the
warmest veneration and respect. After occupying for a short time
the chair of Deputy Professor of Hebrew, he entered into holy
orders, and married.  This last important act of life was.productive
of so much affliction, even to his pious and gentle spirit, and was
entered upon with a guileless simplicity so characteristic of Hooker's
unworldly temper, that we cannot refrain from giving the anecdote
as related by his friend and- biographer Walton. Arriving wet and
weary in London, he put up there at a house set apart for the accommodation of the preachers who had to deliver the sermon at Paul's
Cross. His hostess treated him with so much kindness that Hooker's
gratitude induced him to accept a proposition made by her of procuring him.a wife.  This she accordingly did in the person of her
own daughter, "a silly clownish woman, and withal a mere Xantippe,'" whom he accordingly married, and who appears to have
inflicted upon her simple and patient husband an uninterrupted
succession of such penance as ascetics usually exercise upon themselves in the hope of recompense in a future existence.  When
visited, at a rectory in Buckinghamshire to which he was afterwards
presented, by his old pupils Sandys and Cranmer, Hooker was found
in the fields tending sheep and reading Horace, possibly contrasting
the sweet pictures of rural life painted by the Venusian bard with
the vulgar realities which surrounded him. On returning to the
house the guests "received little entertainment'except from the
oonversation of Hooker," who was disturbed by his wife's calling
12




1144.   OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CHIAP. VIII.
himrn. away to rock the cradle. On their departure the next morning
Ciranmer could not refrain from  expressing his sympathy with
Hooker's domestic miseries, with his poverty and the obscurity of his
condition.  "My dear George," replied this Christian philosopher,
"if saints have usually a -double share in the miseries of this life, I,
that am none, ought not to repine at what my wise Creator hath
appointed for me, but labour (as indeed I do daily) to submit mine to
his will, and possess my soul in patience and peace." Shortly after the
event related in this touching anebdote, Hooker received the dignified
appointment of Master of the Temple in London, a post in which
his learning, genius, and piety were exhibited in all their brightness,
but in which his resignation' and love of peace were put to a trial
not less severe, though certainly less humiliating, than those to which
this heavenly-minded man was exposed: in his Buckinghamshire
rectory. He soon found himself engaged in a controversy with'Walter Travers, his colleague in the ministry of the Temple, an
eloquent and able man, but professing certain opinions respecting
church government with which Hooker could not coincide. In this
interminable sea of discussion was now conscientiously embarked the
mild and modest Hooker; and' though the argument was conducted
on both sides with good temper and courtesy, it embittered the existence of our peace-loving divine, and ended in his antagonist being
suspended from his ministerial functions by the authority of Archbishop Whitgift.  Hooker on this occasion wrote to the prelate a
letter imploring deliverance from " that troubled sea of noises and
harsh discontents," an element so unfitted to the peculiar character
of his mind and temper, and a position which prevented him from
proceeding with the great work he was now meditating, his' Treatise
on the Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity.' The letter breathes so noble
a spirit of Christian purity, and is withal so characteristic of the
man, that we shall, we trust, be pardoned for inserting some passages
of it; the rather as it contains the outline and general aim of the
work itself.
"MY LoRD, —When I lost the freedom of my cell, which was
my college, yet I found -some degree of it in my quiet country parsonage. But I am weary of the noise and oppositions of this place;
and, indeed, God and nature did not intend me for contentions, but
for study and quietness. And, my Lord, my particular contests here
with Mr. Travers have proved the more unpleasant to me because I
believe him to be a good man; and upon that belief hath occasioned
me to examine my conscience touching his opinions. And to satisfy
that, I have consulted the Holy Scriptures and other laws both
human and divine.          And in this examination I have not
only satisfied myself, but have begun a treatise, in which I intend
the satisfaction of. others, by a demonstration of the reasonableness
rf our laws of ecclesiastical polity.  But, my Lord, I shall never ba




CHAP. VIII.]   HOOKER: ECCLESIASTICAL POLITY.                145
able to finish what I have begun, unless I be removed into some
quiet parsonage, where I may see God's blessings spring out of niy
mother earlh, and eat my bread in peace and privacy; a place where
I may, without disturbance, meditate my approaching mortality, and
that great account which all flesh must give at the last day to the
God of all spirits."
His wise and moderate desire was granted; he was transferred,.in
[591, to the rectory of Boscomb, in Wiltshirej where he finished the
first four books of his treatise, which were printed in 1594.  He
was in the following year presented, by Queen Elizabeth, to the
rectory of Bishop's Bourne, in Kent, whither he removed, and where
he spent, in learned retirement and in the faithful discharge of his
pastoral duties, the short remainder of his life. Here he completed
the fifth book of his great work, published in 1597, and also prepared
three others, which did not appear till after his death.  This event
took place in November, 1600; and -it is difficult to conceive any
human soul, purified by suffering, elevated by the most vigorous yet
meekest intellect, adorned by learning, and inspired by piety, passing
through our mortal life with less of stain, and rising into a more
glorious existence with  less need of change and purifying, than the
angelic spirit of the mild and venerable Hooker.
"' Hooker's Ecclesiastical Polity,'" says the excellent and acute
historian of the literature of Europe, "mightseem to fall under the
head of theology; but, the first book of this work being by much
the best, Hooker ought rather to be reckoned among those who have
weighed the principles, and delineated the boundaries, of moral and
political science." No quality is more surely a concomitant of the
highest order of genius than its suggestiveness, and what we may call
its expansive character. Though originally written to determine a
particular and limited controversy on certain matters of church discipline, Hooker's immortal treatise is a vast arsenal or storehouse of
all those prbofs and arguments upon which rests the whole structure
of the moral and political edifice. " The first lays open," says D'Israeli,
" the foundations of law and order, to escape from C the mother of
conflsion, which breedeth destruction.'" Unhappily, however, this
great work is incomplete; or at least so much mystery rests upon its
publication, that it is impossible to divest the mind of the most fatal
of all suspicions which can affect a book —suspicions as to its genuineness. At the death of Hooker his manuscripts fell into the hands
of -his despicable wife, who, marrying indecently soon'after the loss
of the good man whose constant penance she had been, at first
refused to give any account of the precious literary remains of her
deceased husband.  It afterwards appeared that she-had allowed
various Puritan ministers (men professing the very opinions which
Hooker had written to refute) to have free access to these papers;
and it is to their sacrilegious tampering that we ought dolubtless to




146          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CIIAP. VIi
attribute not only the destruction of many of these plpcers, but also
alterations which have apparently been made in the text.  The
wretched woman, who had thus betrayed the glory of her departed
husband, was found dead in her bed the day after she had been
forced to make this humiliating confession.  The precious manuscripts now passed through several hands; and an edition of the five
books of the'Ecclesiastical Polity' was published in 1617. "Again,
in 1632," continues D'Israeli, who has given us the secret history of
Hooker's great work, "the five undoubted genuine books were
reprinted.  But their fate and their perils had not yet terminated."
At the troubled period of the Long Parliament, Hooker's manuscripts
were again examined by order of the House of Commons, and the
sixth and eighth books were given to the world. It is singular that
in this, as well as in subsequent editions, the seventh book is not
included; and doubts were even raised as to the genuineness of that
book when restored by Dr. Gauden in his edition of the work. It is,
however, now generally admitted that the seventh book, though
hastily composed, is really genuine; but we must, on the other hand,
content ourselves with the mortifying conclusion'that the so-called
sixth book is irrecoverably lost; that which occupies its place being
a separate treatise, never intended to form part of the' Ecclesiastical
Polity.' In spite, however, of the loss of an important portion of
its argument, in spite of the numerous and often contradictory passages which have been interpolated by unfaithful copyists and disingenuous commentators, the'Ecclesiastical Polity' will ever remain
one of the noblest ornaments of English literature, and one of the
mightiest triumphs of human genius and industry. " He had drunk,"
says Hallam, "at the streams of ancient philosophy, and asquired
from Plato and Tully somewhat of their redundancy and want of
precision, with their comprehensiveness of observation and their
dignity of soul."  When a portion of Hooker's preface was translated by an English Romanist to the Pope, his Holiness expressed
the greatest surprise at the erudition and acuteness of the book.
" There is no learning that this man has not searched into," said the
Pontiff; " nothing too hard for his understanding, and his books will
get reverence by age."  James I. of England, a prince to whom we
cannot deny the possession of most extensive learning, inquiring
after Hooker, and hearing that his recent death had been deeply
lamented by the Queen, paid the following tribute to his genius:"And I receive it with no less sorrow; for I have received more
satisfaction (that is, conviction) in reading a leaf of Mr. Hooker
than I had in large treatises by many of the learned: many others
write well, but yet in the next age they will be forgotten." Hooker's
style, though full of vigorous and idiomatic expressions, is much
more Latin and artificial than was usual at that time: he does not
disfigure his sentences with that vain parade of quotation which di3



CHAP. VIII.]     JEREMY TAYLOR: HIS LIFE.'  147
tinguishes contemporary writings: his profound learning was, if we
may use the expression, chemically and not mechanically united with
his. mind; it was incorporated not by contact, but by solution.
Though the general tone of the work is of course abstract and even
dry, the sweet and simple character of the man sometimes makes
itself perceptible through the elaborate and brilliant panoply of the
orator; or, to use the beautiful words of D'Israeli, "Hooker is the
first vernacular writer whose classical pen harmonised a numerous
prose. While his earnest eloquence, freed from all scholastic pedantry, assumes a style stately in its structure, his gentle spirit sometimes
flows into natural humour, lovely in the freshness of its simplicity."
In purity and meekness of personal character, in immensity of
erudition, and in power of eloquence, there is a strong resemblance
between the great writer of whom we have just feebly attempted to
give a sketch and the sweet orator to whom we are about to turn our
attention —Jeremy Taylor. They were both stamped with the
majestic impress of that noble age of our literature, when the minds
of men seemed to possess something of the simplicity, grandeur,
and freshness which we fondly believe characterized (at least physically) the primeval races of mankind. Taylor's' learning, indeed,
was hardly less vast and multifarious than -that of Hooker; but,
whether from the poetical and imaginative turn of his mind, or
from the greater temptations offered by the more declamatory nature
of the subjects of his writings, his erudition appears less under his
command than. Hooker's. The latter may be compared to the
Roman warrior, whose arms indeed were weighty, but not so much
so as to impair his strength and agility in the combat; while Taylor
reminds us rather of the knight of the Middle Ages, sheathed from
plume to spur in shining and ponderous panoply, but his armour is
too complicated in its parts to admit of free motion, and the very
plumes, and scarfs, and penoncelles which adorn it, are an impediment, no less than a decoration.  We find, in short; in the writings
of Taylor something of that diffuse, sensuous, and effeminate overrichness which distinguishes the style of many of the Greek and
Roman fathers —Tertullian, for instance, or Chrysostom.  But in
spite of these defects, we cannot conceal our conviction that the
works of Jeremy Taylor are, upon.the whole, the finest production
of English ecclesiastical literature; or, to use the strong but hardly
exaggerated language of Parr, "they are fraught with guileless
ardour, with peerless eloquence, and with the richest stores of
knowledge, historical, classical, scholastic, and theological."
He was born in the humblest rank of life (his father was a barber
at Cambridge), in the year 1613, anc entered Caius College, in that
university, in his thirteenth year.  On taking his. bachelor's-degree
in 1631 he entered into holy orders, and made his first step in the
career of ecclesiastical advancement, by preaching, for a friend, in
12*




148          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CHAP. VIII.
St Paul's Cathedral in London.  Here his eloquence, his learning,
and what a contemporary calls "his florid and youthful beauty and
pleasant air," procured him immediate reputation, and the notice of
Archbishop Laud, who made him his chaplain, gave him preferment
in the Church, and presented him to a fellowship in All Souls' College, Oxford.  Ile married, in 1639, Phoebe Langdale, by whom he
had three sons, all of whom he had the misfortune to survive. But
this prosperous and peaceful existence was now overshadowed'by the
clouds of that tremendous storm  which was soon to burst upon
England, and in its fury not only to sweep away the altar and the
throne, but almost to efface the very foundations of society. At the
breaking out of the civil war Taylor sided warmly with the royalist
party, and-even wrote a defence of episcopacy.  In the troubles
which followed he was taken prisoner by the parliamentary army in
the battle fought under the walls of Cardigan Castle.  The royalist
cause now met with a long succession of reverses; and Taylor, who
had been released by the victorious party, determined to retire altogether from what he probably foresaw was a hopeless struggle, and
one in which an ecclesiastic could hardly hope to mingle with much
utility to his party or much honour to his professional character.
Hie retired to Wales, and established a school at Newton Hall, in
Carmarthenshire, where he remained in tranquillity, without incurring any very violent or persevering- persecution at the hands of
the dominant party.  His own account of this: portion of his life is
interesting and beautiful. "In the great storm which dashed the
vessel of the Churchl all in pieces I had been cast on the coast of
Wales; and, in a little boat, thought to have enjoyed that rest and
quietness which in England, in a far greater,. I could not hope for.
Here I cast anchor, and, thinking to ride safely, the storm  followed
me with so impetuous violence that it broke a cable, and I lost my
anchor.  And here again I was exposed to the mercy of the sea,
and the gentleness of an element that could neither distinguish
things nor persons; and, but that he He that stilleth the raging of
the sea, and the noise of the waves, and the madness of his people,
had provided a plank for me, I had been lost to all opportunities of
content and study; but I know not whether I have been more preserved by the courtesies of'my friends or the gentleness and mercies
~if a noble enemy."
The passage just quoted is taken from Taylor's dedication to the
Liberty of Prophesying,' his first work of a universal and permnanent importance.. The -object of this admirable production is "to
show the Unreasonableness of Prescribing to other Men's Faith, and
the Iniquity of Persecuting Differing Opinions." It is,'in fact, the
first complete and powerful vindication that the world had ever seen
of the great principle of religious toleration.  Proud, indeed, may
IEngland justly be.in the reflection that it was she who first gave to




CHAP. VII.i]    JEREMY TAYLOR: HIS WORKS.                   149
the world the noble birth of Religious and Civil Liberty-those
twin-sisters, eternal and inseparable, the fairest and strongest children
of Heaven.  With the line of argument taken by Taylor in this
production we have nothing to do at present: viewed as a mere work
of literature, it is distinguished by all the excellences which mark
his style, though at the same time it is more argumentative and less
declamatory than his other writings.
His wife having died three years after her marriage, in 1642,
Taylor contracted a second alliance during his residence in Wales.
His second wife was Mrs. Joanna Bridges, said to have been a
natural daughter of Charles I., a lady possessed of a considerable
estate in Carmarthenshire.  Though thus relieved from the necessity
of continuing to be a schoolmaster, he appears at different times to
have suffered serious losses from fines and sequestrations, and even
to have been imprisoned on one occasion, if not more, for having too
freely expressed his sentiments on public and church affairs.  His
literary activity, however, did not for a moment relax, and will be
best proved by the enumeration of some of his principal works:-'An Apology for authorised and set Forms of Liturgy;''The Life
of Christ, the Great Exemplar,' published in 1648;'The Rule and
Exercise'of Holy Living,' and'The Rule and Exercise of Holy'
Dying,' two admirable treatises of Christian conduct, which, like the
last-named work, have taken a permanent place in the religious
literature of the English Church.  Besides these, and a great number of sermons, he wrote'Golden Grove,' a small but admirable
manual of devotion, so named after the seat of his friend and
neighbour the Earl of Carbery; and a treatise on the subject of
Original Sin, which involved him in a controversy with the Calvinists on the one hand, and the High Church party on the other.
This is the only occasion on which Taylor's courtesy and gentleness
of character appear to have at all deserted him.  The Restoration
was now at hand, when the long-oppressed Church might look forward to tranquillity and peace, and when the devoted adherents of
the monarchy and the constitution might reasonably expect some
reward for their sacrifices and their fidelity.
Their hopes, however, were cruelly disappointed: the profligate
monarch forgot, in his moment of prosperity, all the lessons which
exile and distress might have taught even the most insensible; and
it is satisfactory to think that one exception was made to the melancholy uniformity of ingratitude, and that one pious and apostolic
clergyman was rewarded for his sufferings and for his virtues.  Taylor.was made Bishop of Down and Conner, to which see was afterwards annexed that of Dromore, also in Ireland.  These well-won
and nobly-worn dignities Taylor did not long enjoy, for he died of a
fever at Lisburn, in Ireland, on the 13th'of August, 1667, in the
fifty.fifth vear of his age.




150          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CHAP. V III.
His character was truly apostolic, and his was one of those rare
and excellent natures which appear equally venerable in prosperity
and in adversity; the one not able to swell him with pride, nor the
other to humiliate the simple grandeur of his soul.
"' The sermons of Jeremy Taylor are far above any that had preceded them in the English Church. An imagination essentially
poetical, and sparing none of the decorations which, by critical rules,,are deemed almost peculiar to verse; a warm tone of piety, sweetness, and charity; an accumulation -of circumstantial accessories
whenever he reasons, or. persuades, or describes;, an. erudition pouring itself forth in quotation, till his sermons become in some places
almost a garland of flowers from all other writers, and especially those
of classical antiquity, never before so redundantly scattered from the
pulpit- distinguish Taylor from his contemporaries by their degree,
as. they do from most of his successors by their kind.  His sermons
on the Marriage Ring, on the House of Feasting, on the Apples of
Sodom, may be, named, without disparagement to others which per —
haps ought to stand in equal place. But they age not without considerable faults.  The eloquence of Taylor is great, but it is not
eloquence of the highest class; it is far too Asiatic, too much in the
style of Chrysostom and other declaimers of. the fourth century, by
the study of whom he had probably vitiated his taste; his learning
is ill placed, and his arguments often as much so - not to mention
that he has the common defect- of alleging nugatory proofs; his
vehemence loses its effect by the circuity of his pleonastic language;
his sentences are of endless length, and hence not only altogether
unmusical, but not always reducible to grammar. But he is still
the greatest ornament of the English pulpit up to the middle of
the seventeenth century; and we have no, reason to believe, or
rather much reason to disbelieve, that he had any competitor in other
languages."
There can be very little doubt of the general justice of the above
criticism; and as the passage is calculated to give, as far as it goes,
a faithful idea of the peculiarities-and particularly of the faults-of
Jeremy Taylor's prose style, we have not scrupled to quote it here;
we cannot, however, do so without remarking on what, to us at least,
appears to' be a defect in the general judgments of the excellent
author from whose work we have extracted it.
No one can deny Hallam  the praise of perfect acquaintance with
the vast subject he has so ably illustrated, of a store of learning
equally accurate and profound, and of a singularly clear and lucid
style; but at the same time he will be generally found, we think, to
have been barely just to the English literature of the sixteenth and
seventeenth centuries. Whether from the peculiar bent of his
oersonal tastes, from the particular direction of his reading, or from;,he habit of periodical criticism, the discriminating faculty in his




CHAP. VIII.]     JEREMY TAYLOR: HIS STYLE.                  151
powerful mind appears to have been developed disproportionately
with, nay, even perhaps at the expense of, the admiring or appreciating power: in other words, he exhibits a strong and possibly involuntary tendency to prefer what is consonant with a pure and regular
system of rules to that which bears the stamp of vigorous and
possibly irregular originality. His mind delights' rather in what is
negatively than. in what is' positively beautiful. Without enthusiasm,
criticism becomes rather a dogmatic art than an ennobling and pro.
ductive science; and Hallam will appear, in doing ample justice to
the more regular and colder schools of literature in Europe, to have
hardly been sufficiently warm in his praise of the great writers of
this, the boldest and most impassioned period of his country's intellectual history.  In our opinion, the richness, the inexhaustible
fertility, the exquisite and subtle harmony, and the fervent and yet
gentle piety which distinguish every page of Jeremy Taylor's writings, nay, the mere abundance of new ideas, and particularly the
multitude of images drawn by him from  the common objects and
phenomena of nature, would of themselves be more than sufficient
to place this great.poet  for a poet he was, in the highest sense of
the term - at least on an equality with any orator of the so-called
classical school of French pulpit elbquence.
In the peculiarity to which we have just alluded he is indeed
Shaksperian; few prose authors in the English language, and certainly none in any other, having surpassed Taylor in the'number,
the beauty, or the novelty of images drawn from rural life, from the
lovely or sublime objects of nature, from the graces of infancy and
the tenderest endearments of affection-those images, in short, which
we never meet without a gentle flush and thrill of the heart; for
they are echoes and emanations from  a purer, a more innocent, andi
a happier existence.
In one respect, indeed, there exists a resemblance between Taylor
and Shakspeare so striking as hardly to have escaped any'one who
has studied the literary physiognomy of this wonderful epoch; we
allude to that exulting and abounding richness of fancy which causes
them to be lured away at every turn from the principal aim of their
reasoning by the bright phantoms which perpetually arise during its
pursuit.  As, in a country richly stocked with game, the hounds are
perpetually drawn off from their chase by the fresh quarry they have
started as they run, the minds of these writers seem incapable of
resisting the temptation of turning aside to hunt the fancies started
by their restless imagination. This is, it is true, often a defect, anc
sometimes produces confusion, and injures the very effect of the
author's reasoning; few readers are able to follow the irregular
movements of the poet's inconstant and suggestive imagination; to
do that would imply a vivacity of perception resembling the creative
energy of the poet himself.  This discursive character is indeed




152          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CHAP. VfII.
perceptible in almost all the writings of this gigantic era -in those
of Bacon no less than in -those of Shakspeare; it is essentially the
peculiarity of a highly creative age; and though, after accompanying
the poet or orator through the long and varied maze of his discursive
wanderings, we may occasionally find that we have travelled far from
the direct road of argument, we ought -to be grateful for the many
diversified and lovely views he has shown us in the journey, and for
the fresh and fragrant flowers which he has plucked for us as we
wandered.
"We will venture to assert," says a critic who-has written of this
period of our literature with a warmth of enthusiasm that renders
his judgment more genial, and therefore in our opinion more just,
than the colder and more cautious approbation of Hallam-" we will
venture to assert that there is in any one of the prose folios.of Jeremy Taylor more fine fancy and original imagery — more brilliant
conceptions and glowing expressions - more new figures and new
applications of old figures —more, in short, of the body and the soul
of poetry, than in all the odes and the epics that have since been
produced in Europe.  There are large portions of Barrow, and
Hooker, and Bacon, of which we may say nearly as much: nor can
any-one have a tolerable idea of the riches of our language and our
native genius, who has not made himself acquainted with the prosewriters as well as the poets of this memorable period."
The three great names which we have selected to form the subject.
of the present chapter have been chosen from different though successive periods in the history of the Anglican Church, in order that
the.reader might remark in what peculiarities they differ, and in
what they resemble one another; and thus that some notion might
be formed as to the points of similitude or difference existing in the
epochs of which they are the representatives. In Hooker we have
seen the legislative, in Taylor the oratorical feature of religious
writing most strongly developed; in Barrow we shall remark the
deliberate species of eloquence existing in the highest force.  If the
first of these great.men has dug deep into-the eternal rock on which
is founded the whole edifice of human society, in search of materials
with which to build up the frame of ecclesiastical polity; if the
second, by a sweet and abundant eloquence, has made religion lovely
and amiable in our eyes, hanging on the altar of God the freshest
garlands of fancy and imagination, and dedicating the rich products
of intellect and poetry to the service of that Being whose mos'
precious gifts they are, even as Abel offered up to the Lord the first-.ings of his flock; we shall find that the third in this illustrious triad
of great theologians did not fall short of his predecessors, either in
the value of the gifts which he brought as tribute to the same altar,
or in the fervency and purity of his ministration. There is a very
strong resemblance between'the characters of Barrow and of Pascal.




CHAP. VIII.]   BARROW: COMPARED TO PASCAL                   153
A comparison, it is true, between the respective styles of these two
writers would be in some measure an injuryr to the immortal author
of the' Provincial Letters;' for Barrow's writings; vigorous and even
admirable as they undoubtedly are, hardly exhibit that wonderful
condensati6n and originality which make every line of Pascal appeal
so irresistibly and so instantaneously to the highest powers of our
intellect, and make us pause and meditate as each new expression
seems to open to us a long vista of deductions, or suggests to us a
vast and complex train of reasoning.  Nor indeed is the style of
Barrow remarkable, in so high a degree at least, for the frequent
occurrence of those admirable expressions so abundant in every
page of the great French theologian: expressions at once simple and
profound, intensely idiomatic, yet perfectly new. Yet if we look for
a manly and fervid eloquence, for a mighty and sustained power
kept under control by the severest logic, for a peculiar quality of
mastery and vigour to which all tasks appear equally easy, we may
point with pride to the writings of Barrow.  "He is equally distinguished," says an acute and able critic, " for the redundancy of his
matter, and for the pregnant brevity of his expression; but what
more particularly characterises his manner is a certain air of powerful
and of conscious facility in the execution of whatever he undertakes.
Whether the subject be mathematical, metaphysical, or theological,
he seems always to bring to it a mind which feels itself superior to
the occasion, and which, in contending' with the greatest- difficulties,'puts forth but half its strength.'"
Like Pascal, Barrow was one of the greatest physical philosophers
of his own, or indeed of any, age; he was the friend and the preceptor of Newton, and a fellow-labourer with the most illustrious of
modern investigators in many fields of natural science, particularly
in the departments of optics and astronomy.  He thus brought to
the task of demonstrating the nature and necessity of our Chrlistian
duties, and of inculcating the precepts of evangelic morality, a mind
trained in the investigation of. abstract truth, and a severe and
majestic eloquence, the handmaid of the strictest and most comprehensive logic.  He was a man of vast and multifarious attainments,
as a very brief sketch of his life will sufficiently prove.. Born in
London, in 1630, of humble though not indigent parentage, he
early entered, at Cambridge, on that career which ultimately rendered
his name one of the brightest ornaments of that university. Finding
that the religious dissensions of the period of the Commonwealth,
and particularly the predominance during that period of opinions
totally at variance with his own, precluded any hope of success in
the clerical profession, he turned his attention to medicine, and cultivated with ardour many of the sciences which are subservient to that
pursuit, as anatomy, botany, and chemistry.  Nor did he neglect the
studies-which we should consider more peculiarly congenial to the




154          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. VIII.
venerable walls of his "Alma Mater;" he became a candidate for
the professorship of Greek in 1655, but, failing in his attempt to
obtain that dignity, he went abroad, and passed some years in the
East, and particularly at Smyrna and Constantinople. Returning to
England in 1659, Barrow obtained the professorship for which he
had been before an unsuccessful candidate, and to this post were
added several others, of less dignity indeed,.but sufficiently proving
the high reputation enjoyed by Barrow in many different and dissi
milar departments of knowledge. In 1663 he resigned these appoint
ments for -that of Lucasian professor of mathematics in the university,
a post which he filled with increasing glory for six years, at the end
of which period he vacated it in favour of his immortal contemporary,
Newton. His rise to public distinction was now steady and rapid:
he was successively appointed one of the king's chaplains; nominated,
in 1672, Master of his college-that of Trinity, which thus possessed
within its bosom at one time two of the greatest and most virtuous
men who ever dignified humanity-the king paying Barrow, as he
conferred -upon him this deserved honour, the just compliment of
saying that he had bestowed it "on the best scholar in England;"
and lastly he was elected, in 1675, Vice-Chancellor of the University,
which dignity he enjoyed only two years, as he died of a fever in
1677, at the age of forty-six.
Barrow is ain admirable specimen of a, class of men who, fortunately
for the political, the literary, and the theological glory of England,
have adorned her two great seats of learning, Oxford and Cambridge,
at almost every period of her history. Possessed of vast, solid, and
diversified learning, with practice and experience in the affairs of real
life corrected and rendered philosophical by retirement and meditation, with the intense and concentrated industry of the monk guided
by the sense of utility of the man of the world, these rigorous scholars seem peculiarly adapted by Providence to become firm.and majestic pillars of such an ecclesiastical establishment as the Church of
England.  "Blessed.is she,"-we may venture to apply the words
of Scripture,-" for she has her quiver full of them!"




CHAP. IX.]         MILTON: HIS CHARACTER.                   155
CHAPTER IX.
JOHN MILTON.
Character of the Poet —Religious and Political, Opinions-Republicanism —,
His Learning-Travels in Italy-Prose Works-Areopagitica-Prose Styl
-'Ireatises on Divorce-His Literary Meditations —Tractate of Education —
Passion for Music-Paradise Lost-Dante and Milton compared-Study of
Romance - Campbell's Criticism- Paradise Regained- Minor PoemsSamson Agonistes.
MILTON says, in one of the most admirable and characteristic of
his prose works, that a poet should be in his own life and person a
"true poem-that is, a composition of the best and noblest things;"
and whatever discrepancy we may find between the works and the
characters of inferior writers, we shall never fail to remark, in the
case of that small number consisting of the very greatest names in
the history of the human mind, a certain, perfect, and wonderful
accordance between the character of the man and the peculiar excellences of his productions. Of the four great Evangelists of the
human mind, Homer, Virgil, Dante, and Milton, each is in some
measure, personally as well as intellectually, the type and reflection
of the epoch in which he lived; and, as the appearance of these
great luminaries of man's spiritual horizon was coincident with great
events affecting the social destinies of our race, we may even say that
these sublime minds at once guided and followed the direction of the
opinions and condition of their times.
Homer is, in fact, a short expression for the heroic or mythic
epoch, taken in its sublimer and more lovely manifestation; Virgil is
the incarnation of the power, grandeur, and development of the nationality of empire; Dante was no less the literary embodiment of
mediaeval Christianity-that wild and wondrous phase of humanity
which is found petrified, as it were, and presented to us in a tangible
form, in the great triumphs of Gothic art; and our great countryman
will seem no unapt or imperfect type of the Christianity of the Reformation-that is, of Christianity combined with freedom of opinion
and the right of private judgment carried to its extremest conse
quences.
WofSderful, indeed, and complicated as is the combination of causes
and conditions which must conspire to the production of any work of
permanent and universal importance, and to the existence, consequently, of a mind capable of creating such a work, in no case in the
whole history of mankind does that combination appear to have been
Ro wonderful as in the example of Milton.  Born in an age when the
13




156         OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CHAP. IX
great advance of civilization appeared to preclude the possibility of
any great work appearing to rival the immortal monuments of ancient
literature, and when men despaired-as they always have done —of a
great epic being ever again given to the world-as -if the fountains
of the beautiful were not inexhaustible as the rivers of Paradise-he
appears to have had a vast and all-embracing sympathy with whatever
was ennobling in the opinions of his times. His mind was profoundly
and wonderfully eclectic.  His political and religious sentiments were
of the extremest and even most violent character; he was a devoted
republican, with his grand imagination ever dwelling upon the visionary phantoms of antique glory and virtue.  In the earthquake which
overthrew the regal and hierarchic institutions of his country, his
unworldly and heroic soul saw only a beneficent and temporary convulsion, clearing the ground of its load of false temples, and preparing it for the erection of a new and glorious social edifice, with
something of the pure proportions of the Roman Capitol or of the
Attic Acropolis.
In religion, too, his haughty intellect and pure morals revolted at
that admixture of human motives without which, like the baser alloy
in metallurgy, the pure gold of Christianity can hardly be formedat least as society is now constituted-into a practically useful instrument for the improvement of humanity; and he hoped that, by forcibly bringing- back the Church to the structural simplicity of the
primitive times, he would restore the pure, ardent, and evangelic
spirit which chiracterised those ages.  And perhaps, in a world
peopled by Miltons and by Harringtons, such schemes and hopes
might cease to be Utopian. Visionary as they were, these convictions
gave.a peculiar character of elevation to ililton's meditations; and
it'is not too much to say that, had his opinions on government in
church and state been other than they were, we could have possessed
neither the'Areopagitica' nor the'Paradise Lost'"And Heaven had wanted one immortal song."
But the profession of these opinions, and the fierce zeal with which
he advocated them, could not efface in such a mind as Milton's the
impressions made by mediseval art and by the chivalrous history of
his country.  And-thus there appears continually in his works, we
will not say a contest, but a contrast, between his convictions and
his sympathies —between his logic and his fancy. And this, which
in an' inferior mind would not have failed to produce an. incessant
uncertainty and inconsistency, in such a soul as John Milton's rwas
a healthy and vivifying action: it was like the conflicting currents
of the galvanic battery, whose opposing poles give out intensest
light and heat. Thus, while Milton the polemic was advocating the
overthrow of the monarchic institutions of England, and the de
struction of the hierarchic edifice of its Church, Milton- the poet




CHAP. IX.]          MILTON:HIS OPINIONS.                    157
had his soul deeply penetrated with the enthusiasm inspired by his
country's history, and his ear ever thrilling to the majestic services
of its half-Roman worship. The man who desired the abolition of
all external dignities on earth has given us the grandest picture of
such a graduated hierarchy of orders in heaven —
"Thrones, Princedoms, Virtues, Dominations, Powers."
Ile who would have reduced the externals of Christianity to a sire.
plicity and meanness compared with which the subterranean worship
of the persecuted Christians of the primitive times was splendour,
has exhibited a deeper and more prevailing admiration than any
other poet ever showed for the grandeur of Gothic architecture and
the charms of the solemn masses of the ancient cathedrals:-'But let my due feet never fail'Io walk the studious cloisters pale;
And love the high emlbowed roof;
With antique pillars massy proof,
And storied windows richly dight,
Casting a dim religious light:
There let the pealing organ blow'o the full-voiced quire below,
In service high and anthems clear,
As may with sweetness, through mine ear,
Dissolve me into ecstasies,
And bring all heaven before mine eyes."
In the same way, the learning.of'this wondrous being helped to
give his mind that catholicity of taste which is above all things
necessary to the production of an immortal work.  His favourite
reading, it is true, lay chiefly among the sages and tragic poets of.
ancient Greece: he loved to wander through "the shady spaces of
philosophy," as he beautifully calls them, with his beloved Plato, to
follow the soaring of Aristotle's eagle intellect, to listen to the chime
of Homer's oceanic harmony, and to the more irregular music of
Pindar, or "sad Electra's poet."  But all this never deadened his
ear, or impaired his sensibility, for the wilder poesy of the chivalric
age, nor for the more fetninine and artificial graces of the Italian
Muse.  He was perhaps the most learned man who ever lived, and
at the same time the man who had his learning the most completely
under his command.  Like Rabelais, Milton may without exaggeration be said to have traversed every region in the world of knowledge explored down to his age; but at the same time we must not
ftcrget the immense difference, not only in point of extent, but in
point also of kind, existing between the state of human knowledge
in the fifteenth and the seventeenth centuries.  The first of these
two wonderful men was the type of the infancy of tlie Reformation:'the second the embodiment of its manhood.  Milton enjoyed the
rare advantage of a purely literary education.  The intellect and
aptitude for study exhibited by him in his earliest childhood seems




158          OU',TINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CHAP. IX
to have sealed him - even as the child Samson was set apart fron
his birth to the ministry- to the services of poesy and learning.
Though educated in part in the university of Cambridge, he did not
remain long enough within its venerable walls to acquire any particular direction of thought which might have fettered the development of so mighty an intellect; but only long enough to fill his
mind with all that is most solid and ennobling in ancient literature
and in abstract science.  The care with which he has preserved even
the most trivial productions of his college career, his Latin verses
and his fragments of academic comedies, and the tone of serious
pride with which he speaks of his own youthful studies, prove to us
what store he set upon the scholastic -occupations of his youth.; and
it behoves us to remember that what in meaner men would appear
vanity, in Milton must be attributed to a sense of the importance of
what in ordinary cases is little more than an unproductive and boyish
accomplishment. On leaving the university, where his political and
religious opinions rendered his longer residence disagreeable, if not
impossible, the youthful Milton — already a prodigy of learning,
with his mental graces fitly enshrined in a form  distinguished for
that pure and seraphic beauty, which his person retained through
life, and which is conspicuous in all. the portraits of him- travelled
over a considerable portion of Europe, and was received with particular distinction in Italy.  It was here that he became personally
acquainted with one of the greatest of his contemporaries, "the
starry Galileo, with his woes," whom he saw, as he describes, "now
grown old, a prisoner in the Inquisition, for thinking in astronomy
otherwise than as his Franciscan and Dominican censurers would
have him." How interesting is it to picture such a meeting as that
of Milton and Galileo! Lofty, we may be sure, and sublime was
their conversation, and these interviews could not fail to add new
intensity to Milton's fervid zeal for liberty of thought. In Italy,
too, the poet received great encomiums for his proficiency in the
language of the country, a language in which some of his youthful
poems are composed; and these -as we have been assured by an
Italian  are hardly to be detected as the work of a foreigner, and
are, indeed, scarcely inferior to the compositions of contemporary
Italian writers.  Such encomiums as these, which, as Milton him
self proudly remarks, " the Italian is not forward to confer on those
beyond the Alps," helped, undoubtedly, not only to gratify his
haughty dignity of intellect, but probably tended to fix in his mind
that preference for Italian literature which is sq strongly perceptible
in his works.  It may, indeed, be said that, possessed as was his
mind, and even saturated, with the spirit -of antique poetry and
philosophy, and intimate as was his acquaintance with the whole
circle of dead and living languages, it was the Italian literature
which- left the deepest trace upon his mind, and gave the most




CHAP. IX.]          tIoLTON: UIS OPINIONS.                   159
marlked colouring to his writings-particularly to those along them
which are the lmore peculiar offspring of his taste.  As a proof of
this, we need only mention some of those among his minor pieces
which were evidently the reflection of his personal sentiments; the
beautiful pastoral elegy entitled'Lycidas,' the'Comus,' and the
numerous sonnets which he has left us.  In all these works he has
closely followed not only the spirit, but even the forms, of Italian
poetry.  In the first-mentioned work we have a canzone, so exquisitely harmonized, and so full of the sweet and elaborate grace
of Italian lyric poesy, that the very language and music of it has
the echo of
"11 bel paese, dove'1 si suona;"
and it is not too much to say that'Lycidas' is an Italian poem
composed in English.  In' Comus,' and the lovely fragment of the'Arcades,'-a work in that peculiarly Italian species of composition.
the pastoral-romantic drama - he has surpassed Tasso as far as Tasso.
has outstripped Beccari: and as to the sonnet, Milton was the first
man who grafted upon our more rugged language that fairest fruit
of the Ausonian Muse.  We speak of course particularly of that
variety- the noblest -of the sonnet, whose tone and subject is not
exclusively devoted to the passion of love, but which has been made
a vehicle for the sublimest outbursts of patriotism and religion-the
sonnet, in short, not of Petrarch, but of Filicaja.  To this list it
would be quite unnecessary to add those two exquisite poems, in
which the thoughts and the mode of treatment are no less Italian
than their titles'-  L'Allegro' and' Il Penseroso.'
As Milton was born December 9th, 1608, as he retired from the
university in 1632, and began to travel in 1638, he was, at the time
of his sudden return from Italy (having spent only fifteen months
on the continent), about thirty-one years of age, in the full glow
and bloom of beauty and accomplishment. It had probably been
his intention to remain abroad for a much longer period, but the
breaking out of that furious controversy between the royalist and
parliamentary parties, which ultimately led to the judicial murder of
a king and the abolition of the regal office, was an event appealing
far too powerfully to Milton's ardent opinions in religion and politics
to permit him to remain in a distant country a cool spectator of the
mighty struggle.  In all matters of church and state the convictions
of the poet were in accordance with the extremest doctrines of the
republican and Antinomian party. His dream was a commonwealth
on the model of antiquity, in which purity of manners and dignity
of national character would, as he fondly hoped, accompany the
simplifying of the structure of the political machine; he imagined,
like reformers in all ages, that the destruction of a religious hierarchy
would necessarily introduce, into the practice and discipline of the
Christian churclh the purity and simplicity of the primitive imnes.
13*Q ~




160           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. IX
These opinions, probably imbibed, at a very. early age, from  his
father (who was himself, in some measure, a sufferer for conscience'
sake), and still further exaggerated by his own haughty spirit, the
poet now maintained with astonishing eloquence and vehemence in a
large portion of his prose works.  Though these compositions were
in most cases written on local and temporary subjects, and though
he fierce and often sophistical character of their argumentation maly
have contributed to. withdraw them  from  the study of the general
reader, the prose works of Milton are so strongly characteristic of
their illustrious author, and contain so many passages of sublimity
and beauty, that some acquaintance with this portion of his writings
is indispensable for any one desirous of forming a true idea of the
intellectual physiognomy of England's greatest epic poet. The study
of these works presents us with a new and most striking phase of his
character and history: we see,still the grand, colossal, and seraphic
lineaments of that intellectual being which has given us the picture
of primeval innocence, of the splendors of Paradise, and the undying
agonies of fallen yet immortal spirits; but those lineaments are
contracted with indignation, and lurid with fanatic and persecuting
zeal; the soul of Milton is still a mighty angel, but it is an angel
of wrath and destruction -it is Azrael, the angel of death.
The prose works -of Milton possessing such peculiar features, and
having occupied, in the composition, a portion of his life which may
be considered apart from those epochs in his history which gave birth
to his immortal poems, we will devote a few sentences to a rapid
notice of their subjects, and an attempt to fix their value.  Among
the principal of these extraordinary compositions it will suffice to
mention; in the first place,'Areopagitica,' perhaps the noblest of
them all: this is a' Speech fdr the Liberty of Unlicensed Printing
to the Parliament of England.'  It is singular enough, and characteristic of the inconsistency which always accompanies the policy of
revolutionists, that the fanatic Parliament of England exercised a
sway infinitely sterner and more tyrannical than had ever been at.
tempted to be enforced by the government which it had overthrown;
and while the thousand wild sects which now wielded with ruthless
hands the powers usurped from the British Constitution maintained
in its fullest development the right of individual liberty and the
privilege of absolute freedom of private judgment, the inquisition on
the press was never so severe as under their oppressive domination.
Pretending to be the priests and servants of truth, and of free opinion
-the nurse of truth-they fettered the expression of all conclusions
not in harmony with their own exaggerated doctrines: the press was
absolutely manacled, and fine, sequestration, and military law, the
lungeon, the pillory, and the scourge were the rewards for the publination of anything not in servile accordance with their notions.
Eternal honour, then, to Milton, that he manfully stood up for




CHAP. Ix.]          MILTON S PROSE STYLE,                    161
that great principle without which all the professions of the republicans were nothing but hypocrisy and inconsistence! It was an object
worthy of his lofty and ethereal spirit; and nobly indeed did he
fulfil it.'Areopagitica' is a most eloquent and conclusive expusition
of the necessity and advantages of a free press, and, though eititled
a "Speech," is rather an " Oration," conceived and executed in the
spirit of the great monuments of classic oratory.
None, probably, of our readers are ignorant that the orations of
Demosthenes and Cicero were elaborate and previously prepa.ed compositions; and that they in no way resemble that extempore species
of eloquence which is specified by the term "speech," a word bor.
rowed from the parliamentary eloquence of that country which has
produced the greatest triumphs in this kind of harangue. Mlilton's
style in this noble production, as well as in all his prose works, is in
the highest degree majestic, and is a perfect reflex of the character
of the man.
The truth is, that Milton's mind was so completely imbued, so
saturated, with ancient, and particularly with Greek, literature, that
he could not help imitating, often perhaps unconsciously, the involved
structure, the complicated arrangement, and the half-rhythmical
cadence of the sentences of Plato or of Isocrates.
In his eagerness to engraft upon our more rugged and unpliant
tongue something of the delicacy, something of the ever-varying
flexibility which characterises the ancient classical languages, he may
be pardoned if he sometimes forgets the impossibility of complete
success, and the danger of falling into obscurity and affectation, as
well as an air of constraint and pedantry. A totally uninflected
tongue as the English is can never be forcibly submitted, even by
the boldness and the genius of such a mind as Milton's, to the laws
which govern a different language. Independently of the tone: of
learned and scholastic gravity naturally acquired by a proud and
retiring student, something of the peculiarLatinisms and Graecisms
which distinguish Milton's style in poetry no less than in prose (much
less obtrusively, it is true, and offensively in the former than in the
latter) may be doubtless attributed to his proud contempt for the
mean vulgarity which distinguished the style of many of his contemporaries, and particularly the party with some of whose religious and
political opinions the great poet had identified himself. Like a man
of noble birth and aristocratic manners accidentally embracing the
popular side in a revolutionary movement, Milton appears ever
anxious that he should not be confounded with the rude and ignorant
mob in whose ranks he for a moment may find himself, and puts on
a double portion of stateliness and dignity.  Having spoken of what
certainly appears the most complete and important of his prose works,
and also the one which possesses the mlost general and intrinsic
interest, the'Areopagitica,' we will say a few words of several other




162          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CHAP. IX.
compositions likely to attract the reader's attention by their singu..
larity or by the precious details they give us of the author's personal
character, sentirnents, and pursuits. Milton composed two celebrated
treatises on the law of divorce, which throw a great light upon the
poet's opinions respecting the rights and social importance of the
female sex, and pretty clearly indicate the almost Asiatic contempt
with which he regarded the fairer part of the creation. At the same
time these works give us a most extraordinary idea of the boldness,
nay, the audacity, which characterises all Milton's speculations.
Will it be believed that -in one of these works, the'Tetrachordon,'
an exposition of the four places of the Old Testament in which the
law of divorce is expressly'treated, Milton has endeavoured to estabdlish, from the rules and practice of Hebrew legislation, the lawfulness of allowing not only personal but moral "' uncleanness" to form
the'ground of separation between man and wife; and that in various
passages of these books the most extreme latitude in this respect is not
only tolerated but approved? It is true that much of this eagerness
to facilitate divorce may have'arisen from a desire to relax, in his
own case, the strictness of the marriage tie; for we know that his
first marriage was an unhappy one, and that, his wife (the daughter
of a cavalier) having left him and refused to return to his house,
probably disgusted by the studious gloom and religious severity of
the poet's life, he actually gave proof of the sincerity of his opinions
by paying his addresses to another lady, whom he would infallibly
have married but for the voluntary return and submission of his
rebellious partner.
The other work to which we have alluded is unspeakably precious
as giving us an insight into his own studies and literary meditations;
and though these most interesting details are scattered irregularly
over all his productions; there are two passages so peculiarly rich in
these invaluable notices,'that they must be, independently of their
own intrinsic grandeur and eloquence, among the most striking
passages of autobiography which the world has ever -seen.  In one
of them he gives a minute account of his own daily life and occupations, and in the other, after describing his youthful studies, and the
grand aspirations of his early ambition, he gravely passes in review
before him a number of the sublimest subjects for some future work
which should make his name immortal, and, with a serious and sustained enthusiasm than which perhaps the whole history of literature
contains nothing more solemn and more sublime, promises to leave
i" something so writ as future ages shall not willingly let die."  In
this passage he proposes to himself a number of the mightest events
in the history of mankind; he explains the means by which the
immortal work could alone be worthily executed; he describes the
intense Jabour, the severe meditation, and "expense of Palladian
oil" whic.h such a work would require; and, above all, expresses his




CHAP IX.]          MILTON'S PROSE WORKS.                   163
conviction that the true inspiration for such an effort of creative
energy was to be sought for " not in the invocation of Dame Memory
and her Syren daughters, but in devout prayer t0 that Spirit who
can enrich with all utterance and knowledge, and who sendeth out
his seraphim with fire from his altar to touch and purify the lips of
whom he pleaseth."  From  hopes so sublime as these, expressed
with so fervent and yet so exalted a devotion, and supported by such
unequalled powers and so intense and irresistible an industry, we
might well expect a'Paradise Lost.'
In his singular little work, a'Tractate (treatise) on Education,'
Milton sets forth his own peculiar opinions on that all-important
subject, and handles it with his usual boldness and:originality of
view.  The book is distinguished by the same grand and organ-like
harmony of language, and by the same tone of lofty dignity of
thought, that mark all he ever wrote: in the project itself, as the
subject under discussion is of a peculiarly practical nature, we find
even more than his usual audacity of innovation and visionary sublimity of design. Naturally a despiser of authority and precedent;
and living in an age when great political convulsions made all men
familiar with the wildest schemes of moral and social regeneration,
Milton has drawn in this book a plan for an entirely new system of
national education.  We are not, therefore, surprised to find that he
rejects the whole machinery of the school and the university, considering the defects of each species of institution as in no way
counterbalanced by their advantages; and proposes, in place of the
ancient method, a system chiefly imitated from the gymnasia of
Sparta and of Athens! Grand, noble, colossal, but at the same time
(as our readers need hardly be cautioned) totally impracticable and
Utopian, Milton's plan of education embraces, like that of the ancient
Greeks, as may be collected from the half-fabulous accounts of the
antique philosophers and historians, the physical no less than the
moral- and intellectual development of the human powers: the bodies
of the English youth were to be trained in all kinds of corporeal and
gymnastic exercises, while their minds were to be occupied with the
whole cycle of human knowledge, in which the arts, particularly that
of music, were by no means to he neglected.  The whole scheme
reminds the reader of nothing so) strongly as of the half-burlesque
description of the education of P'altagruel in the immortal romance
of Rabelais: and this will be quite enough to show its almost ludicrously. impracticable character.  Visionary, however, as is the general design, there are in this half-forgotten tract of Mlilton a thousand
traces of wisdom, of genius, and of sublimity, such as no hand but
his own could have left; and even many of the suggestions are
becoming generally adopted in the more complete and-generous edu*
cation of the present day, particularly the mnore extended and
universal study of miusic.




164          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CHAP. IX,
This was an art-of which Milton never speaks without a peculiar
and most touching enthusiasm; never does he omit to describe-and
assuredly no poet has ever described them more frequently or more
admirably — the charms and the virtues of music.  Coleridge has
called him -(rather pointedly than justly, it is true) "less a picturesque than a musical poet;" and not only does the grandeur and
the might of music incessantly form the subject of his most willing
and most glorious soarings into the empyrean of poesy, but in all
his works we find a peculiar and recognisable music, an echo of that
celestial and seraphic harmony which rolls for ever before the throne
of God —" a sevenfold chorus of Hallelujahs and harping symphonies."
It was to music that Milton owed the only moments of relaxation
which he permitted himself in the intervals of the severe and incessant studies, the fierce and strenuous controversies of his youth and
manhood: the aspirations and the - prayers which his proud and
haughty spirit deigned not to send up to heaven from the midst of
my congregation of Christians, rose, at dawn and eventide, upon
the swelling notes of the organ, which-he touched with no unskilful
hand, or the more modest chords of his lute; and when " fallen on
evil tongues and evil days, with darkness and with dangers compassed
round," in blindness, in poverty, -in neglect, with all his bright hopes
and all his romantic visions shattered and crushed for ever, then it
was that Music became the consolation and the comforter of her
fondest worshipper, and breathed her softest melodies and her sublimest thunderbursts into the marvellous verses of the'Paradise
Lost.'
The political career of England's greatest epic poet -has been described by a vast variety of writers; and while some have seen in the
whole of his public life nothing but a manifestation of virtue and
independence, others have found reigning throughout his political life
the malignity of the fanatic and the ferocious arrogance of the
revolutionist.  It will be the safest, and probably also the most just
judgment, to take a middle course between these two extremes; and
posterity, we think, -will confirm our own conclusion with respect to
the character of this admirable genius viewed as a Christian and as
a citizen.  It is impossible not to agree with the republican critics
at least so far as regards the sincerity in the expression of opinion
which none have pretended to deny to Milton; but on the other
hand we think that this illustrious name may well serve as a beacon
to those ardent and aspiring. spirits who think that genius, lcarning,
and sincerity will suffice alone to guard human nature from error,
from  folly, or from  crime, and who forget the deep truth of that
admirable precept of the Great Founder of our religion, " Be ye as
little children."  In the case of an inferior and a less pure mind
than Milton's, the sincerity of his republican opinions might perhaps
ne pleaded in excuse for the unfairness and violence of some of his




cHAP. IX.]              PARADISE LOST.                      165
attacks upon the monarchic institutions of his country; and the
universal coarseness and brutality of tone then prevalent in the style
of controversy may be held as palliating the unchristian and inhuman
malignity which.characterises much of his polemic writings  parti.
cularly in his celebrated controversy with Salmasius; but surely no
such excuses will serve to diminish our reprobation for Milton's
slanderous attacks on the personal character of Charles I., who
appeals, as a man, to have been worthy of respect, and even of venet
ration.: who was, besides, an unfortunate and innocent prince, and
had paid with his blood for the errors of an administration whichj
however erroneous, was at least well-intentioned. Nor can any one
hope, but by sophistry, to excuse or justify the various acts of submission to arbitrary and usurped power which form so strong a contrast to
Milton's perpetual and rather obtrusive assertions of independencehis accepting office, for instance, under the government of Cromwell;
his adulation of that wily despot; and above all, the melancholy
weakness (if indeed we ought not rather to use a much sevqrer term)
which allowed him to profit by the plunder of the unfortunate and
martyred sovereign, and to decorate his studious retirement with the
pilfered trappings of royal magnificence; for, alas! we still possess
-the parliamentary order permitting "Mr. John Milton," Latin Secretary. of the House of Commons, to "choose and take away such
hangings as he thinks fit" from the dismantled palace of Whitehall.
Such facts as these are painful and humiliating, but salutary also;
they powerfully demonstrate that the greatest genius and the sublimest virtues can never guard from  folly and from error the man
who once loses sight of those plain and simple rules of human con
duct -" Fear God, and honour the King."
At the beginning of this chapter we presented Milton to our
readers in the character of the great epic poet of Christianity, and
we expressed in a brief allusion the difference between the tone of
thought and conception perceptible in the'Paradise Lost' and that
which pervades the'Divina Comrnmedia.' -There is, indeed, a sin.
gular resemblance between the intellectual- features of Milton and
Dante, and no small similarity also in their lives. Both. possessed
of all the knowledge -of their. age, both deeply versed in the loftiest
subtleties of theology, both animated by a stern and intense religious
enthusiasm, yet with minds susceptible of the softest as well as the
sublimest emotions, each of them is the type and embodiment of-an
age of violent social convulsion. The fierce and bloody struggles
of Guelf and Ghibelline which drove the great Florentine to wander
and die in exile, and the spirit of faction which infuses the waters
of Marah throughout every page of the Divine Comedy, will form a
very close parallel with the furious civil conflicts which ended in the
Protectorate, and the republican and sectarian haughtiness of Alilton's political and polemic writings  But the difference is, -that




166          OUTLINES OF. GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. [X.
Dante is essentially and peculiarly a Romanist poet, while Milton
may be considered as the incarnation of the reformed faith -or
rather of that faith in its extremest Calvinistic intensity.  In their
manner of treatment the two poets differ immensely, though grandeur
is the distinguishing peculiarity of each; but the grandeur. of Dante
seems rather to proceed from the intense earnestness with which he
realises his terrific or sublime creations, while that of the English
poet seems rather to spring from idealising the. phantoms of his
imagination: in the one case it is the concretive, in the other the
abstractive power; the oerie is a painter, the other a sculptor. If we
may. venture to take our illustration from a sister art, we should
rather compare the immortal poem of Dante to some of those extraordinary conceptions of the grim, monastic genius of the Middle
Ages in which our terror and. interest are powerfully excited by
representations whose elements are familiar and every-day; while
Milton's poetical conceptions recall rather the pure outline;, the
subdued tints, and the grand and pure simplicity of Raphael or of
the classical sculpture.  All readers have remarked this wonderful
power of realizing in the one, and the perhaps equally wonderful
faculty of idealizing in.the other.  When we follow Dante into the
tremendous scenes of eternal punishment, we meet the poet's friends
and acquaintance, speaking and acting as in the world; his illustrations are of the same actual character; he compares the stench of
MIalebolge to the horrible fetor arising from  the pest-house in the
Val d'Arno; his giants are described as so many cubits in height,
and their size is compared.to that of some tower familiar to hisreaders and to himself; his demons are little else than hideous and
cruel executioners.  Milton, on the contrary, affects us less (at least
in his more terrible and sublime delineations) by what he says than
by what he leaves unsaid.  In his lazar-house you see a dim vision
of agonized motion, and you hear a mingled and inarticulate sound
of lamentation: —
"Dire was the tossing, deep: the groans;"
and where Dante would certainly have intensified, so to say, our
feeling of the reality of the scenen Milton at once soars into abstraction: -
"Despair
Tended the sick, busiest from couch to couch;
And over- them triumphant Death his dart
Shook-but delay'd to strike."
Again, in his mode of portraying immensity of size: Satan stands
"Like Teneriffe or Atlas, unremoved.
His stature reach'd the sky, and on his crest
Sate' Horror plumed"a picture which is absolutely Homeric.  In Dante, and even more
Iniversal.y in Tasso, the terror or the sublimity is of the physical




CHAP. IY.]              PARADISE LOST.                       167
kind, and the impression is produced upon the imagination of the
reader by the dread fidelity with which the picture is copied from
some known or fancied reality: their demons have colossal size
indeed, but they are furnished with the horns, the hoofs, the tails,
und the talons of the monkish demonology of the Middle Ages:
Milton's sublimest pictures, on the contrary, have none of this
material or earthly horror about them, but are.terrible thoughts,
grim abstractions, whose lineaments are veiled and undefined, and
which are -only the more irresistible in the solemn dread they inspire, as they address themselves, so to say, not to the eye, but to
the imagination: they are fragments of the primeval dark, passionless, formless, terrible.  Speaking of Death, he says,"The other Shape,
If shape it might be call'd, that shape had none
Distinguishable, in member, form, or limb:"
and again, in the same passage, which all the critics have agreed in
calling one of the most wonderful embodiments'of supernatural
terror which ever was conceived by poet,"What seem'd his head
The likeness of a kingly crown had on,"
In these and many other passages the poet seems perpetually on the
point of giving way to that tendency so natural in the human mind,
to descrabe; but his genius puts a bridle upon the realizing power,
and the dread image is left in the awful vagueness of its mystery,
becoming, like the veiled Isis, a thousand times more august and
terrible from  the cloud that shuts it from  our eyes.  The greatest
of all poets, Homer, 2Eschylus, Shakspeare, not to mention the
Hebrew Scriptures, are full of this kind of reticence, by which the
grandeur of the object is rendered more terrible by the gloom and
indefiniteness which surround it: when the Greeks are marching to
the battle, glory blazes in their van like an unwearied fire. What
tremendous ideas are conjured up by Shakspeare's' single line"To be worse than worst,
Of those that lawless and uncertain thoughts
Imagine howling"!
Everything in nature and in art which is supereminently grand
will invariably be found to be at the same time simple in the
extreme; and, in looking through the whole history of mankind for
a subject worthy of his genius, Milton selected, most fortunately for
posterity, the event which of all others was the grandest in itself,
and at the same time possessed of the most universal and eternal
interest to the whole human race-the Creation and the Fall of Man.
We say fortunately, for we know that he long hesitated as to what
subject he should choose:-"Time serves not now, and perhaps I
14




168          OUTLINES -OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CHAP. IX.
might seem too profuse, to give any certain account of what the
mind at home, in the spacious circuits of her musing, hath liberty,to propose to herself, though of highest hope and hardest attempting....And lastly, what king or knight before the conquest might be.
chosen in whom  to lay the pattern of a Christian hero."  From
various passages of his works it is clear that he had meditated taking
as the subject of a great epic,. among others, the half-fabulous adventures of Arthur, and throughout all his poems are scattered number.
less allusions exhibiting his profound acquaintance with, and deep
admiration for, all the treasures of medimval romantic literature: —
"And what resouhds
In fable or romance of Uther's son,
Begirt with British and Armoric knights;
And all who since, baptised or infidel,
Jousted in Aspramont or Montalban,
Damasco, or Morocco, or Trebisond,
Or whom Biserta sent from Afric shore,
When Charlemain with all his peerage fell
By Fontarabia."
No language that we could use would be sufficiently strong to
express the extent and exactness of this writer's learning; a word
which we use in its largest and most comprehensive sense: no species
of literature, no language, no' book, no art or science seems to have
escaped his curiosity, or resisted the combined ardour and -patience
of his industry. His works may be considered as a vast arsenal of
ideas drawn from every region of human speculation, and either
themselves the condensed quintessence of knowledge and wisdom,
or dressing and adorning the fairest and most majestic conceptions.
If Shakspeare's immortal dramas are like the rich vegetation of a
primeval paradise, in which all that is sweet, healing, and beautiful
springs up uncultured from a virgin soil, the productions of Milton
may justly be compared to one of those stately and magnificent
gardens so much admired in a former age, in which the perceptible
art and regularity rather sets off and adorns nature-a stately solitude
perfumed by the breath of all home-born and exotic flowers, with
lofty and airy music ever and anon floating through its moonlit solitudes, decorated by the divine fortns of antique sculpture-now a
Grace, a Cupid, or a Nymph of Phidias; now a prophet or a Sibyl
of Michael Angelo.
In his delineation of what was perhaps the most difficult portion
of his vast picture, the beauty, purity, and innocence of our first
parents, he has shown not only a fertility of invention, but a severe
and Scriptural purity of taste as surprising as it is rare. His Adam
and Eve, without ceasing for a moment to be human, are beings
worthy of the Paradise they inhabit. In' the portraiture of their
primeval beauty —the primeval perfection, fresh from the hand of
God-there can be no doubt that the poet has embodied the impres



OXrAP. Ix.]             PARADISE LOST.                       169
sions left on his mind by the contemplation of the. great monuments
of art which he had seen in Italy, and which he so well knew how
to appreciate.  The relies of ancient sculpture gave him in all probability something of their severe simplicity of outline, while the
pictures of Raphael may have communicated the sweetness, grace,
and heavenly expression of his supernatural and earthly personages.
But of all the arts which have left their spirit to live and glow
through the undying pages of'Paradise Lost,' music is the one
whose influence is most intensely and uninterruptedly felt.  Of the
power of music Milton held a most exalted idea; partly, perhaps,
because its pure and ethereal pleasures were most in accordance with
the heroic and celestial character of his mind; partly because it was
the art which he had himself most successfully cultivated; and
partly, too, no doubt, because it was the -only art which his blindness,
during a great portion of his life, left him the possibility of enjoying
otherwise than in memory. The Paradise of Dante is composed of
the two ideas of light and music; and in Milton, though less exclusively brought forlvard, music may be said to be the living spirit
animating and pervading every creation of his genius.  It is music
which breathes in every changing harmony of his intricate and lofty
versification; it is music which composes the noblest passages in his
Heaven and his Paradise; it is music, too, which forms the only
contrast with the hopeless agonies of his Hell: not the trivial and
sensuous music of modern days, but those solemn and majestic harmonies which were so honoured in the religious and philosophical
systems of ancient Greece, and which are perhaps not imperfectly
reflected in the grand compctitions of Paesiello, of Ha1ndel, and of
Be6thoven: 
"The Dorian mood
Of flutes and soft recorders; such as raised
To height of noblest temper heroes old
Arming to battle; and, instead of rage,
Deliberate valour breathed, firm and unmoved;
Nor wanting power to mitigate and'suage,
With solemn touches, troubled thoughts, and chase
Anguish, and doubt, and fear, and sorrow, and pain,
From mortal or immortal minds."
The noble and reverential criticism  of Campbell is at once so
complete and so condensed, that it will not, we think, be inappropriate to quote some passages of it in this place: nothing can be
better or more discriminating:" Milton has certainly triumphed over one difficulty of his subject,
the paucity and the loneliness of its human agents; for no one in
contemplating the garden of Eden would wish to exchange it for a
more populous world. His earthly pair could only-be represented,
during their innocence, as beings of simple enjoyment and negative
virtue, with no other passions than the fear of Heaven and the love




170          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CHAP. IK.
of each other. Yet from these materials what a picture has he drawn
of their homage to the Deity, their mutual affection, and the horrors
of their alienation   * *    *  *
" In the angelic warfare of the poem Milton has done whatever
human genius could accomplish.  *  *  *  *  The warlike part
of'Paradise Lost' was inseparable from.its subject.  I feel too
strong a reverence for Milton to suggest even the possibility that he
could have improved his poem by having thrown his angelic warfare
into more remote perspective; but it seems to me to be most sublime
when it is least distinctly brought home to the imagination. What
an awful effect has the dim and undefined conception of the conflict
which we gather from the opening of the First Book! There the
ministers of divine vengeance and pursuit had been recalled — the
thunders had ceased
" To bellow through the vast and boundless deep;"
and our terrific conception of the past is deepened by its indistinctness.
"' The array of the fallen angels in hell, the unfurling of the
standard of Satan, and the march of his troops; all this human pomp
and circumstance of war-all this is magic and overwhelming illusion.
The imagination is taken by surprise. But the noblest efforts of
language are tried with very unequal effect to interest us in the
immediate and close view of the battle itself in the Sixth Book; and
the martial demons, who charmed us in the shades of hell, lose some
portion of their sublimity when their artillery is discharged in the
daylight of heaven."
Another circumstance of admirable originality and effect in the
supernatural delineations of the'Paradise Lost' is the singular
felicity with which Milton has given variety and interest to the personages of his fallen angels, by considering them as the demons
afterwards destined to mislead mankind under the guise of the deities
of classical mythology.  The idea-of the ancient oracles being the
inspiration of infernal spirits, permitted for a time to delude the
world, is not, it is true, originally Milton's; he found it pervading
dll the chivalrous and monkish legends of the Middle Ages; and,though many poets have adopted a notion -so admirably calculated to
communicate poetical effect, and so well uniting Paganism with
Christianity, none of them-not even Tasso, or our own Spenserhaye made such noble or such frequent use of this powerful means
of exciting interest in a Christian work.
In the companion work to his immortal epic, in the'Paradise
Regained' -the'Odyssey' to our Christian'Iliad' —the first thing
that strikes the reader is the unfortunate selection of the subject,
and the general inferiority and weaker interest which marks the
executicn.  Neither Milton, nor any human being who ever livedf




CHAP. IX.]          MILTON'S MINOR POEMS.                   171
could have done justice to the only subject worthy of forming a
pendant, or complement, to the tale
"Of man's first disobedience, and the fruit
Of that forbidden tree.'
The subject to which we allude is, of course, the Crucifixion of our
Saviour-the only.event recorded in past, or possible in future times,
of an interest sufficiently powerful, universal, and external, to be
placed in comparison with the Fall of Man. Much as we may regret
that Milton's peculiar and not very well-understood opinions respecting the divine nature of Christ, and the completeness of the sacrifice
of the Redemption, induced him to select for the principal action of
the' Paradise Regained,' not the awful consummation of that sacrifice on the Mount of Calvary, but rather a comparatively unimportant
incident in the earthly career of the Redeemer-the Temptation in
the desert-it may be doubted whether even Milton's sublime genius
could have worthily represented to mortal eyes that terrible crisis in
the destiny of man. Sublime as were the flights of that eagle genius
-and what intellect ever soared
"With plume so strong, so equal, and so soft,"
into the loftiest empyrean of poetry, the unshadowed glory of heaven's
eternal atmosphere, the flower-breathing air of primeval Eden, or the
"thick darkness" of hell?-it must have flagged-even that mighty
and tireless pinion-in the gloom and thunder-cloud that veiled the
more than human agonies of the Cross!
Of some of the minor works of Milton we have already said a
few words.  On those which we have left. unnoticed it will hardly be
necessary to dilate much more. The merit of these productions consists so much more peculiarly in the manner than in the matter, and
they derive so much of their charm from their tone and mode of
treatment, that a mere analysis would utterly fail in giving any idea
of their excellences; while the reader may obtain from  a single
perusal of any of them, a much clearer notion of their style than
from  the most laboured and critical panegyric.  They all bear the
stamp of the Miltonic mind-fulness, conciseness, a pure and Scriptural severity and dignity, and the most consummate grace and variety
of versification.
In'Samson Agonistes,' Milton has given us in English a perfect
Sophoclean tragedy, in which every minutest peculiarity of the Attic
scene is so faithfully and exactly reproduced, that a reader unacquainted with the Greek language will form a much more just and
correct notion of classical tragedy from reading the'Samson' than
from studying even the finest and most accurate translations of the
great dramas-of the Athenian theatre. This may appear extravagant,
nay, even paradoxical; but we speak advisedly.  The Greek trage.
14*.




17. &2        OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.    [CIIAP, X.
dies were grand historical compositions, founded upon the traditional
or mythologic legends of the people for whom  they were written,
and whose religious and patriotic feelings were in the highest degree
appealed to by what they considered as a sacred and affecting representation; exactly as the rude audience of the Middle Ages had
their sensibilities powerfully excited by the mysteries. The Greek
dramas were, in fact, the mysteries and miracle-plays of the Pagan
world, and differed from those of the thirteenth century only in their
greater polish and refinement as compositions. Now, the legends of
classical mythology necessarily affect no less than the stories of the
Scripture history; and consequently the'Samson' (being in all points
of structure and arrangement an exact fac-simile of a Greek tragedy)
produces upon us, Christians, an effect infinitely more analogous to
that made upon an Athenian by a tragedy of Sophocles than could
be produced by our reading the best mere translation of a tragedy
of Sophocles that the skill of man ever executed.
In' Comus' Milton has given us the most perfect and exquisite
specimen of a masque, or rather he has given us a kind of ennobled
and glorified masque.  The refinement, the elegance, the courtly
grace and chivalry-all is there; but there is something in' Comus'
better, loftier, and grander than all this-something which no other
masques, with all their refined, and scholarlike, and airy elegance,
have ever approached-a high and philosophic vein of morality:" Divine philosophy,
Not harsh and rugged, as dull fools suppose,
But musical as is Apollo's lute;"
deep and grand thoughts fetched from the exhaustless fountains of
the great minds of old-his beloved Plato and the Stagyrite-thoughts
fresh with the immortality of their birthplace.
CHAPTER X.
BUTLER AND DRYDEN.
The Commonwealth and the Restoration-Milton and Butler-Subject and
Nature of Hudibras-Hudibras and Don Quixote-State of Society at the
Restoration - Butler's Life - John Dryden —French Taste of the CourtComedies and Rhymed Tragedies-Li-fe and Works of Dryden-Dramas —
Annus Mirabilis — Absalom and Achitophel —Religio Laici —Hind and
Panther-Dryden's later Works-Translation of Virgil —Odes-FablesPrefaces and Dedications - Juvenal - Mac Flecknoe.
THE great productions of literature may be looked at under two
dfferent aspects or relations.  Every illustrious name in letters may
be considered as typifying and expressing some great and strongly




URAP. X.]          BUTLER: HIS HUDIBRAS.                     173
marked epoch in the history of man in general, and also as the offspring and embodiment of some particular era, or some peculiar state
of feeling existing in the nation of which that name is an ornament:
that is to say, criticism may be general or particular, coslmopolite or
national. Thus Milton, viewed as a colossal intellect, without any
reference to his particular century or country, may be looked upon
as the type and offspring of the Reformation and of the republican
spirit combined; regarded with reference to England and the seventeenth century, he will be found to embody the Commonwealth —
that stirring and extraordinary period of British history, when the"
united influences of those two mighty phenomena were acting on a
stage sufficiently limited, and during a period sufficiently short, to
enable us to form a clear.and well-defined idea of their character.
The period at which Milton wrote was, as we' have.seen, a period of
vehement struggle between. powerful and opposite principles: and if
in the illustrious author of'Paradise Lost' we find the eloquent
assertor of the liberty of the press,'and the uncompromising advocate
for democratic forms of government, we cannot be surprised if webehold, in the ranks of the royalist party, a mighty champion of
monarchy, and an irresistible satirist of the follies and vices of the
republicans. This champion, this satirist, is Samuel Butler, perhaps
the greatest master who ever lived of the comic or birflesque species
of satiric writing - a strange and singular genius, whose powers of
ridicule were as incomparable as the story of his life is melancholy.
In point of learning, vast, multifarious, and exact, he was no unworthy rival of Milton: in originality of conception and brilliancy of
form  his work is unequalled; indeed,' Hudibras' is one of those
productions which may be said to stand alone in literature. It is
not to be denied that the reputation obtained out of England by this
extraordinary work is by no means commensurate with its real merit
as an effort of genius and originality, or with the vast store of wisdom
and of wit contained in its pages; nor is it even probable that this
indifference to its merits will ever at any future period be less than
it has hitherto been, or than it is at present.  It arises from a very
natural cause.  The subject of Butler's satire was too local and
temporary to command that degree of attention in other countries,
without which the highest powers of humour and imagination will
have been exerted in vain. It is undoubtedly true that the vices,
the crimes, the follies so pitilessly ridiculed in' Hudibras' are common to mankind in almost every state of civilized society; but we
must no less remember that some of the more prominent of them
never burst forth into so full a bloom of absurdity and extravagance
as they did at the memorable epoch of English history which he has
caricatured.  The Commonwealth and the Protectorate form a revo..
lutionary epoch, and, like all epochs of revolution, were fertile in
strong contrasts of political and social physiognomy.  Such periods




1794        OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. X.
acting, as they so powerfully do, upon the manners of a people, are
admirably suited for the purposes.of the satiric poet. At such times
the elements of faction, the extravagances of opinion, of sentiment,
of manners, of costume, are brought prominently out upon the surface of society, and present themselves, so to say, in a condensed and
tangible form, which the satirist has only to copy to produce a vivid
and striking picture-fortunate, too, if a future age, free from these
violent agitations and strong contrasts, does not charge him  with
exaggeration, and mistake the grotesque Tbut faithful delineations of
his pencil for the sportiveness of caricature.  Curious as they are to
the moral speculator, and full of matter to the studious searcher into
the history of party, the absurdities of that legion of fanatical sects
by whom the destinies of England.were then swayed are neither
sufficiently attractive or picturesque in themselves, nor sufficiently
well known to the general European reader, for Butler's admirable
pictures of them to be generally studied or understood out of EngIand; for with political satire, no less than political caricature, much
of the point of the jest is lost to those who are not able to judge of
the likeness.
It may be objected that, to the great body of English readers, the
very considerable time that has elapsed since the occurrences took
place which Butler has ridiculed, and the total disappearance of the
things and the men represented in his poem, must have rendered
them as strange and almost as unintelligible as they are to the nonEnglish reader, from remoteness of place as well as distance of time,
arid dissimilarity of manners, customs, and sentiments. This is undoubtedly true to some extent: but the intensely idiomatic spirit of
this excellent writer has given to his work a sap and a vitality which
no obsoleteness of subject could destroy.  An immense number of
his verses have passed into the ordinary everyday language of his
countrymen: containing, as they often do, the condensed thought of
proverbs, they have fixed.themselves on the memory of the people
by their proverb-like oddity and humour of expression, and often by
the quaint jingle of their rhymes.  Thus multitudes of Butler's
couplets float loosely in the element of ordinary English dialogue,
and are-often heard from the. mouths of men who are themselves
ignorant of the source of these very expressions, and who possibly
hardly know that such a poet as Butler and such a poem as'Hudi.
bras' ever existed. The fundamental idea of'Hudibras' is, in our
opinion, singularly happy. The title of the poem, which is also the
name of its hero, is taken from the old romances of chivalry, Sir
Hugh de Bras being the appellation of one of the knights (an
Englishman, too, according to the legend) of Arthur's fabulous
Round Table.  Much also of the structure of the poem is a kind
of burlesque of those ancient romances; and the very versification
itself is the rhymed octosyllable so much employed by the Norman




CLAP. X.]             BUTLER: ISUDIBRAS.                    175
trouveres, a measure singularly well adapted for continuous and
easy narrative, and consequently peculiarly fit for burlesque.  Of
comic poetry, part of whose humour consists in a resemblance *or
contrast between a ludicrous imitation and a serious or elevated
original,.there are two principal species. In the one, the characters,
events, language, and style of a sublime and pathetic work are.
retained, but mingled with mean and ludicrous objects; as when the
heroes of the'Iliad' are represented as cowards, gluttons,' and
thieves: and in the other, trivial or ridiculous personages and events
are described with a pomp of language and an affected dignity of
style wholly disproportioned to their real importance. The former
species of writing, it is hardly necessary to say, is called burlesque,
and the second mock-heroic.  Of the first kind are the innumerable
travesties of the ancient poets; and of the second both the French
literature and the English possess excellent specimens, though the'Lutrin' is not to be compared to the'Rape of the Lock.' Although
both these kinds of comic writing may appear to have been the offspring-of a considerably advanced period of literature, it is nevertheless certain thatspecimens of them are to be found at an exceedingly
early epoch - even in the very infancy of poetry in the heroic age,
and in its second birth or avatar of the romantic or chivalric period
of the Middle Ages.  We need only mention, in proof of our first
proposition, the'Battle of the Frogs and Mice,' falsely, it is obvious,
ascribed to Homer, but still a work of very high antiquity; and
also we may refer to many of the comedies of Aristophanes.
As to our second position-that in which we speak of the existence
in the Middle Ages of this kind of comic writing-it will be necessary to refer rather more fully to the literature of that early period,
not only because this section of it is less likely to be familiar to our
readers, but also because it bears more immediately upon the subject
in hand-' Hudibras' being, to a certain degree, a burlesque of the
tales of chivalry which form the staple of mediaeval literature.  We
have, then, numberless proofs that the solemn, wonderful, and stately
romance of the trouvdre was often parodied, and that ludicrous and
burlesque poems were frequently written, for the purpose of exciting
mirth, in which the stately manners and occupations of the knight were
represented in connexion with the ignorance, rudeness, and coarse merriment of the peasant; somewhat in a similar manner as we find in the
Attic theatre the terrible and pathetic tragedy made a source of laughter
in the satiric drama, which is supposed to have formed a part of the
trilogy of the ancients. Of these latter only one example now exists, in
the'Cyclops' of Euripides, an admirable and most laughable jeu
d'esprit, in which the heroic manners and adventure of Ulysses and
Polyphemus are evidently travestied from a serious'tragic version
(now lost) of the same adventure, which formed one of the members
of the same trilogy.  Not to speak of the ancient Normain subdiv~i




~17 G         OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CHAP. X,
sion of the Romanz poetry, we need not look farther than our own
country to find- several examples of the same kind of humour existing in the chivalrous literature of the Middle Ages.  And the thing
is natural enough; the taste and feeling of the ludicrous, which
seems innate in the human mind, will find a ready food in the serious
or elevated productions fashionable in any age or country.  Among
the early English poems to which we have alluded there are two
which are not only admirable for their oddity and humour, but curious
as presenting perfect examples of the, principle of which we are
speaking: these are -the' Tournament of Tottenham' and the'Hunting of the Hare.' In the former of these singular jeu d'esprit the
reader will find a very lively parody of the language, sentiment,
and usages of the chivalric period. The subject is a solemn tourney,
or " passage: of arms," in which the actors are clowns and peasants
instead of high-born and gentle knights, and in which the peculiar
terms and ceremonies of these solemn and splendid spectacles are
most ludicrously burlesqued and misapplied.  In the' Hunting of
the Hare' the leading idea is nearly similar, with the exception that
it is not the language and the usages of the tournament which are
burlesqued by their connexi-on with the lowest order of the people,
but the terms and, if we may so style it, the technology of the art
of venery-an art which was in those ages considered as only second
in importance to the science of war, which possessed a language of
its own no less complicated and elaborate, and was, no less than it.
the peculiar privilege of the nobles  In this curious poem the' baseborn churls" go out to hunt the hare with all the ceremonies of
knightly venery: and the poem, which describes their mishaps and
their ignorant misapplication of terms and customs, produced its
effect in a similar way to the laughable caricature of military and
heraldic splendour in the' Tournament of Tottenham.'
"Cervantes laugh'd Spain's chivalry away,"
says Byron; and though it is an error to suppose that the ludicrous
adventures of the Knight of La Mancha can in any sense be said to
have destroyed a system which had ceased to exist when Cervantes
wrote, yet every reader must feel how much of the comic effect of
this immortal work arises from the strong contrast and want of
harmony between the Don's peculiar train of ideas and the social
condition of the times in which he attempts to realise his hallucination. So completely indeed had knight-errantry ceased to exist at
the period when the Don is supposed to set out oh his adventures,
that Cervantes was obliged to adopt the idea of insanity in his hero
ere he could bring in contact two states of society-two conditions
of sentiment so incompatible as the chivalric age and thereal man.
ners of his own day.  But every one sees how much the ludicrous
dffect is heightened, nay, how completely it proceeds from this forcible




iHAP. X.J       HUDIBRAS AND DON QUIXOTE.                    177
juxtaposition of discordant periods; for as all true beauty arises, it
nature and in art, from harmony, so the ludicrous has ever for its
principal element the incongruous and the discordant.  Place Don
Quixote in the real, age of chivalry, surround him with the real
customs and ideas which his." fine madness" has conjured up from
the past and from the world of imagination, and he ceases to.be a
udicrous, or even an extraordinary character.
In'Hudibras,' the form of the poem, the versification, and the.
onception of some of the adventures, derive their comic piquancy
from their resemblance to the solemn tales of Anglo-Norman chivalry,
The age of knight-errantry is indeed far less prominently brought in
contrast and opposition with a different period in' Hudibras' than in'Don Quixote;' but it is so brought to a certain degree, and with a
certain degree of effect: and herein we may perceive a proof of
Butler's good sense. The manners of Spain when Cervantes lived
were indeed., widely different from those of the chivalric age; but
they were not so completely changed but that many relies of chivalry
still existed in the legends, the songs, and the recollections of the
people: these existed then, it is obvious, for they exist, to a certain
extent, down to the present day.:But England when Butler wrote,
England in the civil war and under the Long Parliament, was as
perfect and absolute a contrast. to the chivalric age as the mind of
man can conceive.  Butler therefore contented himself with taking
from that period certain-general outlines for his picture, the principal
of which-the idea of representing his hero as setting out, attended
by his squire, in a garb and an equipment ludicrously caricatured,
knight-errantlike, to destroy abuses-he undoubtedly took from
Cervantes.  The characters of the Knight of La Mancha and his
inimitable squire, it should be observed, grotesque as they are, are
in no sense intended to excite, or capable of exciting, any feeling but
that of merriment —a merriment which in the case of the former is
always tempered with respect and' pity. The object of Butler was
different: he intended to produce in us a feeling of ridicule and contempt, and of contempt carried as far towards detestation as was
compatible with the existence of the ridiculous. And in their respective aims, both so different and so difficult, each of these great-wits
has wonderfully succeeded.  Cervantes makes you laugh at his
admirable hero, and yet love him  the more you laugh; while
Butler causes you to detest Sir IHudibras as much as it is possible to detest him without ceasing to laugh. Pity and abhorrence
are both tragic passions, and consequently, when carried beyond
certain limits, are destructive of the sense of ridicule: and these
two great men have each in his peculiar line carried their ludicrous
character exactly so far as to touch the brink where the comic ceases,
and where the tragic begins.  Butler's object in writing'I Hudibras'
was to cover the fanatic and republican party with irresistible ridicule i




178           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.    [CHAP. X.
and in that assemblage of odious and contemptible vices which he
has, as it were, condensed in the persons of Sir Hudibras and his
clerk, it is impossible not to see at once the strong though certainly
exaggerated resemblance between the original and the portrait, and'
the extraordinary genius of the painter.  Sir Hudibras, a Presbyterian officer and justice of the peace, sets out, attended by his clerk
Ralph (who is the representative of the Independents), to correct
abuses, and to enforce the observance of the strict laws lately made
by the fanatic parliament for the suppression of the sports and amusements of the people. In moral and intellectual character,, in political
and religious principles, this worthy pair forms a parallel as just and
admirable as in grotesque accoutrement, in cowardice, and in paradoxical ingenuity.  The description of their character, dress, equipment, and even their horses, is as complete and finished a picture as
can be conceived: not a single stroke of satire is omitted: they live
before us a perfect embodiment of everything that is repulsive and
contemptible.
Though the lines which distinguish these two personages are
drawn with a strong, a learned, and a delicate hand, there is too
great a natural resemblance between the two classes of which Hudibras and Ralph are the representatives for us to derive from them
the pleasure -we find in Don- Quixote, and which arises from  the
happy and humorous contrast between the Don and Sancho.  Tile
differences between Presbyterian and Independent, Antinomian and
Fifth-Monarchy-man, were much better known and more easily distinguishe'd when Butler wrote than they can be now after so many
years have tended to confound in one general indistinctness the
peculiar features which gave individual character to the thousand
sects then struggling: for supremacy, each hating with a fervent
hatred the Church and the monarchy of England, but abhorring
each other with far greater cordiality.  But it was not so when
Butler wrote, and we cannot, therefore, justly complain that a work'
written with a -particular and definite purpose of local and temporary satire does not possess a greater universality of design than it
was likely, or indeed possible, it should have. We must remember
that the vices and follies ridiculed-in'HI-udibras,' though they may
no longer exist under the sam6 forms, yet are inherent in human
nature; and we may accept this sharp and brilliant satire as an
attack, not upon the Presbyterian or Independent of 1660, but
upon pedantry, hypocrisy, upon political and religious fanaticism.
The plot and adventures of this poem are very slight and unim,
ortant: the butt of the author was the whole Puritan party, and
he was more likely to render that party ridiculous by what he' makes
his personages say than by anything he could make them do.  The
numerous dialogues scattered through the work are, in this respect,
more powerful means of throwing contempt on the object of the




CH-AP. X.]       HUDIBRAS: ITS POPULARITY.                  179
satire than the events; though many of the latter, as the, adventure
of the bear and fiddle, the. imprisonment in the stocks, the selfinflicted whipping of the knight, &c. &c., are recounted with great
gaiety and invention. The learning, the inexhaustible wit, the
ingenuity, the ever-surprising novelty of the dialogues, forbid us to
regret, or rather altogether prevent us from perceiving, that the
intrigue is so imperfect and inartificial as hardly to deserve the
name of a plot, that the action is inconsistent, and left unfinished at
the conclusion-if, indeed, the abrupt termination of the poemscan
correctly be called a conclusion-in which nothing is concluded.
In the interval between the appearance of the first and last cantos
the Restoration had taken place, to which Butler had so powerfully
contributed, and from which he was destined to meet with such
ingratitude; and consequently many of the topics which he had
treated with such admirable humour in the first part had become
obsolete; so that it may be doubted whether Butler could have
completed his work, or whether the work would have been rendered
more valuable had he done so. Tts success was immense-addressed
as it was to the strongest prejudices of the royalists, and directed
against a party whose peculiar vices were unusually well adapted to
serve as a butt for the satirist.  It immediately became the most
popular book of the time, was qvyoted and admired by all the
courtiers, and by the merry king himself, who was certainly able,
whatever were his deficiencies in more important points, to enjoy
and appreciate the wit of'Iludibras;' but who, with that ungrateful
levity which forms the worst feature of his character, forgot to
reward the admirable author to whom he owed so much in more
senses. than one. Butler was born in 1612, and, as far as the imperfect notices which we possess of his early career permit us to
ascertain, he appears to'have been- recommended (probably by his
youthful learning) to the Countess of Kent, under whose protection
he remained some time, enjoying the acquaintance and conversation
of the wise and excellent Selden.  He appears afterwards to have
passed some time in the service (as clerk or tutor) of Sir Samuel
Luke, one of Cromwell's officers, and this person is supposed to
have sat for.the portrait of the hero of'Hudibras.'  Butler has
hence been accused of ingratitude and an odious betrayal of his
benefactor; but so grave a charge as this deserves, particularly
when brought against an illustrious genius, a much more conclusive
degree of proof than the evidence will supply. We must know,
first, whether Butler was really treated in the family of Sir Samuel
Luke with kindness sufficient to justify us in giving the name of
ingratitude to his satirizing of that personage; and, secondly, we
must have better -evidence as to the severity and malice of the,
alleged satire itself than is to be gathered from the very few and
not very distinct allusions to Sir Samuel occurring in the poem' of
15




180          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   LCHAP. X.' Hudibras.' The rapid and immediate success of Butler's poem of
course brought him under the notice of the court of the Restoration,
whose interests the satire had.so powerfully served; and Charles
presented the author with a sum of 3001., promising to do more
for him. This promise, however, the king never fulfilled, and the
great wit, after living in poverty and obscurity a few years longer,
died in 1680, in a wretched lodging in Covent Garden, then the
most miserable and squalid quarter of London.  He was even
indebted to the charity of a friend for a grave, as he did not possess
sufficient property to pay his funeral expenses; and- it was not till
some time after his death that this great comic genius received the
honour of a monument, which was erected, with a laudatory inscription, at the cost of an admirer.  This tardy recognition of Butler's
merit gave origin to one of the acutest epigrams in the English
language: -
"'Whilst Butler, needy wretch, was yet alive,
No generous patron would a dinner give:
See him, when starved to death' and turn'd to dust,
Presented with a monumental bust.
-The poet's fate is here in emblem.shown;
He ask'd for bread, and he received a stone."
But the true type of the principles of taste, and the system, not
only of literature, but even-we may almost say-even of morality,
which were introduced into England at the restoration of the Stuarts.
is John IDryden, a poet and critic who, if he does not deserve a place
among the very first and greatest lights of his country's literature,
yet must always be ranged at the very head of the second class. The
great revolution in taste to which we have just alluded modified to
a most important extent the whole-face and relations of society, and
so powerful was its influence that- its effects'are very plainly traceable
over the whole of that long period of history extending from the
Restoration to the first French Revolution.  In order to appreciate
and measure the effects of this change, it will be necessary to throw
a glance upon the nature and causes of its occurrence at this
particular period; and in so doing we shall find a new opportunity
of perceiving how closely and intimately connected are the political
land literary career of every civilized nation. We have seen, in the
Elizabethan age, the newly-developed energies of national genius
bursting forth, under the fostering glow of political grandeur, comnlercial prosperity, and great social cultivatton, into the most extraordinary fertility and productiveness; it was under the wise and
vigorous sway of that great.sovereign that the country first took up
its position as a prominent member. of the great European family.
The struggles of the Reformation too, however disastrous may have
been their temporary effect, had accustomed the minds of men to
nabits of inquiry, and fortified their intellectual energies by the




CHAP. X.]       INFLUENCE OF FRENCH TASTE.                 181
greatest freedom of discussion exercised upon-subjects of the gravest
and most enduring importance, and, at the same time, the literature
had not been -so far cultivated, nor the principles of taste so far
established, as to expose the writers of that period to the fatal influence of precedent and authority, compelling them (as invariably
happens in more advanced periods of cultivation) to accept without
inquiry any set of models from some particular age or country. The
result of all this was, that those writers (of whom Shakspeare in
poetry, and Bacon in philosophy, are the most glorious and complete
examples) possessed in the highest degree the apparently opposite
qualities of originality and good sense. Living as it were in the
infancy of literature, they brought to the contemplation of the great
productions of other lands and other ages an eye unhackneyed and
fresh, enabling them to perceive the beauties of nature and of art
with a sensibility and a relish arising from novelty; and at the same
time they were cramped and enslaved in their own productions by
none of those timid systems which are founded upon the supposed
necessity of imitating some particular models.  That character of
freshness, earnestness, and intensity, which marks the thoughts of
childhood, is stamped also upon the productions of the infancy of
literature; the thoughts of men at such a period have not lost their
bloom - the dew is still upon them.
The English nation, exhausted with incessant agitation, and wearied
of endless and unprofitable dissensions in religion, hailed with rapture
the return of their exiled king, and foresaw in a re-establishment of
monarchy a pledge for stability, for peace, and for prosperity.  In
the ardour of triumphant loyalty, they -looked forward to " Saturnian
days," and expected that with a restored throne would be restored
also the ancient nationality and modes of thought of the English
people. But these hopes were destined, as might indeed have been
foreseen, to be disappointed. The exiled king, and the little court
which accompanied him in all his wanderings, had lost much of the
spirit of nationality.  Pensioners on the bounty of foreign states,
Charles and his personal adherents had rubbed off, by their friction
with the men and the customs of other countries, much of that external shell of habits and manners which, if not the most valuable
and essential part of patriotism, is yet an excellent protection and
bond to the love of country. - The exiled royalists too, no more than
their " merry, poor, and scandalous" chief, could not be supposed to
entertain feelings of very deep devotion to that country which had
banished them for so long, and to which they were restored mainly
through foreign interference and intrigues of foreign jealousy; for it
may safely be said that most of the nations of Europe had watched
Fvith envy and distrust the rapid career, so brilliant and so short, of
epublican England.
In considering how far these circumstances were likely to affect




182          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.    [CIIAP. X,
the merely literary tastes and predilections of the restored courts we
must not forget that the great productions of earlier and more
splendid epochs of English literary history had grown obsolete, if
not even unintelligible; for we find Dryden, an ardent, if not very
enlightened admirer of Shakspeare, complaining that the writings
of the greatest of our dramatists had become little read from the
difficulty and antiquated expression of his style.  Moreover, the
English literature.wast at the period of which we are speaking absolutely unknown to the rest of Europe —a circumstance for which it
is easy enough to find a reason., The French nation was, at the
epoch of Louis XIV., the one which had reached the highest point
of civilization then attained. by any European state: her influence,
not only political and military, but even intellectual also, was predominant; she dictated the fashion, not only in all minor matters
of dress, amusement, and behaviour, but in literature and art.
Parisian practice, and the court of the Grand Monarque, was a jurisdiction from which there was no appeal, and its decisions were held
to be equally irreversible, whether they settled the principles of
poetry or the arrangement of a Avord-knot, the laying out of a garden or the rules of the drama. Now, of all the European nations
which have at any period of their existence attained to some degree
of eminence in letters, France is incontestably the one which has the
least caitolicity of taste, the least sympathy with what differs from
her received ideas. This arises, in some measure, from the unity
which characterises French society, and. from the political causes
which have always made Paris the centre and focus of French nationality.  Some portion of. the effect may have been produced, too, by
the inherent poverty of the French language, and by the'sudden and
rapid progress which the literature made towards excellence-the
cultivation of the field being in direct proportion to the narrowness
of its limits.  Lastly, we must not omit from  our calculation the
restless and insatiable vanity which incontestably forms a prominent
feature in the French character; and we cannot, we think, long
wonder either at the industry and activity with which all the French
critics maintained the supposed.superiority of their national literature
over that of every other European country, or at the complete success
which their efforts so long secured.  That, therefore, the Englisb
royalists should have returned from exile with all their predilections
enlisted in favour of French literature, can be no matter of surprise
to usf  What could have been the opinion of a gay and ignorant,cavalier respecting the'Comus,' for instance, of Milton, or the'Paradise Lost?'  And if he could in no sense sympathise with or
understand (as it was next to impossible that he could) the grave
and profound loveliness which characterises the works of the great
* Puritan poet, how very dim and imperfect must, have been his ima.
pressions of Chaucer, of Spenser, of Shakspeare! The consequence




OfiAP. X.]    LITERATURE OF TIHE RESTORATION.                 183
of all thlis was, that there was introduced into England at the Restoration, not merely a difference of tone affecting the general character
of the literature, but new models and new forms of composition.
The court too, and the society of the metropolis, now began to exercise a more powerful influence, particularly on the lighter departments
of literature; and the manners of that court being exceedingly
corrupt and profligate, a deeply-seated taint of immorality was communicated to the social intercourse of the age, which required no
short period of time, and no small exertion of good taste, good manners, and religion, entirely to purge away.  Indeed this corruption
was not entirely eradicated, either from manners or from literature,
till the time of Addison.  The court thus giving the tone and keynote to the metropolis, and the metropolis to the nation, we cannot
be surprised to see that a gay and witty profligacy characterises the
lighter literature of this time; and that a certain worldliness, and a
perfect acquaintance with the surface of fashionable society, should
be the prevailing spirit of the day.  The nation, disgusted with the
long faces and longer prayers of the fanatics, and suddenly freed from
their absurd and odious restrictions, now rushed to the opposite extreme: debauchery was considered as identified with loyalty, and
oaths, and deep draughts, and a gay contempt for all the decencies
of social life, were, as it were, the badges and insignia of a good
cavalier.  Mlen are but too apt in all cases to find pretexts for their
vices in what is in itself laudable and excellent; and in the present
case the follies naturally accompanying the triumph of the royalist
party were fostered and encouraged by the scandalous example of
immorality set by the court itself.  The king, to whom proscription
andl misfortune had taught neither gratitude nor propriety, who had
returned from exile, like the members of another royal house in our
own days, "without having learned and without having forgotten
anything," appears to have possessed no one good quality but that
of a certain good-natured'easiness of temper; and his reign is equally
memorable for internal disorder and for external weakness and pusil.
lanimity. Now what are the literary features which such an epoch
as we have been describing, and such a state of society, might naturtally be expected to possess? Assuredly.we should look for no great
manifestations of creative genius, for no delineations of tragic passion,
for no profound and immortal embodiments of human nature: but
satire would flourish, and that kindred species of composition, the
comedy of manners or intrigue -  that satire (the Horatian, not the
Juvenalian kind) which skims lightly over the surface of society,
and rather wittily ridicules bad taste, bad manners, and folly, than
sternly lashes vice or crime; and that comedy which confines itself
solely to the external absurdities of society, and therefore but a portrait or a caricature of a particular age: not the comedy which
penetrates into the profoundest recesses of human character, reprco
15'




184'         OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.    [CHAI K.renting in lively colours, not an epoch, but humanity itself. Tragedy
they had, and in abundance'; but it was a tragedy in the highest
degree artificial —an exaggerated copy of the already exaggerated
imitations of Corneille and of Racine. At a period when society
had lost all real dignity of manner and all true intensity and earnestness of tone, it had lost also all sympathy with natural feeling, and
all sense for simple passion: and as the convulsive distortions of
weakness and disease may at first sight be mistaken'for'the activity
of healthy vigour, the dramatic audiences of that time were content
to accept fantastic extravagance for sublimity, and an effeminate
affectation for tenderness.  To sickly and enerVated palates, simple
food is tasteless'and loathsome; and the unnatural rants of a'false
and impossible heroism were applauded by the countrymen of Shakspeare and of Jonson.  This was the age of rhymed tragedies: in
the eagerness to imitate the whole form and structure of the French
classical tragedy, they copied' not only what was unimportant, but
also what was defective.  They forgot that the English language
possessed examples of the highest perfection of harmony as a medium
of dramatic dialogue; and they servilely followed the metrical system
of their French models, a system essentially based upon the unmetrical character of the French language.  Nor did they stop here:
they found it necessary to copy also the artificial and exaggerated
tone of the sentiments, the supernatural and impossible elevation of
the characters, and to throw over the whole composition the tint of
courtly and fantastic gallantry, which accords so ill with the real
manners of those epochs (the heroic age of antiquity in particular),
from which' they generally selected the subject of their plays. Their
heroes are no longer men and women, but glittering puppets, dressed
up in a collection of contradictory virtues, placed upon the stage to
declaim long tirades of artificial and exaggerated sentiment: and,
possessing no intrinsic claims on the sympathy of the spectator (for
who can sympathise with a phantoi -- an abstraction?) they were
represented as performing prodigies of impossible valour, and mnaking
sacrifices of not less impossible generosity.
In this degenerate age, however, of our literature, England produced one man who, though deeply tinged with the stains of his
age and country, yet deserved/and obtained, by the innate nobility
and grandeur of his genius, onew of the highest places among the
great men  of his country.  This was John Dryden.  He was
descended from  an ancient Northamptonshire family, and was born
in August, 1631. Though the father of the poet was a man of
rigid Puritan principles, the future critic and satirist received a good
and even learned education, first at Westminster School, and after
wards at Trinity College, Cambridge. Though his first poetical
efforts were devoted-to the celebration of the republican chief of
England, he very soon utterly abandoned the party and opinions of




CHAP. X.]      DRYDEN: HIS LIFE AND WORKS.                  185
the Commoilwealth, so uncongenial to the character'and ambition of
Dryden, who was essentially the poet of the court and of social life;
and we find him  among those who welcomed with the most enthusiasm the restoration of the monarchy. The stage being, as we
e have already intimated, the most fashionable, and perhaps also the
most lucrative arena for literary ambition at this time, Dryden became an industrious candidate for dramatic glory, and he now began
that career of'writing for the stage which continued with little interruption during his whole life.  Among the first plays which he
wrote are'The Wild Gallant,' The Rival Ladies,' and'The Indian
Emperor;' but this department of his works it will be needless to,particularize, as they are now little read, in spite of passages of
great occasional merit, and even many noble scenes of a highly
eloquent and declamatory cast. These remarks, however, apply
solely to the tragedies, for, Dryden, great as were his powers of
satire, can hardly be said to have possessed a spark of humour; and
-humour is the essence and life-blood of comedy.  The truth is, that
his comedies were written less in compliance with the natural bent
of his genius than to obey the taste of the day, and, like most men
who do not possess the vis comica, he seems to have invariably mistaken buffoonery for comic wit, and coarse unblushing profligacy for
comic intrigue. His comedies are, in short, equally stupid and
contemptible, and it is but a melancholy excuse for the errors of
such an intellect as Dryden's to allege the corruption of the society
of his day, or the force of poverty, as palliating,what is equally an
offence against morality and good manners. Ii his tragedies there
is much more to admire and far less to blame - a freedom and
vigour of expression, a masculine energy of thought, and an inexhaustible flow of the purest English, harmonized by a versification
which, for ease, abundance, richness, and variety, has never been
equalled in the language.  The characters in his dramas are: all
reproductions of the scanty repertory of the French scene; his
heroes push courage and generosity to the verge of madness and
impossibility; his heroines are little else than eloquent viragos; and
each class of personages has a tinge of the fantastic and exaggerated
gallantry which had its origin in the system of chivalry, and which
was carried to its highest degree of absurdity in the interminable
romances of the school of Scuddri; and his tyrants rant and blaspheme secundum artem, in sounding tirades which nothing could
render tolerable but the sonorous and majestic versification.  The
truth is, that the genius of this great poet was essentially undramatic. As he wanted all perception of true humour in comedy, so
in tragedy he was completely deficient in that sentiment (so nearly
akin to humour) without which tragedy becomes nothing but declamation in dialogue- pathos.  But his real sphere was lyric,
didactic, and satiric poetry, and in these kinds of writing the




186          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.    [CHAP. X.
qualities which we have described him as possessing —perhaps no
poet ever possessed them in so high a degree - shine out in full'
and unmingled lustre.  In 1667. he published' Annus Mirabilis,' a
poem of considerable length, written to commemorate the events of
the preceding year, which were indeed remarkable enough to justify
the title; — among the ret, the great fire of London, and a desperate action between the Dutch and English fleets.  In this noble
work he made use of a species of versification (imitated, it is supposed, from Davenant) which was peculiarly qualified to exhibit his
mastery over the language, and his consummate power of expressing
ordinary thoughts in varied and majestic numbers.  It is written in
stanzas of four heroic lines, alternately rhymed, and, though de*formed by occasional false, thoughts and extravagances, by marks of
baste and hurry, and injured (as are most of Dryden's compositions)
by a tone of adulation and flattery unworthy a great man, it must
ever be considered as a work of extraordinary merit.  The publication of this vigorous work immediately placed Dryden in the first
rank of the poets of his time; and he made an engagement with
the king's players to supply them with three plays a-year — a task
for which he possessed few qualifications excepting a remarkable
boldness and prolific fluency of mind, and an inexhaustible supply
of rich and varied versification.  He was about this period appointed
poet laureate and historiographer to-the king, which office, together
with his share in the profits of the theatre, amounting to about 3001.
a-year, afforded him -a fixed revenue of at least 7001.  This nmust be
considered as the most prosperous and flourishing period of Dryden's
existence; but he soon became involved in controversies and squabbles with other literary men, and particularly with Elkanah Settle,
a wretched scribbler of that day, placed in opposition to Dryden
partly by the bad taste of the time, and partly by the ingenious
malice of the witty and profligate- Rochester.  These  literary
quarrels embittered the life of the great poet; and though we may
in some sense be said to owe to them several of the finest satiric
productions of Dryden's muse, we-cannot but regret that his powerful energies were in' so many instances unworthily employed in
consigning to an immortality of scorn names which but for him would
have been long forgotten, and thus embalming in the brilliant and
indestructible amber of his satire the lice and beetles of contemporary literature.
In 1681 Dryden published the splendid satirical poem of I Absalom and Achitophel.' In this noble production, under a thin and
transparent veil of Biblical names and'Scriptural allusions, we have
a most powerful description of the political intrigues of the Duke of
bIonmouth and his party, and admirably drawn characters of the
principal public men of that time; indeed it is the force, variety, and
comprchensivencss of the characters which give the work its value in




CHIAP. X.]        ABSALOM AND ACHITOPIEL.                   187
the eyes of modern readers-a value which it can e.ver lose.  In
satire it is obvious that a degree of epigrammatic point in the delineation of characters is as essential an excellence as the same quality
of brilliant discriminative opposition would be a defect in the drama
or in the romance; and thus Dryden's admirable skill in this kind
of moral portrait-painting absolutely rendered his dramatic personages
mere abstractions, rather artificial combinations of distinct qualities
than real human beings. Not even in the elegant gallery of the
Horatian satire, nor in the darker and more tragic pictures of Juvenal,
can we find any delineations, admirable though they be, equal in
vigour, lifelikeness, and intensity of colouring, to the rich and mnagnificent collection of portraits given in' Absalom  and Achitophel;'
most of them have been impressed indelibly upon the memory of
every. reader of English poetry: we may mention, among others,
the characters of Ziinri (the Duke of Buckingham), of Achitophel
(the Earl of Shaftesbury), of Corah (the infamous Oates), and in
the second part the masterly descriptions of Settle and Shadwell, his
chief personal antagonists, under the names of Doeg and Og.  It
should be remarked, that the second part of this striking poem was
written, not by Dryden himself, but by Tate under his direction,
and that the former's share in it (with the exception of " several
touches in other places") was confined to the two latter characters.
It is, however, but just to the much calumniated genius of Ta.te to
say, that his part of the poem is not unworthy of his great collaborator, and that his style is hardly to be distinguished, in this work,
from that of the master.  It is true that we know not how far the
pencil of Dryden may have left its powerful touches on the canvas
of the inferior artist.  This work, like all Dryden's satires, narrative
compositions, and the dialogue of his tragedies, is written in the
rhymed heroic couplet of ten syllables: a measure which ])ryden
must be considered as having carried to the highest perfection of
which it was capable.  It is a species of versification exceedingly
difficult to write with effect, particularly in a long composition, the
structure of this metrical system causing a tendency to complete the
sense at the end of each pair of lines or couplet, and thus being
peculiarly liable to degenerate in ro monotony. But Dryden, by a
diligent study of the great models in this kind of versification, and
particularly of the works of Chau(;er (one of the most harmonious
of our poets), learned to surpass all who had gone before him in the
qualities of vigour, sonorousness, and variety; and he knew how, by
the occasional introduction of a triplet (or three lines rhyming
together) and the skilful use of the Alexandrine (of twelve syllables)
at'he end of a paragraph, to break the uniformity of the couplet,
and to give to his versification that
"Long-resounding march, and energy divine,"
which is the peculiar characteristic of his poetry.




r188.          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.    [CHAP. X.
He possessed in a higher degree than all our other poets, as Johnson justly remarks, the "art of reasoning in. verse," and he well
knew that he possessed this rare faculty: his mind was rather ratiocinative than impressionable; he possessed but feeble sympathy with
nature, and no tenderness at all; in poetical argument, therefore, in
invective, in the delineation of characters of artificial life, he was
inimitable. Nor was he less impressive in a higher sphere —that of
moral or religious controversy-what may be called poetical polemics.
lie has left us two- noble works of this nature, the' Religio Laici,'
and'The Iind and Panther,'-works which neither the unpoetical
nature of their subjects, nor the occasional false reasonings and
sophistries which may-be detected in them, can prevent us from considering as among the noblest efforts of human intellect ever embodied
in majestic verse.  The first is a defence of the Church of England
against the Dissenters; and in spite of the local nature of its theme,
and the tone of scepticism as to revealed religion which is but too
perceptible in many parts, it contains passages in the highest strain
of Dryden's peculiar excellences. The other is an attempt made by
Dryden to justify, under the form of a fable, his recent secession
from the English Church which he had so powerfully defended, and
whose dogmas lie now relinquished for those of'Romanism.  This
event took place about the period of the accession of James II., and
Dryden was exposed in consequence to great obloquy, - his conversion being attributed, and with no small show of justice, to motives
of interest.  Nothing can be more absurd and- unartificial than the
outline and conduct of this fable; in which the principal doctrines
of religious politics are discussed by animals, and the chief sects into
which the Christian world is divided are represented under the guise
of various wild beasts.  In the masquerade of
"A milk-white hind, immortal and unchanged,"
the poet means to present the Roman Catholic Church; in that
of the Panther, the other interlocutor in this polemical dialogue,
the Church of England, depicted as a beautiful but not unspotted
creature:"The panther, sure. the noblest next the hind,
The fairest creature of the spotted kind,Oh, could her inborn stains be #ash'd away,
She were too good to be a beast of prey,How can I praise or blameand not offend?
Or how divide the frailty from the friend?
Her faults and virtues lie so mix'd, that she
Nor wholly stands condemn'd, nor wholly free."
Under the other animals are expressed the other sects; and in the
portraits of many of them we recognise Dryden's usual vigour and
compression of thought. We may specify in particular the Bear and
the Wolf, the Presbyterians and Independents, which are touched




CrHAP. x.]             DRYDEN S ODES.                       189
with a master's hand. We may remark in this noble work, as in all
that Dryden ever wrote, a multitude of those terse and happy expressions which, like the glances in the modern poet, are
"New, as if brought from other spheres,
Yet welcome, as if known for years:"
as, for instance, when Dryden speaks of the "winged wounds."
We now approach the latter part of Dryden's life, a period when
the sun of prosperity, which had thrown a transient glow of wellbeing over his career, was to set, and leave the great poet to finish
his day in gloom, poverty, and unrequited labour.
At the Revolution, in 1688, he lost his office of laureate, and the
remainder of his life was passed in unremitting toil. But no diminution of splendour or intensity is perceptible in the lustre of " this
mighty orb of song;" and his great powers seem to acquire new vigour and activity with his declining age and his decreasing fortunes.
IIis latest works are esteemed his best; and it seems to furnish us with
an irresistible proof (if such were needed by those who remember the
life of Milton) of the elastic and unconquerable spirit of the higher
order of genius. Dryden now undertook the mighty task of translating
Virgil —a task for which it cannot be denied he was peculiarly unfitted,
not only by the character of his mind, but by the nature of his previous productions. Of all the classical poets, Virgil is the one
whose prevailing and most prominent merit, is exquisite delicacy of
thought and expression; a quality which Dryden, partly from want
of sympathy, partly perhaps also from the rapidity with which he
usually wrote, was in no way likely either to appreciate or to reproduce. His translation, therefore, though valuable as retaining many
of the excelleices of the English poet, can hardly be considered a
faithful representation of the Roman bard: it is Dryden, and often
Dryden in high perfection, but it is seldom or never Virgil.
Among the finest compositions of his latter years, we must now
mention the Ode on St. Cecilia's Day, a lyric composition of the
elevated and elaborate character, which is absolutely unequalled in
the English language, and approaches nearer to the true tone of
ancient lyric poetry than any modern production. Its subject is the
power of music, which is most happily illustrated and described in
the succession of different passions and sentiments supposed to be
excited by Timotheus, in the mind of Alexander, feasting, a triumphant conqueror, in Persepolis. Pride, joy, pity, love, terror, and
revenge, are successively evoked by the magic of the'mighty
master," and chase each other, like sun and shade along a mountain
side, over the conqueror's heart.  All these passionis, it is true, are
not described with equal felicity or equal taste; but minor defects
are forgotten in the majestic movements, now gay and now sublime,
f Dryden's versification.  It reminds the reader of some graiad and




1.90         OUTLINES OF GENEIRAL LITERATURE.    [CHAP. X.
elaborate concerto of Beethoven, in which the softest airs and the
most complex harmonies alternate with grand bursts of wild tempestmusic, and swelling strains of lamentation or of triumph, like the
grief or the joy of some whole people. Dryden wrote another ode
of great but inferior excellence, a funeral lyric on the death of Anne
Killigrew; but this latter is injured in its effect by various passages
rather ingenious and fantastic than either pathetic or sublime.
His last work of any importance was his' Fables,' a collection of
narrative and romantic poems, chiefly modernised from  Chaucer or
versified from Boccaccio. In these his genius appears in all its
plenitude of splendour; and nothing can exceed in intensity the impression they make upon the reader of the poet's consummate mastery
over the whole mechanism of his language and versification, and a
peculiar air of conscious power which, though it strongly characterises
all Dryden's compositions, is in none of them so conspicuous as in
these.
We must not forget the deep debt of gratitude which the modern
English literature owes to Dryden, were it only for his having in his
fables disinterred for his countrymen the rich stores of poetry concealed in the then obsolete and unread pages of Chaucer, and thus
prepared the way for a renewed and more reverential study of the
admirable productions of our elder writers. If Dryden had done
no more than this, he would have done an inestimable service to the
literature of his country; and we should have been at a loss to speak
with sufficient respect of a man all whose earlier works are in their
general character so widely different- in feeling and spirit from the
productions of the Middle Ages, and who yet had sufficient taste and
Discernment, though living in an age when these works were almost
completely unread, and perhaps confounded in one sweeping accusation of unintelligible barbarism, to perceive their beauties, and to
disencumber them of the dust- and cobwebs of two hundred years.
But the fables of Dryden are not by any means to be considered as
mere imitations or modernisings of Chaucer; they have a character
intrinsically their own, and they might be read with great advantage
together with the originals. Of course the simplicity of the old
poet, the sly grace of his language, that exquisite tone of naivete'
which, like the lispings of infancy, gives such a charm to the early
literature of almost every country, the direct and simple pathos
coming directly from and going-as directly to the heart-all this is
wanting in the imitations of Dryden; and it is questionable whether,
even if he had felt and sympathised with these qualities of his
original (qualities possessed by almost all early poets, and most
peculiarly by Chaucer), the process of transfusion into more modern
language would not have evaporated this aroma of antiquity: for a
modern poet, not inferior to Dryden in genius, and certainly superior
to him  in reyerential admiration of Chaucer, has confessed his




CHAP. X.]     DRYDEN'S FABLES-PROSE WO0iKts.                1ia
complete failure in the attempt to modernise these delightful works
without losing their bouquet. But what he wants in tenderness
Dryden amply makes up in grandeur, in variety of diction, and in
richness of metrical arrangement. Among tle finest of these tales
are the admirable stories of Palamon and Arcite, Cymon and Iphigenia,
January and May, and Theodore and Honoria.  The besetting sin
of Dryden was the vice of his age —licentiousness; a defect which
stains' this no less than his other works.  Chaucer is sometimes
coarse and plain-spoken, but he is never immoral; his indelicacies
are less in the idea than in the language, and arise less from  any
native pruriency in the poet's mind than from the comparative rudeness and simplicity of his age: Dryden's we must confess with sorrow
and humiliation, are deliberate and most reprehensible administerings
to the base profligacy of a corrupted society.  In'these tales, many
of which are distinguished, in the original of Chaucer or Boccaccio,
for deep and simple pathos, Dryden shows his usual insensibility to
the softer and tender emotions.  His love is little else than; the
physical or sensual passion, and he signally fails in exciting pity.
Of this latter remark we shall find abundant proofs; we need only
mention the weak and cold painting, in Dryden, of the dying scene
in Palamon and Arcite-a scene which, in Chaucer, it is scarcely
possible to read without tears.
Dryden's prose is such as such a man might naturally be expected
to Write. It is careless, hasty, and unequal, but vigorous and idiomatic to the highest degree.  His unversified compositions consist
chiefly of dedications and prefaces.  The former was a species of
necessary accompaniment to every book at a time when the literary
profession occupied a much lower place in the scale of society than
it has since attained.  It is humiliating to think of the greatest
genius and intellect thus begging, in a strain of adulation only the
more fulsome as the more elegant, the patronage of some obscure
great man to works which were destined to immortalise the age which
produced them, and to form the brightest ornament of the country
which- gave them birth.  How painful to see them thus selling their
precedency and birthright for " a piece of silver," and stimulating
the niggard bounty of a patron with the highest refinements of intellectual flattery! But this deplorable sacrifice of independence literature is no longer compelled to make,"The struggling pangs of conscious truth to hide,
To quench the blushes of ingenuous shame,
To heap the shrine of luxury and pride
With incense kindled at the Muse's flame."
These dedications in most cases are absolute models of elegance ana
style; so much so, that in reading them  one almost forgets the
grossness of the adulation they convey. In the prefaces, whicb
16




192          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.    [CHAP. X.
were generally treatises on various departments of poetry, or critical
essays on the characters of poets, Dryden has established for himself
a claim, not only to the glory of being one of the most nerVous and
idiomatic writers in the language, but also to that of having been the
first to write in English anything that deserves the appellation of
liberal and comprehensive criticism. These prefaces were in general
composed with no higher object than that of swelling the size, and
consequently augmenting the price, of the pamphlet or voliume to
which they were appended; and though written to all appearance
very rapidly and carelessly, these essays frequently contain the first
germs or outlines of a true judgment respecting the merit of ancient
or modern authors, and remarks, equally solid and original, concerning many important departments of literature.  That Dryden's
literary creed is not always orthodox, nor his opinions always tenable,
can. be matter neither of astonishment nor animadversion; for we
must remember that he lived when the fundamental principles of
criticism were not yet established, and that he was the first English
labourer who drove a plough into that rich and fertile field which
was destined to be so assiduously cultivated. In some of these
compositions he has given us short but masterly sketches of many
of our older authors, whose works, when Dryden wrote, were either
not read at all, or were quoted with a species of disparaging and
half-contemptuous approbation. He deserves therefore, and he will
obtain,'everlasting glory for the justice which he has so nobly rendered to the merits of our elder dramatists-authors with whose
peculiar excellences he could hardly have been expected (d priori)
to feel any very deep sympathy, and whom the fashion of his age
had apparently consigned to oblivion; and a still higher degree of
applause must be assigned to him for the noble testimony he has
borne to the transcendent merit of Milton, an author whose works it
must have been, were it only from political motives, unfashionable,
if not even dangerous to praise.
In the brief account which we have given of the numerous and
varied productions of this great man, we think we have omitted few
of any importance, if we except his translation, or rather paraphrase,
of the satires of Juvenal and Persius, and his imitations of the epistles of Horace. There was so much resemblance between the personal
and literary characters of Dryden and Juvenal, that we should expect
to find in the English poet a perfect reproduction, not only of the
matter, but of the manner, of the Roman bard. And we shall not
be disappointed.  The declamatory boldness, mingled with frequent
touches of sarcastic humour; the rhetorical gravity, relieved by a
kind of stern mirth; the inexhaustible richness of invective; and
thoe condensed weight of moral precept; —all these were qualities
which Dryden's moral poetry possesses of itself: he had not to go
out of his own manner to be a perfect representative of Juvenal.




jaAP. XI.]               CLARENDON.                        193
This is amply proved by his own satire entitled- Mac-Flecknoe, perhaps the most vehement, rich, and varied piece of invective in which
personal hatred and contempt ever borrowed the language of moral
or literary reprobation.  It is chiefly directed against Shadwell,
whom he represents, in a kind of mock-heroic allegory, admirable
for its boldness and vivacity, as the successful candidate for the
crown of stupidity, left vacant by the abdication of Flecknoe, a
wretched poetaster of that day, and whose Irish origin is wittily
indicated in the name JMac-Flecknoe conferred upon his worthy
successor.  This poem is " the sublime of personal satire:" the lines
seem to flow on, burning, bright, and irresistible, like the flood of
lava bursting from the crater of the volcano, withering, crushing,
and blasting all that they approach.
Dryden died in comparative poverty, though universally placed by
all his contemporaries at the head of the poets of his age, a posit
tion which his name will ever continue to retain. This event tool
place on the 1st of May, 1700, and his remains were buried with
great pomp in Westminster Abbey.  The expense of his funeral
was defrayed by a public subscription, and a monument was after.
wards erected in his honour by the Duke of Buckingham, intended
to bear the following dignified and laconic inscription: —
"This Sheffield raised: the sacred dust below
Was Dryden once. The rest who does not know?"
CHAPTER XI.
CLARENDON, BUNYAN, AND LOCKE.
Clarendon's Life —History of the Rebellion - Characters - John Bunyan -
T'he Pilgrim's Progress - Allegory-Style-Life of Bunyan-Locke-The
New Philosophy-Practical Character of Locke's Works-Life-Letters on
Toleration-Essay on the Human Understanding-Theory of Ideas-Treatises on Government-Essay on Education.
IN the same manner as the external character of the scenery of
any country is reflected in the fine arts which flourish there, do the
great and stirring periods of history tend -to produce the talent by
which alone they can be worthily commemorated and described: the
savage grandeur of the Calabrian mountains and the sunny loveliness
of the plains of Romagna are not more certainly the suggestive cause
of Salvator's wild sublimity or Claude's romantic grace, than the rout
of Xerxes was of the patriotic fervour of the 2Eschylean tragedy, or
the Peloponnesian War of the profound political philosophy of




194i          OUTLINES OF GENERALb LITERATURE.   [CHAP. XIL
Thucydides. We cannot therefore wonder that the great Civil pVar
in England,-the Republic, the Protectorate, and the Restoration - a
period so crowded with events, and so full of intense dramatic interest
-should have produced a historian worthy of describing the mighty
revolutions which were to exercise so extensive and enduring an
influence upon the future fortunes of Great Britain.
These events were sufficiently striking and important to have
inspired even an ordinary intellect: a narration tolerably faithful and
detailed, and executed by a common hand, could not fail to possess a
strong and lasting interest.  How fortunate are we, then, to have a
history of this busy period, executed by a man not only endowed
with extraordinary powers of intellect, but one who was himself a
principal actor -in the occurrences he describes! This was Edward
Hyde, afterwards Earl of Clarendon and Lord Chancellor of England
His work is invaluable for more reasons than one.  It contains a
minute account of a period of peculiar importance in'the constitu
tional history of the country, was the production of a distinguished
lawyer and statesman, himself in a position to enjoy unusual oppor.
tunities for obtaining accurate and extensive information, and personally acquainted with many of the most distinguished men of the
time; it is much more free from -partiality and prejudice than could
be reasonably expected under the circumstances, and is, above all,
fWritten in that easy and colloquial style which is best adapted to recount the events, without depriving them  of their natural power of
interesting and amusing the reader.
Hyde was born in 1608, and, after studying at Oxford, devoted
himself to the profession of the law, in which he soon distinguished
himself so far as to attract the notice of the famous Laud.  Being
a man of considerable fortune, he now abandoned (in 1640) the
practice of his profession, entered parliament, and commenced a
political and literary career. He appears, after some hesitation, to
have joined the royalist party, and became one of the most wise and
trusty advisers of the unfortunate monarch, whose contentions with
his parliament and people were so soon to end in the destruction of
his throne, the loss of his life, and the expatriation of his family.
Though professing monarchic and constitutional opinions, Hyde never
pushed them to that pitch of extravagance which caused the temporary ruin of the monarchy; and if the vacillating and infatuated
Charles had yielded to the advice of his moderate and sensible
minister, the fatal catastrophe might perhaps have been avoided; for
the English people has ever been distinguished, as a body, for its
firm attachment to monarchical, institutions; its cry has'been, in all
ages, when its true sentiments have been able to secure firee expres.
sion, that of the'barons of King John-" Nolumus leges Anglim
Inutari.". But it was not to be so in the present instance; Charles
I. was destined to pursue. the fatal path traced out foi him by a mis.




CHrAP. XI.]         CLARPENDON: HIS LIFE.                 195
taken (however sincere) notion of his own prerogative; the nation
was to be precipitated into twenty years of bloodshed and tyranny,
and Providence was to give a terrible lesson to all infatuated kings
and to all rebellious peoples.
Hyde, who had been made Chancellor of the Exchequer, and
raised to the dignity of knighthood, now quitted the king at Oxford,
and accompanied Prince Charles -to the west of England, and afterwards to the island of Jersey, where he remained for two years,
occupied in writing an account of the events in which he had been
engaged. This was probably the happiest and most tranquil perioc
of his life. In 1648 he again joined the prince in Holland, from
whence he was sent to Madrid. -n a mission to the court of Spain.
This embassy-the object of which was to induce Spain to interfere
actively in behalf of the exiled house of Stuart —was totally
ineffectual; so much so, indeed, that Hyde and his companions were
ultimately ordered to quit the country.  The subject of our remarks
now rejoined his wife and-family, whom he had left at Antwerp;
and after passing some time there in extreme distress, and even
destitution, he again returned to his unfortunate master, who was
now at Paris.  From  this period till the Restoration, Hyde continued to perform for the royal exile those services which none but
a very wise and faithful adherent could have rendered, which the
carelessness, profligacy, and extravagance of the second Charles's
character made so necessary, and which no gratitude could repay.
He watched over the financial affairs of the king and his ragged
little court, gave continual advice, frequently as unpalatable as it
was wise, and keeping up by every means in his power the sometimes precarious harmony; and still more precarious respectability;
of the little band of gentlemen who surrounded the king.
Charles,' to whom Hyde must have appeared in the light in which
a dissipated youth of ruined family regards a severe but faithful
steward, expressed his gratitude to him by naming him Chancellor,
a dignity which at that time was productive rather of danger and
annoyance than either profit or power. At the Restoration he began
to receive the solid and merited recompense for his services and
privations. He was now the first officer of the crown, and had
reached.the highest dignity which a subject can attain., His
daughter, by marrying the Duke of York, became closely allied to
the royal family of England; and at the coronation, in 1661, Hyde
was cr'eated Ea'rl of Clarendon, and presented with 20,0001. For
some time he continued to be one of the king's chief advisers; and
it is allowed by politicians of all parties that his counsels were dis
tinguished for their sagacity and their moderation.  But he soon
began to incur the dislike not only of the court, but of the nation.
The former were jealous of him for the severity of his morals, for
his opposition to the extravagance and profligacy of the times, which
16*




196          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. XI.
must have made Clarendon a perpetual contrast and reproach to the
society of that day; and the people, still in the fervour of loyalty,
and probably jealous of the great wealth and aggrandisement of
Hyde and his family, were but too apt to echo the sentiments of the
court. He was compelled to resign the Great Seal, and forced,'by
the ingratitude of the sovereign for whom he had done so much, to
leave the country.  He retired to France, where he employed the
closing years of his life in composing his invaluable history.  He
died in 1674.
His'History of the Great Rebellion' was written entirely from
personal recollections, and in that style' which is-best adapted to
relate personal recollections with effect. It is perfectly natural and
easy; and thus the strange and romantic adventures of the king are
recounted in a manner which not only renders them more impressive
and amusing, but convinces the reader of the narrator's good faith
and accuracy.  Absolutely impartial in every case it is not, and
it could not be; but it has always been considered, and with justice,
as the most faithful and comprehensive account we possess of the
interesting events it commemorates. The style has some defects of
prolixity and want of clearness; but it is a work to which the
reader returns again and again with renewed pleasure and profit, not
only from the immense mass of information which it contains, but
from the vigorous, sagacious, manly, and honourabre tone of thought
which pervades it.  It abounds in minute and complete characters
of public men.  We are hardly apt to appreciate all the penetration
displayed in these, as we consider them; in the reading, to be simply
a recapitulation of the historian's observations; and we do not at
first perceive the quiet sagacity with wlich this, great intellectual
portrait-painter has concentrated his attention upon those traits
which constitute the individuality of the subject, neglecting, or
rather judiciously subduing, those features which are not so marked
and characteristic.   As, in examining the living likenesses of
Titian and Vandyke, a spectator unacquainted with the practical
details and the practical difficulties of the art will find his impressions of the painter's genius absolutely weakened by the very ease
and facility of the execution, so it may be said that the apparent
naturalness. and simplicity of Clarendon's narrative is apt at first to
diminish our feeling of the difficulty of his task, and of the skill
with which he las executed it.  "Clarendon," says Hallam, "is
excellence in everything that he- has performed with care; his
characters are beautifully delineated; his sentiments have often a
noble gravity, which the length of his periods, far too great in
itself, seems to befit; but in the general course of his narration he
is negligent of grammar and perspicuity, with little choice of words,
and therefore sometimes idiomatic without ease or elegance."
Besides his excellent History, Clarendon has left us, not to spak




CHAP. xI.]    CLARENDON: THE GREAT REBELLION.               197
of a great number of state papers, written in a manner seldom
equalled for dignity and weight, a few other works, several of which
remained unpublished and unknown till a considerable time after his
death, when they were printed, and have much contributed to establish
his fame as a great writer, and a wise and virtuous man. That which
is likely to possess the most universal interest is a dissertation on the
comparative happiness and usefulness of an active or a contemplative
life. It is an irresistible argument in favour of the former: and
Clarendon's own busy and patriotic existence is a complete confirmation of the proposition maintained by his vigorous logic.
We have more than once taken occasion to remark that in every
sound, durable, and healthy literature there will always be found a
large number of illustrious names, of men sprung from the middle
and lower, and even the humblest, ranks of society: and this phenomenon will be more frequent, obviously, in proportion as the literature in question is of a vaster and more all-embracing character, the
expression of national sympathies and feelings, and speaking loudly
and clearly to the national heart. To the glory of England it must
be said, that the vernacular literature of no civilized nation in ancient
or modern times can show so long and so splendid a list of men
rising from the humbler classes of citizens, and eternising their own
age and their country's greatness by triumphs of valour, of wisdom,
and of genius.  Among these, not the least remarkable is John
Bunyan, whose career was as extraordinary as his origin was low, or
as his productions are inimitable and original. There is perhaps
hardly any European language which does not possess a version or a
paraphrase of the I Pilgrim's Progress'-that wonderful fiction, in
which a religious allegory is conveyed with an effect absolutely
heightened by the very qualities of style which at first sight we
should consider would be most likely to injure its impressiveness, by
an unequalled simplicity and even rudeness of language, and by a
bold directness of metaphor and a fearless literalness of parable which
no other work, we think, exhibits.
The subject of this romance (for it partakes of the elements of
romantic fiction) is a delineation of the trials, temptations, struggles,
and ultimate triumph of a Christian, in his progress, from a life of
sin to eternal felicity, typified under the Golden City, or the New
Jerusalem of the Apocalypse. These adventures are all parables;
and the hero, Christian, his friends and enemies-in short, all the
personages of the drama-are more or less of the same character,
personifications of abstract qualities, the follies, the vices, the fears,
the hopes, the virtues, and the failings of religious humanity.  So
far we have nothing more than the ordinary materials of apologue or
allegory.  In what then consists the peculiar charm of this strange
and original fiction,-a charm which renders the rude pages of Bun
yan as familiar and delightful to a child as they are attractive to the




198          OUTLINES- OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CHAP. XT.
less impressionable mind of critical manhood?  It is the homely
earnestness, the idiomatic vigour of the style; it is the fearless
straightforwardness of the conceptions, and the inexhaustible richness
of imagery and adventure. Drawing all his materials from the
Scriptures and from the vivid and intense recollections of his own
spiritual career, the wonderful tinker seems to recount the adventures
of his hero with a simple eagerness and good faith which annihilates
our consciousness of the intervention of a book between the author
and the reader: we seem to be sitting besid him as he labours at his
"' tagged laces" in the jail of Bedford, and we listen with the willing
attention and the absorbing wonder of a child hearkening to its nurse's
fairy-tale. Indeed the very rudeness of the style, with its rough
idiomaticism, its picturesque rustic earnestness, and the strong tinge
of Scriptural phraseology, brings us involuntarily back to the age of
infancy —the age of belief.  In the painting of the multitude of
characters which crowd the action of his strange dirama, we often
mark vigorous strokes of observation, sagacity, and evea humour.
The adventures, too, are varied with a prodigality of conception
which appears absolutely unbounded; and though the primary idea
qf them is often little more than a bold embodiment of some Scrip*,ural phrase or metaphor, yet the author see;is, in spite of himself,
to have perpetually brought them before us, and home to our senses
as it were, by some unexpected and most piG6uresque tduch of description, generally of that actual and material kind which forms so great
a charm  in popular legends.  Like these latter productions, the
episodes of Bunyan's Christian -drama often possess a high degree
of what we may call simple ingenuity: they sometimes attain a true
natural tenderness and beauty, and not unfrequently an unusual
pitch of terrific grandeur and sublimity.  What, for instance, can
be more simply and therefore more genuinely graceful than the
pastoral picture of the shepherds on the Delectable Mountains; what
more gloomy and more terrific than the Valley of the Shadow of
Death; what more natural, lively, and dramatic than the dialogues
with Mr. Hopeful, Mr. Greatheart, and Mr. Littlefaith?
The impressiveness of Bunyan resembles that of the old woodcuts
executed in the infancy of the-art of engraving: there is in both
eases a rude vigour and homeliness of outline, a strange ignorance
of costume, and a -powerful tendency to realise even the most abstract
things by connecting them with the ordinary details of everyday life;
there is also the same earnest intensity of purpose, and incessant
struggle to bring the objects within the comprehension of the uncultivated minds to which the work was addressed. Above all there -is
visible, in the rude woodcut of the old German -artist, as in the hardly
less rude narrative morality of the English tinker,. the unmistakable
and inimitable originality of genius. It is this quality which prevents
the style of Bunyan, though often coarse, from ever being vulgar.




CHAP. XI.]            BUNYAN: IIIS LIFE.                    199
Southey has excellently remarked, in his preface to the'Pilgrim's
Progress,'  His is a homespun style, not a manufactured one: and
what a difference is there between its homeliness and the flippant
vulgarity of the Roger L'Estrange and Tom Brown school-! If it
is not a well of English undefiled, to which the poet as well as the
philologer must repair if they would drink of the living waters, -it is
a clear stream of current English, the vernacular speech of his age
— ometimes, indeed, in its rusticity and coarseness, but always in its
plainness and its strength. To this natural style Bunyan is in some
degree beholden for his general popularity; his language is everywhere level to the most ignorant reader and to the meanest capacity;
there is a homely reality about it; a nursery tale is not more intelligible, in its manner of narration, to a child."
In speakingof the causes of the extraordinary attraction which
this book possesses, particularly to the young, we must not forget the
immense command which Bunyan had over the-whole vast store of
Scripture language and imagery.  He was emphatically a man of
one book, a circumstance which was of itself almost sufficient to
give his mind and productions a stamp of sincerity, originality, and
force.  He is a man of one book, and that book was the best.  It
was religion which first raised Bunyan from the slough of coarse
indulgences and brutal ignorance in which, as he ielates in his
strange autobiography, he was plunged during the early part of his
life: it was religion thatfirst stirred up the depths of his honest and
enthusiastic soul, and taught him to think as well as to feel: and
much as his fanaticism  (which was undoubtedly in some degree
extravagant, proportioned to the greatness of the change produced in
him by the. vivifying influence of religious conviction acting on a
powerful, imaginative, and uneducated character) may have exaggerated the extent of that transformation, we cannot wonder at his profound and incessant meditations on the instrument that produced it.
His life may be recounted in a few words: he was the son of a
tinker in Bedfordshire, and was born in 1628.  Having acquired no
education beyond reading and writing, he followed his t'ather's less
than humble occupation, and travelled about the country, indulging
in all manner of profligate and sinful habits, among which that of
swearing appears to have been perhaps the most reprehensibly,
though he speaks himself with almost equal horror of his reprobate
taste for dancing, ale-drinking, and bell-ringing. After having been
awakened, as he himself imagined (as do all enthusiasts in a similar
case), by a direct miraculous interposition of God, to a sense of his
lost and wicked state, he appears to have gone through all the
phases of transformation, from a careless and debauched peasant"Christopher Sly, old Sly's son of Burton-heath; by birth a pedler,
by education a cardmaker, by transmutation a bearherd, and now
by present profession a tinker"- into an eloquent and celebrated




200          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CHAP. XL.
preacher, and an author of enduring reputation. His religious
convictions having gradually acquired consistence acld certainty, he
was admitted, in 1655, a member of the sect or congregation of
Baptists; and he in time became a-distinguished spiritual leader of
that society. In this position he remained for five years, when he
fell under the provisions of the law enacted against various denomi.
nations of -Dissenters, and was imprisoned during twelve years in
the jail of Bedford. Part of-this long reclusion he employed in
the composition of his works, the principal of which are the singular
and interesting autobiography to which we have more than once
alluded, and to which he gave the title of "Grace Abounding to
the Chief of Sinners;' the'Pilgrim's Progress;' and another religious romance or allegory, entitled'The Holy War made by King
Shaddai on Diabolus, for the regaining of the Metropolis of the World,
or the losing and regaining of Mansoul.' Under this strange fanatical
title it may easily be understood that we have a description of the
Fall of Man, typified in the siege of the city of Mansoul, by Immanuel, the son of Shaddai or Jehovah, who ultimately retakes it
from the usurper Diabolus. The'Pilgrim's Progress' is divided
into two parts, of which the first is by far the most striking, the
latter exhibiting considerable marks of inferior originality and
vivacity, and thus following the ordinary course of Second Parts
and Continuations.  The first part describes the adventures of
Christian in his pilgrimage to the Heavenly Jerusalem; and the
second goes over the same ground with a manifest and unavoidable
diminution of interest, detailing the journey taken by the wife and
children of Christian.
In the manner of thinking, in the subjects selected by this singular genius, no less than in the style by which he conveys his conceptions to the reader, we find innumerable traces of that enthusiastical and fanatic spirit which was prevalent in- England during
the Civil War and the Republic, and which still characterises the
opinions and the language of those numerous sects which dissent
from the discipline and doctrines of the Church of England. It is
an ardent, sincere, and active spirit, and, if not always very philosophical, very reasonable, or very charitable, we must remember that
it has generally been lighted up and cherished by proscription and
persecution, and consequently is generally found burning most
brightly in the hearts of the obscure and the.uneducated.  It is not
surprising, therefore, that the, exclusive study of the Scriptures, and
incessant meditation upon a topic so mysterious and so all-important
as religion, should lead poor and ignorant and persecuted men first
into enthusiasm and then into fanaticism and superstition, and make
them fall inito the error, so universal in all ages, of overrating the
importance and misinterpreting the significance of their own interral




CHAP. xi.]     LOCKE: THE NEW PHILOSOPHY.                 201
sensations, and investing the phantoms of their own heated imagination in the sacred'character of direct inspirations of God.
Bunyan was-liberated from prison. by the generous and charitable
interference of Barlow, Bishop of Lincoln; and continued to exercise
his occupation of itinerant preacher till the proclamation of James
IL appeared, recognising the right of the dissenting sects to liberty
of conscience and worship.  He then was enabled, with the assistance of several friends, to build a meeting-house in Bedford, where
he continued to preach with great and increasing reputation, occa.
sionally making visits to his brother nonconformists in London, until
his death. This event took place in 1688. Few of his numerous
works are now read, with the exception of the' Pilgrim's Progress,'
a book whose admirable originality will ever cause it to retain its
place in English literature beside the' Robinson Crusoe' of De Foe,
a fiction to which it bears in many points, a very strong resemblance
-a resemblance for which we shall endeavour to account in another
place, when we come to speak of the last-named.production.  The
two works are equally favourites with the young: they are read
with equal interest, and remembered in after life by all who ever
read them with equal tenacity.'
In speaking of the vast revolution brought about in philosophy by
Bacon, we took occasion to remark how fortunate it was for his system, and for the future value of his writings, that their author should
have been a man not theoretically alone, but also practically,
acquainted with human affairs, and with the ordinary operations and
general errors of the human mind. The distinguishing quality of
the New Philosophy is precisely this practical spirit; and whatever
the speculations of science have lost in our later days in sublimity
and abstractness of tone has been more than compensated for by their
greater accuracy, usefulness, and fertility. And indeed this superior
sublimity of ancient philosophy is much more in appearance than in
reality; for the triumphs of modern science, if more modest in their
form and mode of acquirement, are incomparably more solid and
more productive; and a much truer and therefore sublimer idea of
the grandeur and majesty of nature will be obtained from the calm
and cautious experimentalism of modern days, than could be acquired
from the bold but so often fallacious theorising of the ancient hypo.
thetical and dogmatic method. Indeed it may be said that the older
manner of philosophizing drew us rather to admire the genius. and
invention of the speculator, while the modern way leads us immodiately to the contemplation of the subject of the speculation; and
fills us with admiration, not for the intellect, displayed in the investigation, but for the wonders of the department of nature which forms
the subject of the inquiry. In this respect, therefore, whatever has
been lost by the philosopher has been more than regained by
philosophy.




202          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [cHAP. XI.
Perhaps one of the most striking exemplifications of the Baconian
method, in matter as well as in form, is to be found in the writings,
so various and so important, of John Locke.  Nor was there a less
striking resemblance betweeen many principal features of the personal
and intellectual character of these two great men. They possessed,
both of them, the spirit of the practical - the useful - in the very
highest degree: they both declared incessant and unrelenting war
against the spirit of obscurity and mystery, the host of arbitrary and
technical forms, in which the subjects of their speculations had been
obscured and enveloped by the scholastic philosophers: they were both
the apostles and the high priests of common sense.
Something of this plain and practical character-the Lutheranism
of science -they possibly derived from their being themselves men
personally versed in -the real affairs of actual life: but we must not
on this groundwithhold our admiration for that courage, that rare and
highest species of intellectual magnanimity, which enabled them  to
throw aside in the arena of philosophy all the imposing but cumbrous
panoply of systems and of schools, and, like the Spartan,'grapple
with glory naked" -with no arms but the vigour and flexibility of
their own intellect.
Locke was descended from an ancient and respectable family in
Somersetshire, and was born in 1632.  He was educated first at
Westminster School, and afterwards at Christ Church College,
Oxford, where he appears to have received that impulse in the direction of metaphysical and educational science which was afterwards to
turn to such invaluable account. The years between 1651 and 1664
he spent at Oxford; and it was during this period that he seems first
to have become convinced of the imperfection and sterility of the
course of metaphysical study pursued in the university, a course
which took Aristotle for-its compass, chart, and pilot. - He appears
to have been peculiarly struck with the comparative inefficiency of
the old dogmatic method in the investigation of truth, and the
insignificance of the results obtained by the employment of so cumbersome and complicated a mechanism. So great was his dissatisfaction, indeed, and so completely convinced was he of the hopelessness
of any true acquisitions being made in this path of study, and with
so fallible a guide, that he renounced a university career for the
profession of medicine, a study in which the application of the
experimental method had produced such striking results and opened
so vast and hopeful a career. This profession, however, for which
the natural penetration and acuteness of Locke's mind so eminently
fitted him, and Which is so peculiarly founded on common sense and
observation, he was soon obliged to renounce from ill health, and we
find him, in 1664, secretary to Sir Walter Vane, in Ireland, and sent'by Charles II. on a diplomatic mission to Brandenburg. In the same
year, 1664, Locke returned to Oxford, and was offered a considerable




caAP. Xi.J             LOCKE: HIS LIFE.                     203
preferment in Ireland, provided he would enter the Church: this
Locke declined to do, alleging for his refusal a reason the more
honourable as it is rare-a want of that sentiment of peculiar vocation without which he justly thought no man ought to embrace the
ecclesiastical career.  In 1666 our philosopher became acquainted
with Ashley, Lord Shaftesbury, a circumstance which brought him
into familiar intercourse with many of the most distinguished intellects of the time.  He became tutor to the son of his patron, and
afterwards to his grandson-the famous Earl of Shaftesbury.
In 1674 he went to France, and resided several years in that
country, principally at Paris and Montpelier; probably acquiring and
consolidating, by an intercourse with learned and enlightened men,
those sound and generous, tolerant and rational ideas, which so strongly
characterise his writings. Four years after this, Shaftesbury having
beon recalled to power for a short period, Locke returned to England,
and on his patron's second political fall he retired with him to Holland, where he remained till he was recalled by the Revolution of
1688. It was during his stay here that Shaftesbury died (1683),
and Locke appears to have alleviated his exile with a great variety
of active, intellectual occupation.  He established, at Amsterdam, a
species of literary society, in which assembled many virtuous and
learned men, chiefly, like himself, exiles on religious and political
grounds, who were then residing in Holland.
While residing under the protection of Holland, that nursing
mother of toleration, Locke produced his first important work, a work
worthy of its subject; this was his'Letter on Toleration,' composed
in Latin, and forming a solid and unanswerable argument in favour
of religious freedom.  This subject he further developed in three
other Letters which successively appeared, and which were written
in reply to the Oxford criticisms on the first Letter.  In all these
works he follows the same line as had been taken before, not only
by Jeremy Taylor, but by so many of those ardent and acute Protestants who had been driven from France and England into exile for
the free expression.of their opinions.  At this time, as in all ages
when despotism has prevailed, political and religious authority were
falsely supposed to be similar in nature, and to rest upon the same
foundations; an error which has caused the greatest oppressions on
the one hand, and the most obstinate resistance on the other.
It may easily be conceived with what delight Locke must have
hailed the Revolution of 1688, an event which not only restored him
to his country and secured to him the free expression of his opinions
on matters of church and state, but which was in itself a kind of
practical embodiment of his own political convictions.
But it was not till the year 1690 that the genius of 1Locke appeared
in its full vigour. Hitherto he had been combating, as it were, on
the outposts of the great battle of human happiness and true philoso17




202           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CHAP. XI.
phy: he now attacked the main position of the hostile array of error
and prescription.  It was at this time that appeared his great works
the' Essay on the Human Understanding,'-a book the composition
of which had been suggested, as he himself relates, by an accidental
conversation, but the composition of which had occupied nearly-eighteen years of inquiry and meditation.  He relates that, having been
once engaged with several of his friends in a discussion respecting
some of the more abstract operations of the human mind, he had
found that the argument began very soon to lose itself in the clouds
of metaphysic- uncertainty; and it then occurred to him. that no
sound or true conclusions could be hoped for in such speculations
until the nature of the human intellect itself had been, to a certain
degree at least, examined and defined, and until some measure oI
limit had been established by which it could be approximately ascertained what ideas were really within the sphere of those operations,
and what beyond them.  Till this was done, it is plain, all argument
respecting the results would be premature, useless, and productive of
nothing but confusion. It was, as we should recollect, one of the
most important problems proposed by Bacon, as destined to form the
basis of all real. progress in knowledge, to ascertain what were the
paths in which the human intellect could hope to advance safely and
profitably, and what were the reverse; a question in n'o wise easy to
resolve, and one which may form the subject of a special science
hereafter to be investigated.
One of the errors against which Locke is chiefly sedulous to warn
the student is that mania for definition which in the older philosophy
produces so fatal a tendency to substitute names for ideas.  He had
learned from Descartes the great principle of the impossibility of
defining simple ideas, a principle the neglect or ignorance of which
had substituted an endless word-catching for true productive investigation.'The Essay on the Human Understanding,' says Stewart,
speaking'particularly of the two first books, " is a precious accession
to the theory of the human mind; the richest contribution of wellobserved and well-described facts which was ever bequeathed by a
single individual; and the indisputable, though not always acknow
ledged, source of some of the most refined conclusions, with respect
to the intellectual, phenomena, which have since been'brought to
light by succeeding inquirers."
The leading doctrine of Locke is the double origin of our ideasj
which are all to be traced to one of two sources, called by him sensl-l
tion and reflection. This theory, beautiful and simple as it is, may
be considered as little more than a different and enlarged form fox
the non-existence of innate ideas in the human mind. Nothing is a
more certain sign of imperfection either in physical or metaphysical
science than the necessity for assigning a complex cause to simple
phenomena; it is, in fact, of itself an antecedent improbability




CHAP. XI.]  LOCKE'S TREATISES ON GOVERNMENT.                205
affecting the validity of any theory; and is, to a certain degree, an
inversion of the usual order of nature, in which we perpetually see
a complex result produced by a simple cause, but very seldom a
simple effect flowing from a complex cause.  In the former part of
his proposition, Locke:las reached the highest degree of clearness
and completeness; namely, the investigation of those ideas which
have their origin in sensation: in the latter part, or refection, he
has sometimes fallen into a certain degree of obscurity and contradiction; but we have only to note the errors into which the greatest of
preceding metaphysicians had fallen, some degrading the operations
of the mind into mere material mechanism, and others refining them
into a mystical and unintelligible transcendentalism. His style and
language is everywhere clear, simple, and idiomatic to the highest
degree; not always quite elegant, it is true, but invariably addressing itself directly to the understanding of a plain, cautious, and
intelligent reader.I It should be distinctly remembered that Locke is
the steady.and professed enemy of all scholastic and learned phraseology; and peLhaps the very skill with which he has popularised his
difficult and important subject may have tended to diminish our
sense of the obligations which science owes to his name: he has
himself often furnished us with arms which we have, become so
dextrous in using, that we forget they were, not of our own invention —a fate which awaits almost all who have simplified human
knowledge.
That part of his work which has perhaps the greatest practical
utility, anrd which gives this admirable author the strongest claim to
our gratitude, is the portion devoted to guard against the imperfections and the wrong use of words. And in this perhaps consists
the peculiar originality of the work. In the older philosophy, which
pursues the investigation of truth by the instrumentality of certain
logical forms, as the syllogism, the inquirer is perpetually warned
against fallacies proceeding from the incorrect use of these intellectual
instruments; but the older logic is always of a combative or polemic
character, and the reasoner is placed in the light of a gladiator, provided with offensive and defensive weapons, whose efforts are to be
directed against an antagonist-a combatant like himself. The.
older method, in short, enables us to overcome an opponent; but it
is fair less peculiarly qualified to enable us to conquer ourselves.
The object of philosophy is certainly not the silencing of an
antagonist, but the ascertaining of truth; and in pursuit of this
last object we are infinitely more exposed to error from fallacies
arising in our own minds — from  our own passions, prejudices, and
ignorance, than from anything exterior to ourselves. It was these
passions, prejudices, and this ignorance and misapplication or loose
emnployment of language, that perhaps the most valuable portion of
Locke's Essay is intended to combat and overthrow.  The necessity




206          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CHAP. XI.
of doing this before any true progress could be hoped in metaphysical (or indeed in any) science was first, clearly and powerfully urged
by Bacon: he first showed the mighty sway over the human mind
of those idols or prejudices which seem  almost inherent in our
nature: it was Locke who most triumphantly overthrew their wide
and fatal dominion.
In 1690 Locke published his two' Treatises on Civil Government,'
which originally sprang out of his refutation of Sir PRobert Filmer's
once-celebrated book-entitled'Patriarcha,' an elaborate attempt to
prove that the royal power is dirived from the paternal authority,
and is, consequently, like that species of rule from which it sprang,
naturally unlimited.  Filmer's proposition  leads immediately to
despotism, or rather to the impossibility of lawfully resisting, on the,part of the people, the encroachments of despotism.  The refutation of Filmer is more particularly confined to the first part of
Locke's essay, in which he treats the question of the original right
and origin of monarchical power, and inquires into the foundation
of that right.
Having thus cleared the way, he proceeds to investigate and lay
down the true principles on Which he conceives all human societ.y to
be founded.  He first discusses the state of nature, and the rights
and obligations of men antecedent to the voluntary establishment
of society. He then treats, in an admirable and conclusive mannert
of the nature and rights of property, exhibiting in this part of his
work a striking contrast to those authors whose useless subtleties
and unnecessarily refined definitions had obscured a subject on which
it is so indispensable for all men to form  true and distinct conceptions. Labour he considers to constitute the true source of property,
and to establish a natural and indefeasible right of the individual to
the preduce of his own exertions.  He then traces the establishment
of all government to the original or implied compact and consent of
the members forming the primitive community, or by an uninterrupted adhesion of the members beginning from  that period and
remaining unbr6ken.  In these reasonings he chiefly follows the::arguments of Hooker, in his' Ecclesiastical Polity.'  The remainder
of the work goes on to develop Locke's ideas — all of them  bold,
and some few perhaps untenable- respecting the rights and principles of communities: and though he generally agrees with Hooker,
whose noble treatise has left very little to future investigators, at,
least as far as the limited nature of its subject extends, it is impossible not to be profoundly struck with the clear, acute, solid, and
simple manner of his reasonings, or with the vigorous, idiomatic,
and unpedantic style in which the arguments are conveyed.
This subject has been so fully and frequently discussed since
ljocke's time by men who have been able to throw upon it the light,3trived from  practical experience of the real acticn of principles




CffAP. Xl.]     LOCKE'S ESSAY ON EDUCATION.                 207
which in his time had only begun to be investigated in theory, that
this work will perhaps in future be rather referred to than studied
as embodying all the arguments and proofs adducible on this subject;
but however this may be, this portion of Locke's works must ever
be considered as sufficient of itself to place his name very high
among the ablest expounders and the boldest defenders of human
rights and liberties.
In the next work which we have to notice he will be found in a
character not less worthy of our gratitude and respect: this is the'Essay on Education.'  "In  this work," says Hallam, "which
may be reckoned an introduction to'that on the'Conduct of the
Understanding,' since the latter is but a scheme of that education
an adult person should give himself, he has uttered, to say the least,
snore good sense on the subject than will be found in any preceding
writer.  Locke was not like the pedants of his own or other ages,
who think that to pour their wordy book-learning into the memory
is the true discipline* of childhood.  The culture of the intellectual
and moral faculties in their most extensive sense, the health of the
body, the accomplishments which common utility or social custom
has rendered valuable, enter into his idea of the best model of edubation, conjointly at least with any knowledge that can be imparted
by books."
Perhaps the most striking and not the least valuable peculizrity
of- Locke's treatise is the immense influence which he assigns in it teo
the power of habit in forming and modifying the characters of men.
That he has a little over-stated and exaggerated the amount of this
influence is incontestable, but we ought to remember that the effects
of such an error, if applied in practice, could only be innocent, if not
even beneficial. It is, of course, an error into which the theorist on
education is always peculiarly liable to fall, and one which hardly a
single writer on the subject of education has altogether escaped.
Locke had no personal opportunities for studying, in the only way in
which it can effectually be studied, the nature and characters of children.  Those who have devoted themselves to this deeply interesting
subject are unanimous in their opinion that the characters of children
will often be found, even where all external circumstances are as far
as can be appreciated identically the same, to retain intrinsic differences which can only be explained by the supposition that there exist
it every age of life many and important varieties of character and
intellectual constitution, in modifying which, education, however
great its power, is very inefficient. Locke's system of education has
been by many condemned as unreasonably severe; but those who
complain of it should bear in mind that he never fails to inculcate
the indispensable necessity of the feeling of disgrace as an element
in all punishment and correction; -a condition which effectually
excludes the possibility of undue severity on the part of the instructor,
17*




209          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CHAP. X!
for the human mind has. so instinctive an appreciation of what is
just, that severity pushed beyond a certain limit would infallibly
defeat-its own object.
Nothing can surpass the soundness and good sense displayed in
the infinite multitude of minute observations respecting the physical,
moral, and intellectual treatment of children, with which this excelent treatise abounds: so numerous, indeed, are they, and so valuable,
hat, though few branches of science have been more seduously cultivated, particularly of late years, than education, the best writers
on the subject would seem to have done little more than complete
and extend the plan laid down by Locke, whose whole work " bespeaks
an intense, though calm, love of truth and goodness; a quality which
few have possessed more fully, or known so well how to exert, as this
admirable philosopher."
Besides these works, Locke was the author of an'Essay on the
Reasonableness of Christianity,' and also of two vindications of the
last.-mentioned production, which we shall not stop to analyse, as tho
nature of its subject places it rather in the department of theology;
and also because his reputation is rather founded on the works which
we have noticed more at length.
The'Treatise on the Conduct of the Understanding,' to which
we have more than once adverted as having been intended to'
form an introduction to his great work, did not appear till after his
death.
It is delightful to reflect that this great writer, whose mind was so
acute and so vigorous, and who devoted all his energies to the furtheranpe of fruth and goodness, was as amiable and venerable a man as
he.was an admirable author. His life was calm, happy, and laborious;
and at his death, which happened in 1704, he left behind him; in
his immortal works, a monument worthy of the continuer of Bacon,
and of the friend of Newton.
CHAPTER XII.
THE WITS OF QUEEN ANNE.
krtificial School-Pope's early Studies-Pope compared to Dryden-Essay ou
Criticism-Rape of the Lock-Mock.heroic Poetry-Temple of Fame, &c.
-Translation of Homer-Essay on Man-Miscellanies-'The Dunciad-Satires and Epistles. Edward Young-English Melancholy-The Universal Passion-Night Thoughts-Young's Style-Wit.
POETRY, in order to address itself with success to tba sympathies
of the reader, must necessarily speak the language of the class for
which it is written; and the more limited that ecass, the feebler, tho




CHAP. XII.]         POPE'S EARLT STUDIES.                   209
more monotonous will be the accents of the poet. Shakspcare wrote
for all mankind; and every human being, whatever his age and
country, will find in Shakspeare's works matter of interest, of instruction and delight. Pope and Swift wrote for an artificial and conventional society-not exclusively, it is true, for a court, but for what
was then emphatically called the Town; and their writings speak
the language not of the world, but of the city. The reader will
find in them incessant strokes of worldly good sense and acuteness, a
delicate and polished irony, a consummate neatness and distinctness of
diction; but he will look in vain for any of the higher attributes of creative intellect: he will find a good deal of wit and ridicule; but he will find
neither true passion, true humanity, true pathos, nor true humour; for
humour is to wit what the pertinent, genial, and creative power of the
galvanic pile is to the momentary and destructive-shock of electricity; it
is not the ray which dazzles,.but the heat which glows and animates.
Thus wit is a quality immeasurably inferior to humour: indeed,
humour is itself the fulfilment and completion of wit, and the possession of the former quality necessarily implies the existence of the
latter.  Of mere wit, a single scene of Shakspeare often contains as
much, scattered with a profuse and- apparently unconscious hand, as
would furnish forth whole libraries of the neat and antithetic literature of this period of Queen Anne: but in Shakspeare we remark
not the wit, for its brilliancy is eclipsed by the much higher quality
of humour; while in Pope or Swift or Addison the intellectual
ingenuity appeals the more directly to our attention because it is
unaccompanied by the higher quality.
At the head of this artificial school in poetry long remained
Alexander Pope, born in 1688, and sprung, like so many of the
most illustrious men of England, from the middle or citizen class.
His constitutional ill health, and the weakness and deformity of his
frame, precluded him from pursuing any of the usual paths to dis-.
tinction, and in a manner assisted in giving to his mind its poetical
direction. A great part of his youth was spent in the green shades
of Windsor Forest, where his father possessed a country-house.
Under circumstances so favourable to the development of the intellect-solitude, forced sedentariness, and that delicacy of organisation
which so often accompanies physical weakness-Pope very'early
gave earnest of his future poetical powers.  Self-educated, of immense literary industry, and of a character singularly reflective and
sensitive, he had obtained literary reputation of no mean value at a
period of life when boys in general are thinking of little else than
robbing orchards and playing truant from school.  Of this precocity
of poetical development he often speaks himself:"As yet a child, and all unknown to fame,
1 lisp'd in numbers, for the numbers came."
At the age of sixteen Pope had already tried his strength in




210           OUTLINES,OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CHAP. XnI
various attempts of different kinds of verse, among the rest in the
drama-a, species of writing for which his genius so little qualified
him, that we have probably no reason to regret that his good sense
induced him to destroy these youthful essays in scenic composition.
Unsuccessful as he probably felt them to be, such attempts could not
fail to strengthen and practise - him  in the art of expression, to
educate his ear, and to give delicacy and variety to. his versification.
Like the young swallow, whose'instinct infforms it of the period of
migration, Pope had already felt the mysterious call of genius; and
these uncertain efforts were but the hovering of the bird before it
darts away upon its annual course-the balancing of the unpractised
pinion, and the fixing of the yet untried flight.  His first publication
was a small collection of Pastorals, which, as well as a number of imitations and translations of Chaucer, plainly indicated to the public
that a. new, great, and original author was about to rise upon the
literary horizon.  A profound and venerating admirer of the genius
of his great predecessor, Dryden, it is not surprising that Pope's first
literary efforts should have been made in the same direction: his
boyish admiration had been gratified by the approbation of the
patriarch of poetry, and by his prediction of the young acolyte's
future glory; and it is no less natural that Pope's versification and
style should be in some degree founded upon the practice of his
illustrious predecessor. But there were essential differences between
the manner of these two admirable writers-differences which must
be accurately appreciated ere we can hope to form a just idea of their
respective merits.  In  Dryden, a vigorous, careless, self-assured
dexterity is perceptible, not accompanied with much passion, it is
true, nor with much depth of sentiment, appealing only te.the more
obvious and direct sympathies of the human character,, but imposing
from the conscious ease which it indicates. In Pope we observe a
greater degree of thought and reflection, a more refined acuteness of
remark, and an almost fastidious neatness and polish of expression.
Both poets are remarkable for the quality of good sense, and both
are admirable for perfect clearness and distinctness of meaning; and
if they sometimes fall into truisms and commonplaces, these are
generally such as in themselves involve principles whose importance
will excuse their frequent repetition, and are so adorned by happiness
of illustration, that we forget the insipidity of the precept in the
beauty of the language in which it is clothed.
Both poets are greater in the delineation of artificial life, in the
analysis of human passions, human motives, and human conduct,
than in the delineation of external nature, or the sympathy with
unsophisticated humanity; but the force of Dryden rather consists
in a kind of brave neglect of minuter shades of character, and a
broad and manly touch of intellectual portrait-painting, while the
Figures of Pope are elaborated with the. neat and discriminating




CHA:P. XII.]    POPE: COMPARED WITH DRYDEN.                  211
delicacy of a pencil accurate without timidity, and distinct without
coldness.  Dryden is a Rubens, and Pope a Greuze or a Watteau.
The peculiar species of versification — the rhymed couplet, so exquisitely adapted for satire and for moral declama.tion - which
Dryden had carried to so high a pitch of harmony, variety, and
power, was destined to receive from his successor the last finish of
which its structure was capable: in the hands of the former poet
it is an instrument of infinite compass, energy, and strength;
beneath the touch of the latter it became much more limited, it is
true, in variety of music, but exquisitely sensitive and delicate.
Dryden frequently introduces the triplet, and occasionally the
Alexandrine of twelve syllables, in order to wind up the period
with a burst of rolling and sonorous music.  This is an artifice
much more sparingly employed by Pope. Indeed it may be said
that this poet gave such perfection to the species of verse which he
generally employed, and which became the popular and fashionable
measure of his day, that the anatomy and prosodiacal structure of
that kind of rhythm became at last familiar to the lowest class of
writers, and the very excellence of Pope's verses furnished his
rivals with the means of equalling him, at least as far as concerns
the mechanical harmony of his metre.  The rhymed couplet was
balanced and polished and melodised, until its construction became
a mere matter of dexterity; and it has been very justly' obsei'ved
that it is not always easy to distinguish - that is, in point of, mere
versification - between the productions of Pope and the meanest
effusions of the most contemptible scribblers of his day.  The
couplet had been refined and elaborated into a feeble and timid
propriety; the sense almost invariably ended with the second line:
and the antithesis of sound and meaning between the two portions
separated by the coesura, which was considered so great an ornament,
frequently degenerated into a mere verbal opposition -- a distinction
without a difference.  From  falling into these defects Pope was
admirably secured by the acuteness and sagacity of his mind; he is
eminently the poet of good sense and reason: and though it is
perhaps hardly fair to charge upon him the faults of his incompetent
imitators, our conclusion will be thlat, in communicating an exquisite
and almost effeminate grace to the measure which he used so well,
he somewhat'impaired its vigour al:d its flexibility.
In 1711 Pope published his' Essay on Criticism,' a poem which
was received with a universal burst of admiration; a feeling rendered
stronger by the contrast between the author's age and the character
of his production.  Though the work of a young man of not much
more than twenty-one, this composition is no less remarkabl.e for the
finish of its style than for the ripe judgment which it displays, andt
the extent of reading and reflection which it indicates.  It cannot
be denied that the principles of art to be gathered from this well.




%212          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. XEI,
thought, and brilliantly-expressed work have little of that depth and
comprehensiveness which the modern study of sesthetie science has
communicated to criticism: they hardly, in short, penetrate to the
"root of the matter;" but, as far as they go (which is, indeed,
farther than criticism  had gone before Pope wrote), they leave nothing to be desired as true and sparkling thoughts dressed in the most
appropriate language.
But as a noble production of Pope's genius, and perhaps the most
happy example of a new and original idea executed in a perfectly
felicitous manner, we must cite the mock-heroic -narrative poem
entitled'The Rape of the Lock.' The occasion of its being written.
was the somewhat unjustifiable frolic of Lord Petre in stealing a
lock of hair from Miss Arabella Fermor, one of the ornaments of
the beau monde of the day.'This rather familiar and cavalier piece
of pleasantry produced a quarrel between the two families, and Pope
composed his charming little poem "to laugh them together again,"
as he phrases it.  In this object he was unsuccessful, it is said; but
the little mock-heroic epic, though it did not appease the disagree.
ment to which it owed its origin, will secure for its author an immortality among his country's poets, so long as the language in which it
is written shall endure. The poem is, as Addison justly characterised
it, "merum sal-a delicious little thing." Like the' Secchia Rapita'
of Tassofii, which has preserved from oblivion the war whose insignificant origin it describes,'The Rape of the Lock' will immortalise,
by the mere force of -grace and invention, things and persons otherwise entirely devoid of interest. The work, like the poem of Tassoni,
or rather like the' Lutrin' of Boileau, is written in that species of
mock-heroic which'describes trifling or contemptible events with the
pompous elaboration of epic language.  It is, in fact, a dwarf epic,
with its involution of interest, its supernatural machinery of beings
respectively favourable and adverse to the various personages, its
episodes, and its catastrophe.  This species of poetry has been most
cultivated among the Italians, a people whose intense enjoyment of
the ludicrous renders them peculiarly sensitive to burlesque and discordant ideas, while the flexibility and richness of their languageand particularly of some of its provincial dialects, as the Genoese,
the Neapolitan, and the Venetian —gives them a singular power of
comic expression. Thus in the older Italian comedy, to which
Moliere owed so much, there is a species of unconscious and almost
infantine simplicity of language and dialect, which forms the most
admirable and appropriate vehicle for the ludicrous extravagance of
the characters, and the sly shrewdness of the drollery.  In comparing together the' Lutriu' and' The Rape of the Lock,' we think no
critic could hesitate to give a most decided preference to the latter.
In the first place, the sluggish sensuality, ignorance, and squabbling
of a parcel of gorbellied priests, forms a much less attractive sub.




CHAP. XII.]        TIIE RAPE OF THIE LOCK.                   213
ject for the coumic poet than the elegant frivolities of aristocratic
society; and in the second, the species of machinery (supernatural
interference) employed by lPope-the exquisite fairy mythology of
the sylphs and gnome which he found in the writings of Paracelsus
and the Rosicrucian philosophers-is infinitely more attractive, more
elegant, more varied, more accordant with the character of the action,
than the unreal impersonations of abstract qualities-as, for instance,
in the celebrated episode of Sloth-adopted by Boileau in the'Lutrin.'  In reading the Frenchman's mock-heroic, we are struck
with the propriety, polish, and neatness of the language; but we
feel that the author is perpetually trenching upon the domain of
satire-a territory which, though bordering upon the mock-heroic,
" for thin partitions do their bounds divide," can never be entered by
the mock-heroic poet without a loss of effect; for satire in its essence
is tragic, and the moment the comic author forgets to smile he quits
his appropriate character.'The Rape of the Lock' is divided into
five short books or cantos, with a delightful mimicry of epic regularity. In the first, after an appropriate invocation, the poet' describes
the breaking of day, the awaking of his fair heroine, and the various
offices and powers of the sylphs-being the protectors of the fair.
We have next an enumeration of the omens which presage the
catastrophe; and a speech from Ariel, the guardian spirit of Belinda,
warning her to admit into her breast no thoughts of beaux. The
toilet is then described with a grace and refined elegance absolutely
unequalled, we think, in comic poetry.  In the second canto, the
fair Belinda goes upon the water; and occasion is taken to describe
the " adventurous Baron's" determination to carry off the fatal lock
or perish in the essay, with an account of the sacrificial ceremonies
by which hepropitiates the powers to aid his bold emprise.  Next
follows an exquisite description of the sylphs, and their desponding
councils; among them Ariel distributes the guard of the various
parts of Belinda's dress, and menaces them with severe and appropriate punishment in case they abandon or neglect their charge.
The reader's expectation being now wound up to the true epic state
of suspense, the main action begins.  The party land at Hampton
Court, where, after a game of ombre, described with consummate
grace and airy ingenuity, they take coffee, and the Baron executes
his fatal purpose; and the canto closes with an admirable picture of
the respective despair and triumph of the different parties.  In the
fourth book the action quits " this visible diurnal sphere," and the
gnome Umbriel betakes himself to the enchanted empire af 6ho
goddess Spleen, from whom he obtains'ca wondrous bag'""Like that where once Ulysses held the winds;
There she collects the force of female lungs,
Sighs, sobs, and passions, and the war of tongues;
A vial next she fills with fainting fears,
Soft sorrows, melting griefs, and fi \wing tears,"




214.         OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.. [CHAP. XIL
By the aid of these the gnome incites the fair unhappy to despatch
Sir Plume (Sir George Brown) to the uncourteous ravisher of the
lock. The'latter refuses to surrender his shining spoil, and Belinda
concludes the canto with a lamentation over her hard fate and irreparable loss. The fifth canto opens with an admirable description
of a general battle (in metaphor) between the ladies and the gentlemen; the latter of whom, after a contest described with Homeric
fire, are routed, and commanded by the fair and indignant victors to
restore the lock. It is, however, discovered that this "causa teterrima
belli" has -disappeared and ascended to the skies, where it is to shine
for ever as a constellation:"A sudden star, it shot through liquid air,
And drew behind a radiant trail of hair;
Not Berenice's locks first rose so bright,
The heavens bespangling with dishevell'd light,
The sylphs behold it kindling as it flies,
And pleased pursue its progress through the skies."
From the foregoing meagre outline-all that our space will permit
-the reader will obtain an idea of the ingenious plan and distribution
of this enchanting miniature epic: to form a notion of the exquisite
grace and fancy, and variety and delicacy of its execution, he must
read it from beginning to end.  THe will then see to what a degree.
the English language (generally considered by foreigners as rather
adapted to the expression of strong emotion than to the more evanescen.t delicacies of poesies de salon) has been made by the touch
of genius a perfect vehicle for the most refined subtleties of artificial
life. We cannot better conclude our remarks on this charming production than by observing the watchful dexterity with which Pope
in this work has retained throughout a purely comic tone. Fully
conscious that his strength lay in satire, and encountering incessant
temptations. to do what he knew he could do so well, he -has never
once abandoned the tone of light and good-humored persiflage, which
his taste informed him was best in harmony with the character of his
work.
Subsequently to'The Rape of the Lock' Pope, published' The
Temple of Fame,' an'Elegy on an Unfortunate Lady,' and (in
1713)'his descriptive poem of'Windsor Forest,' which last work,
however, had been composed at least nine years before. It was not to
be expected that any poet, whatever might be his genius, could twice
hit upon an idea so new, so perfect, so original, as the leading subject'
of the I Rape of the Lock;' and therefore we cannot be surprised to)
find chat the works just specified are, in conception; no less than in
execution, markedly inferior to the enchanting little mock-heroic.
Besides this, Pope's genius excelled less in the delineation of romantio
scenes of chivalrous and allegoric splendour than in the pointed and
satiric sketching of the follies, absurdities, and affectations of artificial




CHAP. XII.]       THE TEMPLE OF FAME, ETC.                  215,
society.'I The Temple of Fame' is a development or modernised
Versions elegant, it is true, harmonious, and polished, of'The House
of Fame,' which we have already spoken of in our account of Chaucer: and it is impossible not to perceive how much of the effect of
the old poet's rich and splendid allegoric painting has disappeared in
the process of revival.  In conceptions of this kind-and in general
in all representations of supernatural objects -the quality most in
dispensable for effect is an air of perfect sincerity and earnestness ii
the poet. It is this quality which communicates the peculiai
interest and splendour to all the poetry of the Middle Ages; and it
is precisely in this-the feeling of faith-that consists the immense
difference  between what are generally called the classical and
romantic schools in modern literature.  The mediaeval writers seem
to speak from the fulness of belief; the classicists-or at least their
modern imitators -appear to use their supernatural interventions
{called by them  with an unconscious and intensepropriety "machines") rather as rhetorical contrivances than as articles of faith.
In the'Elegy on an Unfortunate Lady,' Pope has exhausted all
his powers of pathos and tenderness - not very extensive, it is true
-to bewail the untimely death of a person who is represented as
driven (by causes very obscurely indicated or hinted in the poem)
to the commission of suicide. The great defect of this work is
want of distinctness, and an uncertainty and inconsistency of aim.
It is exquisitely harmonized, ana contains many passages which
dwell in the reader's memory; but its passion wants intensity and
anity of direction, and the poet seems too intent upon eloquence of
expression to fill the reader with a belief of the sincerity of the
passion to which he gives such elegant utterance.  The feeling is
true, indeed, but it seems to us neither very intense nor very comprehensive: it is rather an echo of the accents of deep grief than
the strong and agonised cry of true passion - rather the sorrow of
the stage than the half-stifled and convulsive sobbing of a broken
heart. This work forms a companion or pendant to another excellent poem  of a somewhat similar character, the'Epistle of Eloisa
to Abelard.'  In this latter work Pope's mastery over the tender
and pathetic is exhibited in its highest force.  The agonies of a
hopeless and condemnable passion undoubtedly form a subject more
fertile and more capable of powerful painting than the'early death
of genius, beauty, and misfortune.  But though Pope has made the
Epistle immeasurably superior to, the Elegy, every candid reader
will, we think, agree with us in allowing the enormous space which
separates even the Epistle, eloquent,'fervid, and brilliant as it is.
from the deep, pure, and natural pathos of Chaucer, oi of even many
inferior writers among our Elizabethan dramatists.
Of'Windsor Forest,' we have but few words to say.  Pope'Hgenius, which comparatively failed in the portraiture of the simplei
18




"16          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. XII
and more powerful emotions of the human heart, was not likely to
succeed in the delineation _of external nature.  He had, it is true,
gazed with the eye of youth-intensely but without understanding
-on the foliage and the streams of that woodland scenery which
breathed such freshness into the descriptions of Father Chaucer;
but Pope's mind wanted that deep love, that intense and quiet sympathy, which has made Chaucer, as it made Homer and Theocritus,.and'as it made Thomson and Wordsworth, the interpreters and
hierophants of the silent oracles of the cloud, and of the leaf, and
of the rippling water. He had the eye to perceive, but had not
the " deuteroscopic or second sight" to understand the handwriting
of God, inscribed like the responses of the Cumvean Sibyl upon the
leaves of the forest.
It was at this period of his life-in the full vigour of his extra.
ordinary powers, and in the morning of his glory — that Pope
undertook the execution of his gigantic task -the translation into
English heroic verse of the Iliad and Odyssey of Homer. This
great work, which was published by subscription, and which laid
the foundation of the poet's worldly fortune, extended over a period
of twelve years, from 1713 to 1725. He relates himself how
agitated and depressed his mind was for some time by the reflection
of the colossal labour he had undertaken; but practice rapidly conferred facility, and his unremitting industry was perhaps assisted
by the weakness of his health, which secured him from the interruptions of ordinary pleasures and amusements.  Of the Iliad Pope
alone was the translator, but in the execution of the Odyssey he
called in the aid of his friends. and fellow-poets Broome and Fenton,
to whom together was -confided the~ translation of twelve of the
twenty-four books.  For his:Homer Pope received, after deducting
8001., which Was shared between his fellow-labourers, a clear sum
of above 80001.; a circumstance not only honourable to the poet,
but which strongly indicates the immense improvement which had
taken place in the social position of literary men, and the movement of advance which had already begun towards the liberation
of the highest of all professions from the degradation of dependence
and the humiliating.necessity of servile adulation.  Great w as, the
improvement when Pope was enabled by the profits of a single
translation to acquire a permanent competency in the same country
where the'Paradise Lost' had been sold for 231.!  With the
prudence and good sense which characterized him, Pope invested
this sum in the purchase of a' house and garden at Twickenham,
one -of the most beautiful spots on the banks of the Thames.  HIcre
he resided till his death, and here he entertained the greatest, the
wisestl, and the wittiest of his contemporaries; here assembled
Attcrbury and Gay, Bathurst and Arbuthnot: —




CHAP. XII.]         TRANSLATION OF HOMER.                     217
" Granville the polite,
And knowing Walsh, would tell me I could write;
Well-natured Garth inflamed with early praise,
And Congreve loved, and Swift endured, my lays.''lhe courtly Talbot, Somers, Sheffield read,
Even mitred Rochester would nod the head;
And St. John's self' (great Dryden's friend before)
With open arms received'one poet more.
Happy my studies, when by these approved!
Happier their author, when by these beloved!"
The version of Homer, like all translations, may be looked a
under two distinct points of view —first, as an English poem;
secondly, as a revival, in another age and language, of the Greek
original.  In its. character of an English poem (that character under
which it will ever be regarded by all those readers for whose behoof
it was written-such persons, that is to say, as are unable to compare
it with the Greek)-there can be no question as to its high merit.
It is a rich, flowing, dignified, brilliant, and exquisitely versified
poem, deficient it is true in intensity of feeling, and occasionally
disfigured with trivial and meretricious ornament, but a noble monument of genius and taste.  But if we judge it in relation to its
immortal original; if we examine it as a revival of Homer, or an accurate and spirited copy-as faithful as the difference of nations, dialects,
and times will admit-of the great epic of Troy, our decision will
be very different; and very much less favourable.  Perhaps the best
(as it was the shortest) criticism ever made upon the' Iliad' of
Pope was the acknowledgment returned to the translator for his
present of the volutnes by Bentley, the Greek philologist: —" It is
a pretty poem, Mr. Pope; but you must not call it Homer."  We
do no injustice to Pope when we say that his translation contains
nothing Homeric from  beginning to end, except the names and the
events. The fervid and romantic tone, the Biblical and patriarchal
simplicity, the mythologic colouring, neither quite divine nor altogether human, the unspeakable freshness and audacity of the images
-all that breathes of an earlier world, and of the sunny shores, and
laughing waves, and blue sky of the old /Egean-all this is vanished
and obliterated; nay, the very swell and fall of the versification,
regular in its very irregularity, like the rolling of the ocean, to
which it has been so well compared, even this has found in the
English  no attempt —even unsuccessful, for perfectly successful
no such attempt could ever be —at reproduction and imitation.
Instead of this, we have the accurate and never-failing recurrence
of the neat, elegant, well-balanced couplet, the timid propriety
of modern manners, with all the modern reluctance to name things
by their simple names, the substitution of vague and commonplace ornaments-the "curta supellex" of classical French poetry
— for the burning and picturelike words of the Greek; and fre.
quently the introduction, particularly in descriptive passages, of




218           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. XlI
ideas not to be found in the original at all, and conveying absolute
contradictions and physical impossibilities; as, for instance, in the
celebrated description of a moonlight night, so severely yet justly.
criticised by Wordsworth:_
"As when the moon, refulgent lamp of night,
O'er heaven's.clear azure spreads her sacred light;
Around her throne the vivid planets roll,
And stars unnumber'd gild the glowing pole;
O'er the dark trees a yellower verdure shed,
Ant tip with silver every mountain's head;
T''en shine the vales, the rocks in prospect rise,
A flood of glory bursts from all the skies:
The conscious swains, rejoicing in the sight,
Eye the blue vault, and bless the useful light."
In the above verses there are at least a dozen offences against
nature and reality, and these contradictions are in no case to be found
in the Greek;;for Homer, like Shakspeare, is invariably and minutely
true to nature. They both knew well that the works of God are
more beautiful than those of art.  It would be superfluous to insist
here upon the observation of the immense degree in which the effect
of a work of fiction depends upon and is modified by the tone of
the language in which.it was written: and this increases the difficulty
of producing a successful translation in exact ratio with the antiquity,
and consequently with the merit, of the work. It was well remarked
by a man of refined taste, who had been obliged, by ignorance of the
Greek language, to make acquaintance with the works of Homer
first through the medium of translation, that he experienced a much
more intense impression of the power and majesty of the great
Ionian from  the bold and barbarous literal Latin version usually
affixed to the school editions of the bard, than from the most elaborate
efforts-at transfusing Homier into modern poetry; and that when
afterwards enabled to compare those early impressions with the effect
of the original Greek, he still retained his opinion.  And the fact is
so.  The rude Latin prose is a cast of the immortal statue: its grain
is coarse, indeed, and its value is insignificant, but it preserves the
precise outline of the godlike lineaments of the original. Oum
modern poetical translations are copies, smooth, polished, and elabo.
rate; but feeble, timorous, and cold. These observations will explain
the immense inferiority of all poetical imitations and paraphrases of
the grander and more oratorical passages of the Scriptures.  The
rud-st taste instantly perceives the infinite superiority of the concise.
and burning words of the Hebrew, closely and literally rendered in
the modern versions, even though thus fidelity be often attained at
the expense of the genius and idiomatic character of the language
into which such version has been made.
After this great eftort of industry and poetical skill, which was
received with a degree of enthusiasm, honourable, indeed, to Pope,




x1IAP. XII.]           ESSAY ON MAN.                       219
but often expressed in terms so strong as to prove how little his age
really understood or appreciated the peculiar merits of Homer, our
poet published his'Essay on Man,' a work of-metaphysical and
moral philosophy, intended to form part of a vast poetical system or
cycle of those sciences projected by Pope.  The philosophy of this
work is neither very profound, nor the reasonings and conclusions
(except such as are truisms) either very convincing or very just.
The poem, in short, furnishes an additional proof of the natural
incompatibility between the higher order of poetry and pure abstract
ratiocination, and the want of harmony that results from  their
forcible union; for the reasoning is generally found to injure the effect
of the verse, at least as much as the ornament of verse detracts from
the vigour and cogency of argument. But if any writer was ever,
calculated to surmount this natural want of accordance between
means and end,. with which we have just reproached didactic poetry
in general, that writer was Pope.  The abundant richness of ideas,
the novelty, variety, and appropriateness of illustration, the sparkling
point and neatness of expression, and the.perfect finish and harmony
of versification which the four epistles composing this work so prodigally display, prove that, if he has not succeeded in establishing a
model and perfect exemplar of didactic poetry, it was only because
such an object can never be perfectly attained by human genius.
The argument of this brilliant composition may be briefly stated:The first Epistle treats of Man in his relation to the Universe, showing the imperfections of our judgment founded upon our limited
acquaintance with the order of nature, and suggesting that a higher
degree'of endowment would only have been productive of pain and
misery-a conclusion which, like many other of Pope's deductions,
involves a paradox.  In the second, Man is treated as an Individual,
i. e.. with relation to himself; and the poet shows that the passions
and desires are given him with an evident benevolence of intention,
as by them the stock of happiness is augmented-nay, as without
them happiness itself would be inconceivable and impossible.  The
third-Epistle views Man in his relation to Society; and in the fourth
and last the poet discusses the various notions respecting Happiness.
Throughout the whole of this masterly work it is impossible to
decide whether we are most to admire the point and neatness of the
argument, the abundant wealth of illustration, collected from a wide
extent of reading and observation, or the enchanting harmony and
finish of the language and versification.-  The couplet is carried to
its highest perfection; and though an instrument of but limited
compass, comparatively to the organ-like blank-verse of Milton, oi
the myriad-voiced and ever-changing dramatic versification of the
elder drama, Pope has proved that in the hand of a master even
this imperfect instrument could "; discourse most eloquent music."
In 1727 theve appeaied three volumes of Miscellanies, in prom
18*'




220           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. xnr
and verse, the composition of that distinguished society of which
Pope and Swift in poetry, and Arbuthnot in humorous prose, were
the most brilliant ornaments.  The associates, all bound together by
the closest ties of friendship, and by a perfect similarity of tastes,
principles, and prejudices, worked. together so completely that it is
impossible to assign to each, at least with much,certainty, the portions composed by the respective fellow-labourers. The work is
throughout sparkling with satire, wit, and humnour —atf least that
humour which consists-rather in an acute perception of the ludicrous
and contemptible than in a deep sympathy with the human heart.
The severity and occasional personality of the satire raised round
Pope a storm  of literary hatred, in many cases envenomed by religious and political enmity; and on these assailants Pope was afterwards to inflict a memorable:vengeance.  One  article  of the
Miscellanies was a portion of a prose comic romance, or written
caricature, intended to ridicule the- vain pursuits of ill-directed
erudition, and the solemn puerilities of scientific pedantry.  Of this
work, entitled the'Memoirs of Martinus Scriblerus,' the idea was
better than the execution; many of the follies ridiculed being such,
according to Johnson's excellent criticism, as had long ceased to be
prevalent, and there being a general tone of coarseness and farcical
exaggeration prevailing throughout the work.  Arbuthnot, there
can be but little doubt, was the principal author of this not very
successful jeu d'esprit; but he was much happier in his ludicrous'History of John Bull,' which, though referring only to temporary
politics, and principally directed against Marlborough, has a vein of
irresistible drollery which time cannot deprive of its charm. Indeed,
highly as almost all the members of Pope's brilliant coterie were
endowed with wit (and perhaps at no time in the- history of English literature was that quality more abundantly displayed), the
amiable and learned Arbuthnot was the only person, with the exception of Addison, who exhibited much of the sentiment properly
called humour.  These qualities, so nearly allied in many respects
-for Humour bears' the same relation to Wit as Imagination does
to Fancy — yet are very rarely found much developed in the same
period of literature -much more rarely in the same individual.
One is the tropical plant, dazzling in colour, but scentless and unfruitful; the other the rich and life-sustaining vegetation of the
temperate zone. They are respectively the gem and the floweror rather, perhaps, the gem and the seed.
Pope, as we have just hinted, took a terrible revenge on those
whose envy, whose jealousy, or whose indignation had been aroused
by the burning irony and withering sarcasm embodied in numberLess passages of the Miscellanies.  His wit, keen and polished as
was its edge, was not always wielded by the hand of justice; and,
as the Chinese proverb pithily expresses it, the dart of contempt




CHAP. XII.3              THE DUNCIAD.                        221will pierce the shell of the tortoise. The obscurest intellects, the
coldest and most insensible of souls, will be roused into anger.by
the poinft of a sarcasm; and Pope, one of whose chief and very
natural errors was the notion that all true virtue, as well as all pure
taste and sound morality, was concentrated in the small circle of his
friends, raised around him a cloud of enemies, most of them individually insignificant, and many personally contemptible, but alb
infuriated by the most intense animosity against the reigning wih
and his'clique. This nest. of hornets Pope determined to destroy
at one stroke, and he composed his admirable satire of'The Dun.
ciad,'-the:Iliad of the Dunces.  Taking for his key-note the
MacFlecknoe of his great predecessor, Dryden, he has given us in
this satire one of the most sweeping, fierce, and brilliant philippics,
in which, under the mask of a reprobation of bad writing and bad
taste, Genius ever revenged the injuries of Self-Love. The plot or
fable of this admirable satire is the election of a new monarch to
fill on earth the throne of Dulness, and the various games and trials
of skill performed by the bad writers of the day to do honour to
the event.  In this manner the poet has been enabled to introduce
an incredible number of individuals, most of them, indeed, deserving
of contempt in a literary point of view, but some of whom are
attacked with a ferocity of personality totally indefensible on either
merely literary or moral grounds.           
In richness of ideas, in strength of diction, and in intensity of
feeling, this production surpasses all that Pope had previously done,
and is perhaps the finest specimen of literary satire which exists in
any language in the world.  The whole vocabulary of irony is
exhausted, the whole universe of contempt is ransacked. We find the
combined merits of the most dissimilar satirists - the wild, fearless,
inventive, picturesque extravagance of Aristophanes, the bitter irony
and cold sarcasm of Lucian, the elegant raillery of Horace, and
Juvenal's strange union of moral severity and grim pleasantry.  It
is curious to read these brilliant records of literary animosity, and to
reflect upon the unenviable immortality which Pope's genius has
conferred upon the meanest of scribblers and the most despicable of
_pamphleteers.  Like the straws, the empty shells, and excrements
of dead animals, which the lava has preserved for uncounted centu
ries, and in which the eye of the geologist beholds the records of
past convulsions, these names have been preserved uninjured through
a period of time when many things a thousand times more valuable
have perished for ever; and they exist, and will continue to exist,
as long as the: English language shall endure, imperishable but
valueless memorials — the trash of literature, vitrified by the lightning of indignant genius.
In the fierce contentions which agitated the declining years of Pope
there can be no doubt that the satirist suffered far more than his




222          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CRAP. XII.
victims, and that the deepest wounds dealt on others by the Leen
and polished weapon of his sarcasm, were as nothing in comparison
with the agonies which nerved his own arm to wield that resistless
weapon. Genius, in its very definition, implies a peculiar and
exquisite degree of sensibility, or at least sensitiveness; and it is
but just that, when the highest gift of God is perverted to selfish
ends, to avenge insulted vanity, to humiliate, to blacken, and to crush,
the very exercise of that endowment should necessarily entail upon
its perverter a bitter and inevitable retribution.  God is love; and
his highest gift to man can only be fitly employed in deeds of love
and charity. Personal invective and personal hate, though masked
under the specious pretext of a zeal for good taste, is hardly a less
reprehensible employment for high intellectual powers than sensuality
or blasphemy; and it is fortunate that in this instance, as in all
others, the crime brings its punishment along with it.
Between the years 1733 and 1740 Pope gave to the world his'Satires, Epistles, and Moral Essays,' addressed for the most part
to his distinguished literary friends, Bolingbroke, Arbuthnot, &c.
These admirable compositions, considered separately, are in most
cases directed against some prevailing vice or folly, and it is perhaps
in them that the poet's genius is seen in its fullest splendour.
Glowing with fancy and a rich profuseness of illustration, adorned
with every splendour which art or industry could confer, they are,
noble and imperishable monuments of knowledge, of acuteness of
observation, of finish, and of facility; for the poet had now attained
that mastery in his art when the very elaboration of the workmanship- is concealed in the apparent ease of the execution.  They
abound in happy strokes of description, in exquisite appropriateness
of phrase, and a thousand passages from these charming compositions
have passed into the ordinary language of the poet's countrymen -
a sure test of the value of a work.  Having been less exposed in
the composition of this work to the evil influences of personal and
literary enmity, Pope has avoided that air of malignant ferocity which
defiles so much of the' Dunciad;' and the tone of the Satires is in
general far more Horatian; that is, far more in accordance with
good taste, good breeding, aind good nature. In 1742 Pope added a
fourth book to the' Dunciad,' describing the final advent on earth of
the goddess of Dulness, and the prophesied millennium of ignorance,
lpedantry, and stupidity. In this he has exhibited a gorgeousness
of colouring and a fertility of invention which would enable him to
claim no mean place among merely picturesque poets.  During the
following year our indefatigable satirist, moved by the restless caprice
of his literary enmity, published a new edition of the four books of
the' Dunciad,' having deposed from the throne of Dulness its former
occupant, Theobald, a tasteless pedant and comineitmator on Shakspeare, whose place in "that bad eminence" was now supplied by




CHAP. XII.]    POPE'S SATIRES AND EPISTLES.                 - 3
Cibber, a man who had succeeded in attracting Pope's partictrar
hatred. This change, made to gratify a temporary and personal uiis-'
like, was in the highest degree injudicious, and as injurious to the
poem as it was destructive of the reader's conviction (no unimportant thing for the effect of a satire) of the author's sincerity and good
faith.  Thcobald was one of the worms of literature, a painful antiluarian, devoting his feeble powers to the illustration of obscure
passages in Shakspeare's writings;. useful, indeed, but certainly
humble enough to have escaped the martyrdom  of a'Dunciad'
immortality.  The truth is, that private pique had animated Pope ir
placing Theobald at the head of the dunces. The great poet had
himself published an edition of Shakspeare, in which his want of
that minute antiquarian knowledge which Theobald undoubtedly
possessed was glaringly apparent, a defect which the latter was naturally but too willing to point out. The character given to Theobald
in the' Dunciad,' though of course exaggerated with-all the ingenuity
of a rich imagination and an intense jealousy, was in the main
appropriate; but when Cibber took the commentator's place, and the
old books, the obscure learning, the peddling pedantry,"And all such reading as was never read,"the cold creeping industry and tastelessacuriosity, which accorded
well enough with the character of Theobald, were transferred to
Cibber, even the warmest admirers of Pope were obliged to confess
that hatred had. blunted the great Poet's taste and destroyed his
feeling of fitness.  Cibber, then an actor of high reputation, and a
man who has left us, in his autobiography, one of the most extraordinary combinations ever seen of vivacity, folly, wit, generosity,
vanity, and affectation, was a character as little in accordance with
that of Theobald as unfit to take his place as King of the Dunces.
" The author of The Careless Husband," as Warton justly remarks,
" was no proper king of the dunces."
Pope died at Twickenham, on the 30th of May, 1744, after a life
passed in incessant industry and intellectual agitation, but adorned
with a greater share of contemporary glory than often falls to the lot
of poets. The weakness of his frame, and his almost incessant illhealth, which, by precluding his engaging in the more active scenes
and occupations of life, undoubtedly favoured the development of his
intellectual powers, also tended to make him set too high a value on.merely literary triumphs'; and his constitutional irritability, though
it gave to his mind an exquisite delicacy, an almost feminine acuteness, yet was calculated to increase his tendency to personal satire,
and to deprive him of that large and generous spirit of appreciation
which finds out what is beautiful, good, and valuable even in things
and works most foreign from the usual field of its contemplation.
His poetry was the consummation of what is usually called the




224           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CHAP. XII.
classical, but which would be much more correctly denominated the.French school — perfect gobd sense, an admirable though somewhat
pedantic propriety, polish, point, and neatness, seldom carried away
into enthusiasm, not, as Shakspeare expresses it,-..-   " A muse of fire, that would ascend
The brightest heaven of invention,"but always delicate, impressive, satisfactory.  In his serious and
pathetic pieces, though the passion or the sentiment is generally
true and natural, the expression is often unworthy of the thought
-not from its homeliness and simplicity, however, but, on the contrary, from the perpetual fear Which we seem to perceive in the poet
lest he should degrade his art by making it the expression of human
feeling in its grand and dignified plainness and straightforwardness.
There is always a degree, and often an unnecessary one, of ornament, graceful, it is true, and appropriate: but we remember that
the veiled Venus is the production of an already degenerating art.
Almost exactly contemporary with Pope lived an author whose
poetry, singular, original, and strongly individual, enjoyed a high
though certainly inferior -reputation. This was Edward Young, the
ingenious and often sublime melancholy of whose'Night Thoughts'
obtained numberless readers and admirers among the poet's own
countrymen, and powerfully contributed at the same time to lead
foreigners, and especially Frenchmen, into that false estimate of the
national character of the English people, and those false notions of
the general tone of English literature, which have been long so
absurdly prevalent even among the best informed of continental
critics.  Madame' de Sta1l, among others, has attempted to derive
the alleged melancholy which she supposes to mark the English
character, and the supposed gloom and despondency which so many
superficial observers have thought they discovered in our literature,
from the influence of the poems of Ossian and the mournful contemplations of Young!
The fallacy of such an opinion hardly requires or admits of a
serious refutation.  Without stopping to show that the impossible
caricature embodied in the so-called poems of Ossian -the caricature of a state of manners that never had nor never could have had
a real existence in any age or country-that this extravagant caricature, we say, ever exerted on English literature any perceptible influence, or that MacPherson's bold forgery ever excited in society
any sentiment beyond that of a passing and transitory wonder, we
might allege that Young's poems have'never been so extensively
read in England as to warrant the critic in considering him as one
of the powerful and influential names in English literature. In;
deed, it may be affirmed that the peculiar merits of Young are in
no sense such as would be reolished by a very extensive class of




ClIAP. XII.. YOUNG.                          225
readers, and, appealing rather- to' the intellect than to the sensibilities, would not be capable of giving their author that hold upon the
national mind of his countrymen, without which it is vain to talk
of a writer being either the guide or the reflection of the spirit of
-bis country.  The fact is, that, when English literature began to be
known to foreigners, it was naturally that department of English
letters whose tone, form, and spirit was most consonant with the
then taste of continental readers, and consequently itwas precisely
those productions which possessed least of the peculiar idiosyncrasy
of national character.  Thus the Frenchman,'in -forming his esti.'
mate of the general character of the English muse, imagined as the
principal features of its portrait, not the wild richness of the Elizabethan prose and poetry, its unstudied fancy, its playful wisdom, its
all-embracing depth of philosophical verity, but the neat elegance
of Pope, or the fantastic and epigrammic sadness of.Young.
Edward Young was born in 1681, and educated at All Souls'
College, Oxford: the greater and earlier part of his long life (for
he died at 84) was busily occupied in- the pursuit of literary and
political distinction, in not very successful struggles after fame as a'poet and as a courtier.  Having met at the hands of several patrons;
and particularly at those of the infamous Duke o'f Wharton, with
many overwhelming disappointments, Young, at the age of fifty,
took clerical orders, and passed the remainder of his life in uneasy
retirement, satirising those pursuits in which he had failed- and to
which he appears to have looked back with unceasing -regret, thinly
veiled, however, with a somewhat affected tone of moral self-abnegation and philosophic dignity. His first important work was the
tLove of Fame,' which he qualifies as'The Universal Passion.'
This is a keen, vigorous, aud manly satire, divided into seven
epistles, and'strongly recalling some of the finer peculiarities of
Pope, whose style it resembles more than most of Young's other
productions, particularly in its being'written in the rhymed- couplet.
But while we find in this work strong traces of Pope's clearness,
directness, energy, and point, we shall look in vain for his exquisite
propriety of diction, his gay and playful airiness, and that happy
tone of good-nature and badinage which -he possessed, like his
master Horace, in so eminent a degree.  Young's satire is, to a
e.rtain degree, more Juvenalian, but at the same time we are
haunted, in reading it, with an uncomfortable consciousness that the
moral declamation which so eloquently abounds in it was the off.
spring rather of disappointed ambition than of the injured dignity
of virtue.  On entering the Church, Young by no means relinquished all hopes of distinction; he wrote a panegyric on the king, for
which he was rewarded with a pension, and is related to have been
deeply disappointed at being afterwards refused a bishopric -a
favour withheld by the minister on the ground' of'the devotion to




226          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. XIlr
retirement so frequently and emphatically expressed in his works.
This is a remarkable instance of the malicious ingenuity of courts:
and this refusal, there can be but little doubt, tended to deepen the
gloom which pervades all Young's poetry, and particularly his later
works.
Young married a lady of rank, daughter of the Earl of Lichfield,
and widow of Colonel Lee, to whose two children the poet was
tenderly attached.  The death of this lady, which was followed,
though at considerable intervals, by that of the two children, produced a powerful impression on Young's mind, and had, it is probable,
a great influence in suggesting the tone and subject of his last and
greatest work, the'Night Thoughts.' It is this poem upon which
his reputation, in England as elsewhere, is principally founded; and
we shall endeavour, in giving a short account of its nature and
merits, to show the causes of its great popularity.  It is a series of
reflections on the, most awful and important subjects which can
engage the attention of the man or of the Christian-on Life, Death,
and Immortality-and is in many passages executed in a manner
worthy of the tremendous character of the subject.  The poem is
divided into nine'books, or Nights, each of which pursues some
train of thought in harmony with the supposed feelings of the poet
at the time of composition. These feelings are modified by the deep
grief arising from the recent loss of many beloved objects, and from
the contemplation of the total ruin of a surviving person, "the
young Lorenzo," by some supposed to be the portrait of the poet's
own son, but who is probably nothing more than an embodiment of
imaginary atheism  and unavailing remorse and despair.  There cAn
be no doubt that the.gloom of these unhappy events was intentionally
aggravated and exaggerated by the poet, in order to give greater
weight and impressiveness to the reflections which he pursues.
Whether this want of good faith be real, or only existing in the
reader's imagination, it is singularly injurious to the effect of the
poem; for we are of course apt to look upon the deep gloom which
Young has thrown over his picture rather as a trick of art than as
the terrific thunder-cloud-the "' earthquake and eclipse" of nature:
and the diminution of sublimity in our minds produced by this
want of sincerity-is in exact proportion to the impression that would
have been made had this eloquent grief been altogether real.
The style, too, of Young in the'Night Thoughts' is of a kind
little capable of keeping alive those awful feelings of wonder and
sublimity which his genius is so powerful in evoking. In him the
intellect had an undue predominance over the imagination and the
sensibility; and hardly does he raise up before, us some grand image of
death, of power, or of immortality, than he turns aside to seek after
remote and fantastic allusions, which instantly destroy the potent
charm. Few writers are so unequal as Young, or rather, few writers




CHAP. Xil.]            NIGHT THOUGHTS.                     22'
of such powerful and acknowledged genius were ever so deficient in
comparative or critical taste.  To him  every idea seemed good, provided only it was strong, original, and ingenious; and as his subject
was precisely the one least suited to this species of intellectual
sword-play, the conceits, unexpected analogies, and epigrammatic
turns of which he was so fond, are as offensive and incongruous as
would be the placing of the frippery fountains and clipped yews and
trim parterres of Versailles among the glaciers and precipices of
Alpine scenery. This false taste for ingenious and far-fetched allusions Young may have in some measure acquired from the study of
Crowley, Donne, and other writers of what was incorrectly called
the "metaphysical" school of English poetry; but it is easy to
observe that what in amatory or encomiastic compositions is nothing
but false ornament and perverted ingenuity, -becomes, when introduced into a work of a sublime and religious character, a great and
unpardonable offence against good taste and propriety. It is impossible to open any page of Young without finding something grand,
true, and striking: he is full of
"thoughts that wander through eternity."
He "speaks as one having authority;" and his accents are weighty,
solemn -and awakening, when he exhibits to us the vanity and
nothingness of this life, and the nobility of the human soul- its
aspirations, its destinies, and its hopes. But the mind of Young
was ever on the watch for an opportunity for anything striking and
new; his genius has "lidless dragon eyes," a restless, unappeasable
vigilance; and no sooner does he perceive the slightest opening for an
unexpected and epigrammatic turn, than he turns aside to pursue
these butterflies of wit, these " Dalilahs of the imagination."  Consequently there are few poets whose works present a greater number
of detached glittering apophthegms -none who is so little adapted
to give continuous pleasure to a reader of cultivated taste.  Like
the painter, he is sometimes equal to Raphael, sometimes inferior to
himself.
It would be unjust were we to refuse our tribute of acknowledgment and admiration to the vast richness and fertility of imagination displayed by this powerful writer: it is the fertility of a tropical
climate; or, rather, it is the abundant vegetation of a volcanic
region; flowers and weeds, the hemlock and the vine, the gaudy
and noxious poppy, and the innocent and life-supporting wheat —
all is brought forth with a boundless and indiscriminate profusion.
Hence, in spite of the gloomy nature of Young's subject —a gloom
yet further augmented by the half-affected tone of his languagehis writings are often studied with rapture by the youthful, and by
those whose taste is yet unformed; and there are not many works
Wvhose perusal is fraught at the same time with more danger and
19




228           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE   [CITAP. XIl.
more advantage. His happinesses of diction are innum:.~i bhle  What
can be finer either in images or in sound than his pht:: torbAs of past
glory and power?"What visions rise!
What triumphs, toils imperial, arts divine,
In wither'd laurels glide before my sight!
What lengths of far-famed ages, billow'd h;gh
With human agitation, roll along
In unsubstantial images of air!
The melancholy ghosts of dead renown,
Whispering faint echoes of the world's applause;
With penitential aspect, as they pass,
All point at earth, and hiss at human pride"or that noble and yet familiar image, so justly praised by Cam'pbcll —
"Where final Ruin fiercely drives
Her ploughshare o'er creation"or the bold impersonation of Death, who is introduced
"To tread out empires and to quench the stars."
On the other hand, what can be in worse taste than the* comparison
of the celestial orbs with diamon'ds set in a ring-to adorn the finger
of Omnipotence, which ring, by a supererogation of absurdity, is
afterwards called a seal-ring?" A constellation of ten thousand gems,
Set in one signet, flames on the right hand
Of Majesty Divine; the blazing seal,
That deeply stamps, on all created mind,
Indelible, his sovereign attributes."
But perhaps the most easily perceived defect in this extraordinary
work is the want of a plan and interest pervading the whole, and
producing a natural connection or dependence between the variouT
parts of the poem.  Of course it would be too much to expect that
a meditative or contemplative composition should contain a fable or
narrative of progressive interest; but, at the same time, we have a
right in every work consisting of many parts to look for a certain
degree of dependence and mutual coherency. This condition is
assuredly not fulfilled by the' Night Thoughts,' the' parts of which
have no necessary connection, and may be displaced in their order
without any injury to the effect of the whole. This blemish, perhaps to a certain degree inevitable, is but too much aggravated by
the fragmentary and paroxysmal character of Young's style, producing its effect upon the reader, as Campbell justly and acutely
remarks, rather by short abrupt ictuses of surprise than by sustained
splendour of thought or steady progression of imagery.




fcHAP. xIr..         SWIFT: HItS CAREER.                    229
CHAPTER  XIII.
SWIFT AND THE ESSAYISTS.
Coarseness of Manners in the 17th and 18th centuries - Jonathan Swift
Battle of the Books- Tale of a Tub- Pamphlets- Stella and Venessa -
Drapier's Letters-Voyages of Gulliver — Minor Works - Poems-Steele
and Addison-Cato --- Tatier - Spectator- Samuel Johnson - Prose Style
- Satires of'London' and'The Vanity of Human Wishes' - Rasselas
-Journey to the Hebrides —Lives of the Poets - Edition of Shakspeare -
Dictionary-Rambler and Idler.
IT can hardly, we think, be denied, that the Revolution of 1688
either produced or was accompanied by certain social effects at least
temporarily injurious to society in England, and lowering the tone
of sentiment, not only in political matters, but also, which is of much
more importance to our subject, in the literary character of the times.
Something of the old courtesy, something of the romantic and ideal
in social intercourse between man and man, and still more preceptibly
between man and woman, the Revolution appears to have annihilated;
a more sel fish, alculating, and-material-spiit begins to be perceptible
in society, and consequently to be reflected' in books.  Language
beQomes a little rudermore dispnutative and more comlbative —-the
intellect now plays a more prominent part than either the fancy or
the sensibility -the head'has overbalanced the heart.
Of the general prhevale of-seh-6-o     f — society there can be
no more conclusive proof than the personal and literary-character of
Jonathan Swift; a man of robust and mighty intellect, of great and
ready acquirements, of an indomitable will, activity, and perseverance,
but equally deficient in heart as a man and in disinterestedness as a
patriot.  The Dean of St. Patrick's was indeed a rarely-gifted,
prompt, and vigorous intellect: in his particular line of satire he is
unequalled' in literature; he did' more and more readily what few
beside him could have attempted; he'played during his life a prominent-and important part in the political drama of his country, and
established himself by his writings among the prose classics of the
world: but he was, as a man, heartless, selfish, unloving, and
unsympathising; -as a writer, he degraded and lowered our reverence
for the divinity of our nature; and as a statesman, he appears to
ihave felt no nobler spur to the'exertion of his gigantic powers than
the sting of personal pique and the.pang of discontented ambition.
Ite was born in Dublin in the year 1667; a'posthumous child,
left dependent upon the uncertain charity of relations for support,
and the not less precarious favour of the great for protection.  This




230          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. XI.I.
unfortunate entrance into life appears to have ti'ad-with-Ad -aedkr
shadef misnt-hr opi_ gom t    _peament naturally sat.rnine,
and to have inspired something of that niiorbid melancholy which
ultimately deepened into hypochondria, and terminated so terribly
in madness and idiotcy. Swift at the beginning of his career received
the aid and protection of Sir William Temple, who enabled him to
complete his education at Oxford, and in whose house he made thatacquaintance with Mrs. Johnson (the daughter of Temple's steward)
which became the source, to Swift, of a signal instance of retributive
justice, and to the unfortunate lady of such a sad celebrity under
the name of Stella.  Swift did not begin to write until he had.
reached the tolerably mature age of thirty-four; and this circumnstance
will not only account for the extraordinary force and mastery which
his style from the first exhibited, but it will prove the absence in
Swift's mind of. any of that purely literary ambition which incites
the student
"To scorn delights, and live laborious days."
Throughout the whole of his literary career Swift never appears to
have cared to obtain the reputation of a mere writer: his works (the
greater number of which were political pamphlets, referring to temporary events, and composed for the purpose of attaining temporary
objects) seem never to have been considered by him otherwise than
as means, instruments, or engines for the securing of their particular
object.  The ruling passion of his mind was an intense and arrogant
desire for political power and notoriety; or, as he says himself, " All
my endeavours, from a boy, to distinguish myself, were only for want
of a great title and fortune, that I might be used like a lord by those
who have an opinion of my parts-whether- right or'wrong, it is no
reat matter."  This was indeed but a low and creeping ambition;
and-the fruit —at least as far as any augmentation of human happiness is concerned —is worthy of the tree.
The protege of Temple, Swift was naturally, at the beginning of
his public life, a WThig; and his first achievements in the warfare of
party were made under the Whig banner. He also exhibited his
attachment to his patron by taking part in the famous controversy
respecting the comparative superiority of the ancients or the _moderns;
a controversy of which Temple was the most distinguished champion.
Swift wrote the' Battle of the Books,' a short satirical pamphlet, full
of that coarse invective and savage personality which afterwards
rendered him so famous and so formidable.  Some of the incidents
of the battle are worthy of the hand which painted the Yahoos
or the Projectors' College of Laputa.  The principal object of attack
in this fierce and brutal piece of drollery was Bentley.
In 1704 appeared Swift's extraordinary satiric allegory, entitled'The Tale of a Tub,' in which the author pretends to give an account




"HAP. XIII.]    TALE Or0  A TUB-PAMPHLrEIS.                2 1
of the rise and policy of the three most important sects into which
Christendom has unhappily been divided - the Romanist, Lutheran
(with which he identifies the Church of England,) and Calvinistic
Churches.
These events are recounted in the broadest, boldest, most unreserved
language of farcical extravagance; the three religions being typified
by three brothers, Peter (the Church of Rome, or St. Peter), Martin
(that of Luther), and Jack (John Calvin). The corruptions of the
Romish Church, and the renunciation of those errors at the Reformation, are allegorised by a number of tassels, fringes, and shoulderknots, which the three brothers superadd to the primitive simplicity
of their coats (the practice and belief of the Christian religion).
These extraneous ornaments Martin strips off cautiously and-gradually; but poor Jack, in his eagerness, nearly reduces himself to a
state of nature. Nothing can exceed the richness of imagination
with which Swift places in a ridiculous or contemptible light the
extravagances of the three brothers.  It must be observed that he
invariably sides with Martin, and pursues the fantastic pranks of
Jack with a pitiless and envenomed malignity that shows how richly
nature had gifted him for the trade of political and religious lampooning.
This strange work is divided into chapters, between which are interposed an equal number of what the author calls "digressions," and
which latter, like the main work, are absolute treasuries of droll allusion and ingenious adaptation of obscure and uncommon learning.
In 1708 Swift turned. Tory; and he was soon found writing as
nervously, fluently, and vigorously on the side of his new patrons as
ever he had done in support of his former one. He now published
successively a number of able pamphlets, under the title of'Sentiments of a Church-of-England Man,''Letters on the Application of
the Sacramental Test,' and the admirable' Apology for Christianity.
In this last production, under his usual veil of grave irony, he shows
the ill consequences which would result from an abolition of the
Christian religion: among the rest, for example, proving what a loss
it would be to the freethinker and scoffer and esprit fort to be
deprived of so fertile a subject of ridicule as is now afforded by the
principles and practice of our religion.
About the same time, Swift, in a succession of humorous jeux
d'esprit, ridiculed the credulity of mafiy classes of persons at that
time as to the predictions of astrology, and the gross ignorance of
the almaifac-makers and other needy and obscure quacks, who
administered food to the public appetite for the marvellous.
In 1712 he wrote a species of half-history, half-pamphlet, entitled'The Conduct of the Allies,' severely reflecting upon the Duke of
Marlborough; and nearly at the same time he became acquainted
with the beautiful and most unhappy Vanessa, whose real name was
VSanholrnigh.  This young lady had been in some measure educated
19 *




232          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. XIII.
by Swift; and the fair pupil conceived for her instructor a passion
of that deep, durable, and all-engrossing character, which, for weal
or woe, fills and occupies a whole existence, and to whose intensity
not even time can apply any real alleviation.  It is not certain how
far a thoughtless vanity, or an almost incredible hardness of heart,
or a taint of that insanity, which was to cloud the setting of Swift's
bright and powerful intellect, may have led him to sport with the
affections of this unfortunate girl; but, at the very time when he
was allowing. her to indulge in dreams of happiness which he knew
were vain, Swift was keeping up with Stella, the former victim  of
his selfish vanity, the hope of a union which, if it came at all, was
certain to be but too tardy a reparation.  Vanessa died of a broken
heart, -on learning the relations in which Swift stood, and had all
along remained, with respect to Stella; and Stella appears ultimately
to have received a legal right to Swift's protection as a husband.
But this act of justice came too late either to restore her ruined
happiness or to save her life.  For this double act of'heartlessness
Swift was to suffer a terrible and just retribution.
At the accession to the English throne of the House Qf Hanover,
Swift retired to Ireland; for the Whigs were now in power.  But
in leaving the more busy stage of English politics, Swift carried with
him  the greatest powers to annoy and harass the government at a
distance; and he soon arrived, at a pitch of popularity among his
own countrymen which has never been surpassed-perhaps never
equalled-even in the heated atmosphere of Irish politics.  Taking
advantage of a species of monopoly (apparently not much more
unjust and, oppressive than such privileges usually are) which, the
government was about to grant to a certain William Wood, and the'
object of which was to admit into Ireland a considerable sum of
copper money to be coined by -Wood, Swift succeeded in raising
against the government which granted, and the speculator who obtain.
ed, the obnoxious monopoly, so violent a storm of Irish indignation,
that not only was it found impossible to execute the project,.but an
insurrection was very nearly excited; or to use Swift's energetic
answer to Archbishlop Boulter, who once accused him of having
excited the popular fury against the government, "If I had lifted
my finger, they would have torn you to pieces i" The engine of
this vehement movement was the publication (in a Dublin newspaper)
of a succession of letters, signed "M. B. Drapier," written by Swift
ia the character of a Dublin. tradesman, and a most admirable specimen of consummate sIill. in political writing for the people.
In 1726 appeared the satiric romance of "Gulliver," undoubtedly
the greatest and most durable monument of Swift's style and
originality of conception.'Gulliver,' being a work of universal
sa.-ire, will be read as long as the corruptions of human nature
render its innumerable ironic and sarcastic.strokes applicable and




CHAP. XIII.]              GULLIVEI.                         233
intelligible to human beings; and even were the follies and base-,nesses of humanity so. far purged away that men should no longer
need the sharp and bitter-medicine of satire, it would still be read
with little less admiration and delight for. the wonderful richness of
invention it displays, and the exquisite art with which the most
impossible and extravagant adventures are related- related so
naturally as to cheat us into a momentary belief in their reality.
The book consists of an account of the strange adventures of the
hero in whose person it is written. Nothing can be better than the
dexterity with which Swift has identified himself —particularly at
the beginning —with the character of a plain, rough, honest
surgeon of a ship, and the minute verisimilitude which pervades his
relation — a verisimilitude kept up with surprising watchfulness,
even in the least details and descriptions of an imaginary world.
Lemuel Gulliver, after being shipwrecked, all his companions having
perished, finds himself landed in the country of Lilliput, the inhabitants of which are about six inches high, and in which all the
objects, natural and artificial, are in exact proportion to the people..We have a most amusing description of the court, the capital, and
the government of this pigmy empire; and while exciting our
incessant interest by the prodigality of invention exhibited, and the
wonderful richness of fancy, all these descriptions, as well as the
account of Gulliver's adventures in Lilliput, are made the vehicle
of -incessant strokes of satire, directed not only against the vices and
follies of mankind (thus held up to ridicule in the disguise of these
human insects), but against contemporary persons and intrigues.  It
is hardly necessary to remark, that what is of general application
now possesses a much greater interest than many of the sly temporary allusions which probablyj gave most delight when the book
appeared. In the second part of the fiction our honest Gulliver
visits a nation of giants, where we find the same carefully calculated
proportion between the people of the country (represented as sixty
feet high) and the relative size of their trees, animals, houses,
utensils, and so on.  In Brobdignag the illusion is perhaps even
more artfully kept' up than it is in the description of Lilliput; the
size- so enormous, yet always so perfectly in accordance with the
scale pre-established- of the various objects being here generally
indicated, or rather hinted in a parenthesis, than elaborately de..
tailed.  What can be more richly comic, for instance, than the
conflagration of the capital of Lilliput, the court intrigues, the grand
review of the army, Gulliver's capture of the entire fleet of Blefuscu, or the terrible schisms of the Big-endians and Little-endians?
What can exhibit a more fertile conception, or a more truly Rabelan.
sian drollery, than many of the adventures at Lorbrulgrud, the
metropolis of the gigantic Brobdignagians; the scene in which
poor Gulliver is carried up to the palace-roof by the monkey; the




234          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CHAI'. XI1I[
enmities and spiteful tricks of the queen's dwarf, " who was of the
lowest stature that was ever seen in that country (for I verily think
he was not full thirty feet high);" the description of the maids of
honour; and the battles of Gulliver with flies, wasps, rats, and
linnets?  The satiric aim is the same in both parts of the fiction,
though -attained by different roads. In Lilliput, the author shows
us how contemptible would be human passions, war, ambition, and
science, were they exhibited by the insect inhabitants of a microscopic country. In Brobdignag, he makes us perceive, by as it
were reversing the telescope, the extreme meanness and insignificance which our institutions, pursuits, and actions would exhibit to
beings endowed with gigantic powers.  In the second part of the
romance he represents Gulliver as giving to the king of the giants
-a wise and pacific mlonarch -a description of human warfare,
government, and society; and he makes the king conclude, from
the little stranger's narrative, "that, by what I have gathered from
your own relation, and the answers I have with much pains wringed
and extorted from you, I cannot but conclude the bulk of your
natives to be the most pernicious race of little odious vermin that
nature ever suffered to crawl on the surface of the earth."  No
this, wea___~pphendh,_~whickh is but a fair specimen of beh-general
conclusions of this_.ssatire,ind- indeed the general drift of most of
ift's writin  is neither just nor useful. To be truly powerful,
satire must be.ds`crmilatingi.;..afthis swteeping contempt and
reprobation'not oniyjfet              ctbu is'fromn the true
purpose of satiric paintipg-t _ that of refi-derinigg the species better,
wiser, and more innocent.  Nor must we —oinit here to speak of a
blemish which disfigures all Swift's writings, though perhaps it is
not more prominently offensive in'Gulliver' than in some of his
other works, particularly his poems.  It is a stain which appears to
have been, from some strange peculiarity of mental constitution,
inherent in Swift's character: we allude to the passion which he
seems to have had to seek after images of pure physical disgust and
loathsomeness. No writer was ever more truly moral and virtuous
than Swift, none~-oi6e rudi~ou-sf hold up vice and folly to the contempt and execration of mankind; so that this defect in no sense
-partakes of that detestable ingenuity which makes some writers
pander to the vilest propensities of our nature, nor even of that
exaggerated warmth of invective under whose influence some satirists
(as Juvenal, for instance) have drawn too warm and highly-coloured
pictures of the vices they attack, and thus, like Jaques, done
"mischievous foul sin in chiding sin."
No; Swift's offences against delicacy are not of this kind: they cannot
be said to excite the passions, but they raise the gorge; they make
us shudder, not with moral repulsion, but with physical disgust. Of




CRAP. XIII.J               GTULIVER.                          285
all men of supereminent genius, Swift apcar  to  ave had the least
sympth yvith     what is beautiful the leanst   enthusi'i[ for what is
ublime. Thev        T    d ightQf his style consists in its being
level, plain, prosaic,lJgieal,.,and- uni-ma-gimnative. - But his taste fox
images'iof absdlute physical filthiness we believe to be peculiar to
him: the physiologist might discover its cause.
The third part of this celebrated fiction describes the imaginIary
countries of Laputa, a flying island, inhabited by speculative philoso.
phers, devoted to mathematics and music; which gives Swift the
opportunity to ridicule the follies of pedantic science.  From thence
the traveller descends to Balnibarbi, a land occupied by projectors.
The most notable passage of this part of the work is the description
of the academy, which is a not very happy imitation of the college
of philosophers so admirably depicted in the second part of Rabelais'
immortal extravaganza. Besides, Swift's ridicule in this part of the
work is often deficient in point and propriety; nor was the author
sufficiently versed either in physical science or ancient learning to be
able to ridicule with much effect the abuses of the one or the follies
of the other.  Many' of the objects, too, which he has introduced,
are altogether too disgusting and offensive to form proper features
even in a satiric fiction.  Caricature has its decencies and its bienseances no less than historic or romantic painting.  Rabelais, it is
true, abounds in coarse and indecent images, no less than in the
wildest extravagance of burlesque; but we should remember the
almost frantic tone of animal spirits which pervades his work, so
different from the grave simplicity of Swift: and we must keep in
mind the period at which the cure of Meudon wrote, obliging him,
at the risk of life and liberty, never for one moment to let drop the
antic mask of buffoonery under which he so keenly satirises the
superstitions of the Church and the vices of the world.  Moreover,
Rabelais was (due allowance being made for the difference of their
respective epochs) a far more learned man than Swift.  He was
also a far more genial spirit; at least equal in wit, and immeasurably
superior in humour. He knew more, and he also loved more.
-Swift was admirably characterised by Coleridge as " anima Rabelesii habitans in sicco," the soul of Rabelais dwelling in a dry
place.
The next strange country visited is Glubbdubdrib, an island
inhabited by a people of magicians, who evoke, for the amusement
of the traveller, the spirits of many great men of antiquity; thus
giving the author an opportunity to indulge his satiric vein.  But
this portion of the book is generally found to be exceedingly poor
and flat.  The idea is excellent, but very little has been made of it;
and we neither laugh nor admire when Hannibal is called up from
the shades to assure us that, "in passing the Alps, he had not a
drop of vinegar in his camp," or Aristotle to predict to Descartes




236          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. XII1.1
that the Newtonian doctrine would as certainly be exploded as the
vortices of the French philosopher.
Gulliver next finds his way to Luggnagg, in which country he
has the opportunity of perceiving how miserable would be the consequence of human beings receiving a privilege of eternal life, unaccompanied by corresponding health, strength, and intellect; a reservation which seems rather unnecessary, and a kind of petitio principii.
In point of description, however, nothing can be finer, more powerful,
and Juvenalian in its gloomy energy, than Swift's picture of the
wretched Stuldbrugs, the unhappy possessors of ",an immortality of
woe."
The fourth voyage of Gulliver carries him  to the country of the
Houyhnhnms; and is remarkable for a deeper, fiercer, intenser flame
of satiric fury than any of the three preceding parts.  In the voyage
to Lilliput he chiefly ridiculed the persons and events of contemporary politics; in the government of Brobdignag he gives us a kind
of model of his notions of good government and of a patriot king;
in Laputa, &c., he mocks at the abuses of science and learning; but
in the last voyage, the current of his satire, deepening and widening
as it rolls, envelops, like some vast inundation, all the institutions of
civilized society, and all the passions of our human nature.  He
represents a country in which horses are the ruling and supreme
beings, while man is degraded to the rank of a filthy noxious, and
untamable brute, retaining, with some relics and rough outlines of
til& ihuman formj all our Villanous passions and base appetites exhibited in complete nakedness.  Setting aside the outrageous improbability of the leading idea-viz. that of making horses change place
with men in the social system of nature-it cannot be doubted that
the ferocity of the satire is excessive and absurd, and appears to
have been inspired rather by the rabid instinct of an unreasoning.
misanthropy, than to have been dictated by the legitimate anger of
indignant virtue.  "It.is an ill bird," says the good old proverb,' that fouls its own nest;" and anriy man, possessed of so admirable
and commanding an intellect as that of Swift, who should give us
as the result of observations on human nature, collected through a
long life passed. in full communion with the- greatest and best of his
own country, such a picture as that of the Yahoos-a picture whose
every tint and line testifies the real, sincere, unaffected hatred and
contempt which guided the artist's hand in tracing it-such a man,
we repeat, lays himself open to the charge either of having drawn
not a portrait but a gross and odious caricature, or of having his eye
grievously blinded and perverted by prejudice.
Besides these two great prose satires, the' Tale of a Tub' and the' Voyages of Gulliver,' Swift's collected works contain a vast number
of smaller ludicrous compositions, all of them bearing the stamp of
The author's mind-originality, vigorous plainness of manner, and a




CHAP. XIII.]            SWIFT S POEMIS.                     237
perfect acquaintance with all the minutia  of social intercourse.
Among others we may mention his admirable mock-serious treatise
called' Directions to Servants,' in which, under ironical precepts, he
has exhibited the profoundest, knowledge of all the mysteries of tho
kitchen and the servants' hall. In his'Treatise on Polite Conversation' he has given us a similarly ironical compendium of the coarse
jokes, the vulgar repartees, the pert and proverbial expressions which
at that time formed the staple of fashionable dialogue. The picture
is of course exaggerated, but the outlines are true.  It was an age
when fine gentlemen and ladies absolutely piqued themselves on their
ignorance, and when what were called, in the elegant phraseology of
the day, "bites" and "selling of bargains,", formed the principal
enlivenment of fashionable society.
During his whole life Swift continued from time to time to compose
pieces'of poetry of various kinds; and standing, as he did, upon the
very pinnacle of popularity,' it is not surprising that he should have'obtained a high reputation as a poet.  One quality for the art he
assuredly possessed in an eminent degree, that of originality; and
his verses, generally written on particular occasions, and often as
personal or party lampoons, have certainly the merit of perfect ease,
fluency, and sincerity. His more important pieces are written in the
octo-syllabic rhyme of Prior and Gay; and though they abound in
good'sensei acute remark, and intense severity of allusion, they
possess none of the higher qualities of poetry: not much harmony,
no depth of feeling, no (or very rare) splendour of language. They
are, like their author, dry, hard, and cold.  In'Cadenus and Vanessa' he has given a rather dull description of the commencement of
the sad story of the unhappy IHester Vanhomrigh; in the' Legion
Club' the most intense expression of hatred and contempt (directed
against the Irish Parliament) that human pen perhaps has ever
traced, or human heart conceived; and scattered through his works
are a multitude of farcical little compositions, some of them epigrams
and political pasquinades, others trifles meant merely to amuse the
privacy of a friendly circle; but all of which are marked with as
much excellence as the subject would admit-trifling toys of the
ingenuity, but toys constructed by a master's hand. His best poems
of any length are the verses entitled'A  Rhapsody on Poetry,' in'he beginning of which are several passages of great vigour and more
warmth of expression than is usually to be found in Swift; and the
other called'Verses on my Own Death, in which, with admirable
nature, drollery, and vivacity, he describes the various feelings with
which that event would be received among his friends, acquaintances
and enemies.
This event was not now very remote; but ere this great wit
arrived at that repose which an excruciating and incurable disease
must have made him view with hope, he was destined to pass through




238          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CHAP. XIII.
the severest ordeal to which our nature can be submitted.  He was
to travel, while yet living, through " the valley and the shadow of
death."
During the whole of his life he had been grievously afflicted with
attacks of deafness, giddiness, and pain in the head; andhis gloomy
and despondent spirit seems to have looked forward with prophetic
dread to insanity as the probable termination of his existence. AD
affecting anecdote is related by Dr. Young of Swift having once
oeen found mournfully gazing on a noble oak, whose upper branches
lhad been struck by lightning: " I shall be like that tree," said
Swift, "I shall die first a-top."  Nor were these melancholy predictions falsified by the event. About the year 1736 he was attacked
by repeated fits of pain and loss of memory, and in the composition
of that terrific invective the'Legion GCub' he was seized by a species of fit, from which he never recovered sufficiently to finish the
poem. The long and melancholy interval (of nine years) intervening
between this time and his death was one uninterrupted succession of
mental and bodily suffering.  He passed from  a deplorable and
furious mania to a state of idiotcy; and the active politician, the
resistless polemic, the satirist, the poet, and the wit, died, as he
himself had feared and half predicted, "in a rage, like a poisoned
rat in a hole;""Swift expired a driveller and a show."
This event took place, October 19th, 1745, at Dublin, and excited
among the lower and middle classes of that city, whose friend,
adviser, and defender he had been, the liveliest expressions of grief
and lamentation.  "The Dean" was buried in his own cathedral of
St. Patrick's, and his place of sepulture marked by an epitaph composed by himself, some words of which form the best and most
appropriate commentary that the wit of man could have invented
upon the writings and the character of this illustrious but most
unhappy man:" Hic depositum est corpus
Jonathan Swift, S. T. P.
Ubi sceva Indignatio
Ulterius cor lacerare nequit."
We have taken occasion in the preceding pages, to advert more
than once to the coarse and corrupted state of society which prevailed
in England about the accession of William III., and seems to have
continued with little modification through the reigns of at least the
first two Georges. That this brutal, selfish, and vulgar tone of
social intercourse was- at once a result and an indication of a deep
and general deterioration of morals is more thani probable: it partly
arose from the unfortunate mixture of politics in the whole texture,
so to speak, of society, and may be attributed partly to the increased




CHAP. XIII.]  THE ESSAYISTS: STEELE, ADDISON.               239
influence of the popular element in our political constitution, and
in some degree doubtless to that roughness and ferocity of manners which a long-continued period of warfare seldom fails to coinmunicate to a nation, and of which we have a signal example in
more recent times in the coarse and violent tone of manners introduced in France by the military spirit of the Republic, the Consulate, and the Empire.  Gambling was exceedingly prevalent; and
drunkenness - so long, alas! the vice of Englishmen - was grossly
and universally habitual.  Swearing and gross indecency of language were universally indulged in. The amusements of all classes
possessed the coarseness of those athletic pastimes of which Englishmen have in all ages been so fond, but in many cases without
either the courage which they inspire, or the generous and manly
spirit which they cherish. The barbarous and brutalizing sports of
the cock-pit and the bull-ring were still pursued with at least as
much passion as the nobler amusements of the turf, the river, and
the field.  As to the pleasures of the intellect and the taste, they
were either absolutely unknown, or confined to a few, and those few
regarded as pedants or as humorists.  "That general knowledge
which now circulates in common talk," says Johnson, speaking of
this period, "was then rarely to be found.  Men not professing
learning-were not ashamed of ignorance; and in the female world
any acquaintance with books was distinguished only to be censored."
To combat the national taste for these low and sordid follies, to
infuse a more courteous, refined, and Christian tone into the manners
of society, was the aim of a number of excellent writers, extending.over a considerable period of our literary history, and known under
the general appellation of " Essayists."  Their aim being so comprehensive, the subjects they had to treat so multifarious, and the
public they had to address so numerous, they adopted the expedient
of throwing their remarks upon any subject into the form of a
paper, publishing at a very cheap rate, and at regular and very short
intervals. The originator of this species of work was Sir Richard
Steele, a man admirably qualified by vivacity and readiness of intellect, a profound acquaintance with life in all its phases, and an
undeniable goodness of heart and of intention, to undertake the
office of a periodical censor of manners; but his reputation as a
writer was soon surpassed by many succeeding authors of the same
kind, and particularly by his fellow-labourer and friend Addison.
Thiq latter person was long considered as a sort of standard or
model of all that is most easy, elegant, and natural in English prose
-a throne of supremacy from which he has only recently been
ejected by the more weighty, more highly-coloured, more thoughtful
and profound style of modern times, particularly since the French'
Revolution.  His career was singularly prosperous.  He was born
in 1672, the son of a country gentleman of very moderate fortune,
20                      ~




240           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. XIII.
received at Oxford a good and learned education, and distinguished
himself rather for the elegance than the depth of his scholarship.
His first appearance in English literature was a poetical panegyric
on Dryden, written at twenty-two, and in which he exhibits much
more neatness of versification than originality of thought or justness
of criticism. _He also translated the Fourth Georgic of Virgil,. which
Dryden printed in his own Miscellanies with warm encomiums on
the young poet. But the work which must be considered his first
earnest of success, and which first procured him the entrance to the
arena of his after political success, was his poem on the King,
addressed to Lord Somers, then keeper of the seals. This procured
him  the warm and lasting favour and patronage of the powerful
lawyer, who soon after gave Addison solid proofs:of- his protection
in procuring him a pension of 3001. a-year, which enabled him to
travel over the most interesting parts of France and Italy.
The death of King William deprived Addison of his pension, but
he soon after more than compensated for this loss by the publication
of his poem on the battle of Blenheim, which was rewarded by the
place of Commissioner of Appeals.  The poem is little better than a
rhymed gazette, and strongly reminds the reader of the once equally
celebrated but now equally unread poem of Boileau, on the passage
of the Rhine by Louis XIV. There is in both works the same
incessant and ineffectual struggle' to appear splendid and animated,
but the same stiffness, artifice, and effort.  The famous comparison
of Marlborough to a destroying angel was as much admired in its
day as the often-quoted
"Ii se plaint de sa gloire qui l'attache au rivage"
of the courtly and witty Despreaux.
Addison now rapidly and steadily advanced along the path of
political distinction: he was made Under-Secretary of State, and
accompanied Wharton to Ireland. In 1716 he married the Dowager
Countess of Warwick, to whose son he had formerly been tutor; but
this union, as might have been expected, was an unhappy one -as
such ill-assorted matches between hereditary nobility and intellectual
celebrity are generally found to be. Addison was appointed, in 1717,
Secretary of State, an office for which his fastidious delicacy of taste,
timid character, and total want both of business talents and parlia.
mentary eloquence, rendered him by all accounts singularly unfit.
I-He soon resigned a dignity for which he was so unfitted by nature,
and was rewarded for his services with a pension of 15001. a-year.
Ioe died on the 17th of June, 1719, leaving behind him a most
enviable reputation for purity and integrity of life.  After making
due allowances for the tone of exaggeration and panegyric in which
his biography has been written, it is impossible not to allow him high
praise for personal virtue and piety. It would be too much to expect




cRAP. XTII.             TRAGEDY OF CATO.                        211
that any man —particularly one who was at the same time a literary
man and a politician -  should be perfect; and when we reflect how
much a ministerial life tends to sour the temper and inflame envy
and suspicion, we cannot be surprised that Addison, in spite of a
character naturally amiable and benevolent, should have sometimes
exhibited a little querulousness and impatience. As an author it is
not so easy to draw his character, though its principal outlines will
nearly coincide with those of his political portrait. We shall find the
came timid propriety, the same universal and unquestionable goodness of aim and intention, with perhaps a little shade of the subdued
jealousy of other men's glory which drew from Pope those far-famed
and admirable lines" were there one whose fires
True genius kindles, and fair fame inspires;
Bless'd with each talent and each art to please,
And born to write, converse, and live with ease;
Should such a man, too fond to rule alone,
Bear,'like the Turk, no brother near the throne;
View him with scornful, yet with jealous eyes,
And hate fobr arts that caused himself to rise;
Damn with faint praise, assent with civil leer,
And, without sneering, teach the rest to sneer;
Willing to wound, and yet afraid to strike,
Just hint a fault, and hesitate dislike;
Alike reserved to blame, and to commend,
A timorous foe, or a suspiciotus friend;
Dreading e'en fools, by flatterers besieged,
And so obliging, that he ne'er obliged;
Like Cato, gives his little senate laws,
And sits attentive to his own applause;
While wits and Templars every sentence raise,
And wonder with a foolish face of praise; —
Who but must laugh, if such a man there be?
Who would not weep, if Atticus were he?"
Before we speak of that portion of Addison's writings upon which
is chiefly based his enduring reputation as a classical English prose
writer, it would be' unjust not to speak of one or two of his principal productions, by which he attained in his own day the summit of
popularity, though they are now comparatively neglected. The chief
of these is, undoubtedly, the tragedy of' Cato.'' Cato' is a work
constructed according to the very strictest rules of the so-called
classical propriety. The three unities are exactly and laboriously
preserved, the action simple and elevated, the personages few in
number, the sentiments and language throughout studiously elevated
and imposing.  It is, in short, a carefully-carved mask of the neatest
workmanship; but the reader at every moment exclaims, with the
fox in the fable, "What a pity it hath no brains!"  To preserve
the vaunted unity of time and place (which, when preserved, is good
for nothing), the author sacrifices probability —not only real, but
dramatic - in the most extraordinary manner; making conspirators
plot against Cato in Cato's own house; making the hero himself




242           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CHAP. XIII.
commit suicide in an open hall, public to all the worlh; representing
a project made to carry off a lady by means of the disguise not only
of her lover but of all her lover's body-guards; and a thousand other
such absurdities. For the characters and manners, they are worthy
of the plot: they are.neither Romans nor Numidians, neither patriots
nor conspirators, because they are not human beings. " The virtuous
Marcia towers above her sex" indeed, but it is in frigid pedantry of
ambitious declamation; the patriotic harangues of Cato are sickly
commonplaces, fagoted together out of history; and the celebrated
soliloquy of the hero, when he meditates suicide, though certainly
not devoid of merit, yet is only valuable as a purely didactic passage.
Shakspeare, Jonson, Massinger, Beaumont — these have shown us
iRoman passions, Roman patriotism, and Roman language; these
fiigid abstractions bear the same relation to the Romans of Shakspeare, or the Romans of Rome, as the waxen dolls in the window of
a barber to the living, moving, thinking, passengers that walk by
them in the street.
But it is as a periodical essayist that Addison earned his true
glory. On the 12th of April, 1709, Steele commenced the publication of a small sheet, issued thrice a-week, at a very low price
(each number cost a penny), containing a short essay or disquisition
upon some topic connected with the dress, behaviour, morality,
amusements, &c., of the upper and middle classes of society.  The
remaining portion of the half-sheet was devoted to news and general
information.  This kind of semi-didactic newspaper was chiefly
written by its first projector, Steele, under the pseudonym of Isaac
Bickerstaff, and was entitled'The Tatler.'  The essays, which
formed its prominent feature, were distinguished for that ease,
unaffected good-nature, and fluent, though not always very correct,
style which characterised the amiable author; and the work met
with so much success that no morning tea-table was without this
indispensable accompaniment.'-The Tatler' continued its career
till it amounted to 271 numbers, when it was transformed or remodelled into a nearly similar publication, still more famous in
English literature, under the name of'The Spectator.'  In the
composition of'The Tatler,' Steele had received the occasional
assistance of Addison; but in its successor the latter took a much
more active part, contributing all the papers marked with any ono
of the letters composing the word Clio.' The Spectator' began on
)March 1st, 1713, and, appearing daily, instead of thrice a-week, as'The Tatler' had done, extended to 635 numbers, each of which
contains a complete essay, generally upon some subject of moral
importance, and occasionally a disquisition on the principles of criticism, and the application of those principles in judging of soime
great work of literature or art.  The object of these elegant publi-!ations was in the highest degree laudable and excellent.  "I shall




CHIIAP. XIII.]          TIIE SPECTATOR.                      243
endeavour," says Steele himself, " to enliven morality with wit, and
to temper wit with morality, that my readers may, if possible, both
ways find their account in the speculation of the day.  It was said
of Socrates, that he brought philosophy down from heaven to inhabit
among men.  I shall be ambitious to have it said of me, that I
have brought philosophy out of closets and libraries, schools and
colleges, to dwell in clubs and assemblies, at tea-tables, and in coffee..
houses."  Accustomed as we now are to a much more refined and
intellectual tone of social intercourse, and to the diffusion, even to
the lower order of people, of a degree of general knowledge and
information which was then extremely rare even in the highest, we
may smile at the somewhat trite and commonplace tone of  many of
these essays, at the slender parade of scholarship, the little scrap of
Latin or Greek prefixed to them  as a motto —a sentence of Tully,
or a precept of Seneca or Longinus; but we were unjust to forget
the excellent morality, the useful and reasonable principles of goodbreeding, the Christian and gentle spirit which they inculcate; and
we must remember too, that, however narrow, and prejudiced, and
exclusive may seem to us the dogmas of Addison's literary criticisms, yet that these were the first popular essays in English towards
the investigation of the grounds and- axioms of msthetic science,
and that even here, in innumerable instances (as, for example, in
the celebrated reviews of'Paradise Lost,' and of the old national
ballad of'Chevy Chase'), we find the author's natural and delicate
sense of the beautiful and sublime triumphing over the accumulated
errors and false judgment of his own artificial age, and the author
of'Cato' doing unconscious homage to the nature and pathos of
the rude old Border ballad-maker.
But the most delightful portions of'The Spectator' are those in
which the "short-faced gentleman," the supposed author, speaks of
the imaginary club of which he is a member.  The army is represented by Captain Sentry; the fashionable world by an old beau,
Will Honeycomb; the city and men of. business express their opinions
through the mouth of Sir Andrew Freeport; and the country gentlemen are represented by Sir Roger de Coverley.  These personages
have very little life, humour, or individuality, with the exception of
the last, which is one of the most exquisite embodiments of nature
which the pencil of, fiction has ever drawn.  The mixture, in this
enchanting portrait, of benevolence, old-fashioned politeness, siniplicity, superstition, charity, and a taste for rural sports, is sketched with
a light and delicate, yet firm and skilful hand, which makes the
picture-though so different in style-well worthy to hang in the
same gallery with Don Quixote or with Parson Adamrs, with the
Lismahago of Stmollett or the Mr. Shandy of Sterne.  The first idea
of this sketch, it is most probable, was suggested, and the outline
perhaps roughly drawn in, by Steele.  Be this as it may, wkLther
20 "




244          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CEAP. xm
first suggested by Steele, and afterwards elaborated' by Addison, or
one of those happy conceptions which men owe sometimes to accident
fully as much as to inspiration, Sir Roger de Coverley is uniformly
and unfailingly the delight of every reader"A beautiful thought, and softly shadow'd forth;"
and Addison, not unconscious of the beauty of his work, seems to
have taken an inexhaustible delight in placing if in new points of
view, and drawing forth,- with the gentle and quiet touch of humour
and genius, all its innocent and attaching oddities. He gives us
Sir Roger during his visit to London; he accompanies him (in an
enchanting passage) to Westminister Abbey; he carries us to the
country to visit him in his old pinnacled and mullioned hall, deeply
embosomed in ancestral trees; he shows us the good knight in his
moments of tender pensiveness, or gaily chatting with his ingenious
kinsman, Will Wimble, or mildly testifying against the witchcraft
of Moll White, the village sorceress. When Sir Roger dies (for
Addison is reported to have killed him, as Cervantes did his admirable
knight, in order to prevent any grosser hand from continuing, and
perhaps spoiling, his creation), we -feel as if we had lost a friend.
" Whoever wishes," says Johnson, "to attain an English style.
familiar but not coarse, elegant but not ostentatious, must give his
days and nights to the study of Addison." We cannot conclude
our notice of this excellent writer and estimable man more appropriately than by adopting the words of Chambers, which are warmr
just, and comprehensive: —" In Addison the reader will find a rich
but chaste vein of humour and satire; lessons of morality and
religion, divested of all austerity and gloom; criticism at once pleasing and profound; and pictures of national character and manners
that must ever charm from their vivacity and truth. Greater energy
of character, or a more determined hatred of vice and tyranny,
would have curtailed his usefulness as a public censor.  He led the
nation insensibly to a love of virtue and constitutional freedom, to a
purer taste in morals and literature, and to the importance of those
everlasting truths which so warmly engaged his heart and imagination."
But to us, whose eyes have been scaled and purged by the all.
curing power of time, the greatest figure in this period of English
literary history is undoubtedly Samuel Johnson.  As a writer= he is
e yer incarnation of rood sense,and as a      " manh e was an e xanimnl
f so high a de ree of virtue Imagnanimit.  and sel - =rifice ethatbheaIsb      stly Placed  b  a  rofundm.dern speculator among
the hlteroes of his country. sannals.
He was the son of a-poor provincial bookseller, and was born at
Lichfield. September 18th, 1709; affording another testimony of
that truth so often exemplified in the history of literature, and so




C.tAP. XIII.]  SAMUEL JOHNSON: HIS CAREER.                  245
pithily expressed by an old writer, " that no'great work, or worthy of
praise and memory, but came out of poor cradles." He was afflicted,
even from his earliest years,-with a scrofulous disorder, which disfigured a person naturally awkward and ungainly, and. this disorder
was probably connected with another and more terrible one, which
renders it still, more wonderful how he could have ever attained to
such a degree of just reputation as he afterwards earned.  This was
a constitutional tendency to melancholy and hypochondria —a " vile
melancholy," to use his own touching words, " which;has kept me
mad half my life, or at least not sober."  What a contrast to the
fantastical and intentional gloom of Youig, springing from  the
ignoble source of disappointed ambition, and indulged as the best
key in which he could set his ingenious lamentations over the.vanity
of human things, his sombre conceits, as sadly fantastic as the
glittering ornaments on a rich man's coffin! What a contrast to the
cynical asperity of Swift, masking a haughty, selfish, and arrogant
pride under an affected contempt of human nature, complaining,
though at the pinnacle of fame, of neglect and unrewarded exertions!
The earlier part-nay, by far the greater portion-of Johnson's
career was passed in obscure and apparently hopeless struggles with
want and indigence; and however these may have enlarged his
knowledge of human life, or fortified his own powers of industry and
reflection, they only place in a higher elevation the virtue'of the
mani and the intellectual vigour of the great scholar.  He passed
some time at Pembroke College, Oxford, but his father's misfortunes
compelled him to leave the university without a degree. To the
aspirant after literary fame, to him who takes a wise pleasure in
tracing the struggles of genius to. emerge from a sea of difficulties,
few things are more delightful or more salutary than to follow step
by step the commencement of Johnson's career:
" Slow rises worth by poverty oppressed."
WTe find him  acting as usher in schools, and afterwards unsumessfully attempting to conduct a school himself at the little town of
Market Bosworth.  Poor, independent,-ambitious, conscious of his
own powers, he now adopted the desperate yet natural resolution of
launching on the broad ocean of London society, and he travelled up
to the capital in company with his friend and former pupil, David
Garrick, who was afterwards destined to obtain, on the stage, a repu.
tation as great as that ultimately acquired in literature by his
companion. Johnson now commenced the profession (or rather
trade, for at that time it was, alas! hardly more dignified, and
certainly not so well remunerated as many mechanical occupations)
of author, obtaining a scanty and precarious subsistence by translating
and writing task-work for the booksellers, and principally employed as
a contributor to the' Gentleman's Magazine,' then published by Cave.




210           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CHAP. XIII,
Johnson's style during the whole of his career was exceedingly
peculiar and characteristic both in its beauties and defects, and when
he arrived at eminence may be said to have produced a revolution in
the manner of writing in English; and as this revolution has to a
certain degree lasted till the present day, it will be well to say a few
words on the subject. It is in the highest degree pompous, sonorous.
and to use a havy expression of Coleridge, hyper-latinistic  run"np!   into perpetual antithesis, and balncing period against period
w'a  anoa'CIO         cl regularitv, which at once fis an      es
h  ear    ormed upon certain of our elder writers as  ir ma
Browne, for instance), Whose learning and grave eloquence cannot
always save them from  te charge of pedantry, it was a style, like
ers', exact. such- a-  might have een exec ed from  a man who
had e uc.athimse  ln solitary study, and whose memory was filled
with echoes    ptoal sententiousnes_  o uvena an  eneea,
and the artful and ambitious periods of Sallust or Tacitus.t
deficiency of he  tle is want —    of ease as h s  een  unustly
suposed. for Jo'nson's strong and nervous inllect_ wied e d  its
olished and onderous weakon with perfect mastery and freedomu-t'o  t at f        bility which is best ada ted to the e- neral
_ou rse  of disuisition   It would be unjust to Johnson's good taste
not to remark that he appears to have been sensible of the imperfection of his way of writing; for his later works exhibit a marked and
progressive diminution of this stiffness and Latinism; and we may
also observe that many of the words (generally Latin, as " resuscitate," "fatuity," "germination," &c.), his use of which excited so
much criticism at the time, have since been completely naturalized
and endenizened in the language. The prpvailing-defect of Johnsn's
style is uniformity: the combinations of his kaleidosc.pe are soon
exhausted- hi:ealof bellsa - i               it cihan es  and as
etr is necessarily. in so artifical   sa_&tyJe~._aunai~_:' retension and
ambitiosns    the sne        i mr  fatiuin     than would be the
sni ed eriods and tuneless meanness of a more unojstIeita: f
felicity to English manners, and the corruptions of modern London
society.
After the satire of'London,' of which we shall speak more anon,
Johnson published his'Life of Savage,' the.biography of a poet
whose strange and melancholy story foimed an admirable subject for
Johnson's dignified and moral pen; and in 1749 appeared the
pendant or companion-picture to the'London,' in a similar modernisation of the Tenth'Satire of Juvenal. Our readers may not perhaps
know that the Thirteenth Satire of Juvenal is directed against the




cTAP. XII1.]          JOHNSON: SATIRES.                     24
corruptions of society in Rome, against the miseries and humiliations
which a residence in the great city imposes upon a poor but virtuous
man, and the immense riches and influence obtained, by the most
unworthy arts, by Greeks and favourite freedmen.  The picture is a
striking and impressive one, and has lost none of its grandeur in the
hands of the English copyist, who has with consummate skill trans.
ferred the invectives of Juvenal to the passion for imitating French
fashions, and adapted the images of Juvenal to London vices, dis.
comforts, and corruptions. In the Tenth Satire (perhaps the grandest
specimen which we possess of this kind of writing) the Roman
takes a higher ground, and in an uninterrupted torrent of noble
and melancholy eloquence has pointed out the folly and emptiness
of all those objects which form the chief aim of human desires.
He shows us successively the misery which has accompanied, and
the ruin which has followed, the possession of those advantages for
which men sigh and pray: he exhibits the vanity of riches, ambition,
eloquence, military glory, long life, and beauty, the whole exemplified
by the most signal examples, drawn from history, of the folly of
human hopes, —
"Magnaque numinibus Diis exaudita malignis."
Many passages of Johnson's satires must be regarded as translationsconsummate translations-of the words of Juvenal; but he frequently
changes, augments, and strengthens; as, for example, Juvenal has
instanced Sejanus as a proof of the instability of political power and
the favour of -the great; Johnson has added to this impressive picture
the fall of Wolsey.  Hannibal and Alexander-whose death forms
so instructive a moral of the folly of the conqueror and general-.
are not excluded, but the equally warning story of Charles XII. is
made the vehicle for a moral lesson not less admirably expressed, and
even more impressive, from its nearness of time, to a modern reader.
The lofty philosophical tone of gloomy eloquence, perhaps, is even
more uniformly sustained in the English than in the Roman poet;
and in the conclusion of the satire, where, after showing the nothingness of all earthly hopes, the voice of reason points out what are the
only objects worthy of the wise man's desire-health, innocence,
resignation, and tranquillity-the English poet must be allowed to
have surpassed in pathetic solemnity even the grandeur of his model,
as far as the consolatory truths of Christian revelation are sublimer
than the imperfect lights of Stoic paganism.
Between the years 1750 and 1752 Johnson was occupied in the
composition of a journal, or series of periodical essays, entitled'The Rambler,' founded upon the model of the'Spectators' and'Tatlers' which Addison and Steele had employed so usefully as a
vehicle of moral improvement. But in- Johnson's hands this kind
of writing was neither so popular nor so delightful as it had been in
those of the easy and elegant essayists whom we have just mentior.ed




2I48-         OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CHAP, XIII.
KnowIeage, good sense, sincerity, he possessed at least in as high a
degree as his predecessors, but the reader observes a lack of ease, a
want of light and shade, for which not all the imposing qualities of
Johnson's mind can compensate: the style is too uniformly didactic,
cathedral, and declamatory; he has no shift of words, and will describe
the frivolity of a coxcomb with the same rolling periods and solemn
gravity of antithesis as would be appropriate enough in an invective
against tyranny or fanaticism.  But the'Ramblers' are full of
weighty and solid sense, and if less amusing, they are certainly
neither less useful nor less instructive. Addison and Steele talk,
Johnson declaims: the former address you like virtuous, learned,
and well-bred men of the world, whose scholastic acquirements have
been harmonised and digested by long intercourse with polished
society; Johnson rather like a university professor, who retains, in
the world, something of the stiffness of the chair. The above
remarks will apply no less to the'Idler,' another publication on a
similar plan, which continued to appear between 1758 and 1760.
In the interval which occurred between the discontinuance of the
former and the commencement of the last-mentioned periodical,
appeared the celebrated'Dictionary of the English Language,' on
which Johnson had been laboriously engaged during a period of about
seven years. This work is a glorious monument of learning, energy,
and perseverance; and, when viewed as the production of a single
unaided scholar, is perhaps one of the most signal triumphs of literary activity. If we compare with Johnson's Dictionary the great
national work of the French Academy, we shall find abundant reason
to admire the astonishing courage and diligence of our countryman,
who alone, unsupported, in the midst of other and pressing occupations, found means to produce, in seven years, a dictionary certainly
not inferior to what was considered as a great national monument,
which was produced by the united labour of a royally-endowed and
numerous corporation, and which occupied an infinitely longer time
in the preparation. We must not forget, either. the immense difference between the two languages in point of richness and copiousness,
which renders the task of an English lexicographer immeasurably
more onerous.  Both Johnson's work and the'Dictionnaire de
I'Acaddemie' are remarkable for the neatness and acuteness of interpretation of words; both give examples of the various meanings from
good authors; and in this last respect we conceive that Johnson's
work is markedly superior; for the Academie contents itself with
any quotation which exhibits with sufficient clearness the particular
use of the word in question, but beyond this has no specific value,
and often no meaning or interest whatever. The quotations employed
by Johnson, on the other hand, to illustrate and exemplify the different significations of words, are not only taken from a vast collection
of works of classical authority, but themselves contain something




CHAP. XIII.]   RASSELAS-LIVES OF THE POETS.                249
complete and interesting in itself — either a beautiful passage of
poetry, a pithy remark, a historical fact, or a scientific definition.
The principal defect of this excellent dictionary is the etymological
part. When Johnson wrote, the German literature could hardly be
said to be in existence, and the northern languages were consequently
not studied: the investigator was deprived almost completely of the
immense light thrown upon the history of our language by those
dialects which form the source of so important a portion of it.
In1759 aueared th  fIm,,intal tale entitled'Rasselas.''.ork of -no great length. but exhibiting all the peculiarities of JohnG.'s manner.  As a representation of Eastern society, or indeed as
a picture of society in any sense, it has no claim to our admiration;
there is no interest in the plot, if, indeed, it can be said to have a
plot - there is hardly any attempt at the delineation of character;
but if read as a fine succession of moral remarks, breathing a some.
what desponding tone of feeling, and conveyed in his characteristic
pomp of measured declamation — it merits more than one perusal
Compared with the descriptions of Oriental manners, which more
recent times have given us -' Rasselas' will seem stiff, vague, and
unnatural. The Happy Valley of the Abyssinian prince is as nothing
when compared with the Hall of Eblis in the wonderful tale of'Vathekl;' but w e"eat._that aohnson's production is not to be read
as a  noe  but-aas   arse rieofmr al essa;  o    -ayst mult:   lii_
Lubjects, full of sense, acuteness and r   lyoL&t__ghL~
The-ast work which we shall mention is' The Lives of the Poets,'
originally composed at the instance of a bookseller, in order to be
prefixed to a collection of specimens of this branch of English literature.  The plan of this work was very limited, perhaps unavoidably
so, excluding nearly all of the very greatest names in our literature,
and embracing for the most part only what must be considered as by
no means the most brilliant period of the English Muse, i. e. from
Cowley to Johnson's own time.  With the exception of Miiton,
all the poets whose biographies he has written belong to that
school which we have described as having grown up mainly under
Latin, French, and Italian influence - in' short, the classicists - in
whose works the intellect is the predominant power.  In judging of
this species of poetry, Johnson has shown a might, mastery, and
solidity of criticism, perhaps unequalled by any other author; but
he moment he enters the enchanted ground of what is called
omeantic poetry, he exhibits a singular and total want of perception.
Indeed, his mind, admirably adapted as it was for the scientlfc part
of criticism, was impotent to feel or appreciate what is picturesque
or passionate. He is like a deaf man seated at a symphony of
Beethoven —a sense is wanting to him. How accurately and acutely
has he characterised Cowley, Dryden, Popej and Otway! How justly
has he appreciated the more intellectual qualities of Milton! But




25 0          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CHAP. XIIL.
when he ridicules the' Lycidas,' or complains of the blank verse of' Paradlise Lost,'-when he charges the lyrics of Gray with absurdity
and extravagance, who does not see that Nature, so liberal to him in
some respects, had denied to his powerful mind the least sensibility
for what is beautiful and enchanting in the airy world of fancy-?'The Lives of the Poets,' when read with due allowance, will
undoubtedly remain a classical work in England. We shall not
easily find so vast an accumulation of ingenious, solid, and acute
observation, so rich a treasury of noble moral lessons, or so fine and
manly a tone of writing and thinking, as this excellent volume contains. Let us enjoy what it possesses and can give, without mur-,
muring at what it has not.
Besides the above works, Johnson composed an immense number
of detached pieces of criticism, and distinguished himself as a political
writer. Many of his pamphlets (which were always in support of
extreme Tory or monarchial opinions) obtained great celebrity at the
time. In 1762 he received the gift of a pension of 3001. a-year-a
just though inadequate reward for the utility of his numerous
writings, and his unflinching devotion to the cause of virtue, religion,
and morality.  He also published an edition of Shakspeare, not very
valuable in a philological point of view, from his imperfect acquaintance and sympathy with our older and more romantic literature, but
useful as embodying a large mass of notes and illustrations of disputed
and obscure passages.  The character of Shakspeare's genius, given'
in the preface, is a noble specimen of panegyric; and it is singul;ar
to see how far the divine genius of the dramatist almost succeeds in
overcoming all the prejudices of Johnson's age and education. As
a moralist, as a painter of men and minds, Johnson has done Shakspeare (at least as far as any man could) ample justice; but in his
judgment of the great creative poet's more romantic manifestations
he exhibits a callousness and insensibility which was partly the result
of his education and of the age when he lived, and partly, without
doubt, the consequence of the peculiar constitution of his mind-a
mind which felt much more sympathy with men than with things,
and was much more at home in the "full tide of London existence"
than in the airy world of imagination-among the every-day crowds
of Fleet Street, than in Prospero's enchanted isle, or the moonlit
terraces of Verona. It was this positivism of mind (to borrow a
most expressive French word) that gave him such an extraordinary
and well-deserved supremacy as a conversationist; and it was this
mixture of learning, benevolence, wit, virtue, and good sense that
makes the admirable portrait of him, Daguerreotyped in the memoirs
of his friend and disciple Boswell, the most interesting and living
portrait which literature exhibits of a great and good man-the
perfect embodiment of the ideal of the English character, with all its
honesty, goodness, and nobility, rather individualised than disfigured
by the few and venial foibles and oddities which alloy its sterling gold.




CHAP. XIV.i       HISTORY O  PROSE FICTION.                 251
CHAPTER XIV.
THE GREAT NOVELISTS.
History of Prose Fiction - in Spain, Italy, and France —The Rornance an
the Novel-Defoe-Robinson Crusoe- Source of its Charm -Defoe's Air
of Reality - Minor Works - Richardson - Pamela - Clarissa Harlowe --
Female Characters - Sir Charles Grandison - Fielding - Joseph Andrews
-Jonathan Wild-Tom Jones-Amelia-Smollett-Roderic Random-Sea
Characters-Peregrine Pickle-Count Fathom-Humphry Clinker-Sterne
-'l'ristram Shandy and the Sentimental Journey- Goldsmith- Chinese
Let ters-'I'raveller and Deserted Village-Vicar of Wakefield - Comedies
- Histories.
WE are now arrived at that point in the history of British litera.
ture where, in obedience to the ever-acting laws which regulate intellcctual as they do physical development, a new species of composition
was to originate. As in the material creation we find the several
manifestations of productive energy following a progressive order,
- the lower, humbler, and less organised existences appearing first,
and successively making way for kinds more variously and bounteously endowed, the less perfect merging imperceptibly into the more
perfect, - so can we trace a similar action of this law in the gradual
development of man's intellectual operations.  No sooner do certain
favourable conditions exist, no sooner has a fit nidus or theatre of
action been produced, than we behold new manifestations of human
intellect appearing in literature, in science, and in art, with as much
regularity as, in the primeval eras of the physical world, the animalcule
gave way to the fish, the fish to the reptile, the reptile to the bird,
the beast, and ultimately to man.
Spain, France, and Italy had all possessed the germ or embryo of
prose fiction before it can be said to appear as a substantive, independent, and influential species of literature in Great Britain; and
in each of these countries it manifested itself under a different form,
modified by the character of the respective peoples, the nature of
their language, the character of those antecedent types of literature
which gave birth to or suggested it, and the state of society whose
manners it reflected. In Spain, for example, arising among a
romantic, religious, and chivalrous people, whose memory was full
of the traditions of Moorish warfare, and possessing the acute,
impressible, and yet profound intellect usually resulting from physical
well-being, a considerable degree of political freedom, and a delicious climate, we find it taking the form  of the romance, full of
adventure, and with a splendid prodigality of incident; showing
21




2f29          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. LCHAP. XIV
traces of its mnixed origin in the European delicacy of its humour
and' exquisite sense of the ludicrous, and retaining with the numerous episodes (one inserted within the other, as in the'Thousand and
One Nights') much of the peculiar Oriental structure, together with
the Oriental richness of imagination, and Oriental profusion and
laxity of style. Here we have the union of the Castilian hidalgo
and the Abencerrage, the Goth and the Moor, the lofty sierra and
the smooth and luxuriant vega.  In Italy, again - the Italy of the
fifteenth century-we find a people highly civilised, elegant, commer.
cial, exquisitely sensitive to comic ideas, penetrating, questioning
everything, applying to their government and their religion the
dangerous test of ridicule, yet at the same time in the highest degree
sensuous, with a wonderful and petulant mobility of imagination —
at once childishly superstitious and audaciously sceptical.  Among
them arises Boccaccio, immortalising himself by a collection of tales,
short and pointed-alternately drawing the deepest tears and moving
the broadest laughter-full at once of the grossest indecency and the
highest refinements of romantic purity.
In France, again, we find first the lofty chivalric romance - interminable in length, unnatural and exaggerated in sentiments, but
bearing a general impress of dignity and magnificence-which canraot
but be held as of Spanish origin.  Of this the works of Scuderi
and D'Urf6 are memorable examples.  Secondly, we find another
variety, no less imitated from  the Spanish, in which the meanest
persons of ordinary life are put in motion and pass through a long
series of amusing though often rather discreditable adventures, having no involution of intrigue, and connected together only by the
slender thread of their being supposed to happen to one person. In
this species of fiction (founded upon works which the Spaniards call
stories " de vida picaresca " - of ragamuffin life - from the general
character of the persons and adventures) the French have surpassed
their masters; for much as a careful comparison with the Spanish
originals will induce us to detract from Le Sage's originality, it will
be more than compensated by his genius, when we reflect how far
that admirable writer is superior to Quevedo, Mendoza, and Aleman
and others from whom he so freely borrowed.
From  the above remarks it results that we can establish two
important and distinct forms of prose fiction,-the one treating of
elevated persons, either imaginary or historical, and delineating
serious or important events; the other dealing with men and actions
of a more ludicrous, mean, or everyday character-the romance, in
short, or the novel.  The former species derives its name from  the
long narratives which form the bulk of Middle-Age poetry, which
were generally written in the Romanz dialect; the other from the
short prose tales so popular in Italy and France at the revival of
letters. It is obvious that both these designations have almost com




CIHAP. XIV.]            PROSE FICTION.                       253
pletely lost their original signification.  In England, the romance,
besides the qualities just assigned, is generally the vehicle of a more
artfully constructed and regular plot; while the novel by no means
implies a shorter work, though one of a less grave and ambitious
character.  In a word, though this distinction may he taken as a
general guide to the student, and will aid him perceptibly in classing
these works of fiction, he must by no means take it in too rigid and
invariable an acceptation; or rather, he must not be surprised to find
works partake of both characters.
But, in the department of prose fiction, we hope to be able to
establish for the English literature a claim to a degree of originality
(originality of the highest order, which is exhibited in the separate
creation of a distinct type) not inferior to that which our country
incontestably exhibited in many other departments of intellectual
development-in the romantic drama, for instance.  The father of
our romance and novel was Daniel Defoe, the son of a London
B,+:oharhnpi~_  1 f 61, and educated with considerable care for the
profession of a Presbyterian pastor, but which he renounced for
trade, having during a long and eventful life unsuccessfully engaged
in a great variety of commercial occupations-at one time a hosier,
at another a tilemaker, and ultimately a dealer in wool.  His real
vocation, however, was that of a writer, for he produced an enormous mass of compositions, general pamphlets, either on temporary
and local subjects of political interest, or narratives adapted to suit
the passing taste of the day-in fact, what would be styled by a
French critic "'brochures de circonstance."  In 1699 he published
his'True-born Englishman,' a vigorous poetical effusion, written in
singularly rough and tuneless rhymes, containing a powerful defence
of William of Orange and the Dutch nation; and in 1702 appeared
his celebrated pamphlet,' The Shortest Way with the Dissenters,'
an inimitable piece of sarcastic irony, in which, to exhibit in a hateful
light the unjust and unconstitutional persecution of the dissenting
sects, he puts on the mask of an adherent of government, and gravely
advises parliament to make a law punishing with death any minister
cohvicted of exercising an unorthodox worship.  The government,
infuriated by the bitter satire, prosecuted the author of the pamphlet,
and the uncompromising writer was punished by fine, imprisonment,
exposure in the pillory, and the loss of his ears.  This suggested to
Defoe the strong and excellent poem called' Hymn to the Pillory,'
a powerful expression of the feelings of outraged liberty and patriotism.  During a two years' confinement in Newgate, our indefatigable
writer conducted a periodical publication entitled'The Review,' in
which he boldly attacks the arbitrary and oppressive conduct of
government, and gallantly pleads the cause of liberty and the constitution.  That Defoe must have had a high reputation for honesty
and ability is established by the fact that he was afterwards corn



254           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATERE.  [CIIAP. XIV.
missioned by Queen Anne's government to go to Scotland, in order
to influence the Union between that country and England; and he
appears to have acquitted himself in this delicate mission with
remarkable skill, zeal, and dexterity.  Of this event he afterwards
wrote a history.  Continuing his course as a pamphlet-writer, we
cannot be surprised to find him, after this temporary blink of sunshine in his fortunes, again imprisoned and fined 8001. This confinclment, however, did not last so long as the former, for he was
liberated after two months; and he now appears, either disgusted
with the dangerous and ill-requited profession of a political writer,
or more probably anxious for the welfare of his own family, to have
directed his great powers to a different line of literary exertion-one
in which he could encounter no such persecution as had so frequently
overwhelmed him, and in which present advantage and popularity
were more likely to be attained.
In 1719 appeared the first part of'Robinson Crusoe,' one of.
the most truly genial, perfect and original fictions that the world has,
ever seen. It may be said that some of the high and peculiar merits
of this tale have been the very cause of our not appreciating its
extraordinary qualities as they deserve.  It is almost universally put
into the hands of the very young, and the avidity with which its
pages are devoured by the childish reader, and the never-failing pernanency with which its principal scenes, events, and characters
remain graven on the memory of all who have ever read it, prevent
us from recurring to its perusal, and thus hinder us from applying to
the fiction which enchanted our childhood the test of the more critical
judgment of after life.  Were such a test to be generally applied,
and were we to examine into the means by which those intense
impressions-among the intensest which the memory of childhood.an recall-were produced, Defoe's name would be regarded with
veneration, as that of him who gave our infant curiosity its healthiest
and sweetest food, and our infant sensibilities their most legitimate
and improving action.
Attempts have been made to deprive Defoe of the glory of having
invented the subject and outline of'Robinson Crusoe;' and some
have even suggested that the novelist merely expanded the narrative
of Alexander Selkirk, a Scottish seaman, left (as was a not uncommon punishment among the rude navigators of that time, technically
called "rmtarooning") by his shipmates upon the island of Juan
Fernandez, where he passed a long series of years in a solitary existence, somewhat resembling the supposed life of Crusoe.  But apart
from  the circumstance that the leading idea of the work (a shipwrecked solitary in an uninhabited island of the tropics) implies no
very great stretch of invention, and that such an event is at all times
exceedingly possible, and was then not unfrequent, Selkirk's narrative is extant, and, if compared to the fiction of Defoe, triumphantly




CHAP. XIV.]        DEFOE: ROBINSON CRUSOE.                  255
disproves the accusation above stated, and shows us the imJllense
difference between a meagre statement of bare facts and the powers
of creative genius.  Where shall we find in Selkirk's narrative (the
most striking circumstances of which are the savage and. almost
bestial state to which the unfortunate solitary was reduced) the inexhaustible prodigality of contrivance by which Robinson alleviates
his long reclusion, his attempts at escape, his hopes, his terrors, his
sickness, his religious struggles, hi:s sorrows, and his joys? In Defoe
we associate witn the persons, places, animals, and things of which
he speaks a reality as absolute and intense-nay, often much more
so-as we do with the true recollections of things and people which
surrounded us in childhood.  If  e exarmn    ur own memory we
shall find hat t        f Crusoef  ridav  of Frida's farther of
the goats, the cats.:t.he parrots, of the corn which Crusoe planted
of t.t canoe which he mak s and thev fi'nd& —au ivv for him
aunch, the cave in which he stows his gunpowder the creek in
which_ he lands i'i rf    nd-_m ral t.w-ra'
the-island-we shall find, we repeat, that these images are as stron,.
as intense (as surely, therefore, as real) as our recollection of the
playthings which we broke, the little plot of ground which we
cultivated, the nurse who took care of us, or the woods in which we
went a-nutting. What then is the artifice by which genius has worked
— for even the divinity of genius must work by secondary means —
to do this miracle?  We. rWpy, the admirable causality of Defoe'.s
mind, the couraewith wih  he-renoue   the su ernatural, tlhe
ao   e        t were dena" dement.ohuman character and the most evcrvay o erations of nature.  Ile
miglit have made Crusoe, instead of the plain work-day being that
we behold him-the mate of a merchant-inan, an ordinary man,
neither wise, nor learned, nor ingenious, nor virtuous, beyond the
great mass of human beings-he might have made him intrinsically
(per se) more interesting; but would he not have been relatively'
less so?  In like manner Defoe might have made his work a vehicle
for much more extensive information in natural history,  hysics,
astronomy, &c., than he has done; but would it have been equally
interesting?  This question has been settled by all the innumerable
works which have been written on the model of Robinson Crusoe,
with the laudable object of conveying elementary instruction to the
young through the medium of fiction: as for example, the little book
called'Le Robinson Suisse,' Marryat's' Masterman Ready,'' History of Sir Edward Seaward,' &c.  In all these, and they have all
much merit, the author has injured the effect of his picture by
crowding his canvas with figures, and represented his shipwrecked
families as a great deal too ingenious and adroit, and their exertions
as too uniformly successful.
21 *




256           OUTLINES O GCNERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. XIV.
In  the difficulties encountered by his hero, the author has
frequently represented those as most harassing and as most difficult
to be surmounted which at first thought we should be apt to consider
as trifles: thus, for example, the repeated failures of Robinson to
make an earthenware pot which would stand the fire, or a mechanism
by which to turn his grindstone, are certainly difficulties which a
ouperficial consideration would by no means suggest, and yet which
-eflection would show us were both probable, serious, and surmount)le only by great exertion of thought and labour.  In the same
way the oversights, mistakes, and want of calculation in the supposed
hero are exactly such as might, and probably would, happen to
everybody.  Robinson Crusoe cuts. down a huge tree, and with
immense labour makes a boat which he cannot launch; but Sil
Edward Seaward is far too philosophical to do such a thing. Robinson uses all his ink, and knows not how to make a new stock; but the
father of the Swiss family would have suggested half-a-dozen ingenious compounds which would serve as well, and possibly would have'
manufactured paper into the bargain.  But Robinson possesses just
the average amount of invention, ingenuity, courage, and dexterity,
and therefore every reader can instantly and unfailingly put himself
in Crusoe's place.
The  success of this admirable  story was instantaneous and
immense, and Defoe afterwards published a second part, universally
an'd justly considered as inferior to the first.  The island is changed
into a colony; and the quarrels and labours of the English sailors
and Spaniards, their battles with the savages, though described with
Defoe's neverfailing animation, simplicity, and vigour, fail to interest
us like the inimitable history of the Solitary.  The conclusion of
the work, describing Robinson's voyages and return to England, is
also comparatively uninteresting, though there are to be found in
them several passages and episodes described with impressive power:
as, for example, the ship on fire, the dreadful scene of the crew dying
of hunger, the battle with the wolves, and so on.  They are like
extracts from  the journals of some of our old navigators, simple,
unaffected, picturesque; striking from  the natural pathos of the
rough but kind and honest narrator.
Defoe now poured forth a profusion of narratives detailing th6
adventures and exploits of noted robbers, cheats, and malefactors;
showing an intimate acquaintance with the habits and thoughts of
such persons, and giving to his narratives, by the peculiar magic of
his plain style, all the prestige of reality, a quality which no author
-not even Swift —ever so perfectly attained.  Though the persons
and actions described in this class of works are generally mean and
discreditable, Defoe has not fallen into that base and corrupting error
of more recent literature, of holding up to admiration the characters
and actions of immoral and dishonest men, and making our admira



CHAP. XIV.]         DEFOE': MINOR WORKS.                      257
tion of energy, perseverance, and address, minister to the worst propensities of our nature, by showing these high qualities associated
with unrestrained passions and the deeds of crime.  In his _LLves'
of.M9oll.Flagon,  Colond1 Jak -Captain Singleton &c., Defoeha
_n no t attnn, Ao    ist of these minor
orks we must not omit hi  sJurnal.f  the'     -
tended narrative of tht_.ilene            d n evastated London in
]66Iwritten in thfe haracter of a plain citizen:.and eyewitness of
the horrors he drc.i..In this terrific narrative, many of the
etails of which are probably real, the verisimilitude is so wonderfully maintained, that the book has often been quoted as an authority
on the subject. As a-work of mere descriptive fiction, nothing can
be more awful, more tremenduous, than the hideous phantom of the
maniac, Solomon Eagle, flitting through the city like a messenger of
death, the Great Pit in Aldgate, the Dead-Cart, the apparitions in
the air, or the silent line of ships stretching down the river, " as far
as I could see."
To the numerous p'roofs already alleged of the power, so eminently possessed by Defoe, of what Scott has happily called
"forging the handwriting of nature," i. e. perfectly imitating the
plain and unaffected air of truthful narration, we have only to add
that singular triumph of his peculiar skill in this art, his tract
describing the' Apparition of one Mrs. Veal, the next day after her
death, to one Mrs. Bargrave, at Canterbury, the Eighth of Septei-ber,
1705,'-perhaps the boldest and most adroit experiment upon human
credulity that ever was made.  It is needless to remark that the
whole of this admirably-contrived story, the persons, the place, the
minute and familiar details, the exquisite solution of the objections
to the reality of the apparition, which, with an air of inimitable
candour, Defoe mentions and refutes-in short, the whole wling, is
a pure creation of the novelist's mind, invented to recommend a duli
book on death.  It cannot be wondered at that this consummate
artifice perfectly succeeded, and that, to use the sly words of the
author, " Drelincourt's book is, since this haippened, bought up
strangely."
This great and original genius closed his long, useful, and agitated
existence in 1731, leaving, among the two hundred and ten different
works which he composed, many which will serve the literary student
with the finest models of fictitious incidents, so naturally and artfully
told as to extort to extort the momentary belief of the most sceptical; offering
the metaphysician the materials for solving the abstrusest problems
of credibility.
In the elaborate and once universally read novels of Samuel
Richardson, we shall see evidences of a new advance in the art of
fiction. _e  leadin  aim of Defoe is t  raif             -
etai:h mar_. har,




25           0 OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [cHAP. XIV.
istic is the admirable skill and certainty by which the author excites
and maintains in the reader's mind an involuntary and irresistible
belief in the reality of-the things and persons described..  WTe find
in Richardson the struggle after reality, and the effort to in2ire.
viz., the ide-    tla   r n —ncharacter.  We  ha    assed asit
we-re. fro  a lowen r into a higher  class of organisation. in w-i  the
faculties and funetions of the lower are not su pressed or extinguished-ut those  hichwere Prominen and. a    ital ha become secondary, from the addition of a new and moreelea       element.   We
have advanced to another term of oLr sublime    brssiO anthat progression which begins at zeroand Aseto infi_
All men of great genius seem  to be eminently possessed of the
quality of good sense; and of this truth Richardson, both in his life
and writings, offers a striking confirmation.  He was the son of
rustic parents, in the very humblest class, was born in 1689, and
was apprenticed at the early age of sixteen to a London printer. In
this occupation, not unfavourable (witness Franklin, and other eminent men) to the self-education of an active and well-constituted
mind, he gradually rose to respectability, and ultimately to competence and consideration; for he was afterwards appointed printer of
the Journals to the House of Commons; chosen, in 1754, Master
of the Company of Stationers; and purchased, in 1760, half the
patent or monopoly attached to the lucrative office of King's printer.
Having thus arrived at what must be considered as the highest point
of an active citizen's career, and having by prudence, industry, and
probity, accumulated a handsome fortune, he retired, in the noon of
life, to his pleasant suburban retreat of Parson's Green, near London, where he passed the remainder of his useful and honourable
life.   hraears    to have ben,whether derive  from  natureek.r
nlv resultin  from cirumstances. some thiLng fe'minine in his mental
organisation; forhis works show_ not olly va ood deal of that sensi
tive or rather sentimentalmclancholy  hich charactrJses t      ale
mind, but much of the fem nle timidity of tu.te, the female  aD,peciation of minuliaritie s    8,ancl~      i    b iti ut.  ta 
fLe~maelo. penat.,- _ _d the fermale purity ofmoral sentiment.
Indeed, he appears to have passed much of his life among women;
for, being early distinguished for his talents as a letter-writer, he is
related to have devoted his pen, at one period of his youth, to the
service of three young women in humble life, and to have conducted
their respective love-correspondence.  Perhaps this is the germ of'Pamela' and'Clarissa;" for the female heart, whether bounding
beneath the "sad-coloured" gown of the poor maid-servant, or throb.
bing beneath the diamond stomacher of the duchess, is invariably
and eternally the same. Ithb.q been observed, to, with great justiee
An~~~~Lns enosrvd.o                            a




CIAP. XTV]           RICtHARDSoON: PAMELA.                     259
that Ric  rdsonaLfemale characters are, 4ae1n erall-9 820gMaA_~..L$g..sarably superior inl eth of             7-ivy.a   naturalnt,  2
his men  and we know that one of the innocent weaknesses of te
rreat novelist's advanced life when he was full of years and glory, -
was to receive, le the woman-worshipped Krishna of the Indian
mythology, the delicious incense of admiration and flattery from  a
circle of female adorers which he had assembled around him.
Richardson did not begin to write till he was almost fifty years of
age; when, being urged by two book-sellers to compose a collection
of letters likely to be useful to young people of the lower orders,
and calculated to purify their taste and inculcate principles of morality,
he accepted the task for which he was so well qualified; and in the
course of execution he discovered that his workl (destined primarily,
also, to serve in a great measure as models of an epistolary style)
might be rendered more natural, amusing, and instructive by making
the letters tell a story.  The result was'Pamela,' an admirable and
truly original work of fiction, which at once raised its author to an
unprecedented height of popularity, and instantly annihilated the
vogue of those affected, unnatural, and wearisome romances which
till then had formed the sole amusement of our great-grandmothers.'.Pamela' (which appeared in 17411 said to have been written in three
morn-s, ant  fiee editions of which were exhausted in one year) was,
indeed, an unspeakable improvement upon the interminable and
stilted productions which it for ever displaced; and we can sympathise
with the delight of a female reader of that day, in obtaining a
natural story of ordinary life, full of fine perception of character,
exquisite pathos and tenderness, instead of the absurd exaggerations,
the feeble pomposity of incidents, the puerile uniformity of character,
and everlasting hair-splitting of amorous casuistry, which form  the
substance of the Cyruses and Clelias of the school of Scuderi and
D'Urf6.  It relates, in letters supposed to pass between the principal
personages of the fable-a form of composition from which Richardson never departed —he s1iLrings and tra.ls of thM eautiful heroine
servant- irl  who is persecuted bvmali nit   ~    ie aiI rsed.uction    whose virtue anl constanc  ultimatel  trium  h over all her
en mies an    in ar the  vi  mmQ t                 entl_ nt Jniasr.
Nothing can be simnpler, more illmpretending, more ordinary than
such a canvas.  The cause of the power over our sympathies is the
consummate knowledge of the human  heart-and especially the
female heart-which this excellent author displays, and his wise
boldness in describing, without scruple and exaggeration, even the
most trifling incidents (whether external or mental) as such a story
naturally suggests.'
His first work having been received with a frenzy of'admiration
by the public, and even solemnly recommended fiorm the pulpit, il
was to be expected that Richardson should continue so auspicious a




'260         OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. XIV.
career; a       749.pj r   C,i HarlOwe.' another flction. o
a similar though more ambitious plan, and dealing with personages
in a higher order of society. This work has obtained a European
glory for its author, and has been universally lauded and translated
on the continent, and even in France; and indubitably, as a grand
and impressive moral drama, teaching deep lessons of virtue through
the tragic media of pity and terror, it deserves all its fame.  In
England, however, neither this nor any other of Richardson's novels
can be considered as any longer very generally read.  Accustomed
as we-are to a more fiery, rapid, highly-coloured, and wide-awake
mode of narration, we have in some measure lost our relish for the
manner of this accomplished artist, who produces his effect by an
uninterrupted accumulation of touches individually imperceptible,
by an agglornerative, not a generative process.  If our great modern
works of creative fiction may be compared to the rapid colossal
agency of volcanic fire, the productions of Richardson may resemble
the slow and gradual formation of an alluvial continent, the secular
accumulation of minute particles deposited by the gentle yet irresistible current of a river.  If the volcanic tract-the offspring of firebe sublimely broken into  thunder-shattered mountain-peak and
smiling valley, yet the level delta is not less fertile or less adorned
by its own mild and luxuriant beauty. In'Clarissa,' Richardson
has drawn with more skill and a firmer pencil than was usual with
him the character of a man of splendid talents and attractions, but
totally devoid of morality. Lovelace is familiar to millions of readers
as an admirably strong and natural combination of the most consummate villany with all that can dazzle and impose. In general, it may
be said that Richardson's men, though often marked and individualised by some happy stroke of character, rather resemble men as seen
by women-that is to say, not as they appear to their own sex, but
with something of that involuntary inaccuracy which necessarily
accompanies the estimate of one sex by the other.  They are men,
but seen through a female atmosphere.  The, pathos in'Clarissa
Harlowe' is carried to an intense and almost unendurable intensity,.
and the catastrophe is worthy to be compared, for overwhelming and
irresistible agony, to the noblest efforts of pathetic conception in,
Scott, in our elder dramatists, or in the Greek tragedians.
Four years had not elapsed ere Richardson's indefatigable industry
gave to the world his third and last great fiction, the' Sir Charles
G-randison.' In this he endeavoured to give us his ideal of the character
of a perfect hero-a union of the good Christian and the accomplished English gentleman. But Sir Charles, the model man of Richardsorn'r imagination, is generally found to be exceedingly tiresome and
pedantic; and the heroine, Miss Harriet Byron —a similar model of
fevmale perfection-is, like her lover, exceedingly cold, tame, and
uninteresting.  In general, we must reproach this novel, even in a




CHAP. XIv.J         FIELDING: EARLY LIFE                    261
higher degree than the rest of Richardson's fictions, with the fault
of inordinate lengthiness.  It is true that these works, enormous in
length as they are, were an immeasurable improvement, in this
respect as well as in the more important qualities of naturalness and
interest, upon the egregious tomes which they supplanted; and likewise that, Richardsol's manner depending upon the progressive
accumulation of minute incidents and strokes of character, we
speedily become involuntarily carried away by the gentle and equable
current of his narration, and are compelled, as it were by magic, to
read every page of what we began with reluctance and even with
disgust; yet this author abuses the liberal concessions of patience
which we make, and even the admirable and truly profound
picture of despair and madness in the unhappy Clementina cannot
reconcile us to the eternal bowing and formal hand-kissing of tiresomec Sir Charles, or the minute and detailed description (occupying
Heaven knows how many pages) of the wedding-clothes of the
happy pair.  The fact is, that, with that feminine quality which
we have suggested as characteristic of Richardson's mind, he possessed also a womanly interest in, and reliance upon, minute and trivial
incidents, and a womanly admiration for fine clothes and the externals
of human life.  Besides this, he was a man who appears never to
have mixed in aristocratic society, and the bourgeois tone of his
mind is as perceptible in his conceptions as in- his style, which,
though always what the Parisians expressively call cossu, was at first
rather mean and vulgarly fine, though he gradually rendered it both
more expressive and less affected, for there is a progressive improve.
ment in this respect to be traced through his successive works.  HE
was of course personally unacquainted with that tone of ease and
sinolicitv which always accompanies the intercourse of the higher
classes~of o laet  i whi   asL the    n                  m  have
no fear of beingmistaken for hat they are o. the   ave no temptatomnto P.hbhit, themso. vaother than as the  are.  With these
deductions duly lmade. Richardson  will appear to every candid mind
a. great- rofonund. creative, and, above _all. truly.orlingal geniums
devotina a lowerful and a ivntelect to the hol cause of virtue
and ihoonouria broht ornament to human nature and a, rime cory
fT his con-.%: I.eratre.                                  - 
Perhaps there never existed a character so eminently attractive --
o emphatically loveable-as that of Henry Fielding, or'"poor
Harry Fielding," as one always calls him in one's own mind.  As
an author Fieldin  was atonce the complement and cont 
Richardson, and in every feature of- their personal and mental pnortraits an.opposition miriht be traced out so strikin. that such a
co     in tuoh  efect.   would resemble a chter f La
oohe.hfnnuold, or an antithetical sketchfrom La Bruvbre.   He was
descended from an ancient and distinguished branc of the higher




2~62         OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. XI V.
nobility of England, being the son (born in 1707) of General Fielding, and grandson of the Earl of Denbigh.  His father was a man
of gay and extravagant habits, and, dying early, left a large family
in very embarrassed circumstances. Henry was imperfectly educated,
first at Eton, and afterwards at the University of Leyden, where his
studies were suddenly interrupted, and he was forced to return home,
by absolute want of funds-" money-bound," as he wittily called it
himself. His father dying in inextricable difficulties, and leaving his
son a nominal income of 2001. a-year (for there was no fund from
whence it was to be paid), young Fielding was compelled, at a very
early age, to eke out by his own exertions a very scanty income he
inherited from his mother, and partly from the marriage-portion of
his wife —Miss Cradock, a beautiful and most amiable person —whom
ne appears to have loved with an intensity of affection such as such
an object was likely to inspire, and so passionate a temperament as
Fielding's to feel.  But Fielding was an ardent lover of pleasure,
and totally incapable of economy, calculation, or self-denial: he
lived in a style totally inconsistent with his means, thinking only of
the present moment, and in three years found himself completely
ruined. During this time he had obtained precarious and scanty
subsistence by writing for the stage; and his dramatic compositions
form about a third part of his collected works.
They are chiefly vaudevilles and light comic or farcical productions,
such as were the fashion of the day, and they form  a melancholy
proof of Fielding's total inaptitude for the stage.  It is singular to
see that Fielding's creative power, which in the novels has given us
such numberless conceptions of human character, should be totally
wanting in these pieces, in spite of the bold, careless vivacity with
which they are written.  To this remark there is but one exception. —the admirable burlesque of'Tom Thumb,' a gay and farcical extrava-'
ganza, ridiculing (as'The Rehearsal' had done before, and as Sheri-.-dan's' Critic' was to do afterwards) the absurdities and affectations.of the style of tragedy in vogue at the time.
* He was now totally ruined; but, with many other features of they
French national character, he possessed much of that versatility of
talent for which our continental brethren are so celebrated, and,
above all, their contentedness of disposition and gaiety under every
change of fortune.  "His happy constitution," says Lady Miafy
Montagu, his kinswoman, "even when he had, with great pains,
half demolished it, made him forget every evil when he was before
a venison pasty and a flask of champagne; and I am persuaded he
has known more happy moments than any prince upon earth.  His
natural spirits gave him rapture with his cook-maid, and cheerfulness
when he was starving in a garret." It was not until 1742, i. e.
when Fielding had reached his thirty-fifth year, that he began that
career of glory as a novelist that will continue till time shall be no




CHAP. XIV.]       FIELDNoG: JOSEPH ANDREOWS.                 263
more, as long as men shall delight in wit, humour, originality, and
art.  At this rgrid the',Pamela' of Richardson was in the full
blaze of PoPularity, and Fieldinc was exatl t    man to areiate
the  -u'icrous si es of the book which everv reader was devouring
-F/__krt-ure.   heman of fashion, the gay Drodira ihe  unter
ua -J eai ir~t'matye ve           lhe  ivsteriesof humanif,
who had mov w                redelie easethh evr_.zrht
r   the social system uvhose exquisite sense of character must h v
made  him accuratel  observe ever ws      f  m,n _nesand
_ae in       dm ath                        hi _shaaLte
oys, th.e distresses. anthnrxoni _f evr:y cla   f ociety ad
~hose easy laxitm a held as  niety
hey were accompanied a        se  y. gena Qsit
~Ean!u libralit   ni1ug-s          person must have looked uPo.
Richardson's famous novel as fairntame for ridicuele and burlespie.
he printer's choice of an humble heroine, his vulgarity of style,
his citizen-like inculcation of strict morality and the tamer virtues,
his homely incidents, and, more than all, perhaps, the atmosphere of
sentimental melancholy thrown over the whole, and the elaborate
painting of the mental sufferings and the delicate sorrows of a
female heart-all this suggested to Fielding the happy idea of a
parody or burlesque. Scarron immortalized himself by the' Roman
Cotnique,' written to parody the effeminate affectations, the romantic
fictions of his time; and the'Joseph Andrews' of Fielding, though
written to caricature a particular author, has not only in a great
measure tended to render that author obsolete, but must be considered
as the foundation of a new species of writing —the addition of a new
province to literature-the opening of a new source of intellectual
delight. How disproportionate are sometimes effects to their causes!
the sight of a soldier scraping his rusty musket was the proximate
origin of the art of mezzotint, and the parody of a popular novel
was the generating influence of Fielding's admirable fictions! In
llienh Andrgy~s' the wicked       of Fielding gave the  ubli"c a
Giost irresistible caricature of'Pamela:' to add to the  inuan   of his
_ttckhe reprts his heroa ta..he_._oher of he riml virtuous
Peland   resistin  the amatory advances of his mistre         ady
Boobv.  This picture of virtue triumphant in a young footman, is
irresistibly comic; and the after adventures of Joseph Andrews,
when turned out of his place, and wandering through England with
his friend, the never-to-be-forgotten  Parson Adams, give noble
earnest of the wonderful fertility, freshness, and vigour of the
creative intellect that was to give us so many hours of mirth and
amusement.  Noin          be   more different than the ma nner o
Lyuse  too breth,,t
and heated atosphere of a eitya: in the othrymar
rmina sturdy pedestrnalongd
ram1 s22 l- _na ggh_hi-ha
22




26t4          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CtIAP'. XIV.
a fresh.                       an     xiwith the ev r —varying
of assoenffers, or laughing soundlv out wihtbhzt/.~a.gabonds  ou encounter, now in a foxhunter's antlle,        -.with
the Dicturesue, if not always verv reputable, figures smoking an
drining round  alehouse fire. In Richardson your ear is perpetually filled with the rustle of a petticoat-in Fielding it is struck by'
the loud roar of the rustic wag, or the lusty knock of a stout crab.
tree cudgel encountering some peasant's skull. The character of
Adams would be enough to immortalise even the grand'Cyrus'
itself; his goodness of heart, poverty, learning, ignorance of the
world, combined with his courage, modesty, and a thousand oddities,
make it a portrait to be placed beside that of Sancho Panha or My
Uncle Toby.
After this excellent and original work, Fielding, who had no*i
found his true literary element, and who must have enjoyed, in
tracing his ever-varying scenes and personages, the unspeakable
rapture of genius, published his'Journey from this World to the
Next,' a half-narrative, half-satirical production, not deserving of
a more than passing allusion.?his-was succeeded bybthe'Life and
Adventures of JonatLan Rild the Great —-a fiction   i      under
h        f  scribithe histor    anotorious cheat robber, and
thief-taker, executed aboutf tat t'e   he has~ geiven us a fine safiric,
invective. ~ The principal character is so utterly odious, so mean as
well as so atrocious a scoundrel, that the reader can feel no sympathy
with him, and therefore no interest in his story; but there are
several inimitable scenes and characters - for instance, the Ordinary
of Newgate, who prefers punch to wine, "the rather as it is nowhere
spoken against in the Scripture," and the inimitable sermon on the
text, "To the Greeks, foolishness."
In 1749 appeared his greatest work,'Tom  Jones,' which has
been translated into every civilized language. Fielding had a high
opinion of the importance of the novel in literature; he placed it
on a level with the epic: and we cannot accuse him of indifference
to the gravity of that task which he considered so dignified —the~
profession of the novelist. Perhaps in no other work do we find*
such a variety of events, each exquisitely probable and amusing, adll
converging so infallibly to a catastrophe at once inevitable and sur-l
prising.  A great part of the adventures of this, as of Fielding's
other works, take place in inns and on the road; a circumstance to
be accounted for by the much greater duration of journeys in those
days, when men travelled mostly on foot or on horseback, and consequently spent more of their time in journeys.  This has tended to
increase the tone of coarseness with which we, accustotned to much
more refined habits of society, should be at first liable to reproach
the great novelist, whom Byron calls " the prose Homer of human'
nature." He may also be charged, and.justly, with a very low'




CHAP. XIV.]         FIELDING: TOM JONES.                    265
standard of moral rectitude and virtue.  His heroes, nevel deficient
in generosity and courage, are generally very coarse in taste, and
not over-delicate or scrupulous; as, for example, in that degrading
episode of Jones and Lady Bellaston.  We always conceive his
heroes as stout, fresh, broad-backed young fellows, with prodigious
calves; and his heroines are singularly deficient in ladylike attributes.  But hardly any author in the world has succeeded in giving
interest to the accomplished young lady and charming young gentleman who farm the nucleus of their intrigue; the jeune pre'mier
and ingenue are as insipid in fiction as on the stage and in real life:
and if Fielding has failed where few or none have succeeded, he has
made ample amends in the vast crowd of admirable impersonations
which are recalled to our memory by the mere mention of his name,
-Partridge, Towwowse, Adams, Allworthy, Trulliber, Squire
Western, Square, Thwackum, Ensign Northerton, and a thousand
more. Nor would it be grateful in us to forget the rich and constant
stream of animal spirits, fresh and abundant as a mountain spri:g,
sparkling as champagne, ever bubbling up, as it were, from the
perennial fount of good nature and humanity which God had
created in the generous heart of Fielding; nor his easy command
of a vast store of knowledge, both of books and of the world; nor
his simple, vigorous, unaffected English; nor the tenderness of his
healthy sensibilities.
In 1749 he was appointed, by the patronage of Lord Lyttleton,
to the office of a London police magistrate, and however we may
regret the necessity which obliged such a man as Fielding to fulfil
duties so inconsistent with his literary pursuits, and in an office
which at that time was neither very well paid nor over reputable, it
not only gave him many opportunities of exhibiting remarkable zeal,
activity, and address as a public functionary, but possibly furnished
him with some of those strokes of low life and humour which enrich
his admirable writings.
The death of his wife plunged the generous and impressionable
heart of Fielding for a time into the deepest despair; but, with that
facility of temper which so strongly characterized him, he not long
after consoled himself by marrying his late partner's favourite maid,
with whom it had been his only relief, during the first poignant
agonies of his bereaval, "to mingle his tears, and to lament together
the angel they had lost."  His second wife, however, strange as it
may appear, proved a most faithful and excellent partner, and a good
mother to his children; and the warm affection of Fielding soon
after erected, in honour of his first wife, the companion of his early
struggles, the noblest and most enduring monument that genius ever
consecrated to love and grief.  This was the romance of'Amelia,'
in which the exquisite picture of conjugal virtue and feminine charm
in the heroine, the character and even the infidelities of Booth (her




266           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CIIAP. XIV
husband), and a multitude of minor persons and events, are evidently
transcripts from reality, and (there is little doubt) faithful copies of
his own early history.'Amelia' is a delightful and touching work 
its interest is intimate and domestic; and whatever diminution of
gaiety and movement may be perceptible in it, when compared to
either of its two great predecessors, is more than made up by the
calmer, tenderer, and  more  home-speaking  tone  which  reigns
throughout its pages.  The characters are touched with consummate
skill: Colonel Bath is a perfect masterpiece: and many of the
scenes-that, for instance, at Vauxhall, the appearance before the
magistrate, the adventures in prison, and so on-are drawn with
Fielding's usual vivacity and skill.
Fielding's constitution was now quite broken up, partly with his
early irregularities of life, and partly by his severe exertions both
as a magistrate and as a writer; and having been ordered by his
physicians to -try a warmer climate, he made a voyage to Lisbon.
Of this expedition he has left a journal, in which we see the last
faint glow of his admirable genius, and the undiminished gaiety and
good-humour of his character, glimmering through the clouds of
sorrow and disease.  He set out for Lisbon in the spring of 1754;
and, after lingering till October of the same year, he expired there
of a complication of disorders (among which dropsy was the chief),
and was buried in the cemetery of the British Factory in that city.
To conclude this notice in the solemn and majestic language of
Gibbon: "Our immortal Fielding was of the younger branch of
the Earls of Denbigh, who drew their origin from  the Counts of
Hapsburg, the lineal descendants of Eltrico, in the seventh century
Dukes of Alsace.  Far different have been the fortunes of the
English and German divisions of the family of Hapsburg: the
former, the knights and sheriffs of Leicestershire, have slowly risen
to the dignity of the peerage; the latter, the Emperors of Germany
and Kings of Spain, have threatened the liberty of the Old, and
invaded the treasures of the New World.  The successors of Charles
V. may disdain their brethren of England; but the romance of'Tom Jones,' that exquisite picture of human manners, will outlive
the palace of the Escurial and the imperial eagle of Austria."
The field of prose fiction, so vigorously and productively cropped
by Defoe, Richardson, and Fielding, was rather fertilized than exhausted; and put forth another and hardly less luxuriant harvest
of novelty and wit in the hands of Tobias Smollett, whose genius,
though perhaps of a somewhat lower order than that of his tw~
great and immediate predecessors, was not less rich and inventive,
and certainly not less permanently popular, his works appealing tc
those faculties of, the mind which are most universal-the sentiment
of the ludicrous and the grotesque, and the avidity for surprising yet
n'atural adventure.  This great but unhappy man (for what misfor



et'n    XIV.]              SiMULLETr.                       267
tune is more deplorable than an irritable and querulous temperament?) was born in Dumbartonshire, in Scotland, in te year 1721,
and was educated by the kindness of a grandfather.  Having passed
some time, as an apprentice, in the service of one Gordon, an apothecary of Glasgow, he journeyed up to London, a poor, unfriended,
and probably uncouth Scottish lad, with the intention of supporting
himself as a literary man, and carrying with him his manuscript of
a tragedy entitled'The Regicide.' This work, the production of an
inexperienced youth of Dineteen, was totally unsuccessful; and after
struggling for some time with failure and distress, which the infallible
instinct of genius must have rendered peculiarly bitter, he underwent the examination of surgeon's mate, and accompanied in this
capacity the ill-fated expedition to Carthagena.   If'IRoderick
Random' and'Peregrine Pickle' could not have existed without
their author having mingled in the scenes which he portrays, who
can complain of the price at which Smollett purchased his fame?
or would Smollett himself have held that glory as bought too dear?
On his return from that disastrous expedition in 17416, our author
continued for some time the career of a miscellaneous writer, and
generally of political pamphlets of a very fierce and virulent coinplexion; for Smollett's temperament was almost morbidly irritable,
and his numerous changes of party were the results rather of per-,
sonal feeling than of any very solid convictions on public or abstract
grounds. He published a number of satires and other pieces, in
which sincerity of invective and great ease of fancy are the most
conspicuous merits.  The verses, however, entitled'The Tears of
Scotland' are powerful and pathetic; and many of the lines in his'Ode to Independence' have a fine lyric grandeur of impersonation.
It was not until 1748 that he published his'Adventures of
Roderick Random,' and the world at once perceived that a great and
original novelist had appeared, likely to show that the fertility of
English genius in prose fiction was not exhausted, and capable of
disputing the crown of supremacy with Fielding himself. Nature,
the image and shadow of God, is, like Him, infinite; and Art, the
idealization of Nature, and the sublimest emanation firom the
Divinity, is, like its parent, boundless.  There can be no doubt that
Fielding was a far superior artist to his admirable successor. Jis
lo.s are infinitely finer  moae far-reaching in their conception, and
ri-ed on  with more skill. o.herence  and nrobabilitv.  Smollett'an hardlv be said to. havean plot: a -.rlhisworks are a secession
Gf adventures which Lhave no oh   oe'n th             ppeninm a
one hero; the  can bno mor                    of a whole coucingn to a natural and distant cattr l            the successi
nages   a        -lan
2  *rriaeS      noedre.kh  -arlof.es —
22 *




268          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CItAP. XIn.
an oranizati2  like FI-e;rdn     ht'am ee juxtaposition.  Indeed,
so intense was the objectiveness of Smollett's fancy, so completely
was he identified with the specific scene of drollery which was in
hand —so "totus in illa"- that he perpetually sacrifices to theii
effect the consistency of his characters; never scrupling to represent
his hero, for example, as cowardly, ugly, or contemptible, provided
by so doing he can augment the comicality of the incident.  The
view of life to be derived fronm the fictions of Smollett is not a very
consoling nor a very elevating one: the instances of generous
feeling and self-sacrifice are chiefly assigned to personages incessantly
placed in a ludicrous light; as, for instance, the faithful Strap, who
exhibits much more delicacy than his unfeeling and ungrateful
master: and if, as seems more than probable, Roderick Random is
a true embodiment of Smollett's own London reminiscences, and
Strap a real character, the author has indirectly convicted himself
of a degree of selfishness which, it is but just to say, the whole
tenor of his life disproves.  But his reat force lies in the vivid and
ev-         n  tinaen uos ao a roba  an   arcical cast
and.f              oddities o those numerous characters (or what
may be cal1qd natura    atues)  hich andvbSoav MIDZ.
_ f-~socety.  In one class of these oddities he is unrivalled -sailors.
His own experience in the navy brought him in contact with this
class of men (a class still distinguished in England by marked peculiarities, and at that time forming a perfectly distinct and peculiar
species, little known to their countrymen), and gloriously has
Smollett worked this new and fertile vein of singularity.  The rude
kindness, the fidelity, the contempt for money, the ignorance of the
world, the courage, superstition, and all the habits of the English
seaman (a type as strongly individual as the vieux moustache of the
Old Guard, or the backwoodsman of the Far West), are described
under a dozen different forms with a verve and animation showing
the author's profound knowledge of the subject, and producing the
most intense delight in the reader.  What a number of names arise
at the mention of Smollett's admirable sailors!-Lieutenant
Bowling with his cudgel, the choleric Ap-Morgan with his toasted
cheese and family pride, Admiral Trunnion on his wedding expedition, and the ingenious and taciturn Pipes. Nor are sailors the only
portraits which attest a master-hand: the low characters of every 
kind-prostitutes, sharpers, tipstaves, and all the vermin of society
-are vividly and amusingly delineated.
The next novel produced by Smollett was'Peregrine Pickle,'
strongly resembling, in its merits and deficiencies, the work which
preceded it.  If the adventures of Peregrine are still more discreditable than those of Roderick, and the character of the hero even less
respectable, ample amends are made by the side-splitting humour's
of Admiral Trunnion, Hatchwav, and Pipes, with their amphibious




CHIAP. xIV.]      COUNT FATHOM -QUIXOTE.                      29
household, and the drollery of many incidents of the hero"s travel;
in France, not forgetting the irresistible supper in the manner of
the ancients, which
" Would move wild laughter in the throat of death."
At two successive intervals of two years he produced his third
fiction, entitled'The Adventures of Ferdinand Count Fathom,' and
a translation of' Don Quixote.'  The former work resembles in its
plan and execution his previous novels. with the difference, however,
that it is pitched in a much higher key of moral impressiveness. and
was intended less to amuse by the oddity of the incidents, than to
give an impressive picture of the certain degradation and gradual
descent of infamy that follow a youthful neglect of honour and
generosity.  It may in some sense be called a companion-picture to
Fielding's'Jonathan  Wild.'  But Fathom  is far superior in
interest to Fielding's hero —not personally, it is true, for he is as
base and contemptible a rascal as the other, but from his superior
dexterity and address, and from  the consequent greater variety of
his adventures.  He is a heartless scoundrel, who, after becoming a
gambler and "chevalier d'industrie," dies in misery and despair.
Despite of the gloomy and discouraging tone which prevails through
this picture, somle of the scenes (as for instance that admirable one
in which Fathom is rooked at play in a French coffeehouse by a
more adroit sharper disguised as a raw booby English squire) are
full of Smollett's usual vivacity.  The translation of'Quixote'the most untranslatable of all books-is also a failure: it wants
that picturesque and romantic tone which is so great a charm in the
original —that tenderness of feeling in the midst of, and modifying,
the wildest extravagance of gaiety, which forms as it were the
atmosphere of the southern humour, and distinguishes alike the
frantic wit of the old comedy of Greece, the broad burlesque of the
primitive Italian stage, and glows with such a steady and yet subdued
radiance through the pages of the gentle Cervantes.  Smollett's'Don Quixote' wants sun-the sun of La Manecha.
During a considerable portion of his life Smollett had been unsuccessfully struggling to establish himself as a physician; he was for
some time the principal writer in the' Critical Review,' one of the
first progenitors of that class-now so numerous in England and
elsewhere-of periodical publications devoted at once to political
disquisition and the criticism of books.  For this dangerous trade.Smollett possessed no qualifications but those of sincerity, learning,
and genius; and though his strictures were never dictated by an
unworthy motive, they were strongly and involuntarily coloured by
personal feelings, and raised around our impatient' and thin-sl;inned
author a swarm of hornets-enraged doctors, offended politicians,
an(l, more venomous and implacable still, the insulted -anity of




270          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. XIV.
literary pretension.  For some severe remarks on the conduct of
Admiral Knowles, Smollett was convicted of a libel, imprisoned
for a considerable time, and fined 1001.  During his confinement he
composed'Sir Lancelot Greaves,' a most unfortunate attempt to
transfer to the England of the eighteenth century that admirable
picture which Cervantes had drawn of Spain in the sixteenth. In
such a state of society, and among such a people, as that of Spain
in the days of Cervantes, the existence and adventures of the Don
were neither impossible nor even at all inconceivable; but what
shall we say of a young English squire of good family setting out
(in the reign of George II.), attended by an old sea-captain for his
Sancho Panga, for the redress of wrongs, with the chivalrous
language and even the arms of Quixote? The madness of the
Spanish hero, drawn with so delicate and reverent a hand, affcts
only a particular class of his mental perceptions, and is, besides,
perfectly conceivable when taken into consideration with the age, the
position, the limited education of a poor country gentleman of Spain;
but the madness of Greaves, affecting a mind and body otherwise
sound, a handsome, virtuous, and enlightened Englishman (in so
unromantic an age and country too), is a mania which renders him
fit for Bedlam, and excites our pity rather than our sympathy. Such
be the inevitable fate of imitation!
Smollett, after this, composed a continuation of Hume's' History
of England,' said to have been written in fourteen months; and after
a journey through France and Italy, in which his splenetic disposition, probably aggravated by ill health, found no language but contempt with which to speak of the great monuments of ancient art,
lihe published'The Adventures of an Atom,' a satire upon his former
patron, Bute. In 1770 ill health again drove him abroad, and he
resided some time at Leghorn, where he died, October 21st, 1771.
Thus, like his great predecessor Fielding, this admirable novelist
expired in a foreign land.
During the year of tranquillity which Smollett passed in  the
delightful climate of Italy, the genius of this great writer shed its
last and most genial ray; it was like the setting sun, pouring forth a
calmer and gentler radiance as it sank below the horizon.  It was
here that he composed'Hlumphry Clinker,' the richest and most
exquisite picture of English manners which his pen had ever delineated.  It is a tale related in letters, supposed to be written by the
admirably-contrasted members of a family visiting the then fashionable watering-place of Bath; and the adventures, irresistibly comic
in themselves, receive a double power over our laughter, and some.
times over our tears too, when seen, as it were, through the medium
of the characters who describe them.  The irritable but benevolent.Bramble (a portrait of Smollett himself), with his querulous richness;t imagination, the never-to-be-forgotten Mrs. Tabitha and Winifred




CHAP. XIV.]          STERNE: EARLY LIFE.                    271
Jenkins, the simplicity of HIumphry Clinker, and the humours of
Lismahago-all these make the novel equal, if not superior, to the
finest productions of Smollett's meridian genius.
There are few great names in literature whose intellectual and
personal character present such a tissue of inconsistencies and paradox
as the life and writings of Lawrence Sterne.  Both as a man and as
n author, there is in this truly original person such a union of apparently incompatible merits and defects, that it is impossible not to
feel all our systems of moral and intellectual speculation completely at
a loss when applied to him.
Sterne was borne in 1713, at Clonmel, in Ireland; and was the
son of a lieutenant of an infantry regiment.  But though the future
author of the'Sentimental Journey' came into the world in very
poor and unpromising circumstances, his mother's relations (many of
whom were rich English clergymen) not only secured him a good
education-finished at Jesus College, Cambridge-but also pointed
out the ecclesiastical profession as his future path in life.  Sterne,
on entering orders, obtained the living of Sutton, in Yorkshire, t~
which he afterwards added a prebendary of the cathedral in the same
archbishopric; and he ultimately acquired by marriage the presenta.
tion to another preferment in the Church.  Neither his life nor his
character, however, were more in accordance with his sacred functions
than his face or writings —the features of Sterne being strongly comic,
marked with a most singular mixture of penetration, gaiety, and an
almost morbid sensibility; while his unfeeling conduct to his wife,
and his perpetual squabbles with his brother clergymen, were as little
in accordance with the susceptibility he vaunted as with the character
of a country pastor.  It was one of these squabbles that gave Sterne
the opportunity of displaying his satiric humour; for his first work
was a pamphlet, in which, under a burlesque history of a village uproar about a "good warm watchcoat," he made so droll and severe a
reflection on the greediness for reversionary preferment exhibited by
one of the Yorkshire clergymen, that the person ridiculed is said to
have relinquished his claim on condition that Sterne would suppress
the pasquinade.  In it one may see the dawn, the embryo, of much
of his peculiar manner.
In 1759 our author visited London, carrying with him the two
first volumes of'Tristram Shandy,' which excited, on their appearance, such a tumult of enthusiasm, that the writer immediately
ascended to the summit of popularity, and was urged by universal
acclamation to continue the book; two more volumes of which were
given to the world in 1761, and again two more the yeqr following.
This eagerness of the public cannot be attributed to thA same cause
which made the ladies besiege Richardson with prayers to finish  isb'Clarissa,' viz. -intense interest in the story, and eagerxness to le,-n
the catastrophe; for in Sterne's fiction there is absolutely neit)-r




272           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. XIV.
plot nor catastrophe to learn; and one of the principal oddities of
the book, and chief sources of the impression it produced, was that
it cannot be called a story at all, seeing that it has not one of the
Aristotelian requisites-a beginning, a middle, or an end. Its charm
consists in the easy, rambling style, in the exquisite touches of
pathos and humour that alternately glow and sparkle through its
pages, in the familiarity established between the reader and the fantastic gossiping author, and, above all, in the delicate and masterly
delineations of its many admirably conceived characters.  In this
last respect there is something Shakspearian in Sterne's manner;
and he, like the greatest creator of character that the world has
ever seen, develops and depicts the personage rather by words than
actions-rather by unconscious self-betrayals than by elaborate
description.  Much of the popularity of the book arose-at least
when it appeared-from the fearless novelty of the style, full of
breaks and interruptions, abrupt and exclamatory rather than continuous, which, though certainly in part natural, was also in some
measure a trick of art.  This peculiarity at first gives a great charm
and raciness, but soon rather offends than pleases; for we speedily
perceive that it is, like the perpetual interruptions and digressions, a
piece of mechanical artifice.
The obscure erudition which so astonished the readers of Sterne's
time, when the study of the Middle-Age literature was accounted a
barbarous pedantry, will now be found neither very accurate nor very
extensive; and we now perceive that this author, apparently so
original in his form, was one of the most unblushing plagiarists that
ever wrote, borrowing incessantly from Rabelais and Burton, and
owing, indeed, nearly the whole of his imagery to those authors,
even now little, and then never, read.  Coleridge has acutely remarked, that the character of Mr. Shandy in this novel is an embodiment of pure intellect, and that of My Uncle Toby an irnpersonation of unmixed goodness of heart; and an amusing parallel
might be made between these two admii-able characters and Panurge
on the one hand, and Pantagruel on the other —the chef-d'wsurres
of the immortal romance of the cure of Meudon.  Sterne must
claim all the merit of individualizing these conceptions, of bringing
them down from the airy regions of burlesque to the familiar reality,
the flesh-and-blood consistency of common life, of incrusting them
in the ordinary incidents and manners of the English society of the
day, and of surrounding them with a train of minor personages, as
exquisitely real, individual, and varied as ever were imagined -by the
fancy of genius-Mrs. Shandy, the ideal of nonenity, a character
profoundly individual from its very absence of individuality; the
choleric and uncharitable Dr. Slop, Yorick, Obadiah, the Widow
Wadman, and Susannah.  Toby and Corporal Trim  are two noble
rartraits of goodness and gentleness, sketched in with most delicate




CHAP. XIV.J      STERNE: TRISTRAM  SHANDY.                  2 73
strokes of Humour's own pencil, and glowing with the iris tints of
tenderness and pity.  How identical are the chief elements of these
two characters, and yet how admirably are they distinguished!
The perpetual digressions, interruptions, blank and marbled pages
which abound in Sterne, produce at first an air of oddity and surprise, which soon merges into something like contempt; but the
innumerable effusions of true pathos, the exquisite relations of
simple and affecting incidents, will remain for ever a deep and peculiar charm, and be his title to a durable glory.  At two different
m,,jinds Sterne made a tour on the continent, first to France, and
ftel. geis to France and Italy; and found no difficulty in appending
lis inlpressions of foreign manners to the desultory pages of'Tris-ram Shandy.'  These impressions are often read separately as'The
Sentimental Journey,' a little volume full of the most charming
strokes of tenderness and wit, which has obtained a European reputation. With the exception of some passages of too warmly-coloured
description (a defect rendered more dangerous by the delicate and
romantic tone of Sterne's writings, and one from which none of
his works are free), this volume justifies the author's reputation;
and he particularly deserves our praise for the gentle and cosmopolite spirit which makes him  perceive and appreciate the peculiar
merits of other nations, and do justice not only to their'arts and
their triumphs, but even to the amiable peculiarities of their national
character and manners.  This Sterne laboured to do, and both Eng.
land and France have well rewarded him.  Many of the episodes
of this singular writer are familiar to all readers, and these are
generally the -most pathetic passages: the picture of Captivity, the
Dead Ass, Maria, the story of Lefevre, the Sermon read by Trim,
and a thousand others, immediately recur to the reader's memory:
these are the most popular, because they are the most intelligible to
all. But he who should confine himself to these would form a
very imperfect notion of Sterne's literary and intellectual portrait
The comic passages must be read also; and the conversations of Mir.
Shandy, Toby, and Trim, the numerous soliloquies and artful
betrayals of the minutest shades of character, must be studied ere
we can form a true notion of the singularly complex idiosyncrasy of
the author, or the delicate brilliancy of his style.
Sterne died in 1768, in London, whither he had gone to supcrin.
tend the printing of his' Sentimental Journey;' and it is not to be
wondered at that the flattery which he received, acting on an imu
pressible temperament, should have weakened a character naturally
neither very virtuous nor very firm.  His health had been during
nearly his whole life exceedingly precarious; and though his
writings show  the warmest and tenderest glow  of feeling and
generosity, his life was by no means in accordance with such scntiments.




274 p        OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. XIV.
If the writings, and particularly the character, of Sterne be found
to possess a strong resemblance to the national idiosyncrasy of the
French people and genius, Oliver Goldsmith must undoubtedly stand
for the most complete embodiment, the beau ideal, of the artist character.  This we see in every act, both good and bad, of his romantic
life, so full of vicissitudes, of glory and distress, of folly and generosity, of profound ignorance of the world and deep though transient
impressibility, of genius and of shame, of childish vanity and tender
wisdom.  Much of this arises, doubtless, from  his Irish birth; and
there is not a greater contrast than between the lives and characters
of the two illustrious friends who were at the head of the literature
of their day, Johnson and the author of'The Vicar of Wakefield.'
The one is the very personification of the Englishman, the other of
the Irishman. Both starting from an obscure and humble origin,
both struggling through the early part of their career with every
obstacle, Johnson emerged from the "sea of troubles" which threatened to overwhelm him by the simple vigour of moral and intellectual
energy; Goldsmith floated above the waves by the innate buoyancy
of a careless and happy temperament: one was a strong swimmer;
the other was the stormy petrel. Goldsmith was the son of a poor
Irish curate, whose utmost exertions could hardly give bread to a
large family; and was born in July, 1728, at the village of Lishoy,
in Longford-a village afterwards immortalised in one of his most
exquisite productions.  He was partially and very imperfectly educated by the kindness of his uncle, Mr. Contarine, who sent him  to
Dublin University, where the youth distinguished himself by a number of freaks evidencing an almost incredible want of prudence and
common sense, and proved not only in some instances the romantic
generosity of his heart, but a total incapacity to resist the temptation
of the moment. After having been ignominiously dismissed from
the university, he was again received, obtained, though not without
difficulty, his degree, and, having chosen-as far as such a thoughtless person could be said to choose-medicine as his profession, he set
out to travel to Leyden, where he did study some time; and wandered nearly over the whole of Europe, principally on foot, supporting
himself in some measure by charity and by his flute.  In this way
he visited nearly all the principal places in France, Germany, Holland, and Flanders. This vagabond and gipsy life was perfectly in
harmony with his sensitive and expansif character, and may indeed
be considerea-whatever its bad effects upon the excitable heart and
weak moral principles of this child of genius-as singularly fortunate'
for his glory. It is assuredly in the lower classes of mankind that
fiction will find its richest and most accessible materials.  The liquid
notes of his own flute, had he touched it with the finest finger, breathe
not a sweeter air of feeling, a more touching and tenderer melancholy,




CH&P. XIV.]    GOLDSMITH: CHINESE LETTERS.                  275
than do his writings when the theme is the goodness and happiness
of the poor.
On returning to England in 1756, he began to write for the booksellers, and obtained a precarious subsistence by contributing to the'Monthly Review.'  With a moderate degree of economy and foresight, Goldsmith's charming style would have soon enabled him
gradually to obtain competence as a writer; but economy and foresight were words unintelligible to "poor Goldy," whose Irish heart
could never resist the temptation of vanity or pleasure for himself, or
of an almost insane liberality to others. He was himself exceedingly
fond of fine clothes, had the fatal propensity of the gambler, and his
heart was so extravagantly tender, that he perpetually gave his last
guinea to the first object which awakened his morbid sympathies.
Thus devoid of care for the future, and yielding to present impulses,
his benevolence was neither just to himself nor useful to others; and
he may be charged with heartlessness and ingratitude to those who
had the greatest claims on his assistance and respect. The same
cause kept Goldsmith always poor and plunged in debt; and though
he remained for many years the most admired and popular writer of
his time, he never ceased to be a bookseller's hack, and closed a life
of fruitless and severe exertion in indigence and ruin.
In 1758 he attempted to pass the medical examination qualifying
him as surgeon's mate in a ship of war, but was rejected; and so
poor was he at this time that he was obliged to borrow a suit of
clothes from a bookseller to appear in before the court, which suit
he afterwards pawned. A letter is still preserved, written by him
to the person he had so dishonestly deceived, full of the most passionate expressions of despair.
It was now that he commenced that rapid succession of easy and
delightful writings, in prose and verse, which have rendered his
namle so dear to all who appreciate unaffected grace, delicacy, and
humour.  We shall specify only the more remarkable.  The'Chinese Letters,' afterwards known under the title of' The Citizen of
the World,' are full of the sweetest touches of character, and are
written in a truly attractive and pure style.  Goldsmith's manner
of writing resembles, at least in those points which are not peculiar
to him, at once that of Addison and that of Steele; but possessing
a warmer and more genial tone than the writings of the former, and
an infinitely greater purity and elegance than those of the latter.
It is more transparent than Addison, less prim, less formal; and far
fuller of sentiment, more ideal, than anything of Steele's, between
whose character and Goldsmith's there was a strong resemblance.
Goldsmith then wrote a short and familiar' History of England;'
a mere compilation as to the matter, but related in such exquisitely
easy and amusing language, that it is a model of the art of narrative.
Johnson said justly that Goldsmith could make even the criest and
23




276           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. XI-V.
most repuls.ve subject "as amusing as a Persian tale."  And
certainly nothing but his inimitable ease and grace of narration
could make us forgive-as we do in spite of ourselves-the shallow
crudeness of his learning, and the total want of grasp and system in
his views.
It was now that appeared the first of his two memorable poems,'The Traveller,' a meditative and descriptive work, embodying the
mpressions of human life and society which he had felt in his
travels and in his early struggles. Neither the ideas nor the imagery
are very new or striking, but it is exquisitely versified (in the
rhymed couplet); and its ease, elegance, and tenderness have made
many passages pass into the memory and language of society.  It
is peculiarly admirable for the natural succession and connection of
the thoughts and images, one seeming to rise unforcedly, and to be
evolved, from the other.  It is also coloured with a tender haze, so
to say, of soft sentiment and pathos, as grateful to the mind as is to
the eye the blue dimness that softens the tints of a distant mountainrange.  It is a relief to the reader after Pope, in whom the objects
stand out with too much sharpness, and in whom we see too much
intense activity of the mere intellect at work.  Pope is daylight;
Goldsmith is moonlight.
In 1766 appeared the immortal tale which all the world has read,
translated, and admired-' The Vicar of Wakefield.'  The subject
is nothing.  A worthy, simple country parson is reduced to the
deepest and most unmerited distress, and again restored to happiness.
But the charming character of the hero-a kind of more refined
Parson Adams —the exquisitely drawn portraits of his family, the
natural incidents, the true and tender pathos, and the gentle humour
-who knows not these?  The style is perfection itself; and the
adventures, though not always quite probable, are sufficiently so to
maintain the reader's interest.
In the following year Goldsmith, as if not, contented with the
glory of being the most delightful narrator and the finest painter of
character of his day, now aspired to the more poignant rapture of
theatrical applause. iHis first comedy was' The Good-natured Man;'
and the hero was undoubtedly a dramatised portrait of the author
himself, with his unthinking easiness of temper, and his culpable
imprudence and generosity. The piece has the defect chargeabls
against many -similar works, particularly on  the French stage,
namely, the taking of some mental quality as the subject, around
which are grouped the inferior characters and interests, and which
the dramatist has an irresistible and incessant temptation to exaggerate and caricature. This is not so injurious to nature and probability
(the prime requisites of comedy) when the species of folly chosen is
of a graver and more reprehensible kind, when it is a vice, in short,;nstead of a mere absurdity; but when it is a mere obliquity of taste,




CHAP. XIV.]   GOLDSMITH: DESERTED VILLAGE.                  277
the more forcible and vivid the delineation, the less interest do we
feel in it. Harpagon is always amusing, because we detest as well
as laugh at him; but the weakness of Arnolphe in the'Malade
Imaginaire,' though we may laugh heartily at the oddity of the incidents and dialogue, is not of sufficient solidity and consistency to
carry the weight of a comic plot.  But' The Goodnatured Man' is
lively and gav, and some of the inferior characters, particularly
Croaker, are touched with a humour that makes us pardon  the
rather tiresome uniformity of Honeywood's exaggerated generosity
and self-a-bnegation.
The year 1770 gave to the world the companion poem  to'The
Traveller,'' The Deserted Village,' a work similar in tone, but
immeasurably superior in distinctness of aim and felicity of idea.
It depicts the sentiments of a wanderer, who, mn return to his
native place, which he left a smiling pastoral hamlet, finds nothing
but ruin and desolation, or relies of former happiness more sad and
painful still.  " Sweet Auburn" is supposed to have been painted
from Goldsmith's own recollections of the village of Lishoy, where
his brother had the living; and as'The Deserted Village' is morb
distinct and concentrated in its subject, and more homely in its
details, than'The Traveller,' it is incomparably more touching and
more beautiful.  Goldsmith was one of the first English poets of
this age who had taste and feeling enough to rely for effect upon
simnple and unornamented descriptions of natural, ordinary objects
and persons.  Ile threw aside all that false and vulgar affectation
Which thought it necessary to clothe such objects in a parade of
declamatory language; and his poem is exquisitely pathetic.  Hetnd the numerous great men who followed him in this true conception of poetical art-did nothing else but restore the manner of our
}reater and more ancient writers, who find, in the commonest and
miost familiar images, an inexhaustible source of the most powerful
"motions-the tenderest beauty and the subliriest terror.
Not very long after this poemi appeared'She Stoops to Conquer,'
one of the most amusing  comedies which  the English  stage
possesses.  The action of this piece is exceedingly animated and
laughable, and the absence of any moral aim, the renunciabtiu  of
any attempt to draw, in a principal or leading character, a portrait
of some particular folly, is singularly advantageous to its effect,
however it may degrade the work as a physiological embodiment.
The personages are very numerous, and sketched with felicity; the
booby Squire and his pot-house companions, the prosy and hospitable
MIr. Hardeastle, his foolish wife, and the equivoques produced by
Marlow's extravagant bashfulness-all these, if not of the higher
order of comedy, are abundantly laughable and well managed.
In concluding our renmarks on this author it will only be necessary
to mention a number of histories written merely as booksellers' task



2 78         OUTLINES OF GENEI:RAL LITERATURE.   [CHIAP. XV.
work —mere compilations as regards the matter, but exhibiting
Goldsmith's never-failing charm  of style: this circumstance, together with the absence of any very oppressive degree of crudition,
has rendered them peculiarly well adapted for class-books in schools;
a place they will retain till the more accurate and profound nmethod
of modern historical investigation shall have been communicate4d
even to the elementary instruction  of the young.  Besides the
4'History of England,' Goldsmith  successively published that of'Rome,' of'Greece,' and of'Animated Nature,' the last being fox
the most part a condensation of Buffon.
Our industrious writer (whose life was embittered, notwithstanding his great reputation, activity, and success, by perpetual debts and
difficulties) died in 1774, having hastened, if not produced, his own
decease, by injudiciously and obstinately taking a powerful medicine; and left behind him a reputation as well deserved as it is
universal.  There are very few branches of literature which he had
not cultivated, if not with unparalleled, at least with mnore than
ordinary success.  In all he was above mediocrity, in some he
reached excellence, and in one work (the delightful'Vicar') he has
left us a masterpiece of originality and grace.
CIAPTER XV.
TIlE  GREAT  HISTORIANS.
David fIlme —As Historian-As Moralist and Metaphysician-Attacks on
Revealed Religion-William Robertson-Defects of the " Classicist" Ilistorians-Edward Gibbon-'-The Decline and Fall —Prejudices against
Christianity - Guizot's judgment on Gibbon.
THE character of the English people is marked by singular inconsistencies: there is no nation which exhibits so much reluctance to
pursue to their utmost consequences the deductions of any new
system  or chain of arguments.  The English temperament is at
once bold and timid; at the same time penetratingly far-seeing, yet
almost slavishly devoted to prescription and authority.  Nowhere is
a new theory in legislation or in science more freely and candidly
discussed; nowhere the true sifted from the false with a more
industrious activity; nowhere does a new truth find a more enlightened
and ready acceptance; but, at the same time, nowhere is there a
greater dread of innovation, or a more determined adherence to the
forms of particular systems or institutions.
Of these remarks the story of David Hume is a striking example.




CHIAP. XV.]   HUJME: HISTORY OF GREAT BRITAIN.              279
lIe was sprung fromr an ancient and noble Scottish family, and was
born in 1711.  The greater part of his life was passed abroad, chiefly
in France. Hume was happy and tranquil in the possession of an
income so small that hardly all his national prudence sufficed to
make it a competence.  What is still more to his honour, he supported, during the early part of his literary career, a degree of
neglect and failure which the consciousness of his talents must have
rendered exceedingly bitter-this severe trial he bore, if not without
a deep and very pardonable discouragement, yet with great manliness
and dignity. His first work,' A Treatise on Human Nature,' published in 1737, was received with absolute neglect; and though
recommended by an exquisite refinement of style, and by great
novelty of views, and a bold acuteness of argument, it "fell stillborn from the press."  Five years after this appeared his' Essays,
Moral and Philosophical,' which contain a great variety of refined
and original speculations, often on subjects previously considered as
" hedged in" and defended by an insurmountable barrier of sanctity
and prescription.  During this part of his life he appears to have
had most difficulty and discouragement to struggle with; for he was
for some time obliged to accept the most painful of human occupations, the charge of a madman.  This was the young Marquis of
Annandale, in attendance upon whom the future historian remained
a year. Hume was soon afterwards appointed to the post of secretary
to General St. Clair, whom he accompanied, first to Canada, and
afterwards in his embassy to Vienna and Tur:n. In 1751 was republished, under the title of' An Inquiry concerning the Principles
of Morals,' much of the substance though now considerably altered
and almost recast, of the not very popular or successful treatise
which had appeared fourteen years before: and about this time he
gave to the world his' Political Discourses.'. Having caused himself
to be appointed librarian to the Faculty of Advocates in Edinburgh,
an office which he fulfilled gratuitously for the opportunity of making
use of the bopks under his care, he now entered upon a new path, a
path in which he was to more than redeem  the ill success of his
former publications-that of History.  In 1754 appeared the first
volume of his' History of Great Britain,' containing the reigns of
James I. and Charles I.  This new attenpt was for a while not
more popular than his previous ones, but, in proportion as the sue
ceeding volumes appeared, the public admiration grew ever stronger an4
stro.ger, and Humne was soon placed, by the unanimous applause of his
countrymen, at the head of all the English historians who had then
written.  This reputation he deserved for many rare qualities, for
his philosophic views, and for his exquisite style: and though History
has received in more recent times a very different form, a much
wider spirit of inquiry and investigation, a far more comprehensive,
minute, and accurate spirit, as well as a more picturesque and
23 *




280           OUTTINES OF GENERABr LITERATURE.  [chAP. X Vstriking language, there can be no doubt that Hume's work is of
great beauty and value.  Its chief defects are want, of accuracy in
detail, and strong partialities affecting various important principles.
A polished and fastidious scholar, a Scotsman of aristocratic birth and
sympathies, Hume was tinged not only with those Jacobite tendencies which were so prevalent in the higher classes of his country,
mut with an exaggerated dread of popular movements, and an indis.
losition to acknowledge the undeniable advantage which our constitution has so often and so uniformly derived from revolutions.  A
monarchist in principle, he entertained a somewhat extreme opinion as to the paramount importance of stability in any system
of polity, forgetting that in the case of the British constitution a
gradual and steady progressive movement was inherent in its very
essence-was its sap and life-blood; and that, so far from its stability
being compromised by popular movements, or even by revolutions,
these were its very conditions and vitality.  The English character
has more in common (at least in its political manifestations) with
that of the Roman people than with that of any other great and
civilised nation with which history has made us acquainted.  The
resemblance is overwhelmingly striking when we take into account
the immense difference between the political constitutions of the
two countries.  Both, however, were eminently aristocratic, and in
both.the principle of stability is surprisingly prominent-a stability
so far fiom  being diminished by incessant interna_ agitations, and
even considerable organic changes, that these changes and agitations
are its very exponents.  3Montesquieun has well remarked that movements which in other countries would infallibly involve a complete
overthrow and possible reconstruction of the whole political machine,
in England are considered, and justly so, as a proof of the vitality
of the government.  And the same thing is true of Romb, at least
during its earlier and more glorious period.  Both nations are eminently practical, logical, and calculating, and in both the attachment
to old institutions goes only so far as to make the citizens distrust the
prospective advantage of any proposed innovation: in other words,
never to admit an innovation until forced on them by circumstances.
Thus, the perpetual changes which were going on in the body politic
were no more destructive to its individuality, nor injurious to its
strength, than are the changes of the seasons to the growth of some
majestic tree.  Its leaves may be strewn by the gales of autumn,
the vernal sap may rise within its vessels, incessant deposits of new
matter and never-ceasing loss of old may continue, till not a particle
of substance in the whole living structure may remain the same
after the lapse of a few years, yet the tree is still the same, it is one,
and no other and man and beast find shelter under its ever-waving
boughs.
We have already given Hume credit for a philosophical spirit




ClHAP. XV.]   IIUME: DEFECTS OF HIS HIISTORY.               281
This he undoubtedly possessed, but only to a certain degree.  His
mind had early accustomed itself to abstract investigations, and his
long residence in France had contributed to develop in him a tendency
to those barren and endless speculations which characterised the
French literature of the period.  Acuteness he undoubtedly possessed to a high degree, as well as a sincere love of truth: but his
mind was cold and unsympathising; it wanted that profound humanity,
that deep fellow-feeling with his kind, which is the only vivifying
and fecundating principle. In his philosophy he had reached that
point at which all is negative: he doubted of everything; he doubted
even of the conclusions obtained by means of his own refined dialects;
and if this species of Pyrrhonism could ever become generally prevalent, nothing would be left to man but the gratification of sense and
the prosecution of mere temporary interests.  But there is a point
beyond this: indeed, a man who stops here halts on the very threshold
of the great temple of wisdom.  He who has never doubted (at
least in matters of human reason) cannot be said properly to believe;
and he who believes not can feel no perfect love.  In his history
Hlume has taken too much upon trust from former compilers, and he
has consequently fallen into a great many errors in points of fact,
and been guilty of strange oversights and misrepresentations.  Too
indolent to consult, and too falsely refined to appreciate, the authentic
sources of history in the writers contemporary with the events he
describes, he has given us a work which is indeed a model of easy,
fluent, agreeable narration, but a work which, if compared to many
more modern productions of history (as for instance the admirable'Conquete d'Angleterre par les Normands' of Augustin Thierry),
will afford an incontrovertible proof of the immense advance made
since his time in this branch of literature..His strong predilections
in favour of the Stuart race have led him into innumerable errors
and contradictions, and the whole of one most important episode in
English history, the Civil War, the Republic, and the Protectorate,
is full of inconsistency.  This great and noble monument of Hume's
genius appeared as follows:-the first volume in 1754, the second
in 1757, the third and fourth in 1759, the fifth and sixth in 1762.
From what we have said above, it may easily be inferred that Hume
was unreasonably addicted to paradox and theorising on false or
insufficient grounds.  Moreover, his hostility to the doctrines and
authority of the Christian religion led him to describe in one uniform
tone of contemptuous indifference the labours and sufferings of many
of those illustrious men who have sealed with their blood the charter
of their country's liberty.  Religion, so intimately interwoven with
the whole tissue of private life in England, is a no less prominent
element in all public and political events; and a historian, thereforeQ
who should feel no sympathy with the religious convictions of some
section or other (it little matters which) of the English people,




282          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CHAP. XV.
might indeed avoid party prejudice, but could never succeed, be his
genius what it may, in giving a true picture of events.  "lie had
early in life," says Mackintosh, "conceived an antipathy to the
Calvinistic divines, and his temperament led him at all times to
regard with disgust and derision that religious enthusiasm or bigotry
with which the spirit of English freedom was, in his opinion, inseparably associated: his intellect was also, perhaps, too active and
original to submit with sufficient patience to the preparatory toils
and long-suspended judgment of the historian, and led him to form
premature conclusions and precipitate theories, which it then became
the pride of his ingenuity to justify."
As a moralist and metaphysician Hume is less remarkable.for any
novel or original views in the investigation of fundamental principles than for the admirable clearness and elegance of his mode of
reasoning, for the candour with which he admits objections, the
acuteness- always tempered with courtesy and good taste-with
which he combats them, and above all for the courage which he
exhibits in carrying to their ultimate results the arguments which
he uses.  His chief test for the moral value of an action or a motive
is the principle of utility-a principle into which must be, after all,
resolved all questions of right and wrong.  It is one which has in
all ages excited the greatest outcries against every philosopher whlo
has ventured overtly to propound it; and yet it is obvious that all
systems professing to assign different foundations for good and evil
in human actions are nothing else, when closely examined and
carried to their ultimate application, than fruitless attempts to mask
under specious forms a doctrine which to an unenlightened mind
appears selfish and incompatable with elevated emotion. In stripping
off the bandages of error and prejudice which envelop, like some
Egyptian mummy, the body of moral truth, ordinary investigators
content themselves with stopping at a secondary point.  They are
afraid to look face to face upon what they think is a corrupted and
loathsome corpse; but if we clearly understand the principle, and
properly limit its application, we shall find not only that all other
modes of accounting for what we so unreasonably consider the
invariable sentiment of right and wrong are insufficient, but that
this is the only conceivable and possible way of explaining the
existence of that sentiment at all.
Hume is considered also as one of the most dangerous and
insidious enemies by whom the Christian religion has ever been
attacked.  The point against which his batteries are chiefly levelled
is the credibility of the history of those miraculous events on which
the religion founds its claim to be considered as a revelation, i. e. a
supernatural interposition.  The ground he takes is broad and
simple: the nucleus of his arguments is to be found in the two
famous proposition,  list, that it is contrary to human experience




CIIAP. XV.]     HIUME: ATTACKS ON RELIGION.                 283
that miracles should be true; 2nd, that it is not contrary to experience that human testimony should be false. This mode of reasoning
it was quite natural that he should adopt, inasmuch as his philosophy
is altogether of the negative and sceptical character: but at the
same time his reasoning lies open to a powerful counter-argumentviz. that, if the essential incompetency of any degree of evidence
be so great as to overbalance any force of probability, then that the
convincing power of any arguments addressed to our minds must
labour under an equal degree of uncertainty.
All evidence, whether addressed to our senses (often the most
fallacious reporters) or to our reason, is comparative, and never can
reach the intensity of abstract certitude, for God alone can be
capable of absolutely knowing anything: all that remains is the
question of comparative weight between the probability of the given
event and the degree of evidence before us (an imperfect evidence,
but an evidence which is all that we require or can appreciate); in
short, it is a striking of a balance between two conflicting improbabilities. There is moreover a fallacy in the stating of the two celebhated propositions above quoted, and also something like a petitio
principii; for, in the first place, the use of the words "experience"
and "contrary to experience" would induce us to imply a contradiction fatal to the whole argument; seeing that, if miracles entered
into the ordinary operations of nature (i. e. were subjects of experience), they would no longer be miracles at all; and it is clear that
a revelation cannot be founded, as regards the evidence of its reality,
on anything else but miracles, that is to say on events which are
deviations from the ordinary laws of nature. Whatever of dangerous
is contained in these arguments of Hume, whatever of mischief
they may have done to the minds of inexperienced investigators, is
to be attributed, less to their intrinsic weight and cogency than to
the blind and bigot zeal of many of his answerers, who, in fervour
of arrogant orthodoxy, have replied to Hume's arguments by ieproaches and the ill-simulated language of contempt, combating his
cool and skilful attacks with threats, slanders, and childish declamation. Those who have not acuteness enough to overthrow the
logician are often content to calumniate the man: the hand which
cannot wield the sword can always: guide the dagger.  Against personal attacks Hume found his beet defence in the innocence and
benevolence of his life, in the respect of the great and the wise of
all countries, and in the affection of his own private friends.  1Ho
gradually rose to the dignity of Under Secretary of State, and soon
retired from public life with a moderate, but to him  abundant fortune, and, after living many years in tranquil and lettered case, he
died in 1776 in Edinburgh, his native city.
Our remarks on the life and works of William  Robertson, the
next celebrated name in the department of History, will be very




281          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CHAP. XV.
short.  His story is a very simple one: it is the record of a man of
pure and virtuous life, interchanging the obscure but arduous duties
of a Scottish pastor with the labours of an ardent and enlightened
scholar —a career fertile in active benevolence, in the unceasing
fulfilment of quiet duties, and in the calm satisfactions of literary
usefulness, but presenting little materials for the narrator.
It is singular that two out of the three great historians of this
period should have been Scotsmen, that.they should have produced
extensive works of great and durable value under circumstances
apparently very unfavourable to this kind of composition, and that
their style should have strong points of general resemblance in its
purity, elegance, and clearness. We can warmly agree with the
sentiments of Walpole, who expresses his admiration and surprise
that Robertson, then an obscure country clergyman, without access
to any extensive sources of information, should have produced works
equally distinguished for learning and accuracy, written in the purest
and most classical English.  This excellent historian was born near
Edinburgh in 1721, and cannot be said to have acquired much fame
until the appearance, in 1759, of his' History of Scotland during
the Reigns of Queen Mary and James VI.' This work not only
opened to its amiable author the road to -eminence and distinction,
but, what is of more advantage to us, encouraged him to persevere
in a line so auspiciously begun.  In 1769 he published his'History
of the Reign of Charles V.,' and six years afterwards the'History
of America,' the three great pillars of his fame.  All these books
are distinguished by an elevated and noble tone of feeling, contain
many clear and reasonable if not very profound views of the
important epochs in human history which they portray, and deserve
the highest possible eulogy for the refined elegance and grace of
their style.  Robertson's mind, though calm  and meditative, was
full of a sincere and well-regulated enthusiasm for all that is noble
and good, and he has related with manly pathos the touching story of
the beautiful and unhappy Mary, and the yet sublimer woes of that
great navigator whose genius gave a world to ungrateful Spain. But
with all this grace of style, with a harmony so liquid and so gentle that
its art is occasionally somewhat too perceptible to the reader, we cannot fail to perceive a sort of smooth uniformity-not a monotony of
tone, but a uniformity of treatment in works detailing the annals
of such different ages and countries. There is no distinction between
his handling of these so different subjects; we do not find an individuality in his portraitures of such Widely-differing states of society
-- tnd it is undoubtedly in that individuality that we must seek for
the invaluable quality of picturesqueness, whether in literature or
art.  It would be difficult, almost impossible, for any dulness of
narration to deprive of interest such subjects as the story of lMary
Queen of Scots, the character and abdication of Charles V., or the




CHAP. XV.]            GIBBON: H1S LIFE.                     285
discovery of America,; and yet we cannot disguise from ourselves
an unpleasant feeling that Robertson does not place himself, and
consequently the reader, among the persons and events which he
describes.  To sympathise deeply with these, and to appreciate
them profoundly, the reader ought to be made to breathe the atmosphere of the particular age and country in question. He ought
not to gaze down upon them from the chilly heights of abstract
philosophic speculation, he should mingle with them to a certain
degree on a level. In the'History of America,' for example, the
author seems to have taken his materials at second hand, preferring
(or perhaps obliged by circumstances) to obtain them filtered through
the medium of previous compilations — a process in which, even
when performed by the most skilful hand, a vast proportion of the
raciness and spirit must inevitably evaporate.  It is possible that
Robertson was afraid of injuring the finish of his execution by
admitting, in all their rude and vigorous animation, the picturesque
details of old chroniclers and contemporary narrators, as, for example, the narratives of Bernal Dios and the Conquestadors. In Hume
this absence of the peculiar tone and spirit of the age arose in a
great measure from  indolence and a philosophic (a falsely philosophic) indifference to those details of social life, art, religion, and
popular feeling, which not. only are characteristic of the particular
age or people, but are absolutely the only things that we wish to
know; for the scaffolding, the skeleton of history is pretty universally the same: what we desire to recall is not the battles, treasons,
and coronations, for battles, treasons, and coronations are almost
always the same thing; in evoking past ages from the tomb, it is
not the bones, but the flesh and blood, the life, that we would
behold; not a spectre, but
Our fathers in their habit as they lived.
The third, and unquestionably the greatest, of our English his,
torical triad was Edward Gibbon.  He was a man of good family
and easy circumstances, and was born at Putney, near London, in
1737.  He received an excellent education, and even passed some
time in the University of Oxford; but he employed his early years
in desultory and multifarious study, which, though it gave him the
materials for future eminence in literature, was useless for any
mmediate object.  His attachment to the Protestant faith was also
o much shaken about this time by controversial reading, that he
became a convert to the Popish religion, on which his father sent
him to reside with 31. Pavillard, a Protestant minister at Lausanne,
whose arguments were so conclusive that the young convertite again
returned to the bosom of his national Church.  A religious faith,
however, so subject to change, could not have been very solid, and
Gibbon's works afterwards gave abundant proof that his convictions




28t6         OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CIHAP. XV.
of tie truth of the evangelic history were by no means deeply
rooted In his mind.  Indeed he soon became a confirmed sceptic.
Whie at Lausanne he pursued a regular and steady course of study,
and seems to have adopted the opinions which were so prevalent
just before the outbreak of the first French revolution.  Nor is this
to be wondered at: his mind appears to have been strikingly similar
in its principal features to the character of the Encyclopediste
intellect; the same acuteness and activity, the same confidence in
its own powers, the same distrust of the virtue and disinterestedness
of mankind, and the same tendency towards the actual and sensuous
rather than the abstract -and the ideal.  In 1758 he returned to
England, and gave the first fruit of his reading in a little essay,
written in French, on the Study of Literature: and during great
part of the war he held the commission of captain in a body of
militia. Four years afterwards he again visited the continent, where
he passed a considerable time in travelling through France and
Italy, and it was during these wanderings that he first conceived the
idea or his great work.  The incident, so eventful in the annals of
English literature, took place at Rome, October 15th, 1764, and is
imnmortalised in his own picturesque words: "As I sat musing," he
says, "amidst the ruins of the Capitol, while the barefooted friars
were singing vespers in the temple of Jupiter, the idea of writing
the decline and fall of the city first started to my mind."  But so
gigantic a task was not to be executed, or even begun, without
immense preparatory labour, and without the author passing through
a period of uncertainty and vague agitation when determining upon
the plan, the extent, the arrangement, and even the style of the
work. He returned to England in 1765, and, on the death of his
father, Gibbon, who had come into possession of an embarrassed
fortune, ultimately entered upon a political career.  During all this
time his great plan was working and fermenting in his head, and he
underwent those throes and struggles which genius ever feels in
giving birth to a mighty and durable offspring. These he has
related, and described how long it was ere his subject arranged
itself before his mental eye in a definite form and with intelligible
order and completeness: he has told us how often he was tempted
to abandon in despair the accumulated materials of years of study;
how he composed the first chapter three times, and the second and
third twice over, ere he was satisfied with their effect.  Such is the
training of genius, such are the labours by which alone great productions can be created.
Gibbon was elected in 1774 member of Parliament for the
borough of Liskeard; but though he sat for many sessions in the
H-Iouse of Commons, he never ventured to take part in the debates:
his knowledge and intellectual powers were very great, nor was he
ienconscious of his own gifts, but his taste was fastidious, and his




JIIAP. xv.]     GIBBON: DECLINE AND FALL.                   237
habits were those rather of the man of letters than of the, statesman.
He sate, therefore, invariably silent, filled, as he says, by the good
speakers with despair of imitation, and by the bad ones with the
dread of failure and ridicule.  In reward for his adherence to the
ministerial party Lord North appointed him one of the Commissioners of Trade, so that this historian, like his illustrious contemporary
IIume, occupied a place in the government of his country.
It was in 1776 that appeared the first volume of his History, and
the book, became instantly so popular that its success rather resembled
that of some amusing work of fiction than of a grave and serious
history.  It was the talk and admiration of the day; the volume was
found in the library of every reader, and in the dressing-room and
boudoir of the fashionable and the fair.  Gibbon was greeted with
the warm  and generous applauses of Hume, Robertson, and all the
distinguished literary men of his day, both in England and abroad;
and when we reflect upon the brilliancy and originality of the work
itself, we can easily account for the delight with which it was received:
even its faults were of a nature to impress and to attract. -The
period which forms the subject of the work was one which, though
fertile in splendid, impressive, and pathetic events, had never been
studied or investigated by a genius sufficiently patient and enlightened
to disentangle the contradictions and complexities of the barbarous
historians in whose works alone the materials were to be found.
The antecedent and subsequent epochs had been repeatedly discussed;
but the long interval between the commencement of the decadence
of Rome and the consummation of its ruin had remained, like some
desolate border-country, unvisited and unexplored; it was a region
of gloom and darkness-a twilight between the ancient and modern
world.  His genius was peculiarly calculated to give full effect to
the grand but confused details of this astonishing picture, and his
solemn, gorgeous, and rhetorical style was in happy harmony with
the character of the times which he described.  It would seem as
if he had studied the writings of the Lower Empire till he had
caught, perhaps involuntarily, something of their Asiatic splendoux
-the "barbaric pearl and gold," which dazzles the imagination
though it does not gratify the taste; and of which the writings cf
the Greek and Latin fathers give a striking example.
We have said that Gibbon, like Hume, is one of the most dangel.
JuS enemies by whom the Christian faith was ever assailed-he was
the more dangerous because he was insidious.  The following is the
plan of his tactics.  I-Ie does not formally deny the evidence upon
which is based the structure of Christianity, but he indirectly includes
that system in the same category with the mythologies of paganism.
The rapid spread of Christianity he explains by merely secondary
causes; and in relating the disgraceful corruptions, persecutions, and
superstitions which so soon supplanted the pure morality of the
24




288           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. XV.
primitivt Church, he leads the reader to consider these less as the
results of human crime, folly, and ambition, than as the necessary
consequences of the system itself.  He either did not or would not
distinguish between the parceque and quoique; and represents what
is in reality an abuse as an inevitable consequence. Byron well
describes him. as
"Sapping a solemn creed with solemn sneer,
The lord of irony, that master-spell."
Moreover, though perpetually warmed by the grand or touching inci.
dents he relates into noble bursts of eloquence and enthusiasm, he
has no admiration for the struggles of Christian fortitude and the
triumphs of Christian virtue. The same energy and virtue which,
appearing in a heathen or a Mahomedan, fills his heart with fervour,
and his lofty periods with a swelling grandeur, leaves him cold and
impassible, or cavilling and contemptuous, when it is exhibited in the
cause of Christianity.
In Gibbon's character there is also a peculiarity which, whether
innate and natural or acquired from Voltaire and similar writers of
that period, renders his writings dangerous to the young: this is a
peculiar filthiness of imagination, which seems to revel in objects
and events of gross and sensual immorality. No sooner does he
find occasion to relate a scandalous or obscene story (and the corruption of manners during the period which forms the subject of his
history gives himl but too many opportunities to indulge in this vein)
than he seems to delineate it with a peculiar gusto and minuteness
which is in the highest degree offensive. He does not hasten rapidly
over such scenes, saying, with Dante,
"Non ragioniam di lor, ma guarda e passa!"
but he seems to take a perverse pleasure in dwelling on degrading
images. Voltaire has much of this, and never omits an opportunity
to introduce ideas not only sensual, but often physically disgusting;
but in Voltaire these images are coloured by wit and sarcastic
drollery, and are in harmony with the satiric petulance of his ridicule.
In Gibbon the majestic solemnity of style, and the grave earnestness
of the tone, render these offences against good taste exceedingly
prominent and shocking.
In 1781 were published the second and third volumes, and the
three last in 1787. Gibbon, who has with a justifiable pride given
as the anecdote of the circumstances attending the origin of his
great work, has left us an equally minute and not less interesting
record of his feelings at its conclusion:-" It was on the day, or
rather night, of the 27th of June, 1787, between the hours of
eleven and twelve, that I wrote the last lines of the last page in a
summer-house in my garden.  After laying down my pen, I took
several turns in a berceau or covered walk of acacias, whicb commands




CHAP. XV.]           GIBBON: HIS STYLE.                     289
a prospect of the country, the lake, and the mountai.F.  The amr
was temperate, the sky was serene, the silver orb of the moon was
reflected from the waters, and all nature was silent.  I will not dissemble the first emotions of joy on the recovery of my freedom, and
perhaps the establishment of my fame. But my pride was soon
humbled, and a sober melancholy was spread over my mind, by
the idea that I had taken an everlasting leave of an old and
agreeable companion, and that, whatsoever might be the future
fate of my history, the life of the historian must be short and precarious." 
From  Lausanne Gibbon again returned to England for a short
time, but he came back again to Switzerland, where he remained till
shortly before his death. Finding the society of Lausanne distracted
by parties consequent upon the outbreak of the French Revolution,
and induced by the death of Lord Sheffield, his most intimate friend,
to return to London, in order to console and counsel the widow, he
came back to his own country, and died in London in 1794.
With all its defects, Gibbon's'Decline and Fall of the Roman
Empire' is a noble monument of genius and industry. The style is
extraordinarily elevated and ornate, and resembles rather the antithetical tone of the French literature of the eighteenth century than an
idiomatic English work. Indeed, so completely was Gibbon's mind
saturated with French sympathies, that there is a tradition that he
for some time hesitated whether his great work should be written in
French or English.  His narration is very clear, animated, and
picturesque: he brings before the reader's eye the persons and
events which he describes; and wherever his scepticism and prejudices do not interfere, he gives a lively, penetrating, and natural
account of the characters and motives of men.  But his moral susceptibility was not very delicate, and he'frequently lavishes on the
external splendour of great actions that enthusiasm which should be
reserved for the simple dignity of moral grandeur.  His sympathies
were somewhat theatrical; and though the general current of his
narrative is exceedingly clear, his gorgeousness and measured pomp
of language becomes fatiguing and oppressive.  So great is his
dread, too, of repeating the same word or name in the same page or
at short intervals, that his expedients of finding a synonym are
frequently productive of confusion and uncertainty in the reader.
We cannot better conclude our remarks than by quoting the excel
lent and elaborate judgment of Guizot:-1" After a first rapid perusal
which allowed me to feel nothing but the interest of a narrative.
always animated, and, notwithstanding its extent and the variety of
objects which it makes to pass before the view, always perspicuous, I
entered upon a minute examination of the details of which it was
composed  and the opinion which I then formed was, I confess,
singularly severe.  I discovered, in certain chapters, errors which




290          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. XV.
appeared to me sufficiently important and numerous to make me
believe that they had been written with extreme negligence; in
others, I was struck with a certain tinge of partiality and prejudice,
which imparted to the exposition of the facts that want of truth and
justice which the English express.by their happy term misrepresentation.  Some imperfect quotations, some passages omitted unintentionally or designedly, have cast a suspicion on the honesty of the
author; and his violation of the first law of history-increased to
my eyes by the prolonged attention with which I occupied myself
with every phrase, every note, every reflection-caused me to form
on the whole work a judgment far too rigorous.  After having
finished my labours, I allowed some time to elapse before I reviewed
the whole.  A second attentive and regular perusal of the entire
work, of the notes of the author, and of those which I had thought
it right to subjoin,. showed me how much I had exaggerated the
importance of the reproaches which Gibbon really deserved: I was
struck with the same errors, the same partiality on certain subjects;
but I had been far from doing adequate justice to the immensity of
his researches, the variety of his knowledge, and, above all, to that
truly philosophical discrimination which judges the past as it would
judge the present; which does not permit itself to be blinded by
the clouds which time gathers around the dead, and which prevent
us from seeing that, under the toga as under the modern difess, in
the senate as in our councils, men were what they still are, and that
events took place eighteen centuries ago as they take place in our
own days.  I then felt that his book, in spite of its faults, will
always be a noble work; and that we may correct his errors and
combat his prejudices without ceasing to admit that few men have
combined, if we are not to say in so high a degree, at least in a
manner so complete and so well regulated, the necessary qualifications for a writer of history."
CHAPTER XVI.
TA{'I TRANSITION  SCHOOL.
Landscape and Fim:"iar Poetry-James Thomson-The Seasons-Epieodes
- Castle of indolence - Minor Works - Lyric Poetry- Thomas Gray —
The Bard, and the Elegy-Collins and Shenstone —''he SchoolmistrssOssian-Chatterton and the Rowley Poems-William  Cowper-George
Crabbe-The Lowland Scots Dialect and Literature-Robert Burns.
"' TIE less man really'knows," says an eloquent and acute Russian writer, "' the greater his contempt for the ordinary, for what
surrounds him.  A practical every-day truth appears to him a degra



CHAP. XVI.]            JAMES THOMSON.                       291
dation; what we see before our eyes and often; were present to
ourselves as undeserving of attention.; we want the far, the remote;
ii n'y a pas de grand homme pour son valet-de-chamlbre."  What is
true of philosophy in general is applicable to art in partict ar, and
to literature, the highest, completest, and most perfect of the arts.
What is the distinction between the tone of literature of the eighteenth and that of the nineteenth century? What but the substitu
tion of the real and the actual for the abstract and the remote? I
is true that the real and the actual are idealised, are glorified, in
passing into the golden atmosphere of art, no less than were the
abstract and the remote, and this is an indispensable condition, for
the ideal is the very soul of poetry: but we now find in pictures of
ordinary life, in the description of common nature, a source of profound pleasure, emotion, and improvement.  What Coleridge has
said of old paganism may with more justice be applied to the literature of modern times:
"' Clothing the palpable and familiar
With golden exhalations of the dawn."
The full and complete daylight of this new era is to be found in
Scott, in Byron, in Shelley, in Wordsworth; but the dawning of the
auspicious Aurora was gradual and slow. It was first seen to glimmer (we mean in modern days, for of recent periods only do we
speak) in the poetry of Thomson, and then gradually glowed with
a stronger light, powerfully hastened in its development by the
publication of Percy's'Reliques of Ancient English Poetry,' by
the forgeries of Macpherson, and by the fabrications of Chatterton,
Its characteristic was an intense and reverent study of Nature in all
her manifestations, whether of physical or intellectual activity; cf
the one, Thomson is the type-of the other, Cowper and Crabbe.
The early part of Thomson's career somewhat resembles that of
Smollett. He was born in Scotland in 1700, and came up to London
to push his fortune as a literary man. He carried with him the
unfinished poem of' Winter,' some passages of which he had shown
to Mallet, by whom  he had been strongly advised to publish the
work. Arriving in London at the age of eighteen, he obtained the
situation of tutor in the family of the Lord Binning, which he
afterwards exchanged for -the more powerful protection of Lord
Chancellor Talbot.  With the son of this distinguished lawyer
Thomson had the advantage of travelling over the Continent, and
thus feeding his rich imagination with the fairest scenes of natural
magnificence, and filling his ardent fancy with recollections of the
great and wise of ancient history. The poem of'Winter' was published in 1726, and in the two succeeding years it was followed by
its beautiful companions,'Summer' and'Spring,''Autumn' not
appearing until 1730. The four works together compose a complete
cycle of tha various appearances of Nature during an English year,
24 *




292           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CHAP. XVI.
and are known to all who feel what is beautiful, as the' Seasons'the finest descriptive poem in the English or perhaps in any language.  There is no country whose climate affords so great a
variety and richness of external beauty as that of Great Britain;
none in which the surface of the land is more picturesquely broken
into every form and tint of beauty, none more abundant in spots
sanctified by memory, none where the changes of climate are more
capricious and imposing.  The finest art and the most idiomatic
literature of England bears testimony to the intensity of feeling for
the external loveliness of nature which seems to form a distinctive
feature of the national character — a trait more marked perhaps
among us than even among the ancient Greeks. In that great and
peculiar style, invented and principally cultivated in England —
descriptive or landscape poetry —Thomson is by far our greatest
artist; though this tendency to study and portray Nature for herself
is singularly perceptible in all the greatest works of purely English
genius.  With what a fond enthusiasm  has Father Chaucer, whose
verses are modulated to the forest-music of an English landscape,
the gurgle of the brook, the multitudinous rustle of leaves, and,
above all, to the liquid melody of birds-with what an earnest joy
has this divine poet seized every occasion of painting the physiognomy of English scenery! Spenser's fairy glades are full of this
deep passion for nature as nature-Nature looked at for herself:
neither Shakspeare nor Milton has ever written any twenty consecutive lines without giving us, often in a single word, and parenthetically as it were, some touch of natural scenery, some embodiment
of a physical object familiar as the cloud or the leaf, ever-varying like
them, yet, like them, invariable.
In the'Seasons' of Thomson, we have a subject unbounded in
variety, yet happily limited in extent; and it is no exaggeration to
affirm that there is not a possible modification of English scenery,
terrestrial or atmospheric, which he has not caught and fixed for
ever.  Everything appears in its natural light, in its relative perspective and proportion; and though we are of course carried in succession through the various appearances of the *year, he always has the
art to conceal the joinings in his canvas, and to give us the feeling
of continuity which produces the charm ofa well-executed panorama.
Above all, the work is animated throughout with so gentle yet so
genial a glow of philanthropy and religious gratitude, that its parts
are so to say fused naturally together; the ever-changing landscape
is harmonised by this calm and elevated and tender spirit, which
throws over the whole a soft and all-pervading glow, like the tint of
an Italian heaven.
The language and versification, however, are not always worthy
of the subject nor of the sentiment of the work.  Though very
much purified and simplified in his later works, there is often an




CHAP. XV ]         THOMSON: THE SEASONS.                     293
ambitious tumidity in Thomson's diction not unaccompanied by
vulgar and meian expressions; and though in a thousand places he
has exhibited a peculiar felicity in finding those appropriate words
which paint almost to the eye.
"What oft was thought, butne'er so wel express'd,"
he is occasionally deficient in simplicity and chasteness.
His blank verse is sonorous and musical, but he did not possess that
fineness of ear which seems involuntarily to Wcho the wild and everchanging voices of nature; nor had he the art of concealing, by
an inexhaustible flexibility and sensibility of rhythm, the tendency
to monotony which is the prevailing defect of descriptive poetry.
To relieve the uniformity of his plan he has introduced a great
number of little tales and episodes, generally suggested by the scene
which he is describing.  Of these the pathetic pictures are undoubtedly the best; as, for example, the episode of the shepherd
perishing in the snow, introduced into the "Winter;' and generally,
where a mixture of the pathetic with the terrible is the emotion to
be excited; but when he attempts to be simply graceful, tender, or
facetious, his failure is painful and inevitable.  Thomson's imagination was intensely sensuous: his delineations of love are very far
from romantic; and when he endeavours to idealize the passion, he
becomes pitiably stilted, affected, and vulgarly fine;- as, for instance,
in the bathing scene of Musidora, and little less, though certainly
less offensively so, in the so-often quoted tale of Lavinia.
His comic scenes (as the fox-hunting debauch) are utterly gross,
and totally discordant with the tone of the rest of the work.  That
he was not destitute of a rich and even refined humour, we shall see
when we come to speak of the exquisite'Castle of Indolence.''The Seasons' must be undoubtedly considered, all proper deductions
made, a truly great and beautiful work.  If the poet has sometimes
fallen into the affectation of classicism, and drawn from the ancients
instead of from nature; if with the majestic accents of his hymn to
the Creator-best praised by the glory of his works-he has allowed
to mingle some accents of earthly adulation; if he be sometimes
tedious, or solemn out of season; if his ornaments be sometimes
meretricious, and his language sometimes too heavy for the thought
-all. this, and much more, we can pardon him, for he has interpreted the book of Nature with a penetrating yet reverent eye; he
has made us feel the loveliness of a thousand objects which escape
us from their very familiarness; and he has given to his country the
glory of originating a new, elevating, and beautiful species of
writing, of which the antique literature offers no example.
The success of'The Seasons' was so great as to enable Thomson
(with the assistance of a government sinecure given him  by Talbot)
to purchase a cottage on the banks of the Thames near Richmond,




294         OOUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. XVI.
And pass the rest of his days in comfort and even luxury.  During
zhe whole of his career he continued a pretty industrious writer, and
composed several tragedies in the false and unhealthy taste of that
day, which were neither very successful at that time, nor deserving
of any notice since. They are all remarkable for mannerism, sham
grandeur, and sham pathos, and no less for a declamatory and noisy
emphasis of patriotism.  He also composed an eulogistic poem in
honour of Newton, which contains one or two fine passages, and a
species of lyric entitled'Liberty,' which deserved the failure it met
with, though its subject, as he ought to have foreseen, was too impracticable for any other result to be possible.
In his suburban retirement he appears to have lived much more
happily than often falls to the lot of poets, and to have been able to
indulge not only in that pardonable and innocent luxury which was
congenial to his temper, but also in those acts of benevolence and
goodness that won him the love and respect of his contemporaries.
So intensely indolent, indeed, was he, that he is said to have been in
the habit, when lounging in his dressing-gown along the sunny'
walks of his garden, of biting a mouthful out of the peaches ripening on his wall, too lazy to lift his hand to pluck them. So selfindulgent a poet was fitted to be the high-priest of Indolence, and
he has in one exquisite composition immortalized the very ideal of
his failing. This is'The Castle of Indolence,' an allegorical poem
in the style and manner of Spensbr, which not only is the best
imitation ever made of the great author of'The Faerie Queen,' but
one of the most delightful works in the English language. Spenser
was, to a certain degree, an imitator of Ariosto, and the southern
temperament of Thomson enabled him to reproduce, even more
faithfully than his immediate model, the luxuriant graces of the'Orlando;' for'The Castle of Indolence' is, like Ariosto, more
tinged with gaiety than the poem of Spenser.  In this work the
author of'The Seasons' exhibits a richness of harmony which
could hardly have been expected from him, judging by his former
poems, and the soft profusion of his lulling and luxurious fancy is
most inimitably expressed in the languishing measure of the verse.
The allegorical part, particularly the birth and education of the
knight Industry, who liberates the unfortunate captives from the
enchanted castle, is not either very striking or well imagined: it is
Spenserian, it is true, but not quite Spenser's finest vein.  In this
individualizing magic Spenser himself does not always succeed; he
delights and impresses us, not with the realizing and embodiment of
intellectual conceptions, but by the wonderful variety and vividness
of his personages, which, though bearing the names of virtues and
vices, do not please us by what they pretend to be, but by what they
are, i. e. nlen and women, masked and costumed to act in a splendid
pageant. We are pleased with them, not as dramatic characters,




CHAP. XVI.]            GRAY: IIIS WORKS.                      295
but as actors.  But the charm of'The Castle of Indolence' lies in
the descriptions, in the inexhaustible yet gentle flow of lulling
images of calmness and repose. This luxurious dreaminess we
sometimes feel in reading Spenser, but it forms the very colouring
and key-note of Thomson's poem: let him express it in his own
delicious words: --
"A pleasing land of drowsy head it was,
Of dreams that wave before the half-shut eye,
And of gay castles in the clouds that pass,
For ever flushing round a summer sky;
There eke the soft delights, that witchingly
Tlstil a wanton sweetness through the breast,
And the calm pleasures, always hover'd nigh;
And whate'er smack'd of noyance or unrest
Was far, far off expell'd from that delicious nest."
This excellent man and great poet died of a cold caught on the
Thames, August 2t, 1748.
Lyric poetry is perhaps the only important subdivision of literature in which the earlier period of the history of English genius
had failed to offer models of supereminent excellence. Cowley,
indeed, had made noble essays to reproduce in the literature of his
countryv something analogous in spirit and structure to the lyric
compositions of Greece; but in imitating Pindar and Anacreon he
seems to have forgot the intense mythological fervour which glows
throughout these works, which are among the grandest manifestations of Hellenic art.
Italian poetry, too, was abundant in noble lyrics: Petrarch had
shown the power and majesty of his country's language, and a multitude of great men, Chiabura, Pindemoite, Filicaja, had given
proof that the peculiar energies of the Greek lyric might be revived,
with little diminution of effect, and a not dissimilar form of expression, in the splendid canzoni of Italy.  These works Milton had
profoundly studied, and it was from their study too, combined with
anintense perception of the beauties of the Greek lyrics whose
spirit they so admirably resuscitated, that Gray was able, in the Ode,
to dispute the wreath with Milton himself, and to give noble speciinens of this kind of writing. Gray, like Milton, was one of the
most learned men of his age, and he also had the good taste to
avoid, in the subject and imagery of his works, that feeble affectation of exclusive classicism which gives so monotonous and unnatural an air to most of the lyric compositions of his day: and
thus his very boldness in rejecting all the over-worn machinery of
Greek and Roman mythology actually tended to give his works a
greater real and essential resemblance to the spirit of classical
poetry. The artifices of his language and the peculiar structure of
his verse are reproductions of ancient poetry, particularly of Greece;
but the main source of the pleasure he gives is in the truly national




296           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. XVI.
sympathies he excites, a merit strongly exemplified in two of his
noblest compositions, the'Ode on Eton College' and the'Elegy in
a Country Churchyard.' These are works which any Greek poeteven the greatest-might have been proud to own; they are
saturated with the finest essence of the Attic Muse.  Yet Gray has
in no sense Hellenised too much or out of place: he is Greek by
very force of daring to be English.
Gray was born in 1716, and began his career by travelling over
part of Europe with Horace Walpole.  Returning to England in
1741, he wisely adopted an academic life, for which he was bcst
fitted by his character and pursuits.  He retired to Cambridge,
where he continued to reside, with few interruptions, until his death
in 1771, devoting himself to incessant but somewhat desultory study,
and keeping up with several literary friends a correspondence which
gives us a most amusing and lively portrait of a singular character.
In his manners and feelings Gray was extremely timid and fastidious,
affecting to despise the pursuits and habits of the academic society
by which he was surrounded, and perpetually conceiving great
literary plans which his indolence and self-indulgent Sybaritism prevented him from realising.
His works appeared at considerable intervals-the'Ode on Eton
College' in 1747, the' Elegy' four years after, the noble' Ode on
the Progress of Poetry' in 1757, and'The Bard' (his greatest work)
after the lapse of another period as considerable.  In the' Ode to
Eton College' he gives melodious expression to that natural and
tender feeling of regret with which in after-life we regard the sports
of childhood and the scenes of our school-days.  It is weighty and
rich with thought, and many passages are versified with inimitable
delicacy and skill; we see here some of those bold personifications
and sparkling felicities of diction-those "thoughts that breathe,
and words that burn"-which give such splendour to his after lyrics.
The subject and general treatment of the'Elegy' is familiar to
readers of every nation.  The reflections of this poem are certainly
not marked by any striking originality, but they are illustrated with
such consummate taste, expressed with such a union of impressiveness and grace, that the work is a masterpiece of poetical handling.
The production by which the genius of this poet will be tried is
Andoubtedly the lyric entitled'The Bard.'  It is suggested by the
legend cf King Edward I. having given orders that all the bard:l
should be put to death, as to them he attributed the desperate resistance made by the Welsh people to his victorious arms.  The poemn
opens with a splendid and spirited description of one of these
national poets beholding, from a rock, the approach of the invader's
army"As down the steep of Snowdon's shaggy side
He wound with toilsome march his long array;"




CHAP. XVI.]         COLLINS AND SIIENSTONE.                   297
and the substance of the work is an awful prophetic denunciation of
the woe and ruin which was to avenge on the cruel conqueror and
his house the miseries he had inflicted on Wales. The picture is a
noble and striking one,- and possesses much more distinctness than is
generally to be found in Gray. In this he has exhausted all the
stores of imagery and all the artifices of harmony; and the effect is
singularly grand and imposing. But the poem, in spite of all his
skill, has somewhat of an artificial and hot-bed air; the imagery,
beautiful as it is, inspires the reader with an involuntary feeling of
its having been painfully collected from a multitude of sources.  It
is a piece of rich mosaic; and though the parts of which it is composed are exquisite in themselves and dovetailed together with no
ordinary art, the effect of the whole is rather of construction than
evolution.  Gray's personifications, whether of single figures or
groups of abstract qualities, are often designed with singular felicity
and adorned with a gorgeous splendour of colouring; but they are
sometimes out of place, as, for example, in'The Bard,' that beautiful picture:"Fair laughs the morn, and soft the zephyr blows,
While, proudly riding o'er the azure realm,
In gallant trim the gilded vessel goes,
Youth at the prow, and Pleasure at the helm,
Regardless of the sweeping whirlwind's sway,
That, hush'd in grim repose, expects his evening prey."
The Welsh poetry is indeed full of the boldest personification-as
indeed is that of every rude and warlike people; but the real ftagments of the bardic compositions rather give life to inanimate objects
than represent under a sensible form the abstract conceptions of the
mind.
In'The Descent of Odin' and some other pieces Gray endeavoured to reproduce in English poetry the wild and savage character of
the Runic imagination; but the spirit is not very happily preserved,
and there is visible in these (as for example in the celebrated ode
entitled'The Fatal Sisters') a perpetual and not very successful
struggle after effect.
Lyric poetry was a department of the art in which this period of
English literary history was exceedingly prolific. The two most
popular if not most important names which we have to notice are
Collins and Shenstone: the one is held by many, and with no small
justice, the equal of Gray; and the other may almost be called the
inventor of a peculiar style of pastoral ballad writing.  The story
of both is painful and melancholy: Collins was driven by disappoint.
ment into intemperance, and by intemperance into madness; and
Shenstone, by the imprudent indulgence in his taste for an elegant
art (the art of ornamental gardening, of which he must be considered as almost the inventor), into inextricable embarrassment.
If we admire the genius and skill which has compressed into the




298          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. XVYI.
few pages of Gray's collected poems so many noble images, so many
exquisite movements of harmony, and so much splendour and propriety of diction, we shall find that an intense susceptibility for
beauty has concentrated into the yet smaller compass of Collins's
productions a quantity and depth of loveliness of a kind even more
permanently attractive to the reader. If Gray was the more accomplished artist, Collins was the more born poet. In Collins the first
thing we remark is the inimitable felicity of his expression. Gray's
lovely and majestic pictures are careful, genial, artistic paintings of
nature; those of Collins are the images of nature in the camera
obscura. Gray is the light of day; Collins is the Italian moonlight
- as bright almost, but tenderer, more pensive, more spiritual, —
"Dusk, yet clear;
Mellow'd and mingling, yet distinctly seen."
The'Ode on the Passions' is exquisitely felicitous in conception,
full of personifications conceived in the true lyric spirit: the
changes, too, of imitative harmony with which the poet at once
describes and exemplifies the appropriate music of each passionall these form a noble effort of taste, sensibility, and genius, and
may be boldly compared to the somewhat similar picture in the
immortal'Ode' of Dryden; but we must confess that in our judgment some of the minor lyrics of Collins exhibit not only a rarer
and more exquisite degree of merit, but are a more faithful impress
of the peculiar idiosyncrasy of his mind. The little'Ode to Evening'
consists of but thirteen short quatrains, without rhyme; but in its
fifty-two lines we have the whole spirit and quintessence of its subject: it is an orient pearl of tender loveliness.  All is soft, airy, full
of variety, yet harmonized into grace: it is one of those undulating
melodies of Schubert, on which the soul floats dreamily, as if on the
dewy brea~th of twilight.
Several of Collins's songs (as for example the beautiful Dirge in'Cymbeline,' the stanzas'How  sleep the brave,' the'Elegy on
Thomson,' &c.) possess similar but inferior merit,. and are not only
fuller of the poet's peculiar charm, but more likely to defy future
rivalry, than the more elaborate works, such as the'Ode on the
Highland Superstitions,' that to'Liberty,' or the'Oriental Eclogues:' these last, though beautiful, and though admired when they
appeared as being one of the first attempts to employ in English
poetry Eastern imagery, yet have been much surpassed by more
recent writers, better acquainted with the real manners and nature
of the "Morning-Land."
The'Pastorals' of Shenstone were singularly popular in their
day, and are still admired by the young.  Whatever charm  they
possess is owing to their smooth and easy language, their simple
equable fluency, and also to the true but slender vein of natural
sentiment; which ma'kes us forget their intolerable mawkishness,




CHAP. XVI.]  SIHENSTONE: THE SCIIOOLMISTRESS.             299
and the absurd affectation of the persons and manners of their
shepherds and shepherdesses.
Shenstone affirmed that the vicissitudes of hope, despair, jealousy,
and sorrow, painted with a faithful though feeble pencil in these
emasculated compositions, were records of a real passion: and those
who think, with us, that a single touch of nature will give value to
the weakest execution, will look with no implacable severity even
upon the wearisome fadeurs of this " Bucolical Juvenal."
But in spite of the false innocence and querulous monotony of
these Pastorals, Shenstone has in one exquisite and original little
poem shown that when he had the courage to trust to reality and
nature he could produce what was excellent, nay, inimitable in its
kind.  We have spoken of Thomson's delightful imitation of
Spenser in' The Castle of Indolence;' Shenstone's' Schoolmistress'
is a somewhat similar imitation of the language and versification
of the English Ariosto, though with considerable differences of
treatment.
Shenstone has taken for his theme the humble character of a
village schoolmistress, and the poem (which is very short) is an
exquisite specimen of that kind of burlesque which is ludicrous
without ceasing to be reverential.  Of course there is little or no
allegory; and so far this work neither enters into any dangerous
rivalry with Thomson, nor provokes any recollection but an agreeable
one of Spenser; and the quaintness of the antiquated diction is in
delightful unison with the pleasant rustic details, related with
enchanting ease and simple homely tenderness.
But perhaps the most remarkable indication of the tendency
(obscure at first and uncertain, but rapidly acquiring a definite direction) towards a new and distinct tone of romanticism, is to be
observed in the two remarkable forgeries which had so powerful an
effect on literature, not only in England but on the Continent-the
fabrications of Macpherson, and the Rowley poems of Chatterton.
Of these the former had an infinitely-'wider popularity, particularly
abroad; and it is not too much to say that they gave a' strong and
peculiar colouring to poetry, which was even more durable in France
and Germany than in England.  The works which formed the
favourite and almost 6nly poetical reading of Napoleon, and which
Madame. de Stahl assigned as the proof of that wild and pensive
melancholy which foreigners considered as characteristic of the
English mind, must certainly deserve our notice.  The history of
this strange imposition is as follows: —James Macpherson, a vain
and needy Scotsman, published, about 1760, a small volume of frag.
ments, purporting to be prose translations of ancient legendary
poems still current in the highlands of Scotland, and relating, in
the Erse or Gaelic dialect of the Celtic language, the exploits of
heroes.  These Macpherspn pretended to have merely put into
25




300          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CIIAP. XV1
English, adopting for the purpose a peculiar abrupt and declamatory
but modulated prose, full of bold metaphor and apostrophe, which
was itself a new and striking innovation in poetry, and tended to
increase the air of authenticity. The success of this volume was
immense: and having obtained a subscription to enable him to travel
through the wild and solitary mountain districts of his country,
MIacpherson soon produced a fresh supply of similar remains. among
which were several regular heroic narratives of considerable length.
The discovery of such a treasury of new and impressive forlms of
poetry in a savage region, the singular and complete delineations of
a very chivalrous tone of manners and sentiment existing at a very
remote age, the recurrence of names and events which still lived in
the popular legends of the Celtic tribes-all these gave rise to a
violent controversy respecting the authenticity of the poems.  This
controversy Macpherson could have immediately settled by the production of the Gaelic originals, but this he refused or was unable to
do; and after long and furious discussions, in which the national
vanity of the Highlanders was irritated by the contemptuous incro,
dulity of southern literary men, the Highland Society made minute
and extensive investigations (by addressing a circular letter of questions to the Gaelic pastors of the mountain country) to set at rest a
question which had almost become a matter of national importance.
From the evidence thus collected it appeared, first, that a great many
of the names and events which figure in the Ossianic poems were
familiar to the legendary recollections of the Highlanders, and even
of the Welsh and Irish Celts; secondly, that, though some of the
imagery employed by Macpherson was really to be found in ancient
Gaelic poems, yet that nothing like those compositions, or any one
of them in particular, was to be found existing in the Celtic language
in an independent, complete, and substantive form. A critical examnination further showed that such a raised, artificial, and theatrical
tone of sentiment could never have existed among such a people and
at such an epoch as Scotland in the fourth and fifth centuries; and
a still more minute inspection established the fatal fact that tMacpherson was one of the boldest, most reckless, unblushing plagiarists who
ever existed. Homer. Virgil, the Hebrew Scriptures, even later
poets of his own country, as Milton and Shakspeare-all had been
ransacked to furnish forth images for this Celtic paradise. Wordsworth has well observed that the conceptions of really ancient poetry
are invariably simple, direct, distinct.  Nature appears to the yet
unidealising eye of primitive genius, as she does to the physical eye,
well defined and vivid: but in Ossian all is vague, misty, phantomlike.  In the early ages of poetry, as in human infancy, the imagination corporealizes the remote: it is the last refinement of the ideal
t) spiritualise the near.
The perpetual recurrence of the same images in Ossian, the grass




CRAP. XVI.]         OSSlAN - CHATTERTON.                    30i
waving in the blast, the mist rolling around the grey rock, the lonely
tomb of the warrior, the heath, the voiceful torrent, and the diim
watery phantom floating over the moonlit desert, —these undoubtedly
give a certain impressive wildness, and breathe over the reader's
mind a feeling of vague sadness, vastness, and desolate grandeur;
hut the charm  is soon broken, and, after looking for a short time
upon the cloudy exaggeration of Ossian as the very top and consummation of the sublime, we return with renewed ardour to the true
sim'ple, unaffected splendour of real poetry.
The experiments made by Chatterton upon public credulity, conceived with such boldness, executed with such genius, and persevered
in with such haughty stoicism of pride, present one of the most
singular phenomena in the history of the human intellect.  Of all
men,
"Chatterton, the marvellous boy,
The sleepless soul, that perish'd in his pride,"
appears to have been the most precocious; and the whole of his
short but melancholy tale is a dread proof of the danger of a too
early development of intellect. He was born a man, his mind burst
at once into full flower, and, like some plant made prematurely to
bloom, it faded and withered "with all its blushing honours thick
upon it."  No eulogy can be more wonder-exciting than the sinmple
recapitulation of his history.  He was the son of a sexton and
parish schoolmaster, and was born at Bristol in 1752.  Left an
orphan by the death of his father, he passed his infancy in the
deepest poverty, and received no other education than that of a
charity-school.  And yet this child, one of the humblest natives of
a provincial town, wrote, at eleven years of age, verses which are
not only equal to the early productions of any of the extraordinary
poets who ever lived, but will more than bear a comparison with the
average compositions of his day.  With a mind strongly impressed
with the peculiar character of the Gothic architecture, of which
Bristol affords some noble examples, and exhibiting a peculiar
susceptibility to the impressions of Middle-Age art, this miraculous
child conceived the idea of forging, not some detached records of
antiquity, but a whole literature —of creating a style, a language,
an author, a society of the fifteenth century.  In this colossal
project he succeeded so far as to deceive almost all the literary men
of his own day, and to extort from after-times a wondering admiration, which has been almost driven to deny irrefragable philological
proof, rather than to grant the possibility of such poems being the
forgery of the uneducated son of a Bristol gravedigger.
At the age of fourteen Chatterton was apprenticed to an attorney,
and this occupation, however insupportable it may have been to so
haughty and sensitive a character, undoubtedly furnished him with
new means for the accomplishment of his futurt experiments on




802          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [cHAP. XVI.
credulity, by making him acquainted with the barbarous Latin and
Norman French-the relics of feudal and mediemval phraseologywhich abound in the language of English jurisprudence.  His first
attempt was suggested by the completion of a new bridge over the
Avon, when he sent to a newspaper a minute account of the ceremonies that had solemnised the opening of the old bridge, which he
pretended to have copied from an ancient manuscript discovered by
himself, containing a rich and gorgeous account of civic and chlivalric processions, tournaments, miracle-plays, and solemn church ceremonies, with a sermon or benediction pronounced on the new structure by a saint of whom nobody had ever heard! Nor were these
wonderful impositions devoted only to gratify the municipal vanity
of the public of his native city; his inexhaustible invention found
relics of antiquity adapted to the tastes and failings of his firiends
and acquaintance: to Mr. Burgum, a pewterer of Bristol, who was
fond of heraldry, Chatterton gives a pedigree, deducing the descent
of the honest tradesman from the days of William Duke of Normandy, and making him the representative, in a direct line, of "Od,
Duke of Blois and Earl of Holderness."  To a pious divine the
youth presents a fragment of a sermon on the Divinity of the Holy
Spirit, pretended to have been preached in the fifteenth century;
and another person, enthusiastic for the architectural antiquities of
the city, is gratified with a minute account of all the churches, the
castle, &c., accompanied by drawings of the principal objects, as
made by the "gode preeste Thomas Rowleie." These, and a thousand more parchments on the most multifarious subjects, Chatterton
pretended to have discovered in an old chest which had been
deposited in the treasury or muniment-room  of St. Mary Redcliffe,
at Bristol, of which church Chatterton's father had been sexton. It
was customary in the Middle Ages to secure deeds and other important documents by placing themrunder the protection of consecrated walls. In this church there had been preserved a number of
these chests, and among them one called "Canyng's coffre," containing the deeds, grants, &c., of one Williain Canyng, a great
merchant of Bristol.  " Canyng's coifre " had been broken open by
order of the magistrates, and all the parchments considered of any
importance (grants and specifications of land, houses, &c.) had been
taken away.  It was amnong the parchments which remained in tlhe
chest that Chatterton pretended to have discovered the extraordinary
productions which he gave to the world; and he invented a complete
history to explain their nature and contents.  He affirmed that the
"gode Willyam Canynge," a great and royal merchant of Bristol in
the fifteenth century, who had been a great beautifier and benefactor
of his native city, had employed the monk, Thomas Rowley, to
travel about and collect curiosities for this mediaeval virtuoso. Rowley is represented as an artist, as an architect, as a herald, as a




CIIAP. XVI.]              CATTERTON.                          8083
dramatist, as a divine.  Among the fragments are a number of pastorals in dialogue; a portion of a tragedy on the subject of Ella, a
Bristolian hero; an admirable ballad entitled'The Death of Sir
Charles Bawdin;' a number of heraldic notices, plans and elevations
of buildings; accounts of painters and stainers of glass —in a word,
a most vast and miscellaneous collection of documents, all of them
wonderfully interesting, and all tending to redound to the glory of
Bristol and the falme of the accomplished and munificent "' laistre
Canynge." Examined, however, by the light of the more accurate
inowledge of our days, these pretended relics of the fifteenth century are full of fatal and inevitable errors, inconsistencies, and parachronisms: the heraldic devices, for example, are such as rebel
against the most fundamental rules of the art; the architecture
could never have existed in any age; the very artful employment of
old words, from Chaucer and similar authors, proves that Chatterton
did not always understand the old French which formed a chief element in his mosaic of obsolete diction (as, for example, he used the
Chaucerian word "mormal" in the sense of a' dish, whereas it
is reallv a disease -mort-mal).  These mistakes are of course fatal
to the aviltllenticity of the poems, and are only a proof of the enormous di:i. bly of forging an ancient composition with any chance of
perliauuaenr success; but they cannot diminish our wonder and adnliration for the boldness, the invention, the ingenuity, and perseverance
of Chatterton.  The diction and orthography he adopted is such as
never could have existed at any period of the English language;
and perhaps the chief and most fatal weakness of the poems is
the facility, harmony, and variety of the versification.
There can be no doubt of the admirable merit of the poems
themselves: they are full of genius, and some of them  are in the
highest degree dignified and sublime; but this beauty and sublimity
is certainly not of the fifteenth century; so that whatever glory
Chatterton loses as an antiquarian, he more than recovers as a poet,
As a poet alone lie would, if he had lived, have been the greatest
of his age.
After exciting intense interest in Bristol, and giving rise to a long
controversy as to their authenticity, these poems were submitted by
Walpole to Gray and Ma.son, who at once decided them to be forgeries: but there still remained many who believed it impossible tha
an uneducated lad could have invented such an astonishing mass ot
fabrication.  Full of the consciousness of intellect, glowing witl
the "indomitable pride" of a haughty, sensitive, passionate, anu
meditative mind, this unhappy child of genius canme to Londoin, with
the intention of living by his pen.  On, on he stirug4led, in the
midst of the most dreadful poverty, writing political tlliaopons and
contributing to the newspapers and reviews.  His life w-as lhborious,
almost stoically self-denying; at one time his proud and ardeat spirit
25 *




3014          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CHAP, XVI
was revelling in the hope of fame and near success; and when ho
sent to the mother and sister he so tenderly loved the largest share
of his miserable gains, he would prophesy them wealth, honour,
power, and reputation; but soon his spirit was plunged again into
despondency and despair.  It is truly dreadful to follow  even in
imagination the struggles and the vicissitudes of such an existencehe agonies for mere life, for bread, the agonies of such a soul as
_hatterton's.  They were not long.  After gaining for a short time
a precarious subsistence as a writer, and having gradually descended
into the very abyss and depth of poverty, he tore up all his papers,
shut himself in his miserable garret, and poisoned himself with
arsenic, August, 25, 1770.  When he destroyed himself hle was not
qulte eighteen!  On the-day before his death he refused the offer
of a dinner from his landlady; the fangs of famine must have been
tearing at his very vitals with a burning anguish like that of the
morrow's poison, and yet his more than Spartan pride revolted at
the idea of alms.
His compositions during the latter part of his career, though
vigorous and spirited, are not only coarse and scurrilous, but manifestly
inferior to the Rowley poems: like the wonderful mocking-bird of
the western forests, his note of mimicry was sweeter than his natural
song.
The great poet or artist is not he who feels that the common topics
of daily life, the universal interests of mankind, are too vulgar to
form the groundwork of his creative energy, and who is ever thirsting after the vast, the distant, and the extraordinary.  His creations
are not like the far and brilliant stars of heaven, but like the daisies
at our feet, rooted in the common earth of our nature, and watered
by the universal dews of human sympathy. Of the truth of these
remarks the literary character of William  Cowper is a strong testimony: he is emphatically the poet of ordinary and intimate life, of
the domestic emotions, of household happiness.  His muse is a
domestic deity, a familiar Lar, and his countrymen have enshrined
his verses in the very holiest penetralia of their hearths.  Cowper
was one of the first poets-even among the English-who ventured
to describe those familiar thoughts, feelings, and enjoyments which
are imaged by the word home-that word which echoes so deeply
in the English heart, that word for which so many cultivated languages have neither synonym nor equivalent.  The life of this greal
and truly original poet was singularly unhappy; the greater part of
it was clouded with insanity, taking one of the most dreadful forms
of that terrible disease - a form  unhappily but too common in
England, i. e. religious melancholy.  Few things' are more touching
than the history of Cowper's life, as it is related, with more than
feminine grace, innocence, and tenderness, in his own inimitable
letters; and we can understand the devotedness with which so many




CHAP. XVI.]                 COWPER.                         305
of his friends sacrificed their whole existence to cherish and console
a being so gifted, so fascinating, and so unhappy. The dim shadow,
too, of an early and enduring but hopeless love, throws over the
picture a soft and pensive tint, like moonlight on some calm landscape. Iis first attack of insanity was brought on by a morbid
timidity; and though the disease must have been long latent in his
system, it appears to have been carried to a crisis by the agitation
which he felt at the idea of appearing before the House of Lords to
be examined touching his appointment to an office connected with
that portion of our legislature.  He was reduced to such agonies of
fear and despair, that, after an unsuccessful attempt to commit suicide, he was removed to a madhouse, where he remained a considera.
ble time.  When discharged from restraint, with his whole system
shattered and tremblingly irritable, he retired to Huntingdon, where
he resided in the family of Mr. Unwin, a clergyman, whose friendship greatly contributed to his recovery and happiness. On Unwin's
death, Cowper, with the widow of his deceased friend, changed his
residence to Olney, in Buckinghamshire, where he contracted a close
intimacy with Mr. Newton, the rector of that parish.  The seeds of
the dreadful malady from which he had already suffered were of
course not eradicated, and they were unfortunately ripened gradually
into a fatal growth by the fervours of fanatic enthusiasm.  Newton
was a man of powerful energies, and undoubtedly animated by good
intentions, but he was deeply tinged with that exaggerated and
gloomy mysticism which is the reproach of the Calvinistic or LowChurch party. Accustomed to pay an undue attention to internal
religious impressions, considering every sensation as the immediate
interposition of Divine influence, and consequently fostering that
spirit of valetudinarianism which is even more fatal to the mind than
to the body, a more unfortunate associate for a man in Cowper's sad
condition could not be conceived: rest and cheerfulness was the only
treatment proper for such a case.
With the narrow inquisitorial spirit of his sect, Newton soon constituted himself the religious adviser - the confessor, in fact - of
Cowper, and kept up in his timid, sensitive, impressionable heart,
a morbid irritability which nothing but a mind naturally powerful
could have resisted.
It is singular enough that Cowper's poetical genius was not exhi.
bited till an unusually advanced age: he was fifty before he obtained
any reputation as a writer.  During the early part of his residence
at Olney, Cowper's existence had been that of a religious recluse:
either dreading the agitations of life, or feeling his heart and brain
still sore fromn the recent lashes of disease, he occupied himself with
the most tranquil and innocent amusements, making bird-cages,
taming hares, and so on. He was again overwhelmed by a new and
severe attack of his malady, and it was in recovering from this that




?306         OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CHAP. XVI.
he turned to literature as a pastime rather than a serious occupation.
Previous to this moment he had written nothing except a collection
of hymns, entirely unworthy of his great though as yet undeveloped
powers: and it was at the suggestion of Lady Austen, a member of the
little affectionate circle of devoted friends by which he was surrounded,
that he roused himself to exertions which were to render his name
immortal. This lady, a gay and accomplished person, seems to have
possessed over Cowper an influence which would have been in the
highest degree salutary; but Mrs. Unwin, who feared that the poet's
affections might be transferred to a more attractive rival, seems to
have forced upon him the alternative of renouncing either the friendship of Lady Austen or her own. In this dilemma, Cowper's obligations to Mrs. Unwin, of course, rendered it impossible for him  to
hesitate, and he was deprived of the healthy intercourse which might
have served to some extent as an antidote against the intoxicating
poison of enthusiastic religion. It was Lady Austen who gave
Cowper, as a subject for his verse, her sofa, which the poet afterwards expanded into the admirable'Task:' it was she who related
to him the story of'John Gilpin;' and, in short, her society, had
he been happily removed from the fatal influence of the Newtons
and Unwins, might have restored Cowper to the world.
In'The Task,' the first poem by which he became generally
popular, he starts fronm a mock-heroic introduction, in the manner of
Ambrose Philips, giving a ludicrous account of the rise and origin
of the sofa, and gradually and easily glides into exquisite descriptions
of rural scenery, inimitable pictures of homeborn and domestic
happiness, and reflections upon all that is most interesting and important in the moral, religious, and social life of man.  What must
have been the innate strength and nobility of Cowper's mind, which
could rise superior (as he generally does) to the wretched superstitions of a narrow-minded and exclusive sect! His versification (tor
the most part he wrote in blank verse) was at first intentionally made
rough and irregular, partly for the purpose of giving a colloquiai air
to his works, and partly from a false notion that the solemn truths
he inculcated would only have been degraded by the ornaments of
art: but this error was afterwards much corrected.  His language is
in the highest degree easy, familiar, and consequently impressive;
there is no author who so completely talks to his reader — none
whose works breathe so completely of the individuality and personal
character of their writer.  He abounds in descriptions of scenery;
and we hardly regret that he should have passed his life among the
dull levels of the Ouse, when we think that the power of his geniuz
has given an unfading grace and interest to landscapes in themselve,
neither romantic nor sublime.  It appears to us that he is greatly
inferior to Thomson in comprehensiveness and rapidity of picturesque
perception; but then his mode of expression is simpler, less amb}:tous,




CHAP. XVI.]      COWPER: THE TASK-H-OMER.                    307
and in purer taste, and he surpasses not only the author of' The
Seasons,' but perhaps all poets, in the power of communicating
interest to the familiar details of domestic life.  His humour was
very delicate and just, and his descriptions of the common absurdities of ordinary intercourse are masterly.  When rising, as he often
and gracefully does, into the loftier atmosphere of moral or religious
thought, he exhibits a surprising ease and dignity: his mind was of
that rare order which can rise without effort and sink without meanness.  He is uniformly earnest and sincere; and though in many
passages he has shown traces of the bigoted and exaggerated spirit
of Calvinistic theology, that tendency to see judgments in the most
ordinary accidents of life, and perhaps somewhat too, of the indecorous mingling of religious impressions with the common concerns of
daily existence, it is only wonderful how he could have lived so long
in the heated atmosphere of enthusiasm, without losing the candour,
benevolence, and good sense of his character.
After'The Task,' Cowper produced a new translation of the'Iliad' of Homer.  He was fully aware of the defects of Pope's
version, and endeavoured to approach nearer to the majestic simplicity, the primeval grandeur, of the original; and for this purpose he
used blank verse as his medium.  But Cowper has failed almost as
signally as Pope had done before him: his version is indeed rather
more faithful, but it is tedious and monotonous; it has neither the
might and ever-varying splendour of the original, nor the delicate
artificial graces of Pope, who, if he could not imitate the peculiar
and Scriptural sublimity of the Greek —
"The large utterance of the early Gods"at least made up for the want of that quality by elegance and swcet,
ness peculiar to himself.  Neither the recluse of Olney nor the
skilful satirist of Twickenham  has approached the rough energy,
the truly Homeric fire, or even the resounding oceanic music of old
Chapman.  The translation of Homer was published by subscription, and was tolerably successful; and shortly after the poet
migrated with all his friends to Weston, a beautiful village near
Olney.  Here he again fell into a deep and increasing gloom  of
religious despondency, and the icath of Mrs. Unwin, in 1796, was
the last blow to the unhappy poet's sanity.  He lingered on for
three years in misery and despair, and died on the 25th of April,
1800.  The last verses he ever wrote,'The Castaway,' form a most
melancholy record of his dreadful state of mind, and may be compared with the somewhat similar comlposition of Byron, written
shortly before his death.  Both breathe the very music of sorlrow,
but Cowper's is without hope, and Byron's sadness is dignified by
resignation and manly fortitude. His finest and most popular poellms
are those which contain a mingling of serious reflection, description,




308           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CIIAP. XVI.
and comic painting of character, in which last he has a truly Addisoninn grace and delicacy.  Some of his minor and more fainiliar
works, as the exquisite lines to tMary (AIrs. Unwin), the verses on
his mother's picture, are perhaps unequalled  in  their particular
manner.  It is on these, on the'Table-Talk,' and on'The Task,'
that his reputation is based: it is a glory that will endure as long
as our language.  Cowper was born in 1731, and died at the age of
sixty-nine.
If Cowper be the poet who with a wise boldness has depicted the
joys and woes of domestic and fireside life in rural England, painting what he saw and felt, not in the colours of meretricious ornaIllent, but in the sober hues of truth, Crabbe must be considered as
essentially the poet of the poor-of the English poor.  Cowper
contented himself with turning the telescopic glance of poesy into
the quiet retreats of virtuous, refined, and educated retirement, while
Crabbe directed it into the squalid dens of plebeian  misery, the
workhouse, the gaol, and the smuggler's hut.  It is very singular to
observe that Cowper, the man of exquisite refinement and sensibility, of aristocratic birth and elegant tastes, should exhibit in his
style and tone of thinking a fiequent air of ruggedness and asperity,
while his great contemporary, born in the very depth of poverty,
and nursed during his hard infancy amid the very scenes of want,
of crime, and wretchedness which he so powerfully described, retained in all his works something of the elaborate finish and antithesis
of style which Pope so long caused to prevail in English poetry.
IHe has been aptly and wittily styled "Pope in worsted stockings."
-3[e was born in 1754, at the miserable coast-town of Aldborough,
in Suffolk, and his earlier years were passed ailid the squalor of
extreme poverty, rendered still more oppressive by the gloomy and
violent character of his father.  Virgil had a deep meaning  when
he placed the fiend Want at the portals of the infernal shades where
his hero was to gain insight into futurity; Crabbe's long wrestling
with his fate no doubt gave him that profound knowledge of human
nature which has filled his works with such solemni lessons of pathos
and wisdoml.  The place of his nativity is situated in the ugliest and
most monotonous scenery of a flat and swampy coast, and the inhabitants were in harmony with the nature which surrounded them
— fishermen, poachers, and smugglers, a savage and demoralized
race.  After receiving an education far superior to what could have
been expected, young Crabbe  made an unslcceeesLal attemnpt to
establish himself as a country apothecaary, and, findipn.g himself on
the brinrk of ruin, he took the desperate resolution of journeying up
to London, where lhe arrived without a friend, and with three pounds
and some unfinished  manuscripts in  his pocket.  After battling
nobly and valiantly and hopefully with all the horrors of disappoint-,lentl, and at the moment when  his last hope seemed to have deserted




CIIAP. XVI.]         CRABBE: IIIS WORKS.                    309
him, he was lucky enough to attract the notice of Burke, one of the
wisest, greatest, and most benevolent men who have ever done
honour to our country.  With his assistance he brought out his first
successful poem,'The Library.'  This was the turn of the tide fot
Crabbe, and fortune soon began to shower upon him rewards for his
patience and manly fortitude.  He found patrons on every side, and
entered the Church, performing his sacred functions for the first time
in his native town of Aldborough.  In 1783 appeared'The Vil.
lage,' a work which at once stamped him  as a great original poet.
The principal charm  of this work was its masterly description of
real nature and actual humble life, and it was mainly composed of
studies or recollections of the men and scenes that had surrounded
his infancy.  Crabbe saw the fatal defect of all the pastoral poetry
which had hitherto appeared-its false decorum and feeble distrust
of nature.  His object was to show the poor
"As truth will paint them, and as bards will not."
He trusted to nature, and received immortality as his reward.  The
singular apparent incapability of the society and scenery he took for
his subject is only an additional proof that Crabbe's principle of art
was correct.  He is in poetry what Hogarth is in painting; and if
both poet and painter have been accused, not without a show of justice,
of dwelling too exclusively upon what is odious and repulsive in
reality, and giving a too gloomy and discouraging view of human
society, this fault is more than redeemed by the admirable instinct
with which they have penetrated into the heart of man, and shown
that its strength and weakness, its wisdom and its folly, its majesty
and its degradation, are alike in all ranks and classes.  Crabbe has
read us deep and terrible lessons of human crime and folly, and his
lessons are, like Hogarth's, only rendered more impressive and homespeaking by the familiar language in which they are conveyed. His
works are very numerous, and all very much alike in merit, in form,
in conduct, and in moral.  He generally selects some ground or
framework offering him the opportunity for displaying his peculiar
and admirable talent for minute description of commonplace, ordinary,
and often even repulsive scenes and persons.  On this ground he
introduces a number of detached or episodic tales, generally of lowly
and often of the humblest life-sometimes deeply tragic, sometimes
full of a quaint and subdued humour. Each story is complete in
itself, and depicts some striking episode of internal and domestic life;
they are short but awful extracts from the unread pages of the great
book of the human heart.  The following is a list of Crabbe's
works:'The Village;''The Parish Register' (supposed to be an
account of the most remarkable births, marriages, and deaths occurring during a year in a country parish);'The Borough,' a minute
and masterly delineation of some obscure country town like Aldbo



310          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CIIAP. XVI
rough, with inimitable portraits and biographies of the most remarkable characters, from the highest to the lowest, which figure on such
a stage; the'Tales in Verse,' containing many of his finest specimens of pathos and character-painting; and, lastly,' Tales of the
Hall,' published after a very long interval, during which the poet
seems to have remained indifferent to the famne he had acquired.
These consist principally of the narratives of two brothers, who meet
in old age after a life's separation, and mutually communicate thei.
history of early struggles and adventure.  All these works are
written in the rhymed couplet of Pope.  Crabbe's humour is very
dry and quaint, and is sometimes introduced somewhat out of place;
but his powers of minute descriptive painting, and his skill in setting
vividly before us a scene or a character which at first sight we should
consider hopelessly unattractive, were never equalled in literature.
Nor is he inferior when delineating either the grander or more famniliar manifestations of external nature: the sea, in storm and calm,
has perhaps never been so admirably represented in poetry; and in
the depicting of the fen, the marsh, the quay, the pauper lodginghouse, Crabbe has a power as peculiar and as individual. Nor is he
less great and admirable in his descriptions of moral suffering-the
pangs of plebeian guilt, the hopeless sorrow of uncomplaining bereavement, the wild phantoms of insanity, the punishment of lost innocence, the unpitied sorrows of poverty, ignorance and neglect.
It remains to mention two or three remarkable works, written in
a more lyrical form and measure than those to which we have just
alluded. The finest of these is'Sir Eustace Grey,' the story of a
madman related with tremendous impressiveness by himself; of a
similar kind is' The Hall of Justice;' and it would be unjust to
quit Crabbe without saying a word of the admirable and touching
songs occasionally interspersed among the purely narrative poems.
Crabbe lived honoured and respected to a great age, and died in
1832.
Great Britain has been inhabited at various epochs by so many
different races that there still exist an immense number of distinct
provincial dialects or patois, almost as numerous as the shires into
which the country is territorially divided.
None, however, of these numerous dialects have ever been employed
as a medium of literature; and though a few of our poets (as Spenser
in his Pastorals, and Jonson in'The Sad Shepherd') have made
timid and ill-assured essays to employ a true rural dialect in poetry, yet
these essays were so partial in themselves, and must be considered to
have met with so little success and found so few imitators, that we
must say that the patois of England properly so called have never
been dignified by literary employment.  It is remarkable that the
dialect adopted in the above cases was that of the Northern border
-the counties of Cumberland and Westmoreland; and this dialect




CHAP. XVI.]         LOWLAND SCOTS DIALECT.                     311
approaches very near to the patois of Scotland.  But the patois of
Scotland forms an exception to the remarks we have just made; and
if the reader keeps in mind the distinction insisted on in the first
chapter of this little work, he will easily understand how the
Scottish dialect early acquired and uninterruptedly retained the
character of a literary tongue.  The distinction just alluded to is
peculiarly important for the foreign student of our literature to keep
in mind, as a neglect of it will cause the greatest confusion in his
ideas. Hie must remember that the Scottish dialect is totally different from the Scottish language.  The former (usually called Lowland Scots) is essentially and absolutely English, containing, it is
true, a few words and expressions not to be found in the latter
speech, some of which have arisen from peculiarities of climate,
manners, and natural appearances, and some, singularly enough,
being French.  It differs from  the English of London chiefly in
pronunciation, having a broader and more vocalic sound, and possessing not only an exquisite naivete of sentiment, arising from the
rustic and pastoral character of the people, but a much more musical
and singing intonation, which renders it admirably adapted to be a
dress for those beautiful and plaintive national airs for which Scotland has ever been so celebrated, and which that country possesses
in greater number and variety than any nation in the world.
In fact, the Scottish dialect bears exactly the same relation to
English as the Doric dialect bore to Attic Greek, and we find consequently that Scotland, like Sicily, has possessed many a Bion and
Theocritus. But it must not be supposed that this dialect was a
mere patois: it was the speech of the fair, the great, the witty, and
the wise; and as long as Scotland possessed an independent court
this beautiful and picturesque dialect was used by the noblest and
the most refined. The union of the two kingdoms has of course
tended to throw this dialect into disuse among the higher classes of
Scotland; but it has been for so many ages sanctified by associations
of glory, nationality, and patriotism, it has been the vehicle for so
much of the sweetest and most touching poetry, it is so entwined
with all the fondest recollections of the people, that it will never
perhaps descend to the degraded and local position which the comparatively barbarous patois of the English counties have always
occupied.   These were the corruptions of peasant-speech —the
Scottish dialect was a distinct and highly-cultivated form  of language.  The Scottish language (spoken only in the Highlands) is
the Celtic or Gaelic of the ancient Britons, another variety of which
is still spoken in Wales, and is totally different in origin, grammar,
and sound from English, and quite as unintelligible to the Lowlander
as it is to the Londoner.  Of this we have no occasion to speak
The Lowland Scottish dialect possesses a literature of its own - a
literature as rich, as ancient, as peculiar, and as admirable as can
26




312          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. XVI,
be boasted by many cultivated nations. This vigorous tongue has
been made the medium for science, for theology, for history, and,
above all, for poetry of a very high order.  "In the fourteenth
century," says Campbell, himself a Scot, "Barbour celebrated the
greatest royal hero of his country (Bruce) in a versified romance
that is not uninteresting.  James I. of Scotland; Henrysone, the
author of'Robene and Makyne,' the first known pastoral, and one
of the best in a dialect rich with the favours of the Pastoral Muse;
Douglas, the translator of Virgil; Dunbar, Mersar, and others, gave
a poetical lustre to Scotland in the fifteenth century, and filled up a
space in the annals of British poetry, after the date of Chaucer and
Lydgate, that is otherwise nearly barren." Dunbar, indeed, is an
imaginative poet of a very high order, and his'Dance of the Seven
Deadly Sins in Hell' is an allegory of astonishing vigour and terrific
sublimity -at once Dantesque and Spenserian.  As a satirist and
painter of comic character Sir David Lyndsay is a writer of whom
any nation might well be proud; and Scotland can trace an uninterrupted succession of truly admirable poets, comic, descriptive,
pathetic, or narrative, of a merit well worthy of those admirable
ballads which are inseparably associated with all that is gayest,
tenderest, and most humorous in sentiment, married to the, sweetest
music in the world.
One of the most remarkable and truly national Scottish poets is
Allan Ramsay, whose'Gentle Shepherd' is perhaps the only
modern pastoral which can be compared to the exquisite creations of
Theocritus.  It is the first successful solution of that difficult
problem, to represent rustic manners as they really are, and at the
same time so as to make them attractive and graceful. The difficulty of the task will best be appreciated by reflecting on the innumerable failures, from Virgil down to Shenstone, which crowd the
annals of literature.  But the rustic pictures of Allan Ramsay
breathe the freshness of real country life - they have an atmosphere
of nature, the breezy freshness of the fields: he has revived the
magic of Theocritus, and given us a glimpse into the interior life of
the real shepherds, with their artless vigour and unsophisticated feelings. The immense popularity of this poem among the people
whose manners it describes (for no other readers could generally
either understand its language or appreciate its delicate and local
allusions) as well as the existence of a vast body of very beautiful
songs, would diminish our surprise that Scotland should have produced a number of poets who devoted to the vernacular literature
of their country powers of genius which would have made them
immortal on a larger theatre than the one which they selected. The
greatest of these was undoubtedly Robert Burns, the glory of his
country, and one of the innumerable instances, in which Britain has
been so prolific, of genius springing to immortality from the hulm




CHAP. XVI.]                  BURNS.                          313
bles.t origin.  He was born in 1758, and passed the earlier part of
his life in struggling (though with little success) against the toils
and distresses of a peasant's life.  Having been reduced by misfortunes in his humble career as a farmer, and also in some degree
by indulgence in the passions accompanying so excitable and poetical
a temperament, to the verge of ruin, he was upon the point of
quitting his country in despair and emigrating to the West Indies,
when the unequalled pathos, splendour, and originality of some of
his lyrics struck many influential members of cultivated society, and
the poet was induced to remain in Scotland.  He now went to
Edinburgh, where he reigned for some time the undisputed lion, the
wonder of that literary capital.  His conversation was as brilliant
as his genius was pathetic and sublime, but, unfortunately for himself, the poet could not resist the fascinations of social indulgence,
and the intoxication of universal applause.  He retired again to the
country, and, after fruitlessly struggling for some time as arl agriculturist, he was obliged, in order to obtain bread for his family, to
accept an humble situation in the office of Excise.  This employment, so unfavourable both to habits of temperance and to literary
occupation, only tended to precipitate the setting of this bright and
comet-like intelligence: his constitution, worn out with excesses,
passions, and anxieties, was completely broken up, and he died
la 1796.
His works are singularly various and splendid; the greater part of
them consists of songs, either completely original, or recastings of
such compositions of older date: in performing this difficult task of
altering and improving existing lyrics, in which a beautiful thought
was often buried under a load of mean and vulgar expression, Burns
exhibits a most exquisite delicacy and purity of taste, and an admirable ear for harmony. His own songs vary in tone and subject
through every changing mood, from the sternest patriotism and the
most agonising pathos to the- broadest drollery: in all he is equally
inimitable. Most of his finest works are written in his own Lowland
dialect, and give a picture, at once familiar and ideal, of the feelings
and sentiments of the peasant.  It is the rustic heart, but glorified
by passion, and elevated by a perpetual communing with nature.
But he has also exhibited perfect mastery when writing pure English,
and many admirable productions might be cited in which he has
clothed the loveliest thoughts in the purest language. Consequently
his genius was not obliged to depend upon the adventitious charm
and prestige of a provincial dialect.  There never perhaps existed a
mind more truly and intensely poetical than that of Burns. In his
verses to a Mountain Daisy, which he turned up with his plough -
in his reflections on destroying, in the same way, the nest of a fieldmouse, there is a vein of tenderness which no poet has ever surpassed.
In the beautiful little poem'To Mary in Heaven,' and in many




314           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. XVI
other short lyrics, he has condensed the whole history of love, its
tender fears, its joys, its frenzy, its agonies, and its yet sublimer
resignation, into the space of a dozen lines.  No poet ever seems so
sure of himself; none goes more directly and more certainly to the
point; none is more muscular in his expression, encumbering the
thought -with no useless drapery of words, and trusting always for
effect to nature, truth, and intensity of feeling.  Consequently no
poet more abounds in those short and picturelike phrases which at
once present the object almost to our senses, and which no reflection
could either imitate or improve.  What can be more wonderfully
condensed than his picture of a patriot warrior"Pressing forward red-wat-shod"?
it is absolutely'Shakspearian.
But the religion in which Burns is-not perhaps the most supreme,
but the most alone, is that of familiar humour, mingled with a kind
of sly and quaint tenderness.  Scottish external nature is in his
poems represented in its every phase, in its every shade of variation;
but he is yet more admirable when he delineates the interior life of
his own thoughtful and moral countrymen. There have never been
traced by the hand of man such full, such tender, such living picture of rustic life as Burns has left us.  The half-serious halfhumorous tale of'Tam  o'Shanter,' with its fantastically terrific
diablerie, the satiric gaiety of' Holy Fair,' the'Scotch Drink,' the' Elegy on Matthew Henderson,' the' Address to the De'il,' all bear
witness to the wonderful diversity of his powers, to his deep sympathy
with all that is noble and touching in rustic life, and to his intensely
national vein of mingled tenderness and humour. The true poet is
he who finds the most of beauty and of dignity in the universal
feelings and interests of human life: and increased wisdom and
sympathy (the infallible attendant on increased wisdom) is rapidly
tending to make all mankind echo the exclamation of Burns when
he wept at the sight of a lovely and peasant-peopled scene: "The
sight," he said, "of so many smoking cottages gave a pleasure to his
mind, which none could understand who had not witnessed, like hinmself, the happiness and the worth which they contained."  One of
his most admirable poems,'The Cotter's Saturday Night,' is nothing
bu.t an amplification of this profound and beautiful sentiment




CHAP. XVII.]            WALTER SCOTT.                       315
CHAPTER XVII.
SCOTT  AND  SOUTHEY.
Walter Scott-The Lay of the Last Minstrel-Marmion-Lady of the Lake
Lord of' the Isles-Waverley —Guy Mannering-Antiquary-Tales of my
Landlord-Ivanhoe-Monastery and Abbot-Kenilworth-Pirate-Fortunes
of Nigel-Peveril —Quentin Durward-St. Ronan's Well-RedgaulntletTales of the Crusaders-Woodstock-Chronicles of the Canongate —Anne
of Geierstein. Robert Southey —Thalaba and Kehama-Madoc-Legendary
Tales-Roderick-Prose Works and Miscellanies.
THERtE is no author in the whole range of literature, ancient or
modern, whose works exhibit so perfect an embodiment of united
power and activity as is to be found in Walter Scott. IHe is as
prolific as Lope de Vega, as absolutely original as Homer.  He was
descended from one of the most powerful and ancient houses of
Scotland; and though his father (a writer to the signet in Edinburgh)
was rather an active and intelligent lawyer than a representative of
Middle Age nobility, yet the spirit of clanship which still so strongly
pervades Scottish society was enough to unite the poet in sentiment
as in blood to the great and powerful family of Buccleugh.  Having
received in his childhood a slight injury, which rendered him during
his whole life a little latne, though it did not ultimately affect the
strength of a robust and athletic body, he passed some of his earliest
years among the romantic scenery of his own beautiful countryscenery where every spot had been the theatre of warlike or necromantic tradition.  Scott afterwards passed through a regular course
of education, first at the High School and afterwards at the University
of Edinburgh, where he appears, without distinguishing himself by
any extraordinary triumphs, to have acquired the good opinion of
his teachers, and to have become very popular among his comrades,
partly by his stores of old legends, and not less by his frank, bold,
and adventurous character.  It is not easy to conceive a finer specie
men of humanity than Scott.  His frame was vigorous and manly,
evet: surpassing the ordinary size and strength; his features, though
not classically regular, were animated and attractive; and his character was an admirable union of imagination, of good sense, and of
good nature. Power, in short, and goodness were stamped upon the
man, both within and without. On completing his education he
became a member of the Scottish bar, and was ultimately appointed,
through the recommendation of the head of his clan, the Duke of
Buccleugh, sheriff of Selkirk, to which appointnment were afterwards
20 6




316           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CHAP. XVir.
added one or two others. As a lawyer his success, though not extraordinary, was respectable.  The society of Edinburgh was at that
time unusually rich in men of literary and philosophical accomplishments, and it was, moreover, enlivened and diversified by many
relics of the political struggles of the'45-old Jacobite gentlemen,
whose manners supplied the future novelist with many of his most;
admirable characters, and whose adventures furnished him with many
a wild tale of bravery, persecution, and escape-the traditions of a
romantic age which was rapidly passing away.
Henry Mackenzie, the author of'The IMan of Feeling,' and one
of the ornaments of Edinburgh literary society, had introduced into
Scotland a taste for the ballad-poetry of Germany. It was from the
study and admiration of Biirger and the minor lyrists that the
English began to turn their attention to the Teutonic muse; and
Scott translated the'Lenore' and other small compositions, chiefly
of that wild and spectral character which might have been expected
to possess so much novelty for the British public.  These translations, some of them  executed with great spirit and fidelity (is for
example the version of Goethe's'Erl K6nig'), were contributed by
Scott to Lewis's'Tales of Terror,' the first attempt to give specimens of German literature in England. After having, by the
exercise of reason and good sense, recovered from an early lovesorrow, Scott married a young lady of the name of Carpenter, who
was possessed of a small fortune, and retired to a cottage, where, in
the very flower of his youth and surrounded by domestic happiness,
lie prepared for future glory by steady and uninterrupted labour.
From very early youth he had exhibited a most intense passion
for the ballad-poetry in which his own country is even richer than
England itself; and we know that in childhood his imagination had
been lighted up by the repeated perusal of Percy's'IReliques of
Ancient English Poetry'-that admirable collection which was not
only the germ of the great romantic revolution in lfterature, but
which has perhaps tended more than any book since Homer to
inspire the youthful writer with a passion for natural unsophisticated
sentiment and vivid description.  After translating'Goetz von Berlichingen,' Scott travelled over the Border district, collecting new
stores of ballads from old peasants and wandering rhapsodists, and
thus rescuing from oblivion some of the finest pictures of simple
pathos and heroism, and many curious documents of the history of
that interesting region: these were published in three volumes,
entitled the'Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border.'  Nothing could
be better calculated as a preparation for the future triumphs of the
romantic poet and novelist of Scotland than this task of love; and
the necessary antiquarian reading and  investigation  must have
supplied him with an immense store of the materials he so well
knew how to usr   He afterwards published another work of a




CHAP. XVII.] SCOTT: LAY OF THE LAST MINSTREL.                317
similar nature- a commentary on the singular poetical fragments
attributed to Thomas of Erceldoune, said to have lived in the thirteenth century.
The first of that long and splendid line of poems whose glory
was only to be effaced by the intenser splendour of his novels, was'The Lay of the Last Minstrel,' published in 1805, and received by
the public with rapturous delight.  In its plan, its versification, in
the whole design and execution, this was a new and perfectly original
production; the reader was presented with a picture, fresh, vigorous,
vast, and brilliant as Nature herself.  It is a tale of sorcery and
chivalric adventure, as vivid and bright as a real poem of the Middle
Ages, as faithful, as minute, as picturesque in its details; yet at the
same time imbued with the finer sensibility of modern literature,
and adorned with all the splendours of modern art.  The tale is
supposed to be related by a wandering minstrel, the last of a profession once so honoured; and the framing of the legend is at once
exquisitely beautiful in itself, and admirably calculated to set off
and relieve the narrative.  The description of the aged and wandering minstrel,- the diffidence with which he begins his legend in the
presence of the great lady, and tries to recall the inspiration of
vanished days,-and the glorious bursts of truly Homeric fire when
he gets into the full tide of minstrel inspiration,-all this is as fine
as it is original in conception.  Each canto is appropriately and art.
fully introduced with some passage of description or reflection; and
these introductions are among the most exquisite specimens of Scott's
picturesque and enchanting style.  The tale itself is not very well
constructed, and, though many of the supernatural events are im.
pressive, the character of the Goblin Dwarf is unnecessary to the
plot, and generally felt to be a blemish.  The detached scenes —
solemn, exciting, or g-orgeous - are the real strength of the poem.
The night-journey of Deloraine (an admirable embodiment of the
rude mosstrooping borderer) to fulfil the command of the Lady of
Branksome; the description of Melrose Abbey by moonlight; the
scene of the opening of the tomb of Michael Scott, and the taking
of the book of gramarie from the dead hand of the mighty wizard;
the description of Lord Howard,-all these are absolutely unequalled
in their particular manner.  Most authors who have attempted to
evoke the shades of buried ages raise them before our eyes, as
Samuel was raised by the witch of Endor, rather like shadows than
with the consistency of reality.  Scott revivifies them; and, what
is a still greater triumph of art, he puts the spectator into the condi.
tion of a contemporary: we not only see the things, but we see them
as through the eyes of the Middle Ages.  The versification of this
poem, and of most of its successors, consists principally of the
rhymed octosyllabic couplet, founded on the favourite measure of
the Norman Trouveres. This measure, peculiarly well adapted to




318           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CCHAP. XVII.
lively narrative, Scott varies, in passages expressive of passion or
more violent movement, with an occasional short Adionic verse interposed at irregular intervals among the octosyllabic lines, which in the
latter circumstances rhyme together, not uniformly in pairs, but often
in threes or fours.  This kind of verse he wields with consummate
ease; and though he seems always to have written with extraordinary
rapidity, and to have been nowise assiduous to polish or correct, yet
so exquisite was his ear, that there are few poets whose versification
is more varied and flowing, or more infallibly echoes the feeling and
sentiment of the moment.
Scott had now fairly begun that wonderful career which produced
more of beautiful and wise, and in a more astounding variety, than
perhaps the whole history of literature can parallel.  His activity
was inexhaustible, and he was perhaps more accurately, extensively,
and minutely versed in the details of Middle Age art, letters, and
social life, than any man of genius who ever existed. In 1808
appeared'Marmion,' a tale somewhat similar in its scenery and
treatment to the' Lay,' concluding with the fatal field of Flodden.
The hero is an English knight, valiant and wise, but profligate and
unscrupulous; and his adventures, which principally take place in
Scotland, give the poet many opportunities for his inimitable painting
of natural scenery, of chivalrous life, and of interesting historic
personages, in particular of King James VI.  3larmion himself is
finely conceived, but the expedient of bringing about the catastrophe
by representing such a character, however wicked, as forging documents, is a fatal blemish to the probability of the intrigue in such
an age and country. But this defect of costume is amply, gloriously
redeemed by the splendour, fire, energy, and livingness with which
brilliant and varied scenes succeed each other in this magnificent
evocation of chivalrous days.  The voyage of the nuns is one of the
very finest pictures even in Scott's vast gallery: the reader is carried
hounding on like the bark; the verses breathe the very fieshness of
the sea.  In the scene describing the immuring of Constance before
the grim tribunal in the vaults of Lindisfarn Abbey, Scott has
ventured into the lofty regions of terror and pity; and how wonderfully is this awful episode contrasted with the exquisite grace of the
Scottish court, when the fair Lady Heron sings the ballad of Lochinvar! The battle-scene with which this poem concludes is indeed, to
use the words of Shakspeare,"A fearful battle render'd you in music."
The majestic pomp of preparation, the breathless pause, the roaring
onset, the struggle, the carnage, —all is there: the reader feels his
teeth setting, his breath held in, his blood rushing backward to the
heart: it is as real as anything in the Iliad; and the wail of lamentation and defeat, and the death of the conscience-haunted M3armion,




CHAP. XVII.]            SCOTT: P02OEMS.                      319
form a most admirable and appropriate conclusion to that woful
day
"Of Flodden's fatal field,
Where shiver'd was fair Scotland's spear,
And broken was her shield."
Two years after this noble work, was produced'The Lady of thi
Lake,' perhaps the completest and finest poetical conception of bllis
astonishing genius. In this poem the scene is transferred to a region
still more new to English readers, and more picturesque in itself; the
country surrounding the beautiful Loch Katrine, and situated on the
borders between the civilised Lowlands and the mountains inhabited
by the Celtic tribes, is the theatre of the action, and the feuds
between the two races (ever at enmity) its principal material.  The
intrigue, though simple enough, is artful and interesting; it consists
partly of the adventures of King James, who has lost his way in
the chase, and is received with hospitality in the secret retreat of his
former favourite, Douglas, now banished and disgraced; and partly
of his knight-errant-like encounter (in disguise) with Roderick Dhu,
the formidable chief of a Highland clan which has long defied the
power of the Lowland monarch.  Roderick, the stern and haughty
chieftain; Ellen, the daughter of the Douglas line, yet graceful and
simple as peasant maiden; old Allan Bane, the harper; Douglas,
with his proud heart swelling under the remembrance of his king's
ingratitude,-  what noble types of character, and how freely and
unaffectedly do they move before us! Certainly nothing can be
finer than the approach of Roderick along the lake, the duel between
him and Fitz-James, or the death of the captive Highland chieftain.
Scott appears to have been conscious of his peculiar power of describing battles, for he makes the harper relate to Roderick in prison the
combat between the captive's clan and the troops of King James,
and perhaps even the noble and stirring description of Flodden does
not surpass the battle of Bealan Duine in'The Lady of the Lake,'
and the death of Roderick, in the mid swing and fury of the
minstrel's rhapsody, is nobly and touchingly conceived. It would
be unjust to speak of the exquisite descriptions of scenery, both
lovely and sublime, with which this poem (particularly its earlier
portion) is crowded, without mentioning also, and with equal praise,
the charming glimpses into private life which the poet takes as he
goes along, and the splendid descriptions of customs, superstitions,
&c., which form  the subordinate decorations of the work.  Few
things are more truly pathetic than the little episode of the poor
maniac, Blanche of Devon, more impressive than the scene of the
Fiery Cross, more exciting than the narrative of the rapid flight of
that ensign of war and blood to summon the clansmen to the trystingplace.
After this, perhaps his greatest poetical triumph, Scott somewhat




820          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CItAP. XVII.
changed the direction and form of his productions: his next work,
which appeared in 1811, was' The Vision of Don Roderick,' founded
upon a striking legend which relates that Roderick, the last Gothic
King of Spain, persisted, in spite of all dissuasion, in descending
into a subterranean vault beneath the cathedral of Toledo, where he
saw, prefigured in a kind of phantasmagoria, the invasion of the
Moors, and all the ills which his own unbridled passions were to
inflict upon his house and kingdom.  Scott has somewhat enlarged
this impressive groundwork, and made to pass before the eyes of the
impious monarch, not only the irruption of the Moorish conquerors,
but also the dreadful cruelties and oppressions of the armies of
Napoleon.  It is written in the Spenserian stanza, and with something of the Spenserian richness and cumbrous profusion of ornament and allegory; and it would seem that in quitting the trouvbre
metre, which he wielded so nobly, Scott had lost much of his peculiar
nerve and fire.
Two years after this not very successful effort in a new line, Scott
returned to his old one, and published'IRokeby,' and'The Bridal
of Triermain,' which appeared within a single twelvemonth. In the
former of these poems he most injudiciously selected a period too
modern, and in general there is perceptible in this work a faintness
and uncertainty of hand which is not altogether redeemed by a few
beautiful passages.  In the other work a short adventure, taken
from  the old books of chivalry, is related with much grace and
vigour, but the enchanted castle is too dreamy and unsubstantial to
interest us like'Marmion, or'The Lady of the Lake;' and our
feeling of probability is outraged by the way in which the magical
and fabulous is brought in contact with the action of a real knight.
The purely fabulous part, describing the amour of King Arthur
with the fairy lady, the reappearance of their daughter at the tournament of Carleon, the tourney itself, and the enchanted slumber of
the maiden in the castle of the Valley of St. John -all this is in
the finest vein of Romanz poetry.  Nor is the description of the
watching of the knight unworthy of our-chivalric Homer, but the
adventures which break the spell of this "sleeping beauty" seem
to us not in the finest vein of Middle Age conception.  They are
rather like the chivalry of a ballet than a page prom the MJiorte
Artus.
In 1814 appeared'The Lord of the Isles,' a romantic narrative,
in which the principal personage is the heroic Robert Bruce, some of
whose almost incredible adventures Scott has skilfully and picturesquely recalled.  The action is chiefly carried on amid the savage
and desolate scenery of the Western Isles, particularly in the castle
of Artornish, and afterwards amid the still bleaker and more treinendous deserts of Galloway.  The catastrophe is the great battle
of Bannockburn, and the poet's patriotism has fired the description




CHAP. XVII.]             SCOTT: POEMS.                      321
of this event, so glorious in the reminiscences of every Scot, with a
glow and eestrum which recalls the concluding stanzas of'Marmion.'
But the story is rather entangled, and the march of the events is
sometimes languishing and sometimes precipitate.. We have but two more poems to mention,'The Field of Waterloo,' and'Harold the Dauntless,' of which the former appeared in
1815, and its companion in the following year.'Waterloo' was
written while the impressions of a recent visit to that battle-field
were still fresh in the poet's mind; but the work (which is foi.
tunately short) is entirely unworthy of the author's genius and glory
In' Harold the Dauntless' we have the story of a wild and savage
Berserkir, who is recalled by love from his fierce idolatry to civilization and Christianity.  The principal character is not ill conceived,
but the adjuncts and general character of the poem are rather chivalric than Scandinavian; and though some of the events are in
character with the wild legends of the Norwegian Sagas, yet the
effect of the whole is not in harmony with the design.
Even so early as 1805, at the period when'The Lay of the Last
Minstrel' burst, like a new avatar of the beauty and power of
mediaeval art, upon the public of Great Britain, Scott had comrnmenced a prose tale embodying some of the striking scenes connected
with that romantic event of Scottish history, the gallant but disastrous expedition of Prince Charles Edward, i. e. the unsuccessful
attempt of the Jacobites to replace upon the British throne the
house of Stuart. This event (commonly called the Rebellion of the'45) involved a very great number of the most ancient houses of
Scotland, and it should be remembered that that country was
markedly inclined to prefer the party of the Stuarts to that of the
succession of the house of Brunswick. This period of strong passions and vehement contrasts of political feeling was of course
fertile in originality of character, singular traits of courage, and
surprising vicissitudes of fortune, and Scott was personally acquainted with a multitude of "old'45 men," as they were called, whose
adventures he was very fond of relating, and whose feelings he has
immortalized in so many of his admirable fictions.  The first sketch
of this novel was abandoned after a few chapters only had been
composed, and the sheets were put away in an old writing-desk with
a quantity of fishing-tackle, and almost totally forgotten by the
aathor. On the appearance, in 1813, of'Rokeby,' and'The Bridal
of Triermain,' poems which were considered by the public as manifestly inferior to his preceding compositions, Scott's admirabla
common sense suggested to him that his peculiar poetical vein of
chivalrous fiction was now almost exhausted, and that there was
little hope that he could, by continuing before the public in the same
Utrain of Middle Age revival, vie with the already dazzling poetical
reputation of Byron, which had ao it were taken England by storm.




822           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITEBATURE. [CIIAP. XVII.
tle turned his thoughts to prose; and, drawing the unfinished MS.
of which we have spoken from its inglorious repose in the writingdesk, he completed the tale, and it appeared in 1814, the same year
as'The Lord of the Isles,' under the title of'Waverley, or'Tis
Sixty Years since.'  This was the first of that illustrious series of
prose fictions which have placed Scott, it is hardly too much to say,
almost upon a level with Shakspeare. The novel was published
anonymously, and the public instantly perceived that a new era in
the history of fiction had begun. The plot is exceedingly simple,
and not remarkable for any great ingenuity; but the absolute
novelty of the scenery, the immense number, richness, and variety
of the characters, the brief; picturelike, and inimitable sketches of
natural beauty, and the freedom, freshness, and naturalness of the
situations, comic as well as elevated, soon excited an universal
rapture of admiration.
The tone in Scott, like that of Shakspeare, is always an essentially
noble and elevated one -elevated and elevating.  All objects ale
shown, as it were, through a fresh and sunny atmosphere: all is in
its true colour, proportion, and perspective, but glorified by a geniatl
glow  of goodness and humanity.  Many of the characters of'IWaverley' are masterpieces: the brave, gallant, but pedantic old
Baron Bradwardine is equally delightful amid the feudal splendours
of his ancestral bears, and scribbling his texts of Livy on the walls
of his cave.  What noble figures are those of the haughty Vich Ia.m
Vohr and his high-souled sister; how full of life and movement the
camp of the insurgents; how pathetic the trial of the rebels; how
exquisite the thousand minor characters which crowd these living
pages-the fantastic "innocent" Davie Gellatlie, with his snatches
of song, as pathetic as the ballads of Ophelia herself-the pig-headed
Jvalmawhapple-the faithful Micklewham and Callum  Beg!  Scott
had the true Shakspearian quality of going out of himself to create
-of throwing his own mind so completely into the subject immediately before him, that the creator seems successively to be absolutely
identified with all his creations.
The  universal enthusiasm  which  greeted the appearance of'Waverley' had hardly time to subside into calm admiration when'Guy Mannering' was published (in 1815, the next year).  This
novel exhibits a still wider range of power than the preceding one.
It did not rely upon the prestige which attaches to a romantic episode
in history, and to the interest derivable from the introduction of
historical personages and adventures so interesting in themselves as
those connected with the'45.  In'Guy Mannering' we enter upon
a new and more domestic sphere, the family of a simple Scottish
country gentleman, and we find ourselves in the midst of characters,
common and every-day enough in their definition, but admirably
brought out and contrasted.  Scott's persofial experience and his




CHAP. XVII.]    GUY MANNERING-ANTIQUARY.                    323
legal recollections probably supplied him with nearly all the types
of common and low life which he has so admirably individualized in
this enchanting story: but with what consummate tact has he avoided
the tone of exaggeration and romance which their employment
would be very apt to inspire! If the highest manifestation of creative genius be the power of inventing scenes and persons which are
at once surprising and natural, strongly individual in themselves
yet in perfect accordance with the types of reality, then it is impos
sible to deny Scott the honours due to the highest creative genius
Horace says emphatically, "difficile est propri6 communia dicere;"
and his remark, extended in its application so as to embrace the
inventive as well as the expressive in art, is a formula of criticism
of great value.  The union of the abstract and the concrete is the
highest triumph of art. It was the boast of Apelles that he used
only four primitive colours in his pictures, and the history of all
literature proves that the greatest triumphs of genius have ever been
attained by the use of the simplest elements of external or moral
existence.  It is the mere vibration of a stretched chord that speaks
the unutterable language of music; and it is from the skilful contrast
and genial study of most ordinary human characters that Scott has
read us his noblest lessons of wisdom and of love.  Dominie Samnpson is one of those admirable hits of conception which enter, at
once and for ever, like Shakspeare's characters, into the sphere of
reality. We think of him not as a creation of genius, but as a man,
we involuntarily place him in our thoughts beside Uncle Toby,
Parson Adams, and Lear's Fool. Nor are the minor elements less
admirable: the two young ladies (the most difficult of all characters
to render interesting) are -delicately and charmingly contrasted:
Pieydell (supposed to be a sketch from nature), Henry Bertram, the
scoundrel Glossin, Mac MIorlan,- all, down to honest Jock Jabez
the postilion, are living, natural, unforced, unaffected.  In this
romance the events which bring about the ruin of the rascally
Glossin, and restore Bertram to the inheritance of his ancestors, are
at once natural and surprising: the funeral of the old Laird, and
the sale of his estate; Henry Bertram's wanderings in the wastes of
the Northern Border; that breathless episode where he is concealed
by the gipsy in the ruined hut of Derncleugh; the visit of Mannering to Edinburgh, and the legal saturnalia of High Jinks; the
funeral of the old maid, and the inimitable scene of the opening of
her will; and, above all, every passage in which Dinmont makes hi,
appcarance,-we may boldly say that all these scenes, and a thousand
others, are set before us with astonishing freedom, ease, and power.
In 1816 appeared'The Antiquary,' which gives us a new and
not less interesting glimpse into the interior life of the Scottish
people, and gives another proof of the all-embracing and inexhaustible character of the great man's genius. The chief personage in
27




324          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERAIURE. [CIIAP. XVII,
this novel, the Antiquary himself, is a truly genial creation - as
complete and as individual as Jaques or Falstaff; and the book
abounds, even more wonderfully perhaps than Scott's other works,
with perfect and happy strokes of human character: we need only
mention the worthy but weak Sir Arthur, Miss Grizel Oldbuck,
Hector McIntyre, the warlike Baillie, and, above all, Edie Ochiltree. The passage describing the party caught by the rising tide at
the foot of the cliffs is perhaps unequalled; and the mixture here,
as well as in others of Scott's works, of familiar and even ludicrous
incidents with the most powerful and terrific emotions, is another
strong element of the writer's power. In our remarks upon Shakspeare we observed that his mingling of trivial and agitating ideas
is one of the peculiar conditions of the very highest power of
genius.
In the same year with this exquisite work appeared the first series
of'The Tales of My Landlord,' containing the' Black Dwarf' and'Old- Mortality;: the first of which was muchr shorter and less
powerful than its companion. These tales were preceded by a kind
of fictitious introduction, attributing their authorship to Peter
Pattieson, an usher in a village school - an expedient (adopted to
mislead the public as to these tales being the composition of the
now illustrious "'Author of Waverley," for which purpose also a
new publisher was selected) neither very happy in itself nor very
felicitously executed.  The presiding genius-the Deus ez machind
of'The Black Dwarf' (the deformed misanthrope who gives
name to the tale) is one of those irregularities of nature which
inspire rather pity than interest; and though -as in this instance,
Elshie the Recluse being drawn from a real personage-of occasional
occurrence in the actual world, are yet too rare, and too repulsive
consequently, to form a proper foundation for a plot of real life.
Scott's genius had no need of dwarfs and monsters to set agoing the
wheels of his intrigue: these are the resources of inferior inventors.
Elliott and his family, and the wolfish mosstrooper, Willie of the
Westburnflat — the two poles, so to say, of border character -are
contrasted with consummate skill.
The companion-novel to' The Black Dwarf' was' Old Mortality,'
a fiction of much higher pretensions, greater length, and completer
historical interest: indeed this is one of the very finest fictions that
the world has ever seen. It describes the adventures of the Scottish
Covenanters from the skirmish of Drumclog to the great battle, sc
fatal to their cause, of Bothwell Brigg. The tale opens just after
the murder of Archbishop Sharpe, and the hero of the intrigue, a
young gentleman who is led, by conviction no less than by family
sympathies, to embrace the cause of the insurrection, is naturally
and easily brought in contact with the most remarkable men of
both parties, and is involved in the full vortex of events. Thus we




o.~Pr. XVII.]     OLD AMORTALITY-ROB ROY.                   325
hte splendid sketches of the famous Claverhouse, of General
DP]iz]el, and other celebrated royalists, and on the other hand a most
admirable picture of the fierce, persecuted, and fanatical Covenanters.  There has perhaps seldom been a finer example of the difficult
feat of mingling in one delineation real and fictitious things and
events.  Claverhouse, for example, is as individual, and yet as ideal,
as Talbot, or WNolsey, or Henry V., in the historical plays of our
divine dramaturge.
Of the purely invented characters in this grand creation it is ilnpossible to speak in too high terms; nor of their variety, nor of
their truth, nor of the wonderful power with which the author has
harmonized them with the solider personages borrowed from history.
To the reader, indeed, they appear to have no less consistence, and
he cannot refrain from associating them with the authentic events
when he afterwards reflects upon the annals of the times.  The
Lady of Tillietudlem, Mause Headrigg and her son Cuddy, the old
Major and his veteran servant Pyke, the mean and griping MIilnwood, Serjeant Bothwell, the kind but grumbling housekeeper-all
these are almost real existences, as real as the loftier conceptions of
the covenanting preachers and their wild followers: MIucklewrath,
and the fierce and crafty Burley, advancing gradually fiom  falnaticism to crime, and from  crime to religious frenzy.  There is also a
very deep knowledge of the human heart in the manner in which
the character of Morton, the hero, is gradually modified by the
stern and agitating scenes which he passes through; and the touches
of simple pathos, the exquisite scenes of rustic gaiety, and the innumerable nooks of tranquil domestic life or lovely rural nature into
which we glance, as it were, while borne onward by the interest of
the story-all these form  a picture which has the vastness, the
minuteness, the distinctness, and the splendour of life itself.
In 1818 was published the second series of the'Tales of  Iy
Landlord,' comprising'Rob Roy' and'The Heart of Midlothian.'
In'Rob Roy' Scott has again ventured, and more boldly, into a
region which he had visited with such success in' The Lady of the
Lake' and in one portion of'Waverley.'  The Highlands form the
theatre of action, and the exploits of the famous freebooter who'
gives name to the work the most prominent materials of this fiction.
These scenes and manners, then quite new to the English reader,
and which even an inferior talent could hardly render uninteresting,
are admirably diversified, and connected with characters and events
of a much more familiar kind.  The sketch of a London merchant
in Mr. Osbaldistone, with which the tale commences, is very finely
conceived, and no less so the charming character of Owen, the
faithful clerk.  The scene soon changes to the North of England,
where bthe family of a rude fox-hunting squire is exquisitely colone




826          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CHAP. XVII.
trasted with that most delicate and lovely of all Scott's creations,
the beautiful Di Vernon.
Nor can any thing be finer than the Highland scenes and characters'which fill the greater part of this book: how romantic and yet
how real is Rob Roy himself; with what an atmosphere of wild
energy is the far-famed freebooter-the Robin Hood of Scotlandsurrounded; and yet how skilfully has the author, by intermingling
perpetual details of familiar life and common feeling, brought him,
as it were, near to us, giving him flesh and blood, and substituting
the genial air of everyday humanity for that misty and unsubstantial
grandeur which an inferior author would have left around it! Helen
Macgregor is a conception of a very high order of art, and the scttle
of the defeat of the English detachment and the horrible punishanment of the wretched Morris is intensely exciting. The comic
incidents, too, mingled here as everywhere in Scott's morn tremendous and impressive scenes, only add to the effect, and give a
more intense reality to the narrative.  Constructively sptaking, the
chief defect of Scott's romances arises from the hurried mnanner in
which he winds up his narratives.  He probably always (as indeed
he has told us himself) laid down, when commencing one of his
fictions, a plan or ground-plot of the whole intrigue; but the intensity with which the scenes presented themselves to his glorious
imagination, and the delight (which to such a mind must have been,
and was, unspeakable) of tracing through every ramification such a
character as Dalgetty, for instance, or Baillie Nicol Jarvie, or Monkbarns, or Bradwardine, or Dominie Sampson, soon carried him from
the outline he had fixed upon, and forced him, at the risk of writing
not a novel but a library, to hurry hastily over the conclusion.  To
a conception like his, joined with so intense and wonderful a perceptive faculty, the delineation of such personages must have given the
double delight of the inventor and the historian.  What he abso
lutely created as ideal, he must have anatomised as real.
In'The Heart of.Midlothian' we have a narrative of humble
nay, the humblest — peasant life of Scotland.  We have here the
joys and woes, the weaknesses and the heroism of the poor; described with no affected raptures of sentimentalism, with no unreal
views of life, neither suppressio veri nor suggestio falsi - a simple
tale of obscure sorrow and unadorned heroism, connected with pie.
tures of society as vast and varied as they are accurate and lively.
The Edinburgh riot with which the tale opens is described with a
power that even this picturesque author has never surpassed; and
the firightful and agitating scenes of popular vengeance are most
skilfully made to give way to the calm repose of rustic existence.
David Deans is one of those grim, strongly-marked, yet not unattractive portraits which are as characteristic of Scott's pencil as
the spectacled rabbis and alchemists and burgomasters of that of




CEAP. XVII.]    THE BRIDE OF LAMMERMOOR.                    327
Rembrandt.  The two daughters are exquisitely contrasted —the
unhappy Eflie, with her beauty, her innocent vanity, and the pretty
wilfulness of the spoiled chlilfd; and when the ploughshare of sin
and shame and sorrow drives so ruthlessly over this nook of human
life, and the " Lily of St. Leonard's" is crushed to the earth, how
artlessly, how sulblimely does Jeannie arise to save her erring sister!
Among all the tributes which genius has ever paid to the modest
heroism of rustic life, this is perhaps the noblest and the most
enduring; and when we revere the name of Scott for the glory
which he has thrown over human nature by this noble and touching
delineation, let us remember that it was not all fictitious, and that
the same country which' gave'birth to him who has recorded this
triumph of village heroism was also the fatherland of a real Helen
Walker.
The following year witnessed the appearance of'The Bride of
Lammermoor' and the'Legend of Montrose'- forming the third
series of the'Tales of My Landlord.'  The'Bride' is a work
which differs remarkably in its tone from Scott's other productions:
it has been well remarked that this touching and most painful story
exemplifies in a narrative form the incessant action of Destiny -of
that awful and mysterious power which vivifi.es and pervades the
ancient Greek tragedy.  We see, even at the very beginning of the
tale, the "little cloud, no bigger than a man's hand," which gradually overshadows the whole atmosphere, and at last bursts in ruin,
in madness, and in despair over the devoted heads of Ravenswood
and his betrothed.  The catastrophe is tremendous, crushing, complete; and even the more comic scenes (the melancholy ingenuity
of poor faithful Caleb) have a sad and hopeless gaiety, which forms
a dismal and appropriate relief to the profoundly tragic tone of the
action.  One scene in this awful tale is truly terrific -the muttered
cursing of the three hideous hags at the ill-omened marriage; nor is
the interview  between Ravenswood and the gravedigger, or the
appearance of the unhappy hero to claim his promise friom Lucy
Ashton, inferior.  They bear the impress of our elder dramatists:
they might have been conceived by Ford, by Middleton, or by the
sombre genius of Webster.
In the'Legend of MQntrose' Scott returns into his more usual
and congenial sphere of bright vivid, energetic, and picturesque
animation.  We come forth, saddened and yet elevated, out of the
Valley of the Shadow of Death, and we plunge with fresh ardour
into the sparkling, buoyant waves of romantic life.  The tale is very
s;hort and hurried; and though it contains several scenes drawn with
Scott's usual power of lively description, it is not generally foulnd in
itself one of the most interesting, but derives its principal charm
friom  the humours of "Rittmaster Dugald Dalgetty," a soldier of
fortune, one of the most truly rich, admirable, amusing, and natural
27*i 




35 8         OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CIIAP. XV.
personages ever drawn by the hand of genius.  This character is a
masterpiece: the mixture of pedantry, conceit, valour, vulgar assurance, knowledge of the world, greediness, and a thousand other
qualities, makes him uniformly and never-failingly delightful whenever he appears, as he does almost constantly, on the scene.
The last series of the'Tales of My Landlord' were followed by
a number of detached romances, more than maintaining the reputation which Scott had already acquired; in one year, 1820, appeared'Ivanhoe,'' The 3Monastery,' and'The Abbot,' the last-mentioned
work being a continuation of the second, though at the same time
capable of being read as a distinct narrative.  In'Ivanhoe' our
magician has evoked a new period of English history, and one which
had never before been revived in fiction.  This was the romantic age
of Richard Coeur-de-Lion; and it offered the occasion not only of
showing in strong opposition the sturdy prejudices and rude manners
of the Saxons and the warlike and splendid civilization of the
Norman race, but of introducing many of the most remarkable
characters of our popular history —the Lionheart himself, the
abominable John, and our legendary heroes of the bow and quarterstaff, Robin Hood and his "merry men."  The rude log-built
mansion of the Saxon noble, the frowning battlements of the Norman
castle, the glittering lists of Ashby, the dungeon, the hermitage, and
the "good green wood,"-every object remains for ever pictured on
the reader's memory.  And then the characters: Cedric, Wamba,
Gurth, Front-de-Boeuf, Locksley, Friar Tuck, Le Noir Faineant,
Rebecca, Isaac the Jew, the stern Master of the Templars-all,
down to the humblest, arise before our astonished eyes "in their
habit as they lived."'The Monastery' is principally injured by the introduction of
supernatural machinery. The White Lady of Avenel, a kind of
tutelary spirit protecting the fortunes of a noble family, is not in
accordance with that air of reality which Scott communicates to all
his fictions.  The appearances of this tricksy spirit are indeed
beautifully described, and the poetry which conveys her oracles" for still her speech was song"-is exceedingly graceful; but her
agency is unnecessary, it impedes the story, and some of her pranks
are quite unworthy of the dignity of her mission. All that she
does could have been effected much better without her; and she is
invariably found to jar with the rest of the action.  Christie of the
Clinthill is a spirited sketch of the lean, wolfish, dissolute Jackman;
and the scenes in the castle of Julian Avenel are d:awn with a
powerful and pathetic hand; but the enthusiast, Sir Piercy Shafton,
though amusing, is a caricature of what was already a caricature of
Slhakspeare's.  Generally speaking, this novel is less admired (we
think deservedly so) than its successor,' The Abbot,' in which we:esurne the adventures of the two brothers whom we left in' The




CdAP. XVII.]        KENILWORTH-PIRATE.                      329
Monastery' just entering upon life. The chief personage is the
unhappy Mary Stuart, whose character and misfortunes possess in
fiction a power of tender and pathetic interest as inexhaustible as the
fascination she exerted on all around her during her life, and which
no lapse of time seems likely to deprive of its enchantment.  The
dramatis personre of this great and living work are numerous and
splendid: the Regent Murray, the stern and haughty Lady Douglas,
Catherine Seton, Adam Woodcock the falconer, Roland Gremine, —
all aro. stamped with life and individuality. Nor is the breathless
interest of the principal events less worthy of admiration, nor the
freslh animation and vivacity of the dialogues, nor the noble spirit of
dignity and gentleness that pervades the whole.
The following year, 1821, was signalised by two more productions
of this astonishing being, two singularly different, not only from
each other, but from all which preceded them, and marked by the
same power and beauty: these were' Kenilworth' and'The Pirate.'
Kenilworth was a gorgeous pageant of a period of our history dear
and glorious to every English heart-the reign of Elizabeth.  The
ehief action is the secret marriage of the great and splendid Leicester, Elizabeth's favourite, with a beautiful woman of inferior rank,
and the fatal facility with which the haughty courtier, listening to
the dictates of ambition and the perfidious advice of a wicked intriguer, sacrifices to the hope of becoming the Queen's husband the
happiness and the life of his innocent victim. Much of this romance
is founded on fact: the splendid revelries of Kenilworth are copied
from authentic documents of the time, only vivified and gilded by
the glow of genius; Sussex-the frank and noble Sussex-Raleigh,
Leicester himself, Elizabeth, are faithful and glorious reproductions
of history; and the manners, costume, and, so to speak, atmosphere
of the whole work afford perhaps the noblest instance which.literature
can show of the power of genius to evoke past ages and persons in
the brilliant hues and. motion of life. Perhaps, amid the thousand
fictions of the so-called romantic school to which the success of
Scott gave birth, there are no scenes even approaching in probability,
in ease, grace, and splendour, to the audience in this romance where
the lion.hearted Queen commands the reconciliation of Leicester and
Sussex, to the episode of Raleigh's first court success, to the passages
in the country hostelry of the Black Bear, to the entry of Elizabeth
into Kenilworth; and assuredly the power of pathetic terror was
never displayed more intensely and with a more Shakspearian concise.
ness than in the murder of Amy Robsart.
In' The Pirate' we have a new and untrodden region, new manners,
a new nature; we are transported to the "stormy Hebrides,"
"P laced far amid the melancholy main,"
and inhabited by a people of ancient Norwegian descent.  Even in




330          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CIIAP. XVIL
this barren nook of earth, where human character might be expected
to be as monotonous as its starved and storm-lashed herbage, he has
found a rich harvest of interest and beauty: the noble old Udaller;
his two daughters, each so lovely a picture, yet distinguished with
so gentle a touch, like Celia and Rosalind; Norna of the Fitful-head,
half-maniac, half-pythoness; Claude Halcro, Mistress Bahie, and
the unfortunate Yellowley, Bunce, and the whole company of buccaneers.
The next romance we have to mention is'The Fortunes of Nigel,'
which appeared in the following year, 1822. Here we have a
glimpse into the city life of London in the sixteenth century, and
the action is as vast, as crowded, and as varied a: the theatre. The
court and the domestic manners of the weak and pedantic, but wellmeaning James I., that crowned humorist; the shop, the street, the
tavern, the ordinary, the theatre, and above all, the squalid retreats
of crime and misery-Alsatia; everything appears before us in its
true colours, with its true light and shade and true proportion, and
peopled with figures so varied, so life-like and individual, that after
reading the novel we cannot divest ourselves of a firm conviction of
the reality of persons, places, and events.  So much so, indeed, is
this the case with nearly all Scott's historical novels, that, when we
afterwards find in authentic history any proofs of occasional incorrectness or even anachronism in these fictions, we deny the evidence of
our reason, and cannot be induced to think that the manners, the
characters, or the events, could have been otherwise than as the
artist has represented them. Thus it is hardly a paradox to say, that
the creations of sublime genius are more real than reality, more true
than truth itself; and that we really know more of the character of
Hamlet, for instance, than we do of Napoleon, or even of a man
with whom we are in daily personal intercourse.  In this novel of'Nigel' the character of King James is a case in point to our remark;
and the numerous other dramatis personce are marked by the same
power.  The murder of the old usurer in Whitefriars is a most
terrific bit of night-painting, and the action flows on with a clear
and rapid current.
The year 1823 again gave to the astounded world three excellent
nd wonderfully varied fictions —'Peveril of the Peak,''Quentin
Durward,' and' St. Ronan's Well.' In'Peveril' we have a picture
of English society soon after the restoration of Charles IT., and
many pictures of the court and of the various parties which divided
the nation at the period of the ridiculous panic of Titus Oates' pretended popish plot. The most interesting characters are Sir Geoffrey
i.evere:, a stout old Derbyshire cavalier; a finely marked sketch of
a fanatical republican, Major Bridgenorth, a relic of the Protectorate;
and, above all, Charles himself, the easy, heartless, good-natured
ibertine.




CHAP. XVII.]   PEVERIL - QUENTIN DURWARD.                   331
"Who never said a foolish thing,
And never did a wise one."
Villiers, the profligate Duke of Buckingham, is brought prominently
forward; but in attempting to give identity to that extraordinary
compound of vices, follies, wit, and inconsistency, our novelist has
signally failed. He followed the admirable character given in
Dryden's immortal satire, and produced, not a man, but a bundle of
epigrams. The plot of this piece is chiefly carried on by Christian,
one of those passionless and all-penetrating intriguers whom we so
often see in novels, and so seldom in real life; and his principal
instrument for the attainment of his purpose (a long-cherished plan
of revenging on the Countess of Derby the death of his brother) is
the employment of a deaf and dumb girl, who afterwards turns out
to be his own daughter, and to have been shamming deaf and dumb
for a long succession of years. All this is hardly natural, and not
worthy, even if it were, of such a genius as that of Scott.'Durward' carries us to France and Burgundy in the reign of
Louis XI., and we follow with unceasing delight and interest the
progress of a young Scottish soldier of fortune to fame, riches, and
the hand of a fair countess.  His first interview with Louis, who is
disguised as a mean old merchant, and attended by his abominable
minister Tristan l'Hermite, is highly dramatic, and the gradual view
we gain of the dark and tortuous character of that cruel and miserable king, and his gloomy retreat in the castle of Plessis, is extremely fine. None of Scott's works is more powerfully conceived than
this, nor has he in any other instance displayed a broader and vaster
canvas, filled up with more striking and varied groups.  The vile
instruments which the subtle monarch employs to carry out his perfidious policy —the catlike barber Oliver le Din, Tristan and his two
congenial satellites Petit Andr6 and Trois-Echelles, the wretched
Bohernian-how finely are these relieved against the nobler characters, historical as well as fictitious, and how admirably are they all
grouped around the grand images of the two protagonists -Louis,
and Charles of Burgundy, the wolf and the bull of middle-age history, one the emblem  and embodiment of Fraud, the other of
brutal Force! Dunois, Creveccour, Galeotti, Crawford,  the rude
bravery of the Balafre —it is aL.,lutely impossible to draw any line
of distinction between the phanut(:ns of real men evoked by this
"mighty magic" fiom the dusty tomb of history, and those created
by its power.  The scenes at Peronne are written with a firml hand
and a sort of triumphant mastery, which almost makes us forget the
terrific impressiveness of the attack on the bishop's castle at Litege.
and the murder of the good prelate by the rufiamz  De la MIarck.
In'St. Ronan's Well' we have scenes ard manners of moderr,
society, but the approaching misfortunes of the illustrious novelist
seemin to have thrown a shade of gloom over the work which its very




332          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CHAP. XVII
merits only render more painful to the reader. This contrast of tone
is the more perceptible, as Scott's view of life and mankind is in
general cheerful and genial.  The story is of a deeply painful and
tragic kind, and throughout the work we are haunted with the presentiment of ill, hopeless, inevitable, rendered the more insupportable by the meanness, the frivolity, and the baseness of the majority
of the persons.  This same mournful presentiment of impending
fate forms in'The Bride of Lammermoor' the great charm - the
awful fascination of the work; but there it is unmingled with contempt for the-personages: it is rendered solemn, dignified by distance;
here it is vulgarised by the general tone of the dramatis personc,
and we feel the pang of sorrow without the dignity which can half
console us. Touchwood, however, is a spirited sketch of a character
which Scott had not before attempted to portray; and Meg Dods, the
old innkeeper, is a delineation in his happiest vein.
In 1824 appeared'iRedgauntlet,' a novel in which (though the
story is somewhat confused and imperfect) we find some admirable
studies of character, and some scenes delineated with extraordinary
power. Fairford, the old Scottish lawyer, is exquisitely real, and it
is more than probable that it is a portrait of Scott's own father;
many of the legal scenes and personages are doubtless reminiscences
of the author's own personal experience, and Peter Peebles and his
trial are as fine as anything in Fielding.  We have always considered, too, that Nanty Ewart, the smuggling captain in this novel, is a
clef-d'ceuvre worthy to be placed beside Scott's most admirable creations, and the scene in which he recounts his early life among the
most inimitable passages of fiction.  Of the art of tale-telling Scott
has given in this romance two most consummate examples —this
story of Nanty Ewart, and the unsurpassable ghost-story told by the
blind fiddler to Darsie Latimer.  The two friends are charming and
highly-finished delineations; Joshua Geddes, the worthy quaker, is
very attractive; and Thomas Turnbull, the hypocritical smuggler,
as superlative as Ewart.
The next year brought forth the first series of the'Tales of the
Crusaders,' containing'The Betrothed' and'The Talisman.'  Of
these two the first is so much inferior to the other, that we shall pass
very rapidly over it; it contains very few striking scenes, and those
chiefly of a warlike character: but in'The Talisman' we have one
of the finest, most glowing, and most enchanting revivals of the days
of chivalry, vivified by the introduction of splendid historical person.
ages and exploits dear to the national heart.  It is an episode of the
crusade in which the Lion-hearted King achieved those exploits
which furnished such inexhaustible matter to the rhapsodists of the
Middle Ages, and associated his fame with the fondest recollections
of chivalric glory.  Into this sea of splendid achievement and gorgeous pageantry Scott threw himself with the passion of a Trouvere,




CHTP. XVII.]           SCOTT: HIS LIFE.                     333
with the power of a consummate artist, and the erudition of an antiquarian.  We repeat, without fear of contradiction, that we know no
work so truly Homeric in its effect as this. How finely conceived,
too, are the female characters, Edith and Queen Berengaria; and
what a crowd of noble figures are grouped around the heroic person
of the king - Saladin himself, Philip of France, the wicked Hospitaller, the Knight of the Leopard! We are here in the very midst
of medimval chivalry; and, what is more wonderful, we do not
regard its splendid pageants with mere unlearned and unsympathising
curiosity, but the poet's true epic enthusiasm inspires us, in spite of
ourselves, with the feelings of contemporaries.
Scott's ruling passion was for the life of a British country gentleman.  His sweetest reverie was the hope of transmitting to his
descendants, not only a name famous in Border annals, and glorified
by intellectual triumphs, but a landed estate sufficient to support its
splendour.  To attain this object he laboured with an almost superhuman industry; and the immense revenue which he never ceased
to derive from his works he devoted to the purchase and augmentation of his landed estate, and to the building of Abbotsford.  Here
he transformed a small house, situated on the banks of his beloved
Tweed, and in the midst of a wild, bare, and dreary scenery, into a
fairy castle-a "romance in stone and lime."  The natural dreariness of the scene he remedied by vast plantings of trees, and on the
house and surrounding estate he employed not much less than
70,0001. Here he lived, in the true splendour of a castellan, and
here he delighted to receive, with the graceful hospitality he loved
to practise, the fair, the noble, and the famous, and here he "did the
honours for all Scotland."  It is hardly possible to conceive a higher
point of happiness thafn this.  In the prime of life, blessed with a
promising family to continue his name; loved, venerated, nay,
almost adored by his dependants, his friends, his countrymen,
Europe-the whole world; in the full flush and vigorour of his
powers, for he never relaxed during his whole life his unremitting
industry, (managing, by early rising and regularity, to leave his days
fiee for society); this surprising man had not only conferred upon
the profession.of letters a splendour which it had never before
known-he must be held to have attained as near felicity as humanity
could aspire. But the blight was already at work at this noble tree;
the worm was gnawing at its core; it was soon to fall prostrate, with
all its honours thick upon it, and give the world at once a memorable
example of the instability of human things, and a most touching
proof of fortitude and greatness of mind.  Scott's earlier works had
been published by his friend John Ballantyfse, and the secret of their
authorship had been preserved with a constant and surprising fidelity
but in an evil hour the novelist entered into a kind of concealed
partnership with him; and the commercial distresses of 1826 in volved




33.1         OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CIIHAP. XVII.
the firm in the failure of Constable and other great; publishing
speculators. Some idea of this tremendous crisis may be formed
when we state that Scott's liabilities were not under 117,0001. From
this consequence of unfortunate speculation Scott might have in a
great measure escaped by taking advantage of the indulgence of the
English law, but with more than the spirit of chivalry, this great
man conceived the colossal project of paying off with his pen this
huge mountain of debt. This incredible plan he conceived, and,
what is more, almost executed! But he perished in the effort: he
kept unstained the ancestral honour of his house, and unspotted the
pure glory of his name, but he burst his mighty heart in the unequal
struggle.  On learning the full extent of his frightful losses, he
immediately abandoned the rural splendour which he adorned, shut
himself up in an humble lodging in Edinburgh, and set valorously
to his huge task. In six years it was almost accomplished-in six
years he had produced new and hardly less splendid works than the
long bright series we have been examining; but Scott himself-rthe
martyr of his commercial integrity-was dying in exhaustion, in
delirium, and disease.  Perhaps the annals of literature do not
present so sublime and so touching a fact as this: it is a fact which
has a peculiar significancy to an Englishman, as it is a noble instance
of that chivalrous delicacy of commerce to which our country owes
a mercantile grandeur, power, and supremacy, as peculiar and as
unrivalled as the wisdom of her senates or the glory of her arms.
The historical tale of'Woodstock' was the first result of his
indomitable energy in resisting this great disaster: it was published
in 1826.  Its subject embraces some of the most exciting episodes
of the civil war, and the characters of Cromwell and of Charles II.
figure in many of its finest scenes.  But the gem of the book is the.noble old cavalier, Sir Henry Lee of Ditchley, one of the most
*3omplete and touching embodiments of highborn loyalty that ever
was conceived.  The tale is full of movement, variety, and picturesqueness, and the minor personages too are stamped with strong
vitality: Wildrake, the three Commissioners, Jocelyn Jolliffe, Cromwell's canting but resistless soldiers-all, even down to Bevis the
majestic stag-hound, are such figures as no author but Scott could
have drawn. Indeed we may mention here that a peculiar love for
dogs was one principal mark by which these wonderful novels were
ascribed to him, long before the confession of the great man identified
beyond all dispute the author of'Waverley' with Walter Scott.
There are very few of this admirable series of works which do not
contain some exquisite portrait of a dog.  Who can forget Bevis (in
this novel)-that truly comic and attractive generation of Mustards
and Peppers which the mere mention of Dandie Dinmont conjures
up ir our minds-or the noble Roswal, lying wounded beside the
nanner of St. George-ay, or even Wolf, the ragged attendant of




iAY'. XVII.]  SCOTT'S MISFORTUNES-WOODSTOCK.               335
G.rth the swineherd?  Scott enters into the personality of the dog
character —his affection, -his courage, even his humours and caprices.
This is no weak indication of a great and noble heart.  The escape
of the King in Woodstock, the ineffectual search of Cromwell for
the royal fugitive, and, above all, the'deeply touching concluding
scene, the good old knight's euthanasia at the triumphal moment of
the Restoration-all these are in Scott's very finest manner. It was'at this period that the great poet threw aside the mask of incognito:
at a public dinner at Edinburgh Scott claimed the authorship of all
these admirable fictions, which had, however, almost from the first,
been universally attributed to him on the simnple ground that nobody
else could have been the author, and no less from a vast mass of
internal evidence distinctly pointing at him as the only man whose
nation, genius, profession, tastes, and even prejudices, perfectly coincided with the general character of the works.
In 1827 appeared the' History, of Napoleon' -a work of vigour
and liveliness, but written too near the gigantic events which it commemorated, and too much tinged with the strong national and
political prejudices of the author: to be permanently valuable. Scott's
strong Tory and legitimatist principles, and his attachment to the
English Episcopal Church, rendered him incapable of justly appreciating the greatest fact of modern history-the. French Revolutionand, consequently, of judging fairly (conscientiously as he strove to
do so) of the political and legislative character of Bonaparte; and it
was hardly to be expected that an enthusiastic patriot in England, at
the very moment of his country's triumph, could hold with a steady
hand the balance of historical impartiality.
In the following year appeared the two series of the'Chronicles
of the Canongate,' the first containing'The Highland Widow,'' The Two Drovers,' and' The Surgeon's Daughter;' and the second
the single novel,'The Fair Maid of Perth.'  The fiction which
serves as introduction to this collection is written with great acuteness and knowledge of life, but is tinged with something of that
desponding tone which we objected against'St. Ronan's Well.' "Of
these tales, the two first, though exceedingly slight, are powerful and
pathetic; but the third, particularly the scenes in India, exhibits a
marked want of vividness and condensation.  In'The Fair Maid
of Perth' this glorious lamp of genius and wisdom  seems to give a
dying and convulsive flash; for, in spite of a very perceptible
languor in the narrative, some of the scenes (as the battle between
the Clan Chattan and the Clan Quhele) are delineated with strong
touches of the old minstrel fire; and the character of the smith,
Henry of the Wynd, is worthy of his most glorious days.  What is
general in the above remarks may be applied also to "Anne of
Geierstein,' published in 1829, though the work met with a lmore
satisfactory success fi'om the circumstance of the scene being a new
28




336         OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CHAP. XVII.
and hitherto untrodden one, Switzerland.'Anne of Geierstein' is
closely historical in. its tone; and the episode concluding with the
execution of Pierre de Hagenbach, the tyrannic governor of La
Ferette, is vigorous and striking.  The Swiss deputies, particularly
the noble old Landamman; are contrasted with strong dramatic
power to the splendid and haughty Charles; the scene of the reception of the embassy is very fine; though there is in this novel nothing approaching in tragic pathos and majestic intensity of feeling
to the death of Lady Witherington in'The Surgeon's Daughter.'
The Alpine storm with which'Anne of Geierstein' opens is grand
and poetical; aLd the character of the good but childish King R6n6
is very exquisitely drawn.
The last fictions of this wonderful writer were' Castle Dangerous'
and'Count Robert of Paris;' the former a chivalric episode in the
Border wars, and the latter a scene from Byzantine history. Both
works, though received by the public with grateful indulgence, present melancholy evidence that the gigantic task undertaken by Scott
was too Herculean even for his untiring energy and heroic courage.
A first stroke of paralysis in 1830 was unable to arrest his industry;
but a second, in 1831, rendered it necessary for his family to divert
him from the incessant literary labour which his mind, though now
ruined, still continued to perform. The Government placed at his
disposal a ship of war; and he visited Malta, Naples (where he
resided about four months), and ultimately Rome.  Through these
fair regions was carried this venerable and illustrious wreck, and he
was brought home to die.  He lingered on some little time at
Abbotsford, helpless, unconscious, and patient; his mind wandering
to his professional employment, and sometimes to that princely hos
pitality he so nobly exercised, listening to passages from the Biblo
and his favourite poet Crabbe, but never once referring to those
magnificent monuments of genius by which he had immortalised his
country and glorified humanity itself.  "About half-past one P.m.,"
says Mr. Lockhart, his son-in-law and biographer, "on the 21st of
September, 1832, Sir Walter breathed his last, in the presence of
all his children. It was a beautiful day — so warm that every
window was wide open - and so perfectly still that the sound of all
others most delicious to his ear, the gentle ripple of the Tweed over
its pebbles, was distinctly audible as we knelt around the bed, and
his eldest son kissed and closed his eyes."
His miscellaneous works are exceedingly numerous and valuable.
The'Tales of a Grandfather,' remarkable episodes of Scottish history
related for children, is perhaps one of the most admirable books for
the very young that was ever composed, and may be read'with delight
at any age.  The'Lives of the Novelists,' and his innumerable contributions to the'Edinburgh Review' and other critical journals,
are rich, genial, and full of a fine spirit of learning and wisdom;




CHAP. xvII.]   SOUTHEY: THALABA -KEHAMA.                    337
their only defect is their too universally laudatory tone; for Scott,
who never had an enemy, seems incapable of saying a harsh thing.
No man-and certainly no literary man-ever passed so long and so
illustrious a life without a single personal enmity.  His character
was as amiable, generous, manly, and social, as his genius was varied
and sublime.
The life of Robert-Southey, extending from 1774 to 1843, was a
rare instance of unremitting literary activity; and the immense collection of miscellaneous works which he left behind him is highly
honourable to his learning and his talents, though it is only as a
prose writer that he is likely to descend to posterity.  He began life
as a violent partisan of the principles of the French Revolution;
and in his earlier works-the ridiculous drama of'Wat Tyler,' and
the extravagant and tedious epic,'Joan of Arc'-he devotes all his
powers to the support of extreme liberal opinions. He soon, however, abandoned his early principles, and became one of the most
thoroughgoing supporters of monarchical and conservative doctrines;
was named, in 1813, laureate, and exhibited in the maintenance of
his new political creed as much fervour, virulence, unscrupulousness,
and, it is but just to say, sincerity also, as he had shown for the
Utopian theories of a republican millennium. To give some idea of
the uncompromising and extreme character of his political predilections, we need only mention that in' Joan of Are' he has painted
as the blackest of tyrants our heroic sovereign Henry V., and placed
the Emperor Titus among the " murderers of mankind," while, in
the later stage of his political transformation, he has raised the more
than almost morbid obstinacy of George III. to the honours of an
absolute canonisation i
In 1801 was published'Thalaba,' and in 1810 the'Curse of
Kehama,' two works of a narrative character, which have many
points of resemblance. They are both, in their subject, wild, extravagant, unearthly, full of supernatural machinery, but of a kind as
difficult to manage with effect as at first sight splendid and attractive.'Thalaba' is a tale of Arabian enchantment, full of magicians,
dragons, hippogriffs, and monsters. In'Kehama' the poet has
selected for his groundwork the still more unmanageable mythology
of the Hindoos - a vast, incoherent and clumsy structure of superstition, more hopelessly unadapted to the purposes of poetry than
even the Fetishism  of the savages of Africa.  The poems are
written in an irregular and wandering species of rhythm —the' Thalaba' altogether without rhyme; and the language abounds il
an affected simplicity and perpetual obtrusion of vulgar and puerile
phraseology.  The works have a most painful air of laxity and want
of intellectual bone and muscle.  There are many nassages of' gorgeous description, and many proofs of powerful fancy and imagina,
twon; but the persons and adventures are so supernatural, so comrn



338          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CHAP. XVI.
pletely out of the circle of human sympathies both in their triumphs
-and sufferings, and they are so scrupulously divested of all the
passions and circumstances of humanity, that these gorgeous and
ambitious works produce on us the impression of a splendid but unsubstantial nightmare: they are cegri somnia, the vast disjointed
visions of fever and delirium.  In' Thalaba'. we have a series of
adventures, encountered by an Arabian hero, who fights with demons
and enchanters, and finally overthrows the dominion of the powers
of Evil in the Domdaniel caverns, "under the roots of the ocean."
It is more extravagant than anything in the'Thousand and One
Nights;' indeed it is nothing but a quintessence of all the puerile
and monstrous fictions of Arabian fancy.  In the Oriental legends
these extravagances are pardonable, and even characteristic, for in
them we take into the account the childish and wonder-loving character of the audience to which such fantastic inventions were
addressed, and we remember that they are scattered, in the books of
the East, over a much greater surface, so to say, whereas here we
have them all consolidated into one mass of incoherent monstrosity.
We miss, too, the exquisite glimpses afforded us by those tales in
the common and domestic life in the East.' Kehama' is founded
upon one of the most monstrous superstitions of Hindoo belief, viz.
that a man, by persisting in an almost incredible succession of voluntary penances and self-torture, can acquire a control over the divinities themselves: and in this poem a wicked enchanter goes near to
overthrow the dominion of Brahma, Vishnoo, and Seeva. The poem
is full of demons, goblins, terrific sacrifices, and pictures of supernatural existence; and the slender thread of human (or half-human)
interest is too feeble to unite them into a whole.  These poems, like
everything of Southey's, exhibit an incredible amount of multifarious
learning; but it is learning generally rather curious than valuable,
and it is not vivified by any truly genial, harmonising power of
originality.
In the interval between the publication of these poems appeared
a volume of metrical tales and the historical epic of'Madoc.' In
the tales, as in general in his minor poems, Southey exhibits a degree
of vigour and originality of thought for which we look in vain in his
longer works. Some of his legends, translated from the Spanish
and Portuguese (in which languages Southey was a proficient), or from
the obscurer stores of the Latin chronicles of the Middle Ages, oi
the monkish legends of the saints, are very vigorous and characteristically written. The author's spirit was strongly legendary; and he
has caught the true accent, not of heroic and chivalric tradition, but
of the religious enthusiasm of monastic times: and some of his
minor original poems have great tenderness and simple dignity of
thought, though often injured by a studied meanness and creepl.iguess of expression; for the fatal error of the school to Which he




CHAP. xvII.]           MADOC: RODERICK.                      339
belonged was a theory that the real everyday phraseology of the
-common people was better adapted to the purposes of poetry than
the language of cultivated and educated men; and thus the writers
of this class often labour as industriously to acquire the language of
the workshop and the nursery as the poets of Louis XIV. after an
artificial dignity and elevation.'Madoc' is founded on one of the most absurd legends connected
with the early history of America.  Madoc is a Welsh prince of the
twelfth century, who is represented as making the discovery of the
Western world; and his contests with the Mexicans, and ultimate
conversion of that people from their cruel idolatry, form the main
action of the poem, which, like' Joan of Arc,' is written in blank
verse. The poet thus had at his disposal the rich store of picturesque
scenery, manners, and wonderful adventure to be found in the
Spanish narratives of the exploits of Columbus, Pizarro, Cortes, and
the Conquestadors. But the victories which are so wonderful when
related as gained over the Mexicans by the comparatively well-armed
Spaniards of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, are perfectly
incredible when attributed to a band of savages little superior in civilization and the art of war to the people they invaded. Though the
poem is crowded with scenes of more than possible splendour, of
more than human cruelty, courage, and superstition, the effect is
singularly languid; and the exaggeration of prowess and suffering
produces the same effect upon the mind as the extravagance of fiction
in the two Oriental poems. There is nothing that requires so firm
and steady a hand to manage as the extraordinary; the modesty of
nature, the boundary of the possible, once overstepped, the reader's
curiosity grows more insatiable as it is more liberally fed.  When
we have had a giant twenty feet high, we require one of sixty; if
the hero conquers a dragon which vomits poison, we soon want him
to overthrow a monster which belches fire; and so on in an infinite
series, till all is extravagance, monstrosity, and childish gaping folly.' Kehama' was followed at an interval of four years, by' Roderick,
the Last of the Goths,' a poem in blank verse, and of a much more
modest and credible character thai its predecessors.  The subject is
the punishment and repentance of the last Gothic king of Spain,
whose vices, oppressions, and in particular an insult offered to the
virtue of Florinda, daughter of Count Julian, incited that noble to
betray his country to the Moors.  The general insurrection of the
Spaniards against their M6slem oppressors, the exploits of the illustri.
ous Pelayo, and the reappearance of Roderick at the great battle
which put an end to the infidel dominion, form the materials of the
action.  The king, in the disguise of a hermit, figures in most of the
scenes; and his agonizing repentance for his past crimes, and
humble trust in the mercy of God, is the keynote or prevailing tone
of the work.  Though free from  the injudicious employment of
28*




340          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CHAP. XVII.
supernatural machinery, and though containing some descriptions
of undeniable merit, and several scenes of powerful tenderness and
pathos, there is the same want of reality and human interest which
characterises Southey's poems in general, and the tone is too uniformly
ecstatic and agonizing.  His personages, like his scenes, have something unreal, phantomlike, dreamy: they are often beautiful, but it
is the beauty not of the earth, or even of the clouds, but of the
mirage and the Fata Morgana. His robe of inspiration sits gracefully
and majestically upon him, but it is too voluminous in its folds, and
too heavy in its gorgeous texture, for the motion of real existence:
he is never "succinct for speed," and his flowing drapery obstructs
and embarrasses his steps.  He has power, but not force-his
genius is rather passive than active.
On being appointed poet laureate he paid his tribute of court
adulation with an eagerness and regularity which showed how complete was his conversion from the political faith of his youthful days.
A convert is generally a fanatic; and Southey's laureate odes
exhibit a fierce, passionate, controversial hatred of his former liberal
opinions which gives interest even to the ambitious monotony, the
convulsive mediocrity of his official lyrics.  In one of them, the'Vision of Judgment,' he has essayed to revive the hexameter in
English verse. This experiment, tried in so many languages, and
with such indifferent success, had been attempted by Gabriel Harvey
in the reign of Elizabeth, and the universal ridicule which hailed
Southey's attempt was excited quite as much by the absurdity of
the metre as by the extravagant flattery of the poem itself.  The
deification, or rather beatification of George III. drew from  Byron
some of the severest strokes of his irresistible ridicule, and gave him
the opportunity of severely revenging upon Southey some of the
latter's attacks upon his principles and poetry.
Southey was a man of indefatigable industry; his prose works
are very numerous and valuable for their learning and siicecrity, but
the little'Life of Nelson,' written to furnish young seamen with a
simple narrative of the exploits of England's greatest naval hero,
has perhaps never been equalled far the perfection of its style.  In
his other works — the principal of which are'The Book of the
Church,''The Lives of the British Admirals,' that of Wesley, a'History of Brazil,' and of the Peninsular War-we find the same
admirable art of clear vigorous English, and no less that strong prejudice, violent political and literary partiality, and a tone of haughty,
acrimonious, arrogant self-confidence, which so much detract fi'om
his many excellent qualities as a writer, and as a man, his sincerity,
his learning, his conscientiousness, and his natural benevolence of
character.
In his innumerable critical and historical essays, chiefly contributed
to the'Quarterly Review,' in the' Colloquies' (a book of imaginary




CHAP. XVIII.]                MOORE.                           341
conversations composed on a most absurd plan), and in the strange
niscellaneous work entitled' The Doctor,' we see a gross ignorance
of the commonest principles of political and economic science, and
an arrogant, dictatorial, persecuting tone, which render these works
melancholy examples of the truth that intolerance is not always
naturally associated with weakness of intellect or with malignity of
ieart.
CHAPTER XVIII.
MOORE, BYRON, AND  SHELLEY.
Moore: Translation of Anacreon, and Little's Poems-Political Satires-The
Fudge Family-Irish Melodies - Lalla Rookh - Epicurean - Biographies.
Byron: Hours of Idleness, and English Bards-Romantic Poems-The
Dramas-Childe Harold-Don Juan-Death of Byron. Shelley: Poems and
Philosophy-Queen Mab, Prometheus Unbound, Alastor, &c. —The Cenci
-Minor Poems and Lyrics.
WVE have seen how the name of Walter Scott was the type, sign,
or measure of the first step in literature towards romanticism, or
rather of the first step made in modern times from classicism-from
the regular, the correct, the established.
The next step in this new career was made by Thomas Moore,
who broke up new and fresh fountains of original life, first in the
inexhaustible East, and secondly in his native Ireland. In the
former field, indeed, it may be thought that he was perhaps anticipated
by Southey, so many of whose poems are on Oriental subjects; but
these two poets, are sufficiently dissimilar to absolve the author of'Lalla Rookh' from  the charge of servilely copying, or, indeed, of
following, the writer of'Thalaba' and' Kehama:' in the latter and
more valuable quality, of a national Irish lyrist, he stands absolutely
alone and unapproachable.
Thomas Moore, the Anacreon and Catullus, perhaps in  mine
sense the Petronius and the Apuleius also, of the nineteenth century,
was born in Dublin in the year 1780. Belonging essentially to the
middle class, and a Roman Catholic besides, it may be easily conceived
how he must have sympathised in the deep discontent which pervaded
his country at that agitated period.  Moore passed some time at the
university of his native city, and soon after gave proof that he had
made a more than ordinary progress in at least the elegant department of classical scholarship. His first work was a translation into




3-42          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CHAP. XVIII.
English vrse of the'Odes' of Anacreon, in which he exhibits a
very gr.at extent of reading, and no mean proficiency in Greek
phillogy.  The translation, however, is much more valuable as
giving us an earnest of the poet's future powers than as a faithful
reproduction of the original: it is more interesting as Moore than
as Anacreon: it is Irish rather than Greek.
Canova is said to have exhibited his Venus in a sort of close
recess, surrounded by crimson drapery, and lighted by a single lamp;
he is even said to have slightly tinged the marble with a faint rosy
glow; and this is what Moore has done to Anacreon.  He has
diffused over his version a rapturous and passionate air not in
harmony with the unadorned simplicity of the Greek; he is fanciful
where the original is sensuous.  The reputation, both as poet and as
scholar, which Moore acquired by his Anacreon, combined with his
musical and con~versational talents, immediately introduced him to
the refined and intellectual society then assembled round the Prince
of Wales, afterwards George IV.; for the heir apparent had surrounded himself (as naturally happens in a constitutional monarchy)
with a strong phalanx of opposition wits and statesmen, and Charles
Fox and Sheridan arrayed themselves with the Prince and against
the existing government of the King.
In 1803 Moore received an appointment in the island of Bermuda,
which he not long afterwards lost through the malversation of a
person employed under him, whose dishonesty exposed Moore to the
prosecution of the government, and involved him in difficulties from
which he did not easily extricate himself.  During his absence from
England, both in the beautiful Antilles and his subsequent retirement at Paris, he continued to be an industrious author. We must
mention a small volume of' Odes and Epistles,' written in singularly
easy and graceful language, with very little pretension to elaborate
finish (he calls them  himself "prose tagged with rhyme"), but
exhib;ting the dawning of those powers which were to render him
unequalled in a peculiar and very difficult line. The other production of this period was a small collection of poems, almost all of an
erotic crharacter, and some translated from Catullus, and other poets,
Greek awnd Latin, of the same class.  This volume was published
under tite pseudonym  of "Thomas Little," and the merit of its
contents, though occasionally great, was not sufficient to counterbalance the sensual and immoral tone of many of the pieces. In
this respect'Little's Poems' are indeed open to very severe reprehension, and, without affecting any Pharisaical degree of moral
severity, we may affirm  that they have really done a great deal of
harrm.
He now commenced a long series of political satires-light arrows
9f ridicule aimed against men and measures, generally only of a
temporary interest, but so sharply pointed with wit, so lightly




CHAP. XVIII.] MOORE. SATIRES — FUDGE FAMILY.                343
feathered with grace and dpropos, that these slight shafts will retain
to remote posterity very high value as perfect masterpieces of their
kind.  Moore did for the political "squib" what H. B. has done
for the political caricature-I he deprived it of half its evil by
depriving it of all its grossness."  The Chinese are said to exhibit
fireworks of exquisite brilliancy and ingenuity so contrived that they
can be let off in a room, not only without danger of fire, but with
the peculiarity that in exploding they emit a fragrant odour.  These
light productions of Moore are like the Chinese fireworks: they are
wonderfully varied, petulant, and sparkling; and instead of the
heavy vapours of personal malignity, they spread around, after
crackling and flashing through their momentary existence, a fragrance of good taste, good humour, and classic grace. Though they
must have given, as we know they did, the most exquisite pain to
their unfortunate victims, they are absolutely the most unanswerable
and galling attacks that were ever made; and the only way to conceal the wound must have been by joining in the laugh. They are
full of the most happy turns of ingenuity, of the gay exhaustless
fancy which seems the peculiar heritage of the Irish intellect, and
they show a vast extent of curious and out-of-the-way reading, which
no man ever knew better to employ than Moore.
Among the best of Moore's comic compositions are the admirable
letters entitled' The Fudge Family in Paris,' supposed to be written
by a party of English travellers at the French capital.  It is composed of a hack-writer and spy, devoted to legitimacy, the Bourbons,
and Lord Castlereagh; his son, a young dandy of the first water;
and his daughter, a sentimental damsel, rapturously fond of "romance
and high bonnets and Madame Le Roy," in love with a Parisian
linendraper, whom she has mistaken for one of the Bourbons in disguise.  In this, as in his other comic productions, Moore -shows
great skill in introducing his own witty fancies without destroying
the probability of the character who is made the unconscious mouthpiece for the author's good things. We ought not to forget O'Connor,
the tutor and'poor relation" of this egregious family, who is an
ardent Bonapartist and Irish patriot.  His letters are all serious,
and contain violent declamations against the Holy Alliance, the
British government, &c.; but they are not in harmony with the gay
and ludicrous tone of the work- to which they were probably intended to act as a foil or relief.
Another delightful collection of (pretended intercepted) letters,
supposed to be from eminent persons, is entitled'The Twopenny
Post-Bag.' These, like the preceding, had a most unparalleled
success.  Before quitting this category of Moore's multifarious
writings, we will mention his'Rhymes on Cash, %'rn, and
Catholics,' the subject of which is sufficiently indicated by the title;
his'Fables for the Holy Alliance,' a most spirited and ludicrous




Z 484         OUTLINES OF GENERAL LERAL LITERATURE. [CHAP. XVTII.
monrcery of the legitimist doctrines; and a number of political
squibs wr'itten in the slang or argot of the prizefighters.  These
oifter a new proof of the elegance and versatility of Mloore's talents;
for though in them  he has adopted a dialect associated with the
lowest and most brutalizing of our national sports, he has handled
it so that it is not only not offensive, but in the highest degree comic.
Moore has used the jargon of the prize-ring so as to lose all its
coarseness, and retain only its oddity and picturesque force.  The
narrative of the great fight between " Long Sandy and Georgy the
Porpus" is in true sporting style, and'Tom Cribb's MIemorial to
Congress' contains passages of true poetic spirit.
We now approach those works upon which will be founded this
poet's widest and most enduring reputation -  these are the' Irish
Melodies.'  They are short lyrics, written to suit thait vast treasury
of beautiful national airs which form  the peculiar pride, joy, and
consolation of the Irish people.  "Tl'he task which you piopose to
me," says the poet, in his letter to Sir John Stevenson, the arranger
of the music, " of adapting words to these airs, is by no meains easy.
The poet who would follow  the various sentiments whlich  they
express must feel and understand that rapid fluctuation of spirits,
that unaccountable mixture of gloom  and levity, which composes
the character of my countrymen, and has deeply tinged their mnusic.
Even in their liveliest strains we find soine melancholy note intrude
-  some minor third, or fiat seventh -  which throws its shade as it
passes, and makes even mirth interesting."  We have in another
place spoken of the Scottish national airs in terms of admiriation
which will appear exaggerated to those only who are unacquainted
with them: the popular airs of Ireland are inferior to those of Scotland neither in pathos, in gaiety, nor in inexhaustible variety.  in
Ireland the national music had been associated with coarse, rude, alnd
rmean words, often indecent and trivial in the highest degree; and
thus by degrees many most beautiful airs, naturally expressive of the
tenderest emotion, were deprived, by changes in their time, their
key, and their accentuationi, of their natural sense and meaning.'When we see, among the titles by which the airs are known, such
gross and vulgar appellations (generally worthy specimens of the
pot-house compositions of which they are the beginning) as' Paddy
Snap,''The Black Joke,''The Captivating Youth,''Bob and Joan,''Paddy Whack,''The Dandy 0,' and the like, we shall partly
appreciate the service rendered by Moore to the music and poetry of
his country.
The'Irish Mlelodies,' as songs, have never been surpassed in their
particular kind.  The versification is so exquisite, and executed with
such delicacy of rhythm, that, on hearing them well read,'ve involuntarily and certainly conceive the tune, even though we may
never have heard it.




CIIAP. XVIII.]      MOORE: LALLA ROOKH.                     315
Viewed as poetry, these songs are among the most beautifu. productions of literature. The diction is invariably perfect for elegancee
neatness, and grace: it is truly Catullian, "simplex munditiis:" the
words are never too big for the thought. They exhibit marks, not
so much of labour and effort as of polish and care; and where the
author can prevail upon himself to resist his natural and Irish tendency to say something ingenious and conceited, their sentiment is
as true and beautiful as their execution is felicitous. The great art
in song-writing is to invent something that is original without being
far-fetched; and -when we reflect upon the difficulty of finding untouched and unhackneyed ideas on the few topics offered by patriotism, love, and pleasure (which compose nearly the whole curta
supellex of the song-writer), we shall the more easily excuse Moore
for having sometimes fallen into the fantastic and epigrammatic.
If we compare Moore, as a lyric poet, with Burns, we shall acquire
a much more elevated idea of the Irishman than by looking at him
in a distinct point of view.  The peasant poet of Scotland had the
advantage of using a dialect which was simple and rustic without
vulgarity, and all his finest compositions (with perhaps one or two
remarkable exceptions) are written in that dialect; and it is difficult
for a critic not practically acquainted with that dialect, to judge
how-.far its use may have contributed to give Burns's poetry its charm
of naivete, slyness, and pathos.  Moore has not this advantage: his
lyrics are models of the most refined and classical English. Both
poets abound in beautiful love-passages; but the passion of the
Scottish ploughman is rather too ardent and unscrupulous, while
that of the Irish poet is often frittered away in cold and sparkling
concetti, and thus loses in depth and tenderness more than it gains
in ingenuity and elegance.
In 1817 Moore published the celebrated Oriental romance'Lalla
Rookh' (Tulip-Cheek, so entitled from the name of the heroine).
The structure of this work is truly original: it consists of a little
romantic love-story, in which the beautiful daughter of Aurengzebe,
during her journey into Bucharia, where she is to meet her betrothed
husband, the prince of that country, falls in love with a young minstrel, who afterwards turns out' to be her affianced bridegroom in
disguise, and who thus, "having won her love as an humble minstrel,
now amply deserved to enjoy it as a king." This slender plot is
related in that ingenious and sparkling prose of which Moore is a
consummate master; and nothing can exceed the gorgeousness,
splendour, and pleasanty with which he describes all the details of
Oriental life and scenery during the journey, and the inimitable character of Fadladeen the high chamberlain, a pedantic critic and
accomplished courtier. This prose narrative, which, though very
short, is one unceasing sparkle of brilliant antithesis and Eastern
imagery, forms a kind -of framing (like the prologues of Chaucer)




346          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CHAP. XVIII
for the poems. These are four in number,'The Veiled Prophet,''The Fireworshippers,''Paradise and the Peri,' and'The Light of
the Harem;' and are supposed to be sung for the Princess's amusement by the disguised Feramorz. Of the prose portion of this
enchanting work it is impossible to speak too highly; it is the very
quintessence, the "fine fieur," the bloom and anthos of the gorgeous and voluptuous genius of the East: indeed its only fault is
that it is too incessantly, too fatiguingly dazzling and splendid; it is
"more Eastern than the East itself," and is a concentration or con.
densation of a thousand traits and strokes derived from a vast extent
of Oriental reading. Jekyll said that " it was as good as riding on
the back of a camel."  The tales themselves are of various merit:'The Veiled Prophet,' the most ambitious and the longest, does not
appear to us the most successful.  The narrative wants clearness,
consistency, and event: the march of the story languishes, and the
characters are too conventional and undefined to possess much
power of interest.  It is written in rhymed couplets, and there is
far too incessant a profusion of ornament, which, though rich and
appropriate, is so thickly sown that the effect of the whole is like
that of some Oriental robe, in which the whole texture is concealed
with an unbroken surface of pearl, and ruby, and diamond.'The Fireworshippers,' which is written in irregular octosyllabic
verses, is less oppressive in its splendour, but it reminds the reader,
and unfortunately for its success, of the minor Oriental narratives of
Byron, as, for example,'The Bride of Abydos.'  On the whole,
our favourite of the four poems is' The Light of the Harem:' the
subject is a love-quarrel and reconciliation between the Emperor
Jehanghir and his beautiful favorite Nourmahal. In all these poems
the songs introduced, and the lyric passages in general, are inexpressibly beautiful; those sung by the fair houris in the artificial Paradise,
where Azim is tempted to join the standard of Mokanna; many of
the lyric movements in'The Peri;' and, above all, the delicious
incantations in'The Light of the Harem,' are in Moore's very
finest manner, and perhaps have never been equalled, except by himself in the'Irish Melodies.'
Of'The Loves of the Angels,' Moore's other Oriental poem, we
have but very few words to say: it is generally found to be inferior
to his other works; and though many passages of it breathe a rich
and graceful perfume of passion, it is in characters and scenery too
modern, so to say, too little imbued with a primeval spirit appropriate to the legend, and the personages have lost the pure and celestial
lineaments of the angelic nature, without acquiring our sympathy in
their punishment as men.  How would Milton have maintained the
solemn, ethereal, primeval charqcter of those primeval days of Earth's
first infancy, "when men began to multiply on the face thereof, and
daughters were born unDo them, and the sons of God saw the




CH A&P. XVIr.]              BYRON.                          347
daughters of men that they were fair, and took them wlres of alM
which they chose" I Moore's angels do not so much resemble the
angels of the Bible, or those of Raphael, nor even those of Albert
Diirer, as the Scripture personages of a ballet at the Porte St.
Martin: and indeed it is curious enough that this poem was composed
at Paris.
The remarks we have made on the'Irish Melodies' will equally
apply, though of course not always in the same degree, to various
other collections of songs which this poet has given to the world:
there are many beautiful productions among his'National Songs,'
written for a selection of airs of all countries; and the' Evenings in
Greece,' and other similar works, may be examined by the reader
with a certainty of finding many gems of grace, tenderness, and
harmony.  We have now to say a few words of Moore as a prosewriter. He has distinguished himself both in fiction and in biography
— in the former as the author of the beautiful tale of'The Epicurean,'
and in the latter in a variety of works, of which the most important
are the'Lives' of Lord Byron, his intimate friend and brother-poet,
and of his illustrious countryman Sheridan, the British Beaumarchais.'The Epicurean' is a tale of antique manners, the scene being
laid among the primitive Christians, chiefly in Egypt, and terminating with the martyrdom of a converted priestess, whose character,
as well as that of the hero, a young Athenian, is beautifully sketched.
The book contains many striking and poetical episodes, particularly
% descent into the subterraneous temples of the Egyptian deities,
and a revelation of the arts by which the pagan hierarchy deceived
the candidates for initiation in their unholy mysteries.  The night
voyage on the Nile is also powerful and picturesque, and the style
of the work, though still sufficiently gorgeous and fanciful, is not so
overloaded with ornament and conceits as the prose parts of'Lalla
Rookh.' It also exhibits a profusion of curious erudition.
The two'Lives' which we have mentioned are written on that
plan which is immeasurably the best for this kind of work. They
are not'Lives,' but'Memoirs:' the author allows the subject of the
biography to tell his own story; and the mass of the book consists
of extracts from the journals and correspondence of the person
whose life we are reading. Moore has performed his task with the
penetration of the critic, and with the gentleness and enthusiasm of
the friend: and nothing in it is more admirable than the warm and
generous justice rendered to Byron by a contemporary and most
popular poet, and the total absence of anything like jealousy or envy.
It is impossible not to confess that Byron was the most extraordinary man of his age, and perhaps the most extraordinary person in
the modern history of Europe.  Striking and not uninstructive
parallels have been drawn between him and Napoleon, and even
29




348          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CIIAP. XVIII.
between him and Goethe. All three were eminently the enmbodiment of the period of crisis, literary or political, which characterised
their age. No sooner is Napoleon installed in the Tuileries than he
begins to revive all the ceremonies and exploded offices of the ancient
court of France; and, by what would seem (but only to a superficial
glance) a similar caprice, Byron, " the young Napoleon of the realms
of rhyme," has no sooner mounted with the step of a giant to the
uncontested throne of his country's literature, than his first manifestos
proclaim his adherence to those canons of taste and principles of
criticism, the total and unsparing annihilation of which was the
particular mission of his power.  Though  the greatest of the
romanticists, Byron incessantly insisted on the superiority of the
classicist school; and, whether from blindness, or from that perverse
contempt for received opinions which so strongly coloured his character, the author of'Childe Harold' and'Lara' affected to consider
Pope as his superior in poetry.  "It was all Virgil then," says he;
"it is all Claudian with us now:" and he has compared the two
classes of literature respectively to a Grecian temple, and to a glittering but barbarous pagoda.  He affected to be prouder of his cold
and formal'Imitations of Horace' than of those immortal poems
by which he revolutionised the taste of Europe.
This extraordinary. man was born in London on the 22nd of
January, 1788.  His mother was a Scottish heiress, who had in an
evil hour married a ruined profligate, from whom she had soon been
obliged to separate; and the early days of the young poet were
passed chiefly in Scotland, amid the miseries of poverty and neglect,
and exposed to all the dangers arising from the almost insane character of his unhappy mother-capricious alternations of frantic fondness and unreasoning rage. He was eleven years old when the death
of his grand-uncle put him in possession of the title, and made him
the representative of one of the most ancient Norman houses of the
English aristocracy.  The hereditary estate, Newstead Abbey, not
far from Nottingham, was situated in the middle of the most beautiful
rural scenery, in a district dignified by the legends of " Robin Hood
and Little John" and the fair Forest of Sherwood; but the property
was dilapidated by the follies and vices of his ancestors.  However
favourable may have been all these circumstances to foster that union
of passion and sensibility which composes the poetical character, and
to inspire and develop that mixture of pride, melancholy, and haughty
repining which characterises the poetry of this great man, they were
indubitably not favourable either to his happiness or to his virtue.
An early and ill-requited passion came, too, to throw an additional
tint of gloom over this lofty and mournful heart; and his boyish love
for Mary Chaworth was afterwards to be immortalised in verses
whose sad and imperishable beauty only renders their sincerity too
painfully apparent.




CHAP. xvIII.]       BYRON: ENGLISH BARDS.                     349
His prospects in life being considerably improved by his accession
to the peerage, young Byron passed some time at Harrow School,
where he made himself chiefly remarkable by the intensity and
almost feminine fervour of his schoolboy friendships; and afterwards
at Trinity College, Cambridge, where the tradition goes that he
occupied the same rooms as had been formerly inhabited by Newton.
At the university his life was neither very happy nor very moral,
but both here and at Harrow he continued to indulge the salne
voracious appetite for all manner of miscellaneous reading which had
distinguished him almost from his infancy. It is singular enough
that his predilections should have lain, in a great measure, in the
lepartment of Oriental history.  Of classical learning, at least of are
accurate and technical kind, he never possessed a great share; and he
1as left us, in many passages of his works, strong indications of the
weariness and disgust with which a bad system  of education had
associated, in his mind, the finest passages of ancient literature.
It was in 1807 that Byron first appeared before the public as an
author.  The'Hours of Idleness,' a small volume of fugitive
poems, of no intrinsic value whatever, and (what is singular enough)
giving no indication of his future powers or style of thought, was
treated  with extreme severity in a memorable criticism  of the' Edinburgh Review.' Byron's rage at this contemptuous and sarcastic
article, and the terrific revenge which he afterwards took, has induced
many people to consider this famous criticism as a notable instance
either of malignity or ignorance.  But it seems to us that this is an
error and an injustice.  The criticism in itself, though not perhaps
written in the best possible taste, is fair and reasonable enough; for
the poems are exceedingly weak and commonplace. The true culpability of the reviewer lies in the selection, for a subject of his strictures, of a work so trifling and unimportant.  The critique threw
Byron into a passion of rage and indignation, and he shortly afterwards printed his satire of'English Bards and Scotch Reviewers,' a
fierce and indiscriminate- piece of retaliation, in which he revenges
his self-love upon nearly the whole of the literary men of that day.
This poem, as might have been expected from the sincere anger which
dictated it, is in many parts very powerfully written, and exhibits,
if not a complete foretaste of all the qualities which distinguish his
peculiar genius, at least the earnestness, intensity, and admirable
clearness of expression, which form chief elements in his future
productions.  It is equally to the honour of the satirist and his
victims in this ebullition of youthful indignation, that he afterwards
became the warm friend and correspondent of many of the persons
whom he had attacked-of Jeffrey, for example (editor of the obnoxious Review), of Scott, of MIoore, and many others.
After inflicting this fierce vengeance the poet travelled for two
years, and embodied, in the first and second cantos of' Childo




350          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CIIAP. XVIII.
Harold,' w: ich appeared on his return in 1812, the impressions of
beauty, tenderness, and sublimity which the scenes of Spain and
Greece were so likely to make upon such a mind. The appearance
of this admirable poem placed the author, instantly and for ever, at
the head of all the poets of his time. The remainder of'Childe
Harold' appeared at considerable intervals; the fourth (and last)
canto not until 1818.  For this reason we think it advisable to
defer our remarks upon this work till we can discuss the whole of it
at once. The first and second cantos were followed in rapid and
brilliant succession by those inimitable romantic narratives which
form an era in literature, and which proved that Byron's genius had
now found a new and vast source of passion, interest, and sentiment.
This source was principally the East, and modern Greece in particular. Familiarised as we now are, and chiefly familiarised by the
genius of Byron himself, with the scenery and costume of this
region, we can hardly form  an idea of the impression which must
have been made by the first appearance of'The Giaour' and' The
Bride of Abydos,''The Corsair' and'Lara;' they produced in the
public of England, and indirectly throughout rfarope, an enthusiasm
which was little short of madness. That deep and spiritual perception of beauty, that mixture of pride and tenderness, of fervour and
voluptuous softness, the rapid alternation of the fiercest energy with
the loftiest and most pathetic meditation-all these made Byron as
peculiarly the poet of Greece, as they rendered  Greece the just
patrimony of Byron's genius.  Most of these narrative poenls were
written in the irregular-rhymed metres which Scott had brought into
fashion.  They have rarely any pretensions to ingenuity of plot or
connected development of incident; and are, indeed, little else than
powerful embodiments of terrible situations — culminating instants
-in Oriental existence.  They are not, in short, dramas, nor hardly
scenes, of the life of man: they are moments of intense and tremendous passion.  They have no variety of character: they contain but
two figures, sometimes slightly relieved against a few conventional
and monotonous characters, but rendered invariably impressive and
affecting by the scenery and circumstances which surround them,
and by the unequalled intensity, directness, and pathos with which
their passions are set before us.  The male character is the same as
we behold in Childe Harold, in Conrad, in Lara, in Alp, and even
in the tragedies-a character unnatural, impossible, and inconsistent
in itself, but painted with a terrible force and distinctness.  Both
Scott and Byron excel in description; but with this difference, that
Scott contents himself with the external manifestation of the object,
whose most picturesque and striking lines he selects and reproduces
with an admirable energy and vividness; or, if these are allowed to
acquire any colouring from the poet's mind, that tint is seldom of,'miy unusual or profound character. No passions, indeed, can be




CHAP. XVII.]      BYRON: ROMAiANTIC POEMIS.                   351
said to colour Scott's descriptions, except occasionally the enthusiasm
of chivalric daring, the glow of patriotic exultation, or the tenderness of the domestic affections.  Byron is the exact reverse of all
this. Not only is every manifestation of his sublime genius intimately and inseparately connected with the peculiar moral constitution of the individual, but the very existence of that genius can only
be conceived as inseparable from that constitution.  In him it is not
possible to separate the artist from the man.  The fact is, that the
character of Byron is intensity; that is to say, intense earnestness
and sincerity: and this quality is so rare in art or in literature, that.we are content to purchase it even at the price of monotony.  In
the infancy of society-that is, at the periods of great physical
agitation-poetry, like  art, preserves its external or superficial
character: it speaks to the eye, and to the imagination. But as man,
or as mankind, grows older, and he " puts away childish things," he
turns his eye inward upon the mysterious workings of his own moral
nature, and poetry becomes searching, analytic, deeply passionate.
Byron's writings are, in this point of view, as complete a manifestation of the nineteenth century, as the'Iliad' and the'Odyssey' are
of the heroic, or as Scott's poems are a revival of the chivalric age.
It is singular how almost all Byron's human characters resolve
themselves into moments and situations of intense but stationary
interest.  Alp gazing on the cloud, whose passage is to decide his
everlasting fate; Lara smiling sadly at the dancers; Manfred drinking
in the loveliness of nature, which can, however, bring no consolation
to his despair-these are delineations which will occur to every one;
and the narrative or dialogue in which these conceptions are introduced is of the same stationary, unprogressive character; there is no
evolution, nothing advances.'The Corsair' and'Lara' are two prominent adventures in the
life of the same person; for it is evident that Lara and the page
Kaled can be no other than Conrad and Gulnare. These two poems
are remarkabl.e as being written in the rhymed heroic couplet of Pope
and Dryden, instead of the irregular lyric measures of the other
romantic tales. Byron has handled the difficult instrument with
perfect mastery.  In the former of the two poems, the song of the
pirates is inexpressibly vigorous, and full of wild, savage energy; but
the analysis of Conrad's character is generally considered as the
finest passage, and the death of Medora as an unequalled instane
of Byron's power
"To ope the sacred source of sympathetic tears."
No author ever possessed so little of the dramatic power-of that
going out of oneself to create-of that faculty of getting entirely
rid of one's own idiosyncrasy, which Shakspeare posstssed to a
degree in no sense short of supernatural.  In fact, it is to this -ion
29 *




852          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CHAP. XVIII.
centration of thoughts in himself, to the very incapacity of going out
of the circle of his own moral being, that Byron owes his specific
character as a poet.
It was this portion of Byron's life which we might call the happiest, if glory and pleasure were enough to make life happy.  He
was now the idol of society, considered "facile princeps" of the;ving poets of his country, and boldly compared even with the
reatest names among the mighty dead; and about this time he con-.racted his marriage with Miss Milbanke.  The tale of this truly
melancholy episode is soon told: after living a short time with his
lady, between whom and her illustrious husband there seems to have
existed no disagreements not to be explained by the very embarrassed state of their fortune, the relations, and particularly the mother,
of Lady Byron, appear to have induced her to separate from her
husband, not only (as far as appears) without assigning any sufficient
cause, but without communicating to Byron himself any plausible
pretext; for he solemnly affirmed, until his dying day, that he never
knew the cause of separation. He soon hurried away once more
from England, with the hope of forgetting or alleviating his pain
amid the loveliness of foreign climes, and in those beautiful regions
immortalised by ancient glory, but to which his genius had given a
new enchantment. But, before his departure, he gave to the world'The Siege of Corinth' and' Parisina,'-short, wild, irregular poems,
in which his characteristic merits are splendidly perceptible. In the
former, the apparition which visits Alp with a last chance of salvation is a scene nobly contrasted with the warlike fury of the storming of the devoted city; and in the second, pathos of the deepest and
nost hopeless kind is embodied in descriptions and reflection so exquisitely touching that we forget the horror of crime and vengeance
shed over the meagre story, and we feel no want of that strong
picturesque situation in which this poet's romantic tales are rarely
deficient. The opening lines of' Parisina' are consummate in deep
internal beauty, and are worthy of being compared even with the
ghost scene of the siege, or the inimitable attack and capture of
Corinth by the Turks.
The restless pang of misery which was now fixed for ever to this
noble heart again drove him abroad. In six months he sent to England the third canto of' Childe Harold,' and the exquisite little
poem of'The Prisoner of Chillon.'  Respecting the latter of these,
we need not make any very detailed remarks.  Story or dramatic
interest it has none, but the effect of grief and imprisonment upon
the characters of the three brothers is painted with a variety of touch
aus strong as it is delicate, and the death of the youngest is a haunting image of quiet, patient, uncomplaining hopelessness. We behold
the captives, we see "the iron entering into their souls;" and the
feverish and fantastic imaginings of the survivor, his reflections on




CHAP. XVIII.]          BYRON: MANFRED.                      353
his brother's grave, and his welcoming of the bird which comes to
visit him, are deeply-imagined indications of that weakening and revulsion of the mind which follows hopeless and irremediable sorrow
-the recoil of the o'erstrained spring.  The view of happy nature
without is exquisitely relieved and contrasted against the cold dull
monotony of the prison, and is like a little glimpse of blue sky
framed by the grating of a dungeon.
It was about this period of his career (1817) that Byron began to
write dramas; and the first work of this nature, and probably the
best also, was, as might have been expected, but little removed in
form  from  the contemplative poems which had gained him  his
greatest fame. This was the drama of' Manfred.' Byron's genius
was singularly ill adapted for scenic writing, principally from that
want of variety with which we have reproached all his attempts at
the creation of character.'Manfred' is no more a play for the
stage than' Faust,' and the author has repeatedly insisted that this
(and many other of his dramas) were never composed "with the
remotest view to representation."  The truth is, that this work is
dramatic only in form; there are no events, properly so called, there
are no characters, and there is no dialogue.  The so-called play, in
short, is little else than a series of grand and majestic soliloquies,
and the form of dialogue is only assumed to enable the author to put
into the mouth of a few other persons (who have nothing whatever
distinctive and characteristic) remarks which give Manfred the occasion of describing and re-describing his own sublime agonies. The
work therefore is much less a drama than the' Prometheus' of 2Aschylus, and little more so than the'Paradise Lost.' It bears a strong
superficial resemblance in many points to the'Faust,' but a very
slight examination will show the difference between these two awful
productions.'Faust' is a cold, cynical, cruel, deliberate anatomy
of the vanities of human virtue and knowledge; the hero is little
more than inert matter in the hands of the sneering fiend, who plays
with him as a juggler with his balls.  Mephistophiles is the real
hero of the poem, as Satan is of the'Paradise Lost;' Faust is but
the weak and erring Adam of his vain Eden of human perfectibility.  But Manfred is a haughty and regal spirit, whose tremendous agonies have endowed him. with power over the powers of
Nature, Destiny, and Ahrimnanes. The abstract and unworldly features of this awful conception are softened and humanised by his
deep and unfailing love for nature and his longing remembrances of
the earthly passion of his youth.  The character resembles those
Alpine solitudes amid which he utters his sublime woes;' it is tie
cold and glittering unfruitful glacier, bordered with the mournful
flowers of the mountain rhododendron; it is the icy peak, thundershattered and inaccessible, but glowing in the rosy hues of Love's
departed sun.  All the soliloquies in this immortal work are full of




A5 4         OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CHAP. XVIII,
the rarest beauty; that spoken on the summit of the Jungfrau, the
evocation of the Witch of the Alps, and that grand and pathetic
passage in which the mind of the lofty victim, now calhned by the
hope of approaching death, recalls the majestic sadness of ruined
Rome.  The songs of the Spirits are indescribably beautiful as
lyrics; and in one overwhelming scene (that in which the phantom
of the dead Astarte is called up to answer Manfred before the throne
of Ahriman) it cannot be denied that Byron has shown a power
almost dramatic.
This splendid work appeared with'The Lament of Tasso,' and
was followed in the succeeding year by the fourth and concluding
canto of' Childe Harold,' about which poem we shall now say a few
words.  In selecting as the medium of a contemplative and descriptive work the nine-lined stanza of Spenser (itself a modification of
the ottava rima of Tasso and Ariosto), Byron at first determined to
convey something of that quaint and antiquated air which his great
master had adopted in'The Farie Queene.' This suits well enough
with Spenser's subject, a tale of romantic chivalrous adventure; but
even in' The Faerie Queene' the use' of old and obsolete language
was carried rather too far.  Byron attempted (it is not easy to say
with what object) to do the same; the very title of the poem-'Childe' signifying, in our old English legendary language, knight
-is a proof and example of this.  But we feel neither surprise nor
regret that he soon abandoned this forced masquerade of diction.'Childe Harold' derives its wonderful power over our sympathies
from the admirable variety, splendour, and beauty of its descriptions
of scenery, spots of eternal and historical interest, and the great
triumphs of human art and genius. These have no natural coherence
or connection, and are only united into one complete whole by the
grand tone of mournful reflection in which the impressions are embodied, the atmosphere of lofty sadness through which the various
objects are viewed.  Harold is an exhausted and disappointed libertine, who wanders over the earth, beholding its fairest and most
exhilarating scenes with the calm and abstracted glance of one who
no longer either hopes or fears, but who is sometimes capable of
being roused for a moment by contempt or admiration, by the base
or the beautiful, by patriotism, by despair.  Neither the English nor
assuredly any other literature had produced any passages of description at all comparable to the pictures of nature, man, and society
which crowd these four wondrous cantos-the plaintive loveliness of
Greece; the stern splendour of Mussulman dominion; the scenes
of heroic struggling for Spanish and Portuguese independence; the
cataracts and peaks of Switzerland; the phantom  splendours of
Venice; and all the wonders of antique and medireval art.  It is of
course impossible for the reader, in spite of Byron's eager and
reiterated declamations, to avoid identifying the hero of this great




CrAP. xvIII.   BYRON: CHILDE HAROLD —BEPPO.                   355
work with the personal and individual character of its authwIt.  The
bitter and scornful declamati6ns against military glory and intellectual supremacy, the invectives against the hollowness of modern
society, do indeed sometimes'wear a somewhat suspicious air not only
of sophistry, but of affectation; but it is to the eternal honour of
this great genius that his enthusiasm for what is really good, noble,
or beautiful is always stamped with an air of deep and fervent
sincerity.  The mask is that of Mephistophiles, but the features
which it conceals are the lineaments of an archangel.  The poem
begins and ends with the ocean; to whose majestic undulations, to
whose changing aspects of gloom and sunshine, of calm and tempest,
of melancholy grandeur and immeasurable depth, it bears no faint
similitude, and of whose many-voiced harmonies its varied music is
no unworthy echo.
Together with the fourth canto of'Childe Harold' appeared'Beppo,' a light, half-playful, half-sarcastic tale of modern Italian
society, in which Byron gave the first earnest of his powers as a
comic writer.  It is composed in the easy stanza employed by Pulci
and the more ludicrous Italian poets, and is a consummate example
of easy familiar grace, occasionally rising into pathos and tenderness.
The story is as trifling as possible, being a not very moral carnival
adventure; but what an abundant and transparent flow of refined
chat and badinage, with only just that slight touch of satire and
pathos which suffices to give it pungency! The somewhat lax
mlorality we pardon with a smile, by attributing it to the custom  of'
Venetian society; and we no more think of directing the artillery
of moral declamation against the lady and her dilettante cicisbeo,
than of levelling a cannon against a pair of sporting butterflies.
For a considerable time, and with various intervals of travelling,
eyen down to 1821, Byron resided in Italy, principally at Venice
and Ravenna, steadily and uninterruptedly adding stone after stone
to that pyramid of glory in which he has eternised his name.  His
private life, during the whole latter part of his career, was neither
very moral nor very regular.  Driven from  his own country by his
embarrassed circumstances, endowed with even more than the poet's
impressibility and passion, this great man plunged into a life of dissi
pation neither dignified in itself,;),r even excusable by the lax tone
of Italian manners at that time. IIis productions however continued
to be poured forth with as much variety, splendour, and effect as
ever, though one particular department of them (the tragedies) were
rather striking, bold, and original in their manner, than in perfect
harmony with the peculiar style which had acquired him such famle
The first work of this epoch which we shall mention is the tale of'3Iazeppa,' full of vigour, passion the more impressive from  its air
of being bridled in and restrained, and roughi rapid descriptions of
sufiring, terror, and revenge.  The mise e n scene of this narrative




356          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CHAP. XVII,
is admirable: it is a story of his early days told by the fierce and
"ugged veteran to amuse Charles XII. at a bivouac after the dreadful
defeat of Poltava: and the character of the rude old hetman (who,
however, in no way resembles the real historical Mazepa) is in perfect
harmony with the scene, the circumstances, and the savage nature
of his youthful adventures.
The tragedies are six in number, and can be divided into two
categories-first, those of a purely abstract and imaginary kind; and,
secondly, the dramas more strictly historical: the former class may
be considered as productions of the same phase in the poet's intellectual life which produced'Manfred,' and the latter to have been
written under the combined influence of Alfieri and Shelley. In
the one class are placed'Cain,''Heaven and Earth,' and'The
Deformed Transformed;' in the other,' Marino Faliero,''Sardanapalus,' WTerner,' and' The Two Foscari.' Of the first-mentioned three,'Cain' is undoubtedly the finest, whether we consider the tremendous
boldness of the sentiments, the pictures of primeval existence, now
awful and now exquisitely lovely, which it contains, or the tremendous agencies which are embodied in its personages.  It is little else
than a fearful piece of special pleading, in which the goodness of
God is brought into question: but if we examine the finest (and consequently most dangerous) dialogues in which this terrific thesis is
argued between Cain and Lucifer, we shall discover that there is no
real dialogue, and that the majestic speeches are nothing else but
monologues in reality, and all tending to the same result.  The
argument against Divine goodness is really an argument in which
the speakers are both on the same side. But the glimpses of primeval life which we get through the clouds and darkness of Cain's
haughty scepticism, the picture of little Enoch's sleeping infancy,
and the gloomy grandeur of those tremendous phantoms which
Lucifer shows to his questioner in the realms of space peopled with
the ghosts of premundane existences-all these are in the loftiest
vein of conception, though their merit is far more lyrical than
dramatic: perhaps the only really dramatic passage in the mystery
Is the last line, in which Cain, with a short, simple, and terrific
exclamation of remorse and despair, is sent forth to wander miserable
and restless over the world.' Heaven and Earth' is altogether lyric,
and is much feebler than either' Cain' or' Manfred:' it seems to us
a not very happy imitation of Shelley's abstract and cloudy manner,
but without his exquisite diction, imagery, and unequalled melody
of versification. In' The Deformed Transformed' Byron has given
a bitter and savage expression to his recollections of his own deformity
andl unhappy childhood.  There is much satire and invective too, in
the drama, onl the folly of mankind, and on the atrocious puerilities
of military glory; but the only passage which remains in the reader's
mnemory is the evocation of the forms of the beautiful and wise of




CHAP. XVIII.]           BYRON: DRAMAS.                        357
the antique world, when the Stranger offers to the Deformed the
choice of a new body.
The more purely historical dramas are undoubtedly fine and dignified
compositions, on the model, not of Shakspeare but of Alfieri. Between
Byron and the great modern reformer of Italian literature there were
innumerable points of resemblance, both moral and intellectual; and
those classical tendencies of Byron's mind to which we have alluded
some pages back doubtless received new food from the strong admira.
tion he felt for the fiery, haughty, sublime author of' Filippo.' We
doubt whether Byron ever felt a very warm or sincere sympathy
with Shakspeare, as a dramatic artist; there ever lurked in his mind
a sort of suspicion that the unaffected and irregular richness of the
Elizabethan stage was rather a defect than a merit-that its admirable
ease, grace, vivacity, and nature, could not compensate for the stern
dignity of classical tragedy; and perhaps a consciousness, too, of his
own want of flexibility and animation of dialogue, and of variety
and naturalness in the conception of characters, made him voluntariiy
adopt those severe and rigid forms which might palliate or conceal
those defects.  Thus his self-love, as an author, was masked under a
natural or affected preference of those models which alone he could
hope to imitate.  This was natural enough, and therefore our wisest
proceeding is to admire the beauties of his tragedies, with their
monotony of style, their languid march of incident, and their repetition of a few types of character, their unities and their gravity,
without making any invidious comparisons between their somewhat
formal grandeur and the inexhaustible glories of our elder drama.
The man of true taste is always catholic in his admirations-he can
find intense pleasure in the regal gardens of Versadlles without
losing his relish for the dewy glades of a primeval forest.
In'Marino Faliero' the principal defect is the insufficiency of such
an event as the supposed insult offered by Steno to the Doge t0 excite
in such a mind as that of the heroic veteran the tempest'of passion
which agitates his soul from  the first act to the last.  The passion
is also somewhat monotonous in itself, and Faliero is too often lashed
into wrath rather by his own eloquence than by the suggestions oi
provocations from without.  This will be proved by comparing the
character with Othello or with Lear. The conversations between the
fierce old Doge and his young wife, though languid, are very beautiful;
and the conspiracy-scene is a fine specimen of declamation-but decla.
mation is rather the vice than the beauty of the French and Italian
drama; and even the noble energy and force of such passages as the
famous curse with which the Doge takes leave of life and Venice
bear too strongly impressed this air of rhetoric, not passion.  The
description of the ball, by the senator Lioni, is exquisitely luxuriant,
but totally out of place in a tragedy; there is nothing scenic in this
play but the scene in which the illustrious conspirator is awaiting the




31i8          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CIIAP. XVIII.
sound of the great bell of St. Mark which is to give the signal for
the massacre.  In this the interest is really worked up to a breathless intensity of expectation.
On the stage the most successful of Byron's tragedies are'Sarcl —
napulus' and'Werner;' but the latter derives all its effect from the
interest of the plot, and the uncertainty, so artfully kept up, as to
the real assassin of Strahlenheim. The language is throughout little
better than dull prose.  In fact this play is nothing else but thil
admirable prose narrative in Miss Lee's' Canterbury Tales,' entitle d'The Hungarian's Story,' arranged into acts and scenes, and clumsily
cut up into phrases of equal length, by courtesy called verse.' Sardanapulus' has much higher merit: the character of Myrrha, the
Ionian slave, is exquisitely and tenderly touched; and though Sardinapalus himself, with his luxurious good-natured effeminacy, and his
moments of heroic courage and careless energy, is little else but ali
expansion of the antithesis of the historian and the satirist, he is
striking and interesting on the stage.
Of'The Two Foscari' we have only to remark the monstrous
improbability of the sentiment which is the root of the action — the
frantic and unreasonable love of country in Jacopo which drags him'back from exile to die by lingering torture in ungrateful Venice.
But nevertheless it is impossible not to sympathise with the despair
and agony of the Doge, and our heart, though not our reason, takes
part in his sorrow when the desolate old man, the victim of the implacable revenge of Loredano, throws himself to die upon the corpse
of his unhappy son.
In all these tragedies, though none of them  are unadorned with
some noble and majestic declamatory passages, or with some description executed with Byron's never-failing intense and inward sentiment of beauty, the general run of the dialogue is singularly prosaic
and sober: we perpetually meet with long passages of the plainest
prose, and the line frequently ends with of, to, with, or some such
wretched monosyllable, while the sense is so often carried, without
any pause, into the next line, that it is only when we read that we
can perceive it to be intended for metre.  This, in a versifier so
consummate as Byron was when he pleased, is a great blemish, and
shows how little he had studied the admirable class of dramatists
whose external forms he imitated in these plays. Corneille and
Racine might have taught him, and Alfieri too, that the highest
severity was not incompatible with the most finished and elaborate
versification.
We have now only to speak of that extraordinary poem which is
the most complete embodiment of all the varied discordant elements
of this wonderful genius; nay, which is a full expression or reflection of the age in which he lived.  In I Don Juan,' as in a mirror,
we see imaged all the features of modern society, its earnestness and




CHAP. XVIII.]         BYRON: DON JUAN.                      359
its mockery, its scepticism  and its faith, its sublimity and its meannesS.  The prevailing vice of our age-the haunting demon, is cant:
and of cant Byron was the most implacable, active, and unresting
enemy: cant in all its myriad disguises - the cant of religion, the
cant of morality, the cant of patriotism, the cant of literature —it
was his chief aim and passion to attack and overthrow.  The first
five cantos of the poem were written at Venice and Ravenna, and
ten more were gradually added, chiefly at Pisa. The work is absolutely without plot or intrigue: it is a'Gil Blas' in easy verse - a
series of varied and almost unconnected adventures.  Don Juan is a
young Spanish grandee, whose early education is described with
touches of the sharpest and most resistless satire. These keen razorstrokes, though bearing reference to the hollow hypocrisy and 7artufferie of our age, are frequently directed specially against Lady
Byron and her family, and never did genius take a more terrible
revenge for real or imaginary wrong. The young Don engages in an
amour with a married woman somewhat older than himself, and is
obliged to leave Spain. The ship founders at sea, and, after dreadful sufferings, the hero is thrown half-drowned and starving on a
little island in the 2Egean, where he is succoured by Haidoe, a Greek
girl-one of Byron's sweetest conceptions.  Tn the midst of the
wedding festivities, Lambro, the father of Haidee, a pirate, suddenly
returns; Juan is disarmed and put on board his vessel, and carried
to Constantinople, where he is sold for a slave, and is bought by
Gulbeyaz, the haughty and voluptuous favourite of the Sultan.
After some admirable but rather warmly-coloured scenes in the
seraglio, Juan escapes, and we find him, with Johnson, an Englishman who had been the companion of his captivity, arriving at the
Russian camp before Izmail, just as Suvoroff comes to take command
of the besiegers; and we have a most vivid and terrific description
of the storming of that devoted place.  Juan afterwards passes some
time at the court of Catherine II., by whom he is sent on a secret
diplomatic mission to England.  We then have some most severe
and lively descriptions of English society, in which all its weak and
rotten points are anatomised with merciless severity; and we at last
accompany the hero to a villeggiatura, or summer-party, at a great
country-house (a noble description of Newstead Abbey is introduced
here), and we are admitted into the very focus of aristocratic life.
Just as we are about to meet with what promises to be a piquant
adventure, the poem abruptly concludes.
The primary characteristic of this extraordinary creation is a rapid
and incessant alternation of the severest satire and the gayest and
most comic impressions with images the most solemn or pathetic.
The artifice of the poet consists in passing without a moment's preparation, without any intermediate state of transition, from the loftiest
to the humblest images, from  the most refined to the most'vulgar
11 0




360          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITEnRATURE. [CIIAP. XVITI,
from the bitterest sneer to the tenderest enthusiasm, from the griL
of Mephistophiles to the agonised gaze of the Niobe.  The (e-itics
have all complained of this, but we think without: reason, for it is in
this that consists the poem:" Aliter non fit, Avite, liber."
It is undeniably true that this close apposition of the ridiculous
and the sublime, of the beautiful and the hideous, gives an air of
heartless mockery to the satire, and of insincerity to the tenderness; but we must remember that such apposition and inconsistency
is the very type of our modern society: the moral of the work lies
deeper than the surface, and we must not apply to this vast,structure
of irony and sadness (a sadness deeper for the irony) the mere rules
of literary criticism: if we complain, it should not be of the mocking
spirit of the poem, but of the hypocrisy, cant, and hollowness of
the age.
It is written in a kind of easy ottava rima, as admirably suited to
the purpose as the Spenserian harmonies of' Childe Harold' are to
the subject and-character of that splendid work; and it is a curious
and instructive proof of Byron's admirable skill and exquisite ear,
that in two poems so different in tone he should have used a metre
nearly alike in form, but so admirably varied in feeling and rhythm,
that the effect is perfect in each case. In' Don Juan' we have the
perfection of easy, familiar, lively conversation; the English is as
pure and idiomatic as is conceivable- the style, transparency itself.
Of humour this wonderful poem contains no trace, but it is throughout sparkling with an exhaustless current of wit —wit of the cold
and caustic character ofi Beaumarchais and  V oltaire.   Modern
Europe, after the frenzy of war and revolution, feels the collapse,
the exhaustion, and the weariness, which are the natural consequence
and reaction of violent excitement-the headache und nausea which
follow the debauch, the cold shuddering indifference which succeeds
to the paroxysm  of sensuality.  Modern society has acquired  a
smooth varnish of civilized propriety, and the satire of Byron, like
a concentrated acid, burned off and ate away this superficial polish,
showing the weak and cracked places concealed beneath. Of the
richness, abundance, and intensity of the wit in this poem, there
can be but one opinion; the absence of humour is, we think, as
evident. All his satire is caustic-all is negative, not reconstructive:
in the loftiest, the holiest, the tenderest emotions of the mind he
shows us a selfish and contemptible ingredient. Such an element
there assuredly is in all human feelings; for man is a composite and
complicated being, and the taint of self defiles his most elevated
sentiments.
"Quidquid agunt homines, votum, timor, ira, voluptas,
Gaudia, discursus, nostri est farrago libelli."




CHAP. XVIII.]          BYRON: IlIS DEATII.                     361
The secret of the power of this astonishing work is, as we have
said before, the incredible facility with which the poet passes from
the most tender or exalted feeling to the bitterest and most sneering
mockery   The sarcasm is only the more intense from being uttered
with a graceful smile and with the epigrammatic polish of refined
society. But perpetually as the mocker is at our side, pouring into
our ear, with the smooth voice of Mephistophiles, the heart-hardening sophistries and the heart-piercing verities of artificial life, the
poet is never absent either; it is impossible to surpass those delineations (so numerous and so beautiful) of the lovely and terrible scenes
of nature, of the intoxication of youthful love, and the splendid
gallantries of courts and camps.  What truly poetical figures in
Ilaid~e, in Gulbeyaz, in Aurora Raby, in Lambro, in Donna Inez,
in Julia! The picture of the festivities in the Pirate's Isle of the
MEgean, and the inopportune return of Lambro, is superlatively rich
and vivid, and so is the caustic portraiture of English aristocratic
life.' Don Juan' is a complete expression of Byron's life and genius;
capricious, varied, ranging from cynic mockery to the deepest tenderness, it is also a perfect type of the age which produced it-an age
at once sceptical and believing, bold and effeminate, shameless and
hypocritical, coldly calculating and wildly imaginative; and it was
just that this splendid literary career should close with a work which
is so full and perfect a type of its marked and inconsistent features.
Among the singular contrasts and inconsistencies which crowd the
personal and literary portrait of this man, not the least striking are
those of his political existence.  Born and bred an aristocrat, and
exhibiting a tenacity of the prejudices of rank and manners even
more than usually intense, Byron remained all his life a supporter
of extreme liberal opinions. The two speeches, neither -ery successful, and exhibiting rather rhetorical than statesmanlike ability, which
he pronounced in the House of Lords, recorded certainly an unequivocal adherence to liberal doctrines; and during his residence in
Italy Byron not only expressed the warmest sympathy with the
efforts of the Carbonari, but even entered into the unfortunate speculation of'The Liberal,' a journal which totally failed.  But at the
end of his life a noble destiny invited him.  He determined to take
an active part in the Greek war of independence, and, after consecrating to a cause which must have had for him, as a man, as an
Englishman, and as a poet, the deepest interest, not only very considerable sums of money, but great exertions also, he landed,
January 4th, 1824, at Missolonghi. Europe has hardly yet recovered
from the shock of grief and admiration with which she learned that,
the great poet, whose glory had filled so large a space of the social
horizon, had died (April 18th, 1824), after suffering a short but
painful illness produced by extreme fatigue and anxiety acting




362          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CHAP. XVIII.
up)n a mind and body worn out with all kind of indulgence and
emotions.
It was a benevolent destiny which ordained that this great man
should die on those shores which owe half their immortality to his
genius, and amid a nation whose noble though fallen character he had
rendered so interesting.  His remains, after being conducted to the
sea-shore amid the universal lamentations of the Greek patriots,
were carried to England, and interred in the village church of Hucknail, in Nottinghamshire, where many generations of his ancestors
repose: and the stupid bigotry which refused his bones a place in the
national cemetery of Westminster Abbey, has not long ago crowned
its climax of imbecility by denying within the walls of that Pantheon
of England's worthies a statue to the memory of him who is the
chief among her intellectual glories in the nineteenth century!
The genius of Shelley is the most exceptional and abnormal, the
most difficult to classify, of any of the great poetical manifestations
of the present age. No author has exerted a more powerful influence
on detached and individual minds; there is none, at least of a merit
in any way comlparable to his, who has exerted so little influence on
his time.  Byron was a consummate artist, and always retains a
complete consciousness and self-command. His muse is a Pythoness,
who, in tie fiercest moments of possession, remembers to sit gracefully on her tripod. Shelley is the very reverse of this; he does not
possess his art, but is possessed by it-crushed, overpowered, overwhelmed; and if his works never fail to bear a peculiar ineffaceable
stamp of ideal grace and beauty, this is to be attributed to the innate
elegance and purity of his mind.  His glory has been exposed to a
destiny as strange and fantastic as his life; his fame has been
equally injured by uncandid enemies and by injudicious admirers.
Shelley's biography can be related in a very few words. In many
of its chief outlines it bears a striking and melancholy resemblance
to the story of his immortal friend, but there is a general vein of
difference pervading even the most similar points in the history of the
two men.  Both were unhappy in their relations with the world,
and both sought, and found, oblivion of their personal and social
sufferings in the love of nature and in the unspeakable raptures of
genial creation. But in Shelley, both the sufferings and the alleviation, both the disease and the remedy, were of the moral sense; in
Byron, both the one and the other were of the heart.  Byron was
discontented with the world as it is, Shelley was ever pining after a
world which was not.  Both were sprung fromn ancient and noble
houses-Shelley was the son of a baronet of old family, and born
in 1792; they both received a very similar education, first at one of
the great English public schools, and afterwards at the university.
From Eton Shelley was removed to Oxford, from whence hc: was
expel'ed for the bold scepticism of his youthful poem' Qucen RMab.'




CHAP. XVIII.]    SHELLEY: HIS SCHOOL-DAYS.                   363
But the Harrow boy was distinguished among his colnpanions for
generous manliness and the warmth of his schoolday friendships:
the young Etonian, delicate and almost feminine in frame ztlil
manners, was filled with anguish at the foretaste of the world which
the republican constitution of a great English school offers to the
child yet warm from the soft existence of home. Shelley left Eton
with his mind full of terror, disgust, and sensitiveness, and on entering on his Oxford life plunged ardently into a sea of abstract and
physical study. The spirit of resistance to authority and dogmatism,
so natural to a youthful and enthusiastic temperament, and combined
with a vague course of reading, led him to scepticism, and scepticism
to atheism-if that system of belief may be called atheism, which,
while denying the existence of a Divine Being, such as we conceive
the Deity to be, supplies its place by an imaginary existence whose
qualities and attributes, at least as far as they are not mere abstractions, correspond exactly with our own conclusions respecting its
nature.  He published one or two trifling productions, apparently
intended to brave the University, was expelled from Oxford, and
soon afterwards renounced, when little past his boyhood, by his
family.  At eighteen he published the wild and fantastic poem
Queen Mab,' which was at the same time a formal exposition of
the doctrines he had adopted in religious and political philosophy,
chiefly consisting of the fallacies and paradoxes of the French
writers of the eighteenth century.  The sting of this work lies in
the notes, which are, however, little more than the often-refuted
dreams of the philanthropist humanitarian theorists, but the poem
contains many passages of that peculiar and inimitable melody which
forms the great charm of Shelley's writings.
At this period of his life, while yet a mere boy, Shelley married
a girl of inferior birth and education, and travelled for some time on
the continent. His union was unhappy, and, after once more returning for some time to England, he was separated from  his wife.
During this short residence in his own country, he lived principally
amid the beautiful scenery of Windsor; and here he wrote his poem
of'Alastor, or'the Spirit of Solitude.' In this work, a wild romantic poem, he describes the early fate of a youth, whose mind, elevated
and purified by a lofty and benevolent philosophy, pines after communion with a similar spirit, and who dies desponding at not finding
such a being. The strength of the poem consists in the exquisitely
rich and ideal descriptions of solitary woodland scenery, for which
Shelley had, indeed, a poet's eye. On being separated, by the intervention of the law, from his wife, he soon afterwar-ds contracted a
second marriage, with the daughter of Godwin, a man whose opinions
were in many respects in harmony with his own; and rewiring to a
village in Buckinghamshire, produced'The Revolt of Islalm, a
rapturous declamatory narrative, exhibiting, under sn allegorical
30 *




364-          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CHAP. XVIII.
form, the, triumph of his philanthropic theories over the tyranny,
hypocrisy, and hollowness which he considered inseparable from all
8he religious and political systems adopted by mankind.  His health
was now so weak-his fortune, in spite of the singular simplicity of
his mode of life, so dilapidated-that he could no longer remain in
England.  lIe left his country, in 1818, never to return, and went
directly to Italy, where he settled in a climate and a country much
more congenial to his poetical temperament. He now produced his
drama of'Prometheus Unbound,' in some measure suggested, as
far as its pure lyric form and colossal grandeur of outline are concerned, by the'Prometheus' of LEschylus.  In spite of the transcendental reveries of modern, and particularly of German, criticism,
which has discovered, in the gigantic drama of the Athenian, an
allegorical shadowing forth of primeval struggles between human
will and fate, between the good and evil principles of humanity, we
are apt to believe that this lyric tragedy had no such esoteric and
mysterious meaning, and that ~Eschylus simply embodied the traditional mythology of his country, just as the rude monkish artist
revived on his stage the events of the Christian history.  The transcendental exposition, however, was best suited to Shelley's theory
and object; and, therefore, in his'Prometheus Unbound' he has
essayed to give us the complement or companion-picture to the wild
and phantasmagorial drama of 2Eschylus.  His hero is nothing but
a personification of man's indomitable resistance to the tyranny of
religions and governments; for to religion and government he
attributed all the ills which afflict humanity. It contains passages
of the sublimest granderur, and the most wonderful richness of imiagination; but the effect of the whole is so vaporous and unsubstantial,
the images which he evokes are so unsolid, that not even the unsurpassable purity of the diction, and the unequalled variety of the
lyric music, can preserve us from weariness and a painful sense of
dreamy confusion.  As to the attacks upon all systems of religion,
which he calls priestcraft, and all systems of government, which he
styles tyranny, it is hardly necessary to refute them seriously here.
Religion and government, the priest and the king, viewed from the
point which Shelley has selected, are, indeed, open to all the charges
he brings against them. But the fallacy precisely consists in his
taking that point, and arguing ex abusu, the most fatal of all sophis.
tries. It is obvious that false religions and bad kings are great evils,
but the portion of human woe and crime which is produced by the
most degrading of superstitions and the cruellest of despots is very
far indeed from being comparable to the evils traceable to man's own
selfishness and passions: and another great error of Shelley, and
such reasoners, is the supposition that religion and kingship are
something extraneous, foreign to our nature, and imposed by a superior and independent force; whereas all experience and argument




CHAP. XVIII.]  SHELLEY: THE CENCI -POEMS.                  365
show that these institutions, whether good or bad, are essentially the
expression of man's own wants and condition, and are modified, not
ab extra, but ab intra.
In Shelley's writings it is very easy to separate the philosophy
from the poetry; and the philosophy, though so hostile to existing
conditions of society, is so free from any moral impurity, so ethereal,
so imbued with deep love for everything noble and elevated, and
withal so exceedingly abstract and impracticable, that we do not
think it is likely to do much harm; or, rather, the lovely and
incessant manifestations of beauty in which it is clothed are
calculated to do more good to the mind of a young and enthusiastic
reader, than the declamatory sophistries of the reasoning can do
injury.
In 1819 Shelley produced a work surprisingly distinct, in form
and spirit, from any of his previous poems. This was the tragedy
of'The Cenci,' founded upon one of the most horrible domestic
tragedies recorded in the black annals of Italian society in the
Middle Ages —annals which seem written with blood and poison,
and recalling a mode of existence only the more revolting from the
glow of intellectual splendour which art, literature, and civilization
throw over corruption and profligacy. This portion of history resembles the terrific picture of Correggio in which the gilded wreathing serpents are twined around the features of Medusa, lovely but
infernal. The style of this play is astonishingly intense and nervous,
and the character of the unhappy Beatrice contains some strokes of
true and profound pathos, particularly the scene before her execution.
The father is one of those demons of wickedness which happily are
so rare, that our incredulity becomes an antidote to our loathing.
Such beings are unfit for dramatic purposes, and it is no defence to
say that they have existed: they are toul anomalies.
We have but few words to say of a number of Shelley's subsequent poems-' Hellas,''The Witch of Atlas,''Adonais' (a lament
for the death of Keats), and'Rosalind and Helen.' In the former
two of these works we have a repetition, though in somewhat feebler
and more diluted language, of the same wild declamation against the
corruptions of society which forms the staple of his earlier poems,
and a reiteration of the same fallacies about priestcraft and kingcraft; but'Adonais' is a beautiful and affectionate tribute to the
nlemory of Keats, whose early death deprived the world of the
promise of a great poet, and whose manner of thinking and writing
had much in common with that of Shelley. In' Rosalind and Helen,'
we have an exposition (in form of a domestic tale) of the evils which
the poet supposes to arise from the institution of marriage. He shows
us two beautiful and accomplished beings, one of whom is driven to
despair and death by the tyranny and caprices of an old and repulsive
husband, while the other lives a life of happiness and innocence in E




366          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CIIAP. XVIII.
union not sanctified by the indissoluble tie of marriage.  But, un all
human affairs, "abusus non tollit usum," and this tie was undoubtedly invented for the general welfare of mankind, to which experience shows that it in the main conduces: so the selection of an
arbitrary and imaginary case, where misery follows wedlock, and
happiness is assured by a kind of philosophical concubinage, proves
nothing at all.  It would be just as easy, and infinitely more in
accordance with ordinary experience, to select an exactly opposite
case.  Such theorists begin at the wrong end: marriage is not bad
because married people are sometimes unhappy together, but people
may be unhappy though marriage in the main is good.
The death of this exquisite poet, and benevolent visionary, was
singular and melancholy.  He was returning in a small yacht from
Ravenna to Rome, when his vessel was caught by a squall in the
Bay of Spezzia, and Shelley and his two companions perished. The
poet's body was afterwards washed on shore, and burned, after the
ancient manner, on a funeral pile, in presence of Byron and several
others of his friends. The ashes of Shelley were buried in the
Protestant cemetery of Rome, near the pyramid of Cestius —a spot
of sad and tranquil loveliness, where repose the remains of many
English wanderers.
Shelley died in 1822, and in his end, and even in the manner of
his funeral, there was something strangely in accordance with his
life and sorrows.  In spite of the hostile and revolutionary tone of
his philosophy, he was, as a man, mild, benevolent, temperate,
refined: his person, almost ethereal in its delicacy, was in apt
accordance with the abstract and visionary tone of his writings: the
chief characteristic of his poetry is its profusion of imagery, and a
spiritual, tender harmony, like the fitful music of the ZEolian harp,
which no English poet has ever surpassed in variety and sweetness:
the images are of a character at once bold and tender in the highest
degree; his intensely passionate study of Greek literature (particularly the lyric writings) gives a peculiar air of classical purity and
transparency to his conceptions: and from the same inexhaustible
source Le drew those artifices of metrical arrangement which make
the English language, in his hands, as flexible, as musical, as the
Greek itself.  One peculiarity in his manner is particularly to be
noticed: it is what may be called incatenation, a linking together
of images, each of which is attached to that which precedes it, and
which in its turn suggests another which. follows it, but which often
lead the reader far away from the original generating idea; so that,
if we take two images placed even at a short interval from each
other, we shall often be astonished that two ideas so different can be
connected together by any middle term.  Shelley's mind was in the
highest degree impressionable - nay, almost feminine; and thus we
often perceive a want of keeping and relief in the sllbordinate parts




CHAP. XVIII.j   SHELLEY: HIS PECULIARITIES.                 3617
of his diction: the subsidiary or illustrative image is as vivid as that
which it is meant to enforce or interpret; and in him we find a perpetual interchange of type and thing typified, as, for instance, in his
exquisite'Ode to the West Wind,' where the dead leaves are compared to ghosts flying before the spell of an enchanter.  Shakspeare
has innumerable examples of this incatenation of metaphors and
images: it is impossible to open his plays without seeing plentiful
instances of it: it is, indeed, the characteristic of his manner: but
in him the secondary, the illustrative, is always subordinate;- while
in Shelley the ornament perpetually eclipses the thing to be adorned.
In short, Shakspeare "writes all like a man," while Shelley writes
like a woman.  This singular tendency sometimes renders passages
otherwise beautiful almost unintelligible, as, for instance, in those
wonderful lines'On a Cloud,' where the illustrations, drawn from
animated nature, are so crowded in the delineation of inanimate
things, that the effect is rather fantastical and dazzling than beautiful
or distinct.  Conscious, too, perhaps, of this feminineness of mind,
so ill in accordance with the haughty and serene tone of philosophy
which he struggled to maintain, he was apt to exaggerate the horrible and repulsive, and his struggles to attain energy and a fierce
declamatory tone are often rather extravagant than powerful.  But
with all these deductions made, the genius of Shelley will not fail to
be held by posterity as a wonderful manifestation of power, of grace,
and sweetness; and the ode we have just quoted, and the lovely'Lines written in the Euganean Hills,' and that to a'Skylark,'
which is the very warbling of the triumphant bird, and the tender
beauty of the'Sensitive Plant,' and the magical translations of the'Walpurgisnacht' of Goethe, and a thousand passages in the longer
poems, will form for the memory of Shelley a wreath of fadeless
flowers worthy of him who was the friend of Byron, and the pure
apostle of a noble but mistaken philanthropy.




t6t5          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. ICHAP. XIX,
CHAPTER XIX.
THE  MODERN  NOVELISTS.
vree Piction  r'ie Romance: Walpole, Mrs. Radcliffe, Lewis, Matui-:, and
Mr-.. Shelley —aames, Ainsworth, and Bulwer —'he Novel: Miss bEarney
-Godwin — I4ss Edgeworth — Local Novels: Galt, Wilson, Banim, &c.
- Fashionable Novels: Ward, Lister, &c. — Miss Austen — Hook - Mrs.
Trollope-Miss Mitford-Warren —Dickens-Novels of Foreign Life: Beckford, Hope, and Morier —Naval and Military Novels: Marryat and R.
Scott.
THE department of English literature which has been cultivated
during the latter half of the last and the commencement of the
present century with the greatest assiduity and success is undoubtedly
that of prose fiction-the romance and the novel.
This branch of our subject is so extensive, and it embraces such a
multitude of works and names, that the only feasible method of
treating it so as to give an idea of its immense riches and fertility
will be to classify the authors and their productions ini?) a few great
general species: and though there are some names (as that of Bulwer,
for example) which may appear to belong to several of these subdivisions, our plan will be found, we trust, to secure clearness and aid
the memory. The divisions which we propose are as follows: I.
Romances properly so called; i. e. works of narrative fiction, embodying periods of ancient or middle-age history, the adventures of which
are generally of a picturesque and romantic character, and the
personages (whether taken from history, or invented so as to accord
with the time and character of the action) of a lofty and imposing
kind.  II. The vast class of pictures of society, whether invented
or not.  These are generally novels, i. e. romans de vie intimne,
though some) as those of Godwin, may be highly imaginative, and
even tragic.  This class contains a great treasury of what may be
called pictures of local manners, as of Scottish and Irish life.  III.
Oriental novels —a branch almost peculiar to English fiction; and
originating partly in the acquaintance with the East derived by
Great Britain from her gigantic Oriental empire, and partly from th
Englishman's restless, inappeasable passion for travelling.  IV
Naval and military novels; giving pictures of striking adventure,
and containing records of England's innumerable triumphs, by sea
and land, together with sketches of the manners, habits, and feelings
of our soldiers and sailors.
The history of modern prose fiction in England will be found to
accord pretty closely with the classification we have just adopted,




CI[AP XIX.J        PRO]Fr. FICTION: WAI POLE.              3,t-J
We have spoken in another place of the three patriarchs of the
English novel-Richardson. Fielding, and Smollett: and the immense
class of works we are about to consider may be looked upon as totally
distinct from the immortal productions of these great men, though
the first impulse given to prose fiction will be found to have been in
no sense communicated by'Clarissa,''Tom  Jones,' or'Roderick
Random.' This impulse was given by Horace Walpole, the fastidious dilettante and brilliant chronicler of the court scandal of his
day, a man of singulkaly acute penetration, of sparkling eDigrammatic style, but of a mind devoid of enthusiasm  and elevation.
Rather a French courtier in taste and habits than an English nobleman, he retired early from political life, veiling a certain consciousness of political incapacity under an effeminate and affected contempt
for a parliamentary career, and shut himself up in his little fantastic
G-othic castle at Strawberry Hill, to collect armour, medals, manuscripts, and painted glass, and to chronicle with malicious assiduity,
In his vast and brilliant correspondence, the absurdities, follies, and
weaknesses of his day.'The Castle of Otranto' is a short tale, written with great rapidity
and without any preparation, in which the first successful attempt
was made to take the Feudal Age as the period, and the passion of
mysterious, superstitious terror as the prime mover, of an interesting
fiction. The supernatural machinery consists of a gigantic armed
figure dimly seen -at midnight in the gloomy halls and huge staircases of this feudal abode-of a colossal helmet which finds its way
into the court-yard, filling everybody with dread and consternation
— of a picture which descends from its frame to upbraid a wicked
oppressor-of a vast apparition at the end-and a liberal allowance
of secret panels, subterranean passages,, breathless pursuit and
escape.  The manners are totally absurd and unnatural, the heroine
being one of those inconsistent portraits in which the sentimental
languor of the eighteenth century is superadded to the female
character of the Middle Ages —in short, one of those incongruous
contradictions which we meet in all the romantic fictions before
Scott.
The immense success of Walpole's original and cleverly-written
tale encouraged other and more accomplished artists to follow in the
same track.  After mentioning Clara Reeve, whose'Old English
Baron' contains the same defects without the beauties of Walpole'b
haunted castle, we come to the great name of this class, Anne Radcliffe, whose numerous romances exhibit a very high order of genius,
and a surprising power (perhaps never equalled) over the emotiond
of fear and undefined mysterious suspense. Hel two greatest works
are,'The Romance of the Forest,' and' The Mysteries of Udolpho.'
The scenery of her predilection is that of Italy and the south of
France; and though she does not place the reader among the fierce




370           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. XIX.
and picturesque life of the Middle Ages, she has, perhaps, rather
gained than lost by choosing the ruined castles of the Pyrenees and
Apennines for the theatre, and the dark passions of profligate Italian
counts for the principal moving power, of her wonderful fictions.
The substance of them all is pretty nearly the same; and the author's
total incapacity to paint individual character only makes us the
more admire the power by which she interests us through the never.
failing medium of suspense.  Mystery is the whole spell.  Nothing
can be poorer and more conventional than the personages: they are
not human beings, nor even the types of classes; they have no
more individuality than the pieces of a chess-board; they are merely
counters; but the skill with which the author juggles with them
gives them  a kind of awful necromantic interest.  The characters
are mere abstract algebraical expressions, but they are made the
exponents of such terrible and intense fear, suffering, and suspense,
that we sympathise with their fate as if they were real. Her repertory is very limited: a persecuted sentimental young lady, a wicked
and myterious count, a haggard monk, a tattling but faithful waitingmaid,-such is the poor human element out of which these wonderful
structures are created. Balzac, in one of his tales, speaks with great
admiration of an artist who, by a few touches of his pencil, could
give to a most commonplace scene an air of overpowering horror,
and throw over the most ordinary and prosaic objects a spectral air
of crime and blood. Through a half-opened door you see a bed
with the clothes confusedly heaped, as in some death-struggle, over
an undefined object which fancy whispers must be a bleeding corpse;
on the floor you see a slipper, an upset candlestick, and a knife perhaps; and these hints tell the story of blood more significantly and
more powerfully than the most tremendous detail, because the
imagination of man is more powerful than art itself:" Over all there hung.a cloud of fear,
A sense of mystery the spirit daunted,
And said, as plain as whisper to the ear,
The place is haunted."
A great defect of Anne Radcliffe's fictions is not their tediousness
-f description, nor even the somewhat mawkish sentimentality with
which they may be reproached, nor the feebly-elegant verses which
the heroines are represented as writing on all occasions (indeed all
these things indirectly conduce to the effect by contrast and preparation); but the unfortunate principle she had imposed upon herself,
of clearing up, at the end of the story, all the circumstances that
appeared supernatural-of carrying us, as it were, behind the scenes
at the end of the play, and showing us the dirty ropes and trapdoors, the daubed canvas, the Bengal fire, by which these wonderful
impressions had been produced. If we had supped after the play
with the "blood-bolter'd Banquo," or the "majesty of buried Den



CHAP. XIX.]  LEWIS -  MIATURIN -  MRS. SHELLEY.               371
mark," we should.not probably be able to feel a due amount of
terror the next time we saw them  on the stage; but in MIrs. Rad.
cliffe, where the feeling of terror is the principal thing aimed at, this
discovery of the mechanism deprivesmus of all future interest in the
story; for, after all, pure fear-sensual, not moral, fear —is by no
means a legitimate object of high art.
A  class of writing apparently so easy, and likely to produce so
powerful and universal an effect - an effect even more powerful on
the least critical minds- was, of course, followed by a crowd of
writers.  Most of these have descended to oblivion and a deserved
neglect.  We may say a few words of Lewis, Maturin, and Mrs.
Shelley. The first of these, a good-natured effeminate man of
fashion, the friend of Byron, and one of the early literary advisers
of Scott, was the first to introduce into England a taste for the infant
German literature of that day, with its spectral ballads and diablerie
of all kinds. He was a man of lively and childish imagination; and
besides his metrical translations of the ballads of Biirger, and other:.
of the same class, he published a prose romance called' The MonL,'
full of horrible crimes and diabolic agency.  It contains several passages of considerable power, particularly the episode of' The Bleeding Nun,' in which the wandering Jew-that godsend for all writers,
good, bad, and indifferent, of the "intense" or demoniac school-is
introduced with picturesque effect; but the book owes its continued
popularity (though, we are happy to say, only among half-educated
young men and ecstatic milliners) chiefly to the licentious warmth
of many of its scenes.  Maturin was a young Irishman of great
promise and still greater vanity, who carried the intellectual merits
and defects of his countrymen to an extreme little short of caricature: his imagination was vivid, and he possessed a kind of extravagant and convulsive eloquence, but his works are full of the most
outrageous absurdities.  He perpetually mistakes monstrosity for
power, and lasciviousness for warmth.  His life was short and
unhappy, and his chief work is I Melmoth,' a farrago of impossible
and inconceivable adventures, without plan or coherence, in which
the Devil (who is represented as an Irish gentleman of good family
in the eighteenth century) is the chief agent. Mirs. Shelley is known
also, in this department, as the authoress of the powerful tale of'Frankenstein,' in which a young student of physiology succeeds in
constructing, out of the horrid remnants of the churchyard and
dissecting-room, a kind of monster, to which he afterwards gives,
apparently by the agency of galvanism, a kind of spectral and convulsive life. This existence, rendered insupportable to the monster
by his vain cravings after human sympathy, and by his consciousness of his own deformity, is employed in inflicting (in some cases
involuntarily) the most dreadful retribution on the guilty philosopher; and some of the chief appearances of the monster, particu31




372          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CHAP. XIX.
larly the moment when he begins to move for the first time, and,
towards the end of the book, among the eternal snows of the arctic
circle, are managed with a striking and breathless effect, that makes
us for a moment forget the childish improbability and melodramatic
extravagance of the tale.
To this subdivision will belong the works of that most easy and
prolific writer, James-rthe most industrious, if not always lost
successful, imitator of Scott, in revival of chivalric and middle-age
scenes. The number of James's works is immense, but they bear
among themselves a family likeness so strong, and even oppressive,
that it is impossible to consider this author otherwise than as an
ingenious imitator and copyist-first of Scott, and secondly of himself.
The spirit of repetition is, indeed, carried so far, that it is possible
to guess beforehand, and with perfect certainty, the principal contents,
and even the chief persons, of one of James's historical novels.
His heroes and heroines, whose features are almost always gracefully
and elegantly sketched in, have more of the English than continental
character.  We are sure to have a nondescript grotesque as a
secondary personage-a half-crazy jester, ever hovering between the
harebrained villain and the faithful retainer: we may count upon
abundance of woodland scenery (often described with singular delicacy
and tenderness of language) and moonlight rendezvous of robbers
and conspirators.  But whereas Scott has all these things, it must
be remembered how much more he has beside.  He looks through
all things "with a learned spirit:" James stops short here, unless
we notice his innumerable pictures of battles, tournaments, huntingscenes, and old castles, where we find much more of the forced and
artificial accuracy of the antiquary, than of the poet's all-embracing,
all-imagining eye. James is particularly versed in the history of
France, and some of his most successful novels have reference to that
country, among which we may mention'Richelieu.'  His great
deficiency is want of real, direct, powerful human passion, and consequently of life and movement in his intrigues. There is thrown
over his fictions a general air of good-natured, frank, and well-bred
refinement, which, however laudable, cannot fail to be found rather
tiresome and monotonous.
This difference between the works of Scott and those among his
imitators who have endeavoured to revive the phantoms of past ages
with "the very form and pressure of the time," is also perceptible
in the works of Ainsworth and Bulwer: of course we allude only to
those in which are depicted the manners of by-gone society. Both
of these authors have enjoyed a very high degree of popularity; and
though it would be an injustice to the author of' Eugene'Aram' to
compare him, in a general sense, with the writer of' Rookwood'
and' Jack Sheppard,' yet we may with advantage establish a parallel
between these two novelists as far as they are historical. Several of




CIIAP. xIX.]               AINSWOR.TH.                         373
Ainsworth's earlier and best works were piflres of medieval
manners and society, and they exhibited, together with much of the
extravagance, false taste, and melodramatic exaggeration of youthful
productions, no small amount of power, picturesqueness, and originality.
It may appear unjust to the genius of Victor Hugo to say so, but to
our minds the romances of Ainsworth possess more resemblance to
the particular manner of'Notre Dame de Paris' than any other
productions of English literature. If the romantic school of modern
France was really generated, as some critics maintain, by the unexamrnpled fascination of Scott's historical fictions, the offspring very
soon lost all family resemblance to its parent.  All that is essential
and characteristic in Scott has disappeared-the simplicity, the ease,
the natural and unforced pathos, the fresh and manly drollery, the
obtaining of the most powerful impressions by the play of ordinary
but consistent characters.  Instead of this we have, in the modern
French school, an intense convulsive energy, proceeding, not by
gradual and uninterrupted progression, but by violent and consequently temporary jerks of passion and surprise.  In Scott there
are very few scenes which can be detached opdily from the work so
as to lose no portion of their interest and picturesqueness, and capable
of forming gems or brilliant extracts in a Chrestomathia; whereas,
in the other writers, these bright and salient scenes form  precisely
the merit of the work, and the writers seem to be of the opinion of
Bayes in' The Rehearsal,' who asks " what the plague is the use of
the plot, but to bring in the fine things?"
The general tone of Scott (as well as of Fielding, Cervantes, and
Shakspeare) is remarkable for its universality-for being intelligible
to all men, dealing with the ordinary elements of human character,
and consequently coming home to all readers.  These elements are
indeed highly idealised, for the ideal is the very essence of art, but
everybody can comprehend them  in the measure of his own powers
and sympathies.  The contrary of this takes place in the school of
Hugo.  Starting from the shallow paradox, that the adaptability of
an object to the purposes of art can only be measured by its power
of producing strong emotion, they have conceived that hideous and
monstrous objects are quite as fit materials for their purpose as what
is beautiful and sublime: if it be not true with them  that 1" le laid
eat le beau," at least they have shown a perfect indifference which
they should choose, and have even exhibited a preference for the
horrible and the repulsive.  They forget that there is a strong line
of demarcation between horror and terror, and that it is the former
sentiment alone which is a legitimate object of art.  The works of
Ainsworth possess much of this fragmentary and convulsive character,
and the erudition (often great) which he has lavished on his pictures
of east ages, bears, like that of Victor Hugo, a painful air of effort




374-          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CIHAP XIX
-of having been read up for the purpose, and collected for the
nonce.  The most successful of Ainsworth's romances are'Rookwood' (the first) and'Jack Sheppard:' the former owes its success
chiefly to the wonderful hurry and rapid vividness of Turpin's ride
from London to York in one day, and in the latter the author has
broken up what appeared to the public to be new ground — the
adventures of highwaymen, prostitutes, and thieftakers.  Defoe had
done this before, and with astonishing power of invention and probability; but that great moralist has never confounded good and Cvil,
andl has shown his squalid ragamuffins as miserable in their lives as
they were contemptible and odious in their crimes.  Ainsworth,
however, has looked upon the romantic side of the picture, and hats
represented his ruffian hero as a model of gallantry and courage.
This, we know, is contrary to universal experience and probability;
and while we read with breathless interest the escape of Jack froml
prison, we forget the monstrous inconsistencies of the story, and the
mean and wolfish character of the real criminal, who is here elevated
into a hero of romance. To the ignorant and uneducated, who are
charmed, like everybody else, with the boldness, dexterity, and
perseverance so often exhibited by the worst characters, and which
are here dignified with all the artifices of description, but who
cannot distinguish between the good and the evil which are mixed
up even in the basest characters, this kind of reading is capable of
doing, and has done, the greatest mischief; and the very talent —
often undeniable —of such works, only renders them  the more
seductive and insidious.
Bulwer has written in so many different styles, that he almost
forms a separate subdivision of our classification of prose fiction.
We may, however, view his long and active career under three
distinct epochs, the first exampled in'lPelham,' the second in'Eugene Aram,' and the third in'Ernest Maltravers.'  In the
earliest of these we find him essaying to give a lively and somewhat
ironic -reflection of the manners of the higher classes, mingled with
occasional scenes of low life, sometimes of a broadly comic and
farcical, though more often of a gloomy tragic solemnity; in the
second we find an attempt at the ideal in his art; and in the third a
mixture of the pure ideal with a prevailing tone of philosophic
analysis of character, and a metaphysical and abstract investigation
into the principles of human passi,:n and human life, their strength
and weakness, their health and their disease.'Pelham' is in general
gay and brilliant enough; not very profound, it is true, but lively,
sparkling, and effervescent.  It contains a great many ingenious
paradoxes, clever epigrams, and good things; many scattered hints
and fragments of character, but not a single personage drawn with
consistency and force. Pelham, the hero, is nothing but a compound
of two or three affectations which inderd are often found together in




CHAP. xiX.]                 BULWER..                          375
an effeminate dandy and Nwit about town, but whlich in no sense compose
a real human being: Pelham betars the same relation to Tom  Jonies,
for instance, that a painter's lay figure bears to a living man.  The
same thing may be said of Vincent; and Glanville is nothing but a
caricature of the Corsairs, Manfreds, and Childe Harolds, which
Byron's poetry brought into fashion. But in Byron these characters,
unnatural as they are, are rendered less apparently so by the romantic
grandeur and melancholy beauty of the scenery which forms their
oackground, and by the ideal and ecstatic tone which is essential to
)oetry; Glanville is Lara speaking in the House of Commons, wearngf a dress-coat, with a fine house in Grosvenor Square. The scenes,
owards the end of the book, among the thieves, are powerfully
anteresting, from  the author's talent of direct, simple, unaffected
iescription -a quality which he possesses in a high degree: but as
pictures of the real manners and way of life of such persons, they
are totally absurd and impossible.  In this novel, as well as in
several others (in'Paul Clifford' for instance, and in sonle parts of'Ernest Maltravers'), Bulwer has attempted, like Ainsworth in'Jack Sheppard,' or Eugene Sue in'Les Mysteres de Paris,' to
bring on the scene the interior life of the lowest orders of artisans,
malefactors, &c.; but a whole work can never consist entirely of
such scenes; and with whatever fidelity these things and persons
may be described, we always find these authors at a loss when it
comes to theJitting on these passages to the descriptions of ordinary
life and personages.  They are placed separately, detachedly before
the reader, like prints taken from a portfolio or pictures in a gallery;
they do not melt into each other by just gradatidns, as they would
to a person successively visiting them: we jump from one to the
other; there is nothing between.'Paul Clifford,' the personages
of which are almost all members of a band of highwaymen, the
chief being the hero, is a notable example of this discord: the
characters are alternately philosophers, high-bred gentlemen, and
robbers; Clifford himself a mixture of the coxcomb, the brigand,
and the satirist of society.  The want of harmony to which we have
alluded is never to be found in the works of the greatest writers of
fiction.  Our curiosity is gratified, but not a craving after childish
wonder; we have thieves and thieftakers in abundance, gipsies, and
rioters, and we have also nobles and judges, tradesmen and princes;
but we nowhere see sentimental pickpockets, or highwaynm en declaim
ing against the vanity of human wishes.  Mere surprise in fiction is
as much below the dignity of the art, as optical illusion is degrading
to the art of painting.  In the next phase of his literary development, Bulwer has given pictures of a more lofty, ambitious, and
Ideal kind.  Of this'Eugene Aram' is an exa:mple.  But here he
has exhibited not only an ostentatious parade of indigested philosophy,
crudely gathered up chiefly from  German writers, bat a vermy repre31'




OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CIIAP. XTX.
hensible neglect of the distinctions between good and evil, between
virtue and crime.  Aram, in the true record of his life, gathered
from  the prosaic but faithful documents of his trial, was a self-educated man of unusual powers of mind, but in a moral point of view
a criminal of the most ordinary calibre.  He committed under the
basest of influences an atrocious and cowardly murder, which was
afterwards discovered in a very singular monner; he defended himself
with much perverted ability, which only increases our detestation foi
his character, and perished on a well-merited gallows.  Now in
Bulwer's story we have nothing of what we should conceive to be
the most impressive and dramatic features of this event -  the everpresent terror, the fascination of the murderer, his remorse, his
struggles in the net of retribution which imprisoned him, the horrid
certainty of discovery, and the striking scene of that discovery; we
have the robber and murderer of an old man metamorphosed into
a romantic enthusiast of the beautiful and the good-a haughty and
retiring scholar, who has been led, in spite of himself, into a crime
which his soul abhors, and which he almost justifies on his trial by
asserting that in robbing and murdering Daniel Clarke he wished to
remedy the unjust and unequal distribution of wealth which Providence has made.
This taste for soi-disant philosophy Bulwer carries yet farther in
his later works; in'Zanoni' and'Night and Morning' it forms the
staple of the productions. Irritated, perhaps, by the shrewd common
sense which characterises the judgment of English critics, and which
did not fail, of course, to point out the weak parts and inconsistencies
of many of his novels, Bulwer threw himself headlong into the
turbid ocean of German metaphysics; and his later works, though
still exhibiting his usual flowing style and vivacity of conception,
have become a kind of clumsy allegories, generally developing a
paradox or an absurdity.  The truest and profoundest philosophy of
life is to be gathered from the faithfullest representations of its action
and passion; the great verities of humanity spring, like wild flowers,
by the hedges and waysides of existence; and, to our idea, there is
more true depth, true knowledge, true wisdom, in a single, fresh,
vigorous, unaffected, strongly-drawn scene of Fielding or of Scott,
than in whole libraries of such cloudy raptures as' Zanoni' or as' Alice.'  His more purely historical novels are much superior, par
ticularly'Rienzi,' though the character of the hero is rather of the
nineteenth than of the fourteenth century.  This novel, which is
also better constructed than his works usually are in point of plot,
was to a certain degree a labour of love, inasmuch as it served the
author to embody marty of his political convictions.'The Last
Days of Pompeii' is also generally read with great interest; and
though there is rather too much parade of not always very accurate,ntiquarian knowledge, it is written with great verve and brilliancy




CHAP. XIX.]        THE NOVEL: MISS BURNEY.                    377
of imagination. In' The Last of the Barons' he has ventured into
the enchanted ground occupied by Scott-English medieval history;
but with exactly the success that was to be expected.  The book is
a heavy and extravagant caricature, with perhaps not a single page
worthy of Bulwer's reputation.
Our second subdivision-the novels of real life and society-is so
extensive that we can but throw a rapid glance on its principal productions. To do this consistently with clearness we must begin rather
far back, with the novels of Miss Burney.  This lady, while yet
residing at her father's house, composed, in her stolen moments of
leisure, the novel of'Evelina,' and is related not to have communicated to her father the secret of its having been written by her,
until the astonishing success of the fiction rendered her avowal
triumphant and almost necessary.'Evelina' was followed by a
number of other novels bearing the same character: their chief defect
is vulgarity of feeling-not that falsely called vulgarity which describes
with congenial animation low scenes and humble personages, but the
affectation of delicacy and refinement.  The heroines are perpetually
trembling at the thought of impropriety, and exhibit a nervous,
restless dread of appearing indelicate, that absolutely renders them
the very essence of vulgarity.  All the difficulties and misfortunes
in these plots arise from the want, on the part of the principal personages, of a little candour and straightforwardness, and would be
set right by a few words of simple explanation: in this respect the
authoress drew from  herself; for her lately-published' Memoirs'
exhibit her as existing in a perpetual fever of vanity and petty
expedients; and in her gross affectation of more than feminine
modesty and bashfulness —literary as well as personal- we see the
painful, incessant flutter of her " darling sin "-" the pride that apes
humility."  Women are endowed by nature with a peculiar delicacy
of tact and sensibility; and being excluded, by the now-existing
laws of society, from taking anu active part in the rougher struggles
of life, they acquire much more than the other sex a singular penetration in judging of character from slight and external peculiarities.
In acquiring this power they are manifestly aided by their really
subordinate, though apparently supremen position in society, by the
seductions to which they are exposed, and by the tone of artificial
deference in which they are always addressed; men who appear to
each other in comparatively natural colours never approach women
(particularly unmarried women) but with a mask of chivalry and
politeness on their faces; and women, in their turn, soon learn to
divine the real character under all these smooth disguisements.
The prevailing literary form, or type, of the present age, is undoubtedly the novel-the narrative picture of manners; just as the
epic is the natural literary form of the heroic or traditionary period.
and the above remarks will, we think, sufficiently explain the phe,




.37,8         OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERYATURE.   [CIHAP. XIX
ncmenon of so many women now  appearing, in France, Germntny,
and England, as novel-writers.  Our society is highly artificial: thle
broad distinctions and demarcations which anciently separated one
class of men and one profession from  another, have been polished
away, or filled up by increasing refinement and the extension of
personal liberty: the artisan and the courtier, tile lawyer and the
divine, are no longer distinguished either by professional costume, or
by any of those outward and visible signs which formerly stamped
their manners and language, and furnished the old comic writer with
strongly-marked characters ready made to his hand.  WTe must now
go deeper: the coat is the same everywhere; consequently, we must
strip the man — nay, we must anatomise him -- to show how he
differs from his neighbours.  To do this well, fineness of penetration
is, above all, necessary- a quality which women, ceteris paribus,
possess in a higher degree than men.
Miss Burney was followed by a number of writers, chiefly women,
among whom the names of Mrs. Inchbald and Mrs. Opie are pronlinent.  Their fictions, like those of M3iss Edgeworth in more recent
times, have a high  and never-failing moral aim; and both these
ladies have exhibited a power over the feelings, and an intensity of
pathos, not much inferior to Richardson's in  Clarissa iHarlowe.'
But their works are very unequal, and the pathos of which we
speak is not diffused, but concentrated into particular mnoments
of the action, and is also obtained at the expense of great preparation and involution of circumstances; so that to compare their genius
to that of Richardson, on the strength of a few powerfiul pictures
of intense moral pathos, would be a gross injustice to the admirable
and consummate artist, in whose works the pathos, inimitable as it is,
forms but one item in a long list of his excellences,
At the head of the second division of our fictions is undoubtedly
William Godwin, a man of truly powerful and original genius, who
devoted his whole life to the propagation of certain social and political
theories- visionary, indeed, and totally impracticable, but mnarled
with the impress of benevolence and philanthropy.  With  these
ideas Godwiin's mind was perfectly saturated and possessed, and tihis
intensity of conviction, this ardent propagandisnm, not only gives to
his writings a peculiar character of earnestness and thought —
earnestness, the rarest and most impressive of literary qualities-but
may be considered to have made him, in spite of all the tendencies
of his intellectual character-invitd JMinerv5t-a novelist.  Godwin
was born in 1756, and appears to have sucked with his mother's
milk those principles of resistance- to authority, and attachment to
free opinions in church and state, which had been handed down from
one sturdy DIissenter to another from  the days of the civil war and
the republic.  -Ie was in reality one of those iard-headed enlthusiasts
m-t once wild visaonaries and severe logici.uns-who abounded in




CHAP. XIx.]                 GODWIN.                            379
the age of Marvell, Milton, and Harrington; and his true epoch
would have been the first period of Cromwell's public life.  His own
career, extending down to his death in 1836, was incessantly occupied with literary activity; he produced an immense number of works,
some immortal for the genius and originality they display, and all for
an intensity and gravity of thought, for reading and erudition. The
first work which brought him into notice was the' Essay on Political
Justice,' a Utopian theory of morals and government, by which
virtue and benevolence was to be the "primum mobile" of all human
actions, and a philosophical republic-that favourite dream of vision
aries-was to take place of all our imperfect modes of polity.  Animated during his whole life by these opinions, he has embodied them
under a variety of forms, among the rest in his immortal romances.
The first and finest of these is'Caleb Williams.'  Its chief didactic
aim  is to show  the misery and injustice arising from  our present
imperfect constitution of society, and the oppression of our imperfect
laws, both written and unwritten — the jus scriptum of the statute.
book, and the jus non scriptum of social feeling and public opinion.
Caleb Williams is an intelligent peasant lad, taken into the service
of Falkland, the true hero, an incarnation of.honour, intellect,
benevolence, and a passionate love of fame.  This model of all the
chivalrous and elevated qualities has previously, under the provocation of the cruellest, most persevering, and tyrannic insult, in a
moment of ungovernable passion, committed a murder: his fanatic
love of reputation urges him to conceal this crime; and, in order to
do this more effectually, he allows an innocent man to be executed,
and his family ruined.  Williams obtains, by an accident, a clue to
the guilt of Falkland, when the latter, extorting from him an oath
that he will keep his secret, communicates to his dependant the
whole story of his double crime, of his remorse and misery.  The
y:-th, finding his life insupportable from  the perpetual suspicion to
XvWich he is exposed, and the restless surveillance of his master,
escapes; and is pursued through the greater part of the tale by the
unrelenting persecution of Falkland, who, after having committed
one crime under unsupportable provocation, and a second to conceal
the first, is now led, by his frantic and unnatural devotion to fame,
to annihilate, in Williams, the e\vilence of his guilt. The adventures
of the unfortunate fugitive, his dreadful vicissitudes of poverty and
distress, the steady, bloodhound, unrelaxing pursuit, the escapes and
disguises of the victim, like the agonised turnings and doublings of
the hunted hare -all this is depicted with an incessant and never
surpassed power of breathless interest.  At last Caleb is fornally
accused by Falkland of robbery, and naturally discloses before lhe
tribunal the dreadful secret which had caused his long lrerseeIution,
and Falkland dies of shame and a broken heart.  The interest of
this wonderful tale is indescribable; the various scenes are set before




880          OUTILINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CHAP. XIX.
us with something of the minute reality, the dry, grave simplicity of
Defoe. Bu t in Godwin, the faculty of the picturesque, so promninent
in the mind of Defoe, is almost absent: everything seems to be
thouglht out, elaborated by an effort of the will. Defoe seems simply
to describe things as they really were, and we feel it impossible to
conceive that they were otherwise than so; G-odwin describes them
(andl with a wondrous power of coherency) as we feel they would be
in such and such circumstances.  His descriptions and characters
are masterly pieces of construction; or, like mathematical problems,
they are deduced step by step, infallibly, from  certain data.  This
author possesses no humour, no powers of description, at least of
nature-none of that magic which communicates to inanimate objects
the light and glow of sentiment —very little pathos: but on the
other hand, few have possessed a more penetrating eye for that
recondite causation which links together motive and action, a more
watchful and determined consistency in tracing the manifestations of
such characters as he has once conceived, or a more prevailing spirit
of self-persuasion as to the reality of what he relates. The romance
of' Caleb Williams' is indeed ideal; but it is an ideal totally destitute of all the trappings and ornaments of the ideal: it is like some
grand picture painted in dead-colour.
In 1799 appeared' St. Leon;' in 1804,'Fleetwood;' in 1817,
Mandeville;' and in 1830, just before his death,'Cloudesley.'
These four works are romances in the same manner as ~ Caleb Williams;' but there is perceptible in them  a gradual diminution in
vigour and originality-we do not mean of positive but of rela!cive
originality.'St. Leon' is, however, a powerful conception, executed
in parts with a gloomy energy peculiar to this author.  The story is
of a man who has acquired possession of the great arcanum - the
secret of boundless wealth and immortal life; and the drift of the
book is to give a terrible picture of the misery which would result
from the possession of such an immortality and such riches, when
deprived (as such a being must be) of the sympathies of human affection, and the joys and woes of human nature.  This novel contains
several powerfully-delineated scenes, generally of a gloomy tone, and
a female character, Marguerite, of singular beauty and interest.
At the head-facile princeps -of the very large class of female
novelists who have adorned the more recent literature of England,
we must place Miss Edgeworth, born about 1768   This place she
deserves, not only for the immense number, variety, and originality
of her works of fiction, but also, and perhaps in a superior degree,
tor their admirable good sense and utility.
Most of thorse who have undertaken the ill-requited but certainly
most important task of writing for children have failed, from  not
liaving sufficiently considered the nature and character of the child,ft nmind.  They are perpetually haunted by the notion that it is




CHAP. XIX.'             MISS EDGEWORTH.                       381
indispensable to write down to their audience: tley think it necessary
to place,he moral of their story offensively in the foreground: they
do not consider this perpetually perking, as it were, of the moral in
the face of the reader-so offensive in a work addressed to grown up
persons-is no less disgusting to children, however young. Children
hate to be lectured at least as much as their elders; and, consequently, the great difficulty in writing for the very young is either
entirely to conceal, under an interesting and striking narrative, the
nauseous dose of morality which is to be administered, or, at least,
to gild the pill as far as possible. The chief defect of Berquin, and
other excellent and well-intentioned writers for childhood, is the
leaving nothing to be discovered by the intelligence of the little
reader; for children, like grown-up people, are exceedingly glad of
the opportunity of employing the perceptive and comparative facul..
ties of their minds; nay, take the more pleasure in doing so, because
those faculties have in general been but recently called into activity.
Therefore they despise those feeble and affected writings in which
the characters are either complete embodiments of some virtue br its
corresponding vice; and their sense of probability is very much
shocked by seeing represen'ted in fiction what even their imperfect
experienep shows them  to be never occurring in real life —i. e
characters of unmixed good or unmitigated evil, virtue invariably
rewarded, and vice as invariably punished.  Miss Edgeworth has
written a complete literature for infancy and youth. She has had the
sense and courage to begin from the very beginning; and the first
tale of her admirable series is, if we remember well, a story in words
of one syllable, and adapted for the very earliest age.  From  this
she has passed on to the exquisite little tales contained in'The
Parent's Assistant,' a collection to the first perusal of which no one
ever looked back but with feelings of gratitude and delight; and
then through the various'collections under the titles of'Popular
Tales,''Moral Tales,' and'Fashionable Tales,'-a cycle of fictions
which, including the novels of' Patronage,'' Leonora,'  Belinda,'' Helen,' and' The Absentee,' may boldly be said to contain more
sound sense, acute observation of character, and applicability to
practical life, than any set of works professing a didactic tendency.
In all, the primary qualities just mentioned are equally visible.
Even in' Frank' and' Rosamond'-little stories for the almost infant
mind -we perceive the same infallible and irresistible sense, the
same ease and vivacity of narration, and the same exquisite percep.
tion of character and the weaknesses of human nature.  To those
who confound form with matter in literary judgments it may seem
preposterous to assign such high praise to a collection of tales for
children; but to persons who know from experience the difficulty of
writing effectively in this manner, our criticism, laudatory as it is;
will not appear extravagantly favourable.  There are few failings of




882           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. XIX.
the opening character — few of those passions and errors which,
being common to all ages of human life, so easily grow from defects
into vices, and from vices into crimes-which she has not with penetrating eye pursued into the inmost foldings of the heart,,and driven
them forth with her gentle satire and admirable logic of.good sense.
She excels in reducing a folly, or a false virtue, "ad absurdurn;"
she is truly Socratic, in the manner by which she drives a fallacy to its
last defences.  She has invariably and perseveringly discountenanced
all exaltation and enthusiasm; and this incessant attention to the
real and practical, however it may sometimes diminish her glory as
a great artist, undoubtedly increases her utility as a moral teacher.
In one class of characters she is almost unrivalled: no author has,
with so much sympathy, penetration, and vivacity, exhibited the
national peculiarities of the Irish -a nation which she has studied
with peculiar interest and love.  Her volume entitled'Castle Rackrent' is a kind of chronicle of the oddities and humours, the vices
and generosity, of a series of Irish landlords, and contains a wonderful amount of acute observation.
Miss.Edgeworth's never-failing success in the delineation of this
kind of local character will warrant us in placing her at the head of
a class of novelists almost peculiar to English'literature,-Ind which
ought to form a subdivision in this part of our subject — we mean,
writers whose works.are devoted to the delineation of local manners
and character. Thus, there are many excellent writers of fiction
who have devoted themselves to the painting of the peculiar manners,
oddities, and domestic life of Scotland and Ireland  exclusively.
John Galt, in a long series of novels, has confined himself to the
minute delineation-as rich, as original, and as careful as the workmanship of Douw, Mieris, or Teniers -of the interior life of the
Scottish peasantry and provincial tradespeople.  The'Annals of the
Parish,' the supposed journal of a quaint, simple-minded Presbyterian
pastor, give us a singularly amusing insight into the microscopic
details of Scottish life in the lower classes.  Galt's primary characteristic is a dry, subdued, quaint humour-a quality very perceptible
in the lower orders of Scotland, and which in his works, as in the
national character of his countrymen, is often accompanied by a very
profound and true sense of the pathetic. The more romantic and
tragical side of the national idiosyncrasy has been exquisitely portrayed in the touching tales of John Wilson, than whom, it should
be remarked, no author has ever shown a finer eye for the beauties
of nature, or a profounder feeling for the virtues and trials of humble
life. In this department of local manners the Irish have peculiarly
listinguished themselves; as might, indeed, be expected, when we
remember the intense vivacity of the Hibernian character, and the
abundance of materials for the novelist'afforded by the incessant
social, religioas, and political discord which for three centuries has




CHAP. XIX.]             LOCAL NOVELS.                       383
never ceased to convulse that country.  A  long' list of names
presents itself to our notice, of which, however, it will suffice to say
a few words of the principal-Lady Morgan, Banimn, Crofton Croker,
Carleton, Mrs. Hall, Lever, and Lover.  All these persons have
devoted themselves, with more or less success, to the depicting the
humours or the passions, the bright or dark, the light and shadow,
of Irish life.  Some —as, for example, Banim —have attached themselves more exclusively to the tragic, or rather melodramic, scenes of
Irish society, generally in the peasant class; and though it is imposBible not to appreciate in their works a very marked degree of power,
picturesqueness, imagination, and eloquence, yet these high qualities
are often eclipsed by an exaggerated and ferocious energy which
defeats its own object, and renders the work ridiculous instead of
sublime. In the Irish character there is no repose, and where there
is no repose there can be no contrast -the only element of strong
impressions. Other authors, again, as Crofton Croker, have attached
themselves more particularly, and with more effect, to the merely
romantic and imaginative features of the national legends and superstitions; and the latter gentleman has produced a little collection
of fairy tales worthy to be placed beside the delicious'I-IHaus und
Kindermachen' of the brothers Grimm.
Of those who have devoted themselves to the delineation of purely
English manners in all ranks of society, the number is so immense
that it would be as useless as tedious to give even a catalogue of
their names and works.  We shall content ourselves with selecting
a few of the most prominent, or rather such as appear typical, and
as consequently will give, in each instance, the general idea of the
class at whose head we place them; and first, of the writers of what
are called "fashionable' novels" —i. e. such as pretend to depict the
manners, habits, and sentiments of aristocratic life.  There is no
country in the world, assuredly, in which the middle and lower
classes possess so much personal liberty, and consequently so much
enlightment and independence, as England; but, at the same time,
there is hardly any nation in which, generally speaking, there is
such a tendency in each class to admire and ape the manners of the
class immediately above it. Our present business is with the literary
effect of this peculiar admiration of aristocracy.  Its tendency ha;
been to flood our literature with a preposterous amount of trashy
writings, proposing to give a reflection of the manners and habits of
high life.  Frequently composed, and as a mere speculation, by
persons totally unacquainted with the scenes they essayed to describe,
and relying for their interest either on grotesque exaggerations of
what they supposed to exist in those favoured regions-the Empyrean
of fashion - or on coarse scandal and misrepresentation, these egregious books were either sign-post caricatures of what the authors had
never seen, or were clumsy rechaufifs of forgotten scandal, without
32




884           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CHAP. XIL
wit, sense, probability, or nature. The more extravagant, however,
we-re these pictures, and the less they resembled the ordinary life of
the reader, the more eagerly were they admired; and it is not to be
wondered at that the time should come when persons, either them.
selves members of aristocratic society, or men capable of forming
true ideas on the subject, should have taken in hand to give some.
thing like a true picture of the life of these envied circles.  Among
the best of these fashionable novels are those of Lister (perhaps
this gentleman's' Granby' is as good a specimen as can be selected
of this class), Lady Charlotte Bury, Mr. Ward, Benjamin D'Israeli,
Lord Normanby, and Lady Blessington. The novels of Ward are
distinguished by the author's attempt to unite with an interesting
story a good deal of elevated philosophical and literary speculation;
so that many of his works-as, for instance,' Tremaine,''Le Vere,''De Clifford,' &c,-are something which is neither a good narrative
nor a collection of good essays. Either the philosophy impedes the
narrative, or the narrative destroys the interest and coherency of
the philosophy.  But the writings of Ward, as well as of Lister, are
valuable for the simple and unaffected tone of their language, for
the moral truth and elevation of their sentiment, an.d for the charm
that can only be expressed by that most untranslatable of English
words — "gentlemanliness."  These merits are also in a very high
degree possessed by such of James's novels as describe modern
manners, many of which have considerable interest, of a gentle and
subdued kind. Of Bulwer we have already spoken.
Descending the social scale, we come to a very large and characteristic department of works-the department which undoubtedly
possesses not only the greatest degree of value for the English reader,
but will have the most powerful attraction for foreign students of
our literature.  This is that class of fictions which depicts the
manners of the middle and lower classes: and here again we shall
encounter a singular amount of female names. The first in point
of time, and perhaps almost the first in point of merit, in this class,
especially among the ladies, is Miss Austen, whose novels may be
considered as models of perfection in a new and very difficult species
of writing.  She depends for her effect upon no surprising adventures, upon no artfully involved plot, upon no scenes deeply pathetic
or extravagantly humorous.  She paints a society which, though
virtuous, intelligent, and enviable above all others, presents the
fewest salient points of interest and singularity to the novelist-we
mean the society of English country gentlemen.  Whoever desires
to know the interior life of that vast and admirable body the rural
gentry of England-a body which absolutely exists in no other
country on earth, and to which the nation owes many of its most
valuable- characteristics-must read the novels of Miss Austen.  In
these works the reader will find very little variety and no picturesque




CfAP. XIX.]          HOOK-MRS. TROLLOPE.                      385
ne.s of persons, little to inspire strong emotion, nothing to excite
wonder or laughter  but he will find admirable good sense, exquisite
discrimination, and an unrivalled power of easy and natural dialogue:
Miss Ferriar has also written a number of novels, generally depicting with great vivacity and truth the oddities and affectations of
semi-vulgar life, but her works are far inferior, as artistic productions,
to the elegant sketches of Miss Austen.
Of the purely comic manner of fiction there are few better
examples than the novels of Theodore Hook.  He is greatest in the
description of London life, and particularly in the rich drollery with
which he paints the vulgar efforts of suburban gentility to ape the
manners of the great.  There is not one of his numerous novels
and shorter tales in which some scene could not be cited carrying
this kind of drollery almost to the brink of farce.  Many of his
works —as'Sayings and Doings' —consist of short tales, each
destined to develop the folly or evil consequences of some particular
inconsistency or affectation: thus the work just cited consists of a
set of detached stories, each written on the text, as it were, of some
common well-known proverb; and though the narratives are of very
slight construction, and do not contain very profound views of
character, they none of them  are devoid of some incredibly droll
caricatures of manners.  What, for example, can be more irresistible
than the Bloomsbury evening party in'Maxwell,' or the dinner at
Mr. Abberley's in'The Man of Many Friends?'  Hook's more
exclusively serious novels are generally considered as inferior to
those in which there is a mixture of the ludicrous; and for one of
the last works produced by this clever writer before his death, he
selected a subject admirably adapted to the peculiar strength of his
talent. This was'Jack Brag,' a most spirited embodiment of the
arts emlployed by a vulgar pretender to creep into aristocratic society,
and the ultimate discomfiture of the absurd hero.  Hook was a nlan
Df great but superficial powers, one of the most amusing conversationists of the day, an inimitable relater of anecdotes, a singer, and an
improvvisatore; but he was himself afflicted with the same passion
for, the society of the great as he has so wittily caricatured in Mr
Brag, and his life was passed in incessant but desultory literary
labour as a novelist and journalist, in frequent disappointments, in
debt, and in the empty applauses of the circle he amused. He died
in 1842, leaving a large number of works, all of them  exhibiting
strong proofs of humour, but mostly deprived of permanent value
by the haste perceptible in their execution.  The best of them are,
perhaps,' Gilbert Gurney,' and its continuation,' Gurney Married.'
Very similar to Theodore Hook in the subject and treatment of
her novels, and nit unlike him in the general tone of her talent, its
MIrs. Trollope, vilose happiest efforts are the exhibition of the gross
arts and impudent stratagems employed by the pretenders to fashion.




386           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CHAP. XI.X
Mrs. Trollope's chief defect is coarseness and violence of contrast:
she does not know  where to stop, and is too apt to render her
characters not ridiculous only, but odious, in which she offends
against the primary laws of comic writing.  Moreover, she neglects
light and shade in her pictures: her personages are either mere
embodiments of all that is contemptible, or cold abstractions of
everything refined and excellent.  Her best work is, perhaps,'Ihe
Widow Barnaby,' in which she has reached the ideal of a character
of gross, filll-blown, palpable, complete pretension and vulgar assurance. The widowwith her coarse handsome face, and her imperturbable, unconquerable self-possession, is a truly rich comic conception. Mrs. Trollope's plots are exceedingly slight and ill constructed,
but her narrative is lively, and she particularly excels in her characters of goodnatured, shrewd old maids.  She first became generally
known to the literary world in 1832, by her relation of a residence
of some years in the United States, in which she exhibited so unfiattering a picture of American society, that our transatlantic neighbours
have not yet recovered from the paroxysm of anger into which the
rough strictures of Mrs. Trollope threw them.
It would be a great injustice were we not to devote a few words
of admiration to the charming sketches of Miss Mitford, a lady who
has described the village life and scenery of England with the grace
and delicacy of Goldsmith himself.'Our Village' is one of the
most delightful books in the language: it is full of those home scenes
which form the most exquisite peculiarity, not only of the external
nature, but also of the social life of the country.  In nothing is our
nation so happily distinguished from all others as in the enlightenment,
the true refinement, the virtue, and the dignity of her middle and
lower classes, and in no position are those classes.so worthy of adniration as in the quiet, tranquil existence of the country.  She
describes with the truth and fidelity of Crabbe and Cowper, but
without the moral gloom of the one, and the morbid sadness of the
other.  Whether it is her pet greyhound Lily, or the sunburnt,
curly, ragged village child, the object glows before us with something
of that daylight sunshine which we find in its highest perfection in
the rural and familiar images of Shakspeare.
Passing over Smith, whose numerous novels are little more than
repetitions or imitations of the works which were in fashion at the
different periods when he wrote them, we come to Samuel Warren,
who obtained an enviable reputation for vigour *and originality so
early as 1837, when he commenced contributing to'IBlackwood's
Mlagazine' a series of tales entitled'Passages from  the Diary of a
late Physician.'  The nature of these narratives may easily be
guessed from their title, and Warren very skilfully maintained the
disguise of a medical man, gained chiefly by his own early introduc.
tion into a humble branch of that profession.  The tales themselves




MeAP. xrx.]                WARREN.                          387
are of various lengths, and very unequal degrees of merit.  They
are all, with the exception of one or two (which are not important
enough to change the general impression on the reader), of a very
tragic and painful nature-dark and agonising pages from the vast
book of human suffering. The scenes are taken from almost every
gradation of social life; we have the last moments of -the condemned
forger, the slow martyrdom of a virtuous philosopher, the madness
of the lover and the statesman, and two or three most impressive
pictures of commercial ruin, and the fatal effect of vice, ill-regulated
passions, and a morbid indulgence of imagination. Perhaps th,
finest of these tales are those entitled'The Spectre-smitten,''The
Banker's Clerk,' The Statesman,' and'The Forger.' The style,
though occasionally rather too highly coloured, is very direct, powerful, and unaffected; and the too great prevalence of a tone of agony
and extreme distress, which certainly injures.the effect of the whole,
by depriving the work of relief, which is, above all, indispensable
in painful subjects, is perhaps rather attributable to the nature of
the subjects than to any defect of the artist.  It is but just to
remark, too, that this monotony of gloom and agony is not perceptible
in these tales as they at first appeared, separately and at considerable
intervals, in the pages of a magazine, though it is certainly objectionable in them when collected into a single publication. Encouraged
by this success, Mr. Warren began the tale of'Ten Thousand-a.
Year,' which also appeared in'Blaekwood's Magazine.'  This work
portrays the unexpected elevation to immense wealth and importance
of one of the most contemptible beings that the imagination can
conceive, Mr. Tittlebat Titmouse, a vulgar, ignorant coxcomb of the
lowest order, a linen-draper's shopman in Oxford-street, and suddenly
exalted, through the instrumentality of some rascally attorneys, who
have discovered a defect in a pedigree, to the third heaven of English
aristocracy.  The book is crowded with "scenes of many-coloured
life," and with an infinity of personages, all vigorously, and some
admirably drawn. The gradual development of the plot is carried
on, not only with considerable skill and probability, but with a great
deal more attention to detail than is usual in modern fiction; and
many of the scenes are highly dramatic and natural -for instance,
the dinner at Mr. Quirk's; the trial; the suicide of Gammon at the
end of the book, which is as finely worked up as anything in
Richardson; and the insanity of Lord Dreddlington.  Mr. Warren
is a barrister, and a distinguished writer on legal education; and we
cannot, therefore, be surprised that he should exhibit great and
accurate knowledge, not only of the profession itself, but of the
habits of its members. The work is undeniably a production of
great skill and genius, and setting aside a little political partiality
(for all Mr. Warren's good people are Tories, and his bad ones as
32 *




388           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CHAP. XIX.
invariably Whigs), must be considered as giving a vivid, well-drawn,
and impressive picture of modern English society.
The greatest name in the contemporary literature of Great Britain
is indubitably that of Charles Dickens, who first appeared before the
public some twelve years ago, as the author of a short series of
sketches written to fill the vacant columns of a London newspaper.
These were very slight but charming descriptions of metropolitan
or suburban life, and mnust be considered as the first breaking up of
an entirely new literary vein.  The subject is "everyday life and
everyday people," and no author ever showed a more delicate skill in
appreciating and expressing the almost imperceptible shades of
London life.  The best sketches were those of a purely descriptive
character, such as'The Marine-store Shop,''Seven Dials,''The
Streets;' in short, those in which some phase of London life, or one
of the thousand appearances of London scenery, is set before us.
Several of these sketches were little narratives, of which the most
ambitious and elaborate are invariably the least effective; while
those embodying some slight trait of character and manners exhibited
a victorious power of exciting pathetic impressions,'and an infallible
tact for the various shades of personal or professional oddity.  It
was easy to see that a perfectly original author had appeared, possessing an inexhaustible knowledge of all the mysteries of London
life, particularly in the lower class, and that rare and infallible
evidence of genius -the power of extracting novelty and interest
from the most ordinary and common details of society, from things
which we are so familiar with that we cannot conceive how they can
contain materials either for laughter or for tears.  In 1837 began
the publication, in monthly numbers, each containing about two
chapters, of the humorous tale'The Pickwick Papers,' which may
be described as a succession of detached adventures, very slightly
connected together by a thread of plot, full of the richest and raciest
delineations of London scenery, characters, and oddities. Mlr. Pickwick himself, the citizen Don Quixote of the nineteenth century, is
a personage as natural, as delightful, and as completely drawn as the
inimitable hero of Cervantes. But what praise can be sufficiently
enthusiastic for the admirable conception of Sam Weller, that inimitable compound of wit, simplicity, quaint humour, and fidelity! The
"gamin de Paris" does not possess a more distinctive and attractive
physiognomy than Dickens has here immortalised in this exquisite
portrait of the Londoner; perhaps since Parson Adams literature
cannot afford an instance of a personage so exquisitely true to nature,
so intensely comic, so individual, and at the same time so perfect a
type of a class, as this delightful creation.  Of the inferior persons,and the adventures it will perhaps suffice to say, that those which
belong to London life-Boz's peculiar domain -are almost invariably
sxquisite: but in quitting the streets of the capital Dickens seems to




C, AT>. xTx.]         DICKENS: PICKWICK.                     389
leave behind him  much of his characteristic delicacy and power.
Not but that many of his descriptions of country and provincial
scenery are exceedingly rich and delicate; but he seems ever most at
home in the great Babylon, and appears to look upon every other
object with the eye of one who, though a painter and a poet of rare
merit, is still a Londoner - a "'Cockney."  Nothing can be more
admirably true to nature and humorous than the supper-party of the
medical students, the scenes of low life in which most prominently
figure MIrs. Bardell, Mrs. Cluppins, and Mrs. Raddle, with her
unfortunate henpecked husband.  All the passages in which we
behold any of the multitudinous variety of attorneys and attorneys'
clerks-a most characteristic species in London —are unsurpassable;
it is indisputable that since Scott no author has appeared in European
literature who has succeeded in producing anything like the impression made by these truly original draughts from  nature.  The plot
or intrigue of this work is absolutely nothing; the personages flit
before the reader like the phantoms of the magic-lantern; but we
forget all the improbability of the, fable in the vivacity and fluent
abundance of the incidents.  This author is a striking proof of the
truth that the same delicacy of mental organization which renders a
man susceptible to the impressions of the humorous and the comic,
best enables him to command our tears.  Many of the defects of
this work are to be traced to the manner of its appearance, in
detached portions.  There is every reason to suppose, not only that
it was published, but that it was also composed, in this desultory and
fragmentary form; and the increasing practice of giving to the world
narratives in this manner is, we think, productive of so much injury
to this branch of literature, that we cannot refrain from saying a
few words on the subject. The immense development within a few
years, both in England and other countries, of periodical literature
or journalism, has induced almost all modern authors to publish
works (even of continuous fiction) in this form.  The consequence
is that the writer, whatever be his genius, and however carefully he
may have previously arranged the plan and outline of his work,
finds himself exposed to a perpetual temptation of over-colouring
each particular portion.  He knows that the public expects in each
monthly or weekly "feuilleton" something highly spiced and intensely
interesting; and is thus tempted to neglect that gradation, that proportion, that subordination of the parts to the whole, which is as
necessary to the due effect of a novel as of a picture or as of a wcrl;
of architecture.'The Pickwick Papers,' the success of which was enormous
(100,000 copies having been sold, according to common report), was
almost immediately followed by' Nicholas Nickleby,' a more regular
and carefully constructed fiction, exhibiting no diminution of power
originality, and picturesqueness.  The events take place chiefly in




~B90         OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CHAP. XIX
London, though one important portion of the work is devoted to
giving a most frightful picture of the atrocities perpetrated in cheap
schools - a nuisance which Dickens's powerful expose in this novel
tended mainly to diminish, if not altogether to abate. l Mr. Squeers,
the ignorant, cruel, and rapacious schoolmaster, is a chef d'ceuvre;
and the wanderings of. Nicholas, with his broken-spirited prot6g6
Smike, are full of variety and interest; particularly their adventures
in Mr. Vincent Crummles's troop of provincial actors.  Among the
serious characters in this tale are two usurers, Rlalph Nickleby and
Arthur Gride, which, as striking yet perfectly natural embodiments,
have perhaps never been surpassed.
With a fertility like that of Scott, Dickens very speedily appeared
again before the public in' Oliver Twist,' a simple tale of the adven.
tures of a charity-boy, who "falls among thieves" and is initiated,
though without his innocence being corrupted, into all the mysteries
of the London housebreakers and pickpockets.  The "merry old
gentleman," Mir. Fagin, a Jew who keeps a kind of boarding-house
for a society of young thieves, and the acolytes who are grouped
around this venerable professor of the art of appropriation, all these
are as fine as anything in Smollett; the Artful Dodger in particular
is a gem, an absolute literary type; but not Smollett, nor Fielding,
nor perhaps all the romance-writers whose works we possess, could
have produced anything equal, in terrific reality and vividness, to the
murder of Nancy and the wanderings of the ruffian Sykes.  Sykes
and his dog alone are enough to establish Dickens's fame as a great
original writer.  Nothing so prosaic in its subject, yet raised by the
mere force of genius to a true intensity of horror, is perhaps to be
found in fiction. The adventures of Oliver, the hero, are unnatural;
but the true strength of the work consists in the other characters.
The next work of our inexhaustible novelist was' Master Humnphrey's Clock,' in which, under a general fiction not very probable or
well imagined, the author intended to unite a number of detached
stories.  Of these we have two,'The Old Curiosity Shop' and
Barnaby Rudge.'  The first is a powerful and impressive delineation of the gambler's mania, exhibited in a miserable old being,
tottering on the verge of the grave, and a number of subordinate
personages, sometimes grotesque, as Quilp, but always stamped with
vigour and consistency.  Above all these, and in the thick atmophere of misery, hopeless suffering, and privation, floats the exquisite
and angelic figure of "Little Nell," one of the most enchanting
conceptions of grace and innocence -the more admirable, perhaps,
as Dickens is not always very successful in such delineations.'Barnaby Rudge' is in some sense historical, as its chief action is
the dreadful insurrection of 1783, called "Lord George Gordon's
Riots," when the refuse of the London population, under the
pretext of a dread of Popery, committed, during several days, the




CHAP. XIX.] DICKEN:' CHIUZZLEWIT-CHRISTMAS TALES.    391
most horrible disorders in the capital.  These riots, and the chief
personages who figure in them, are set before us with great but
somewhat exaggerated energy, and this principal action is combined
with the detection of a horrid fratricide supposed to have been committed some years before.  The long agonies of the unrepentant
murderer are described with a power that reminds of the admirable
episode of Sykes.
In 1843 Dickens male a voyage to the United  States, and
described his impressi)ns of the manners, &c., of the Americans in
a book which is strangely unworthy of his powers. The impressions
themselves are highly unfavourable to the Americans, and in this
respect accord with the reports of almost every English traveller who
has given to the world his personal observations on the republic.
But many of the richest contents of his American note-book were
transferred to the pages of' Martin Chuzzlewit,' a narrative some.
what resembling' Nickleby,' which appeared in the year just mentioned.  This novel is one of the finest of his composition -not the
American scenes, perhaps, for these have generally an air of exaggeration which injures themn; but the adventures which occur before
and after the hero makes his unfortunate and unsuccessful voyage
across the Atlantic.  I1lr. Pecksniff, the architect, is a finished
hypocrite-the Tartuffe of morality, a sort of Mr. Squeers without
the brutality.  This tale contains, too, one of those exquisite personaoes which Dickens excels in inventing, and placing amidst his
dranzatis personae, as a kind of embodiment of his own gentle,
generous, loving heart. Who can forget Tom Pinch, old Tom Pinch,
with his guilelessness, his oddity, his exhaustless goodness of heart?
Opposed to this truly delightful creation we have Jonas Chuzzlewit,
whose mean brutality and small tyranny is finely and consistently
sustained.  Even in Dickens there are few things finer than the
episode of the murder committed by Jonas; and the pangs of remorse
acting on a base and wolfish nature have seldom been more powerfully described. Nor are the comic scenes less varied or less excellent;
the dinner-party at Todgers's is one of the very finest things in the
whole range of comic fiction, and immeasurably superior even to the
far-famed "supper after the manner of the ancients" in Smollett's'Peregrine Pickle.'
Since the appearance of this rich and rapid succession of noble
fictions, Dickens seemed to content himself with reposing on the
laurels he has gained; having produced no long works, simply
reminding us of the existence of his undiminished power by publishing a series of little festival Christmas tales.   Of these, four have
already appeared, entitled'A  Christmas Carol in Prose,''The
Chimes,''The Cricket on the Hearth,' and'The Battle of Life.'
They are all admirable for the benevolent genial spirit which they
express, and display a degree of grace and fancy which is in every




892          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CHAP. XIX.
way worthy of the object for which they were written — the noble
aim of inspiring the rich and happy with sympathy and compassion
for the poor.  They breathe the very spirit of Christmas-timne-the
highest praise which can be given. The best of them, as far as the
story is concerned, is the first, though'The Chimes' contains au
immense power of fantastic imagination. They are all very short:
the' Carol' describes the conversation, begun by a ghost, and continued by a series of visions, embodying the "Past, Present, a.nl
Future," of a coldhearted old miser, to the hearty benevolence so
suited to Christmas; the second is a goblin story; and the third oneof those delightful glimpses into very humble life which no author
can embody like Dickens. Even should he write no more, he has
done enough to deserve the love and admiration of posterity; his
works possess the highest and rarest of merits -that of complete
originality both of matter and of form; his view of life is generous,
elevating, genial; he sympathises with what is good and noble in all
classes and conditions alike; he makes us love our kind, he makes
as love the exercise of the huumbler and more modest virtues, he
chronicles the minor accidents and impressions of life; his writings,
though describing the manners of the poorest and lowest classes of
mankind, contain nothing which can shock the most fastidious taste;
and the only things he has held up to ridicule or detestation are
vice, hypocrisy, or the pretensions of imbecile vulgarity.  He is an
author of whom England may be proud.
The immense colonial possessions of Great Britain, and particularly her colossal empire in the East, combined with the passion for
travelling so strongly manifested in the nation, have created in our
literature a class of works which may be considered as forming
almost a separate department of fiction.  These are novels which
have for their aim the delineation of the manners, scenery, &c., of
distant countries; and as among these works the Oriental are
naturally the most splendid and prominent, we shall take three which
seem the most favourable specimens of this subdivision.  They are
different from  each other in form, in tone, and in scope, but are
equally distinguished for their cleverness and, individuality. Of these
Oriental novels, then, we select, as the most striking examples,' The
History of the Caliph Vathek,' by Beckford; the romance of' Anastasius,' by Hope; and the inimitable' Hajji Baba' of Mloiier.  The
first of these fictions was as wild, strange, and dreamily magnificent,
as the character and biography of its author-a man almost as rich, as
splendidly luxurious, and as coldly meditative as the Comte de
Montecristo, in Dumas' popular story.'Vathek' is an Arabian tale,
and was originally published in 1784, in French, being one of the
rare instances of an Englishman being able to write that difficult
language with the grace and purity of a native.  Being afterwards
translated by the author into his mother tongue, it forms one of the




C HAP. XIX.]       NOVELS OF FOREIGN LIFE.                   393
most extraordinary monuments of splendid imagery and caustic wit
which literature can afford.  It is very short, and in some respects
resembles (at least in its cold sarcasm of tone and exquisite refine..
ment of style) the' Zadig' of Voltaire.  But' Vathek' is immeasurably superior in point of imagination, and in its singular fidelity to
the Oriental colouring and costume.  Indeed, if we set aside its
contemptuous and sneering tone, it might pass for a translation of
one of'The Thousand and one Nights.' It narrates the adventures
of a haughty and effeminate monarch, led on, by the temptations of
a malignant genie and the sophistries of a cruel and ambitious
mother, to commit all sorts of crimes, to abjure his faith, and to
offer allegiance to Eblis, the Mahommedan Satan, in the hope of
seating himself on the throne of the Preadatmite sultans.  The
gradual development in his mind of sensuality, cruelty, atheism, and
insane and Titanic ambition, is very finely traced; the imagery
throughout is truly splendid, its Eastern gorgeousness tempered and
relieved by the sneering sarcastic irony of a French Encyclpediste;
and the concluding scene soars into the highest atmosphere of grand
descriptive poety.  Here he descends into the subterranean palace
of Eblis, where he does homage to the Evil One, and wanders for a
while among the superhuman splendours of those regions of punish
ment. The fancy of genius has seldom conceived anything more
terrible than " the vast multitude, incessantly passing, who severally
kept their right hands on their heart, without once regarding any.
thing around them. They all avoided each other, and, though surrounded by a multitude that no one could number, each wandered
at random, unheedful of the rest, as if alone on a desert where no
foot had trodden."
Hope, like Beekford, was a man of refined taste, luxurious habits,
and possessed of a colossal fortune accumulated in commerce.  His
work, though very different in form from that of Beckford, was not
unlike it in some points.'Anastasius,' published in 1819, purports
to be the autobiography of a Greek, who, to escape the consequences
of his own crimes and villanies of every kind, becomes a renegade,
and passes through a long series of the most extraordinary and
romantic vicissitudes. The hero is a compound of almost all the
viwcws of his unfortunate and degraded nation; and in his vicissitudes
of fortune we see passing before us, as in a diorama, the whole
social, political, and religious life of Turkey and the Morea.  The
style is elaborate and passionate; and this, as well as the character
of the principal personage,
" Link'd with one virtue, and a thousand crimes,
reminds us, in reading'Anastasius,' very strongly of the manner ot
Lord Byron. Indeed, this romance is very much what Byron
would have written in prose-the same splendid, vivid, and ever,




89-4         OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. XIX.
fresh pictures of the external nature of the most beautiful and interesting region of the world, the same intensity of passion, the same
gloomy colouring of unrepenting crime.
But if the darker side of Oriental nature be presented to us in
Vathek' and'Anastasius,' in the former combined with the caustic
irony of Voltaire, in the second with the mournful grandeur of
Byron, the' Hajji Baba' of Morier will make us ample amends in
drollery and a truly comic verve. This is the' Gil Blas' of Oriental
life.  hajji Baba is a barber of Ispahan, who passes through a long
but delightfully varied series of adventures, such as happen in the
despotic and simple governments of the East, where the pipe-bearer
of one day may become the vizier of the next. The hero is an
easy, merry good-for-nothing, whose dexterity and gaiety it is impossible not to admire, even while we rejoice in the punishment which
his manifold rascalities drawn down upon him; and perhaps there is
no work in the world which gives so vast, so lively, and so accurate
a picture of every grade, every phase of Oriental existence.  Mr.
Morier, who resided nearly all his life in various parts of the East,
and whose long sojourn as British minister in Persia made him profoundly acquainted with the character of the people of that country,
has most inimitably sustained his imaginary personage.  The Hajji
is not only a thorough Oriental, but intensely Persian, and a Persian
of the lower class into the bargain; a perfect specimen of his nation
- the French of the East —gay, talkative, dexterous, vain, enterprising, acute,'not over scrupulous, but always amusing. The
worthy Hajji, in the continuation of the story, comes to England in
the suite of an embassy from "the asylum of the universe;" and
perhaps nothing was ever more truly natural and comic than the way
in which he relates his impressions and adventures in this country,
his surprise at the condition of women among us, his admiration of
the "moonfaces," and, above all, his astonished wonder at the
"Coompany," the great enigma to all Orientals.
It now remains only to speak of one species of prose fiction-that
which has for its subject the manners and personages of marine or
military life. It may easily be conceived that, the former service
being most entwined with all the sympathies of the national heart,
the subdivision of marine novels should be the richest. The contrary
might be naturally expected in France; and in France we accordingly
find that though, particularly in modern times, numerous novelists
have endeavoured to put in a picturesque and attractive light the
manners and scenes of a sea-life, yet that it is the army which has
supplied popular literature-the novel, the chanson, and the vaude,
ville -with the types of character most identified with the national
feeling and predilection.  What the militaire is to the French
public, the sailor is to the English: in the songs of the people, on
their stage, in their favourite books, the "Jack Tar," the " old Aga.




CHAP. XIX.]    NAVAL AND MILITARY NOVELS.                     395
memnon" who followed Nelson to the Nile, is as perpetually recurring and indispensable a personage as the " vieux moustache," the
grogneur de la vieille garde," to the French.  And this is natural
enough.  Each country is peculiarly proud of that class to which it
owes its brightest and least disputable glory: as the Frenchman
naturally hugs himself in the idea that France is incontestably the
first military nation in the world, so the Englishman, no less naturally
is peculiarly vain of his country's naval achievements; not that in
either case the former at all forgets Jr undervalues the naval triumphs
of his flag, or the latter the military exploits of his; but simply
because France is not essentially maritime, and England is, and
therefore the natives of each attach themselves to that species of
glory which they consider the peculiar property of their nation.
At the head of our marine novelists stands Captain Marryat, one
of the most easy, lively, and truly humorous story-tellers we possess.
One of the chief elements of his talent is undoubtedly the tone of
high, effervescent, irrepressible animal spirits which characterises
everything he has written.  He seems as if he sate down to compose
without having formed the least idea of what he is going to say, and
sentence after sentence seems to flow from his pen without thought,
without labour, and without hesitation.  He seems half tipsy with
the very gaiety of his heart, and never scruples to introduce the
most grotesque extravagances of character, language, and event,
provided they are likely to excite a laugh.  This would produce
absurdity and failure as often as laughter, were it not that he has a
natural tact and judgment in the ludicrous; and this happy audacity
— this hit-or-miss boldness —serves him admirably well.  Nothing
can surpass the liveliness and drollery of his' Peter Simple,''Jacob
Faithful,' or' Mr. Midshipman Easy;' what an inexhaustible gallery
of originals has he paraded before us!  The English  national
temperament has a peculiar tendency to produce eccentricity of
manner, and a sea-life in particular seems calculated to foster these
oddities till they burst into full blow and luxuriance.  Marryat's
narratives are exceedingly inartificial, and often grossly improbable;
but we read on with gay delight, never thinking of the story, but
only solicitous to follow the droll adventures, and laugh at the still
droller characters. Smollett himself has nothing richer than Captain
Kearney, with his lies and innocent ostentation; Captain To, with
his passion for pig, his lean wife and her piano; or than Mr. Easy
fighting his ship under a green petticoat for want of an ensign. This
author has also a peculiar talent for the delineation of boyish
characters: his Faithful and Peter Simple (the " fool of the family")
n lt only amuse but interest us; and in many passages he has shown
no mear? mastery over the pathetic emotions.  Though superficial in
his view of character, he is generally faithful to reality, and shows
an extensive if not very deep knowledge of what his old waterman
33




~39O         OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CHAP. XIX.
calls "human natur."  There are few authors more amusing thau
Mlarryat; his books have the effervescence of champagne.
Captains Glasscock and Chamier, Mr. Howard and Mr. Trelawney,
have also produced naval fictions of merit; the two last authors have
followed a more tragic path than the others mentioned above, and
have written passages of great powersand impressiveness; but their
works are injured by a too frequent occurrence of exaggerated
pictures of blood and horror — a fatal fault, from which they might
have been warned by the example of Eugene Sue.
The tales called'Tom  Cringle's Log' and'The Cruiz9 of the
Midge' are also works in this kind (though not exclusively naval)
of striking brilliancy and imaginative power.  In these we have a
most gorgeously coloured and faithful delineation of the luxuriant
scenery of the West Indian Archipelago, and the manners of the
creole and colonist population are reproduced with consummate
drollery and inexhaustible splendour of language.  They were the
production of Mr. Scott, a gentleman engaged in commerce, and
personally familiar with the scenes he described; and the admiration
they excited at their first appearance (anonymously) in' Blackwood's
Magazine' caused them to be ascribed to the pen of some of the
most distinguished of living writers, particularly to that of John
Wilson, the editor of the journal.
Of the military novels we have but a few words to say: they are
generally inferior to the same class of works in France.  Mr. Gleig
has recorded in a narrative form many striking episodes of that " war
of giants" whose most glorious and terrific scenes were the lines of
Torres Vedras, the storm of Badajoz, and the field of Waterloo; and
a number of younger authors, chiefly Irishmen, as Messrs. Lever
and Lover, have detailed with their national vivacity the grotesque
oddities and gay bravery of their countrymen, who never appear to
so INuch advantage as on the field of battle.




CHAP. XX.]           COMEDY IN ENGLAND.                      397
CHAPTER XX.
THE  STAGE AND  JOURNALISM.
Comedy in England-Congreve. Farquhar, &c.-Sheridan —The Modern
Romantic Drama-Oratory in Enrgland: Burke-Letters of Junius —Modern
Theologians: Paley and Butler —Blackstone-Adam  Smith —Metaphysics:
Stewart - Bentham - Periodicals: the Newspaper, the Magazine, and the
Review- -The Quarterly, and Blackwood - The Edinburgh, and the New
Monthly-The Westminster-Cheap Periodical Literature.
COMEDY is essentially the expression not of Life, but of Society.
It does not deal with the passions, but with the affectations and
follies of our nature: it belongs, therefore, particularly to a highly
civilized and artificial state of existence. Many of Shakspeare's most
humorous creations are comic in the highest degree, but they are not
in any sense comedies: they are something infinitely more elevated,
more profound, more far-reaching; but they are not comedies. Exquisitely humorous as they are, the humor is not in them the primary
element, the unmixed subject-matter of these inimitable delineations;
it is united with tenderness, romantic passion, exhaustless poetic fancy;
and therefore we call them Plays. Indeed, it may almost be maintained
that humour is not the true element of comedy at all —that is, of
comedy properly so named.  Wit is the essence, the life-blood of
comedy, and wit is as different from humour as from  tragic passion.'Wit is the negative, the destructive process — humour the positive,
the reconstructive.  Wit is an analytic, humour a synthetic operation. The latter indeed is so demonstrably a higher power of the
mind, that it includes.the formner, but with the addition of something
more, and something, too, infinitely higher in its source and nature.
The humorist must possess wit; but he must also possess tenderness,
sympathy, love.  In the language of algebra we may formulise it
thus: wit + sympathy = humour. And in proportion as the affections are an endowment of our nature far more elevated than the
mere activity of our comparative or perceptive faculties (in the
unusual delicacy and sensibility of which consists that power we call
wit), in exactly the same measure is humour superior to wit.  We
may be proud to remember that humour is the distinguishing feature
of the English national intellect, and the peculiar stamp of individuality
which marks our literature.  This circumstance alone would suffice
to account for the undeniable superiority of our national literature
over that of all other civilized countries, in every point- of depth,
of grandeur, of variety, of indestructible vitality.




i998         OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.    [CIIAP. XX,
This being granted, it will not be difficult to discover what are the
social conditions most necessary to the production of a brilliant school
of comedy in a given nation.  As the stage in general must ever be
the reflection of the life, the character, the colouring of the country
and epoch in which it appears, comedy must be the offspring of a
highly artificial, corrupt, and intellectual era. As its pabulum, its
ubject-matter, is folly, its aim being
" To feed with varied fools the eternal jest,"
it may be most certainly expected to flourish at a time when civilization hits not advanced so far as to obliterate those strong class-distinctions which sharply mark the professions, habits, language, and
manners of mankind, and at the same tinre when those elements are
upon the point of being mingled into one unvaried mass.  We can
have no pure comedy now, because the manners of all classes, like
their.dress, have come to be so uniform that there remains nothing
of conventional, of universally intelligible, sufficiently salient for the
comic dramatist to lay hold of.  The " frac noir"-the true equalized
power of the nineteenth century -has levelled all men, like death.
The follies, vanities, and eccentricities of course exist as much as
ever, but they have been thrown inward; and if we seek fer oddities
now, we shall find not classes but individuals, and, if faithfully
represented on the stage, they resemble not types familiar to every
spectator, but caricatures, often apparently extravagant.  The consequence of all this is, that we have no comedy, but we have a vaudeville-an excellent thing in its way, but very different from its predecessor. In England the reign of Charles II. was the period which
most completely satisfies the conditions we have just essayed to
establish, just as in France the reign of Louis XIV.  The firstmentioned epoch produced Congreve, Wycherley, and Farquhar; the
second Moliere and Regnard.  In the writings of the three great
English wits there is seldom any trace of humour, and therefore
nothing can be more different from  Shakspeare.  Wit is the reigning element, and witty dialogue perhaps was never so completely
exhibited as in these admirable comedies.  They are not natural in
an absolute, though highly so in a relative sense: they are nob true
to universal but to local nature; or rather we may say that the
nature of their day was an unnatural nature. They were written,
not for the court, nor for the people, in the true sense of the word,
but for the Town; and they are inimitable for intense vivacity of
sparkling dialogue, for the richest abundance of odd and extravagant
character, for ingenuity of plot (generally, however, a mechanical
ingenuity, arising rather from  disguises, mistakes of persons, and
errors of the senses, than from the play of passion, or the deceptions
m aused by vanity and self-love), and above all for an air of inexhaustible high spirits and gaiety.  In all these works the chief dccct is the




tr,. x. XX.]        COMENI)Y OF CHARLES II.                  399
shackimng tone of immorality which pervades them.  The characters
are nothing but an unvaried crowd of sharpers, seducers, prostitutes,
and butts: but it is fair to remark that in reading these dramas we
seem to lay aside all our stricter notions of moral duty: as Charles
Lamb acutely remarks, we seem to have got into a new world, where
the old-fashioned distinctions of right and wrong have no currency.
In point of art, their chief defect is allied to their principal merits:
it arises partly firom the restless and incessant sparkle of the dialogue,
which ever glitters with an unappeasable activity, like the blinding
ripple of a noonday sea; and, secondly, from the want of intellectual
distinction between the personages; for the fools, dupes, and coxcombs are quite as brilliant and smart in their repartees as the professed and ostensible wits of the piece.  Everything is epigram and
point; and though in many of these plays there are occasional
touches of nature exquisitely true, delicate, and poignant, and even
whole scenes which may serve as models of liveliness not inconsistent with probability, the general character of this school is certainly
unsolid, and absolutely wearying from excess of sparkle and epigram.
Assuredly no nation has produced anything in this artificial vein
finer and more complete than the comedies of'Love for Love,'  The
Way of the World,''The Man of Mode,''The Country Wife,'
iThe Confederacy,' and' The Provoked Wife.'  The popularity of
these works was enormous: comedies and pamphlets formed nearly
the slum total of the lighter literature of that age; and though, not
having their foundation in the deeper recesses of the human heart,
they are now comparatively neglected, no man can have a true idea
of the perfections of our noble language who has not made acquaintance with this class of writers.  What Hazlitt says of Congreve is
generally applicable to all the rest: "His style is inimitable, nay,
perfect. It is the highest model of comic dialogue. Every sentence
is replete with sense and satire, conveyed in the most polished
and pointed terms.  Every page presents a shower of brilliant conceits, is a tissue of epigrams in prose, is a new triumph of wit, a
new conquest over dulness.  The fire of artful raillery is nowhere
else so well kept up. This style, which he was almost the first to
introduce, and which he carried to the utmost pitch of classical
refincment, reminds one exactly of Collins's description of wit ats
Opposed to humour,-'Whose jewels in his crisped hair
Are placed each other's light to share.'"
The first of this remarkable class was Etherege, and the last
Farquhar; though Sheridan (after a long interval, during which the
comic stage had obtained a quite different direction) seems to have
revived it for a moment in all its brilliancy.  The chronology of the
principal names among them was as follows: Sir George Etherege,
born in 1636, died in 1683'; his best comedy'The MIan of Mode.'
33 *




400          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.    LCIIAP. XX
WVycherley, the author of'The Plain Dealer,' a comedy somewhat
resembling'The M3isanthrope' and'The Country Wife,' which may
be advantageously compared with'L'Ecole des Femmes,' born in
1640, died in 1715.  Congreve, the greatest of them all, celebrated
not only as a comic dramatist, but as the author of'The Mourning
Bride,' a tragedy in the dry classical French taste, but a work of
great merit, 1670 —1729: his finest comedies are'Love for Love,''The Old Bachelor,' and' The Double Dealer.' Sir John Vanbrugh
(1672-1726) comes next, a great architect as well as a dramatic
artist, for he designed Blenheim. His plays are of a somewhat coarser
texture than those of Congreve, but superior in a certain rich and
genial glow: his master-pieces are'The Relapse,''The Provoked
Wife,''The Confederacy,' and he left unfinished the admirable
fragment afterwards completed by Cibber under the title of'The
Provoked Husband.' The last of these authors was Farquhar, born
in 1678, and who died at the early age of 29.  His best-known
comedies are'The Constant Couple,''The Beaux' Stratagem,' and'The Recruiting Officer,' all of which, though sufficiently immoral,
exhibit less of that cool heartless depravity which marks the productions of this class.
By one of those revolutions of taste -regular as the seasons, or
as the oscillations of the tide in the physical world —which takes
place in literature generally and in every department of literature in
particular, comedy in England acquired, after the brilliant period of
which we have been speaking, a direction towards sentimenztalism.
The writings of Sterne very much contributed to this tendency, and
Colman, Cumberland, and most of the modern writers for the stage,
endeavoured to unite the pathetic and the broadly humorous.  This
class was begun by Steele; and these comedies have lost the peculiar
charm of gaiety, refined satire, and wit, without acquiring anything
in exchange: the moral and sentimental parts are mawkish, tedious,
and affected, and the laughable ones degenerate into gross farce and
caricature. But the true old comedy, the admirable English comedy
of Congreve and Wycherley, received a bright and momentary
resuscitation in the person of Sheridan.  This wonderful Irishman
-- as perfect an embodiment of the intellect of his country as his
biographer Moore - was one of the political and literary comets of
his day.  Without fixity of purpose, without learning, without any
of that political influence (the most important of all in a constitutional country like England) which arises from personal and moral
respectability, he obtained as a parliamentary orator a brilliant
though useless reputation in that age of giants when the eloquence
of Chatham was yet ringing in the national ear, giving animation to
the struggles of Pitt and Fox.  As a dramlatic author, Sheridan proI
duced three works which will ever be considered master-pieces in
their different styles —the two comedies entitled'The School for




CHAP. XX.]            COMEDY: SHERIDAN. -                     401
Scandal' and'The IRivals,' and the inimitable dramatic caricatu: 
of' The Critic.'  The first of these is a regular comedy of intrigue,
the persons all of the upper ranks of life: the dialogue is one incessant sparkle of the finest and most polished repartee; and though
the moral of the piece-the unmasking of a coldhearted hypocrite
and pretender to virtue, and the forgiveness'of his brother, a gay
goodnatured rake- is not established but at the expense of some
dangerous sophistries, and the confounding of virtue with hypocrisy,
and the excusing of vice by the plea of generosity, this comedy is
one of the triumphs of the English scene.  Many of the situations
are so exquisitely comic, though a large portion of the piece is passed
in talk which does not advance the action, the habit of scandal and
talebearing is so admirably ridiculed, and the tone of the whole is
so brilliant and refined, that it is equally delightful when read or
when acted.  It contains much profound satire on the corruptions
of society, as brilliantly expressed, though less animated by bitterness, as in the'Figaro' of Beaumarchais, to which work it bears
some little resemblance; but in point of exquisite finish of form, in
consummate elegance of manner, it is equal to Congreve himselfthe highest possible praise.  The other comedy we have mentioned' The Rivals'-depicts adventures of a broader cast, and characters
less exclusively taken from  polished society.'The School for
Scandal' seldom excites more than a smile, while' The Rivals' keeps
the spectators in a broad laugh.  Nothing can be happier tbhan the
light but masterly sketches of character in this exquisite piece' the
self-willed, blustering Sir Anthony; the generous Irish fortunehunter; the sentimental novel-reading Lydia, who can see no happiness but in disguises, persecuted attachments, and elopeinents; the
inimitable Mrs. Malaprop, with her exquisitely good bad English;
and the never-to-be-forgotten Bob Acres.'The Critic' is one of that
numerous class of pieces which contains a double action-the scenes
between the author, his friends and critics, and the rehearsal of the
tragedy.  It is impossible to say which is the best or most witty
part of this comedy, the dialogue between Dangle, an empty-headed
theatrical busybody; Sneer, the very concentrated essence of critical
bitterness; Puff, the bold impudent literary quack; and Sir Fretful
Plagiary (a portrait of Cumberland), all alive with sore irritable
sensibility; or the admirable extravagance of the "tragedy in the
Shakspearian manner."
The subsequent history of the English stage is very soon related,
and not very exhilarating. In comedy the German sentimental
spirit to which we have alluded gradually gained ground: common
types of patriotism, generosity, vulgar burlesque, and yet more
vulgar elegance, have been reproduced usque ad nauseam.  We
have been sickened with never-failing tirades about the moral dignity
of the British merchant, the noble virtue of the British farmer, and




402           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.    [CHAP. XX,
the valour of the British soldier and sailor, who is always represented,
in order to " tickle the ears of the groundlings" as able to thrash
three Frenchmen,-and all this in a style as vulgar and conventional
as the ideas.  Nevertheless, it would be unjust to suppose that there
alre not many scenes, and even some characters, in the plays of
Cumberland, Colran Reynolds, &c., exhibiting a power to do better
things: but the general tendency of comic drama with us, as in
F rance, has been towards the vaudeville - with this difference, that
the vaudeville is essentially and peculiarly a French creation, and
therefore a valuable type of French art; whereas in England it is
either servilely copied or coarsely caricatured fiom  that charming
production of the French theatre.
The most intensely national type of the English drama is the
romantic drama-the school of Shakspeare.  It may easily be conceived that some attempts should have been made to revive so
adlmirable and national a mode of composition.  Perhaps these
ussays form the only sound, healthy, and at all promising class of
modern theatrical writing; but even this class has a forced and hotlned air, and is kept alive rather by the taste of a few than by the
eager sympathy of the public generally. These works are imitative,
and, however beautiful they sometimes may be, they confer pleasure
rather by recalling to us those forms of literature which we look
back upon with the greatest pride and veneration, than by their
unassisted merits.  The romantic plays of Miss Baillie, and particularly of Sheridan  Knowles (the most successful of our. modern
dramatists), are always interesting, and in some passages even excellent; but their invariable adoption of the Elizabethan diction not
only produces a painful impression of the writer being afraid to
trust purely to his own unassisted powers of poetry and passion, but
carries also with it an air of sham, of mimicry — a confounding of
the accident with the substance. Admirable as is the diction of that
wonderful epoch, the diction is not the essential thing: at all events,
it was the natural style of that day, only elevated, of course, and
glorified by genius; whereas now an imitation of it must ever wear
a pitiable air of factitiousness and affectation. Many of Miss Baillie's
Plays on the Passions,' Knowles's' Hunchback,'  Vife,''Virginius,'
atnd others, might be cited with great praise, but with an expression
of just regret that they should be so injured by the patchwork air
of their diction, in which modern words and ideas jar so strangely
with the tone of that glorious, easy, fanciful dialogue, so hallowed
in our memory. Two or three men of an original and independent
way of thinking have written dramas (designed rather for reading
than representation) in which this defect has been "reformed," as
the player says in' Hamlet,' " indifferent well."  Mr. Talfourd has
composed several pieces in which, though the style is a little too
perceptibly modelled upon that of Ford and Beaumont and Fletcher,




CHAP. XX.]                  ORATORY.                          403
this air of imitation is compensated for by the pure elegance of
design, and the simple, direct, elevated pathos, and something too of
an ideal severity reflected from the Greek dramatists.  His tragedy
of'Ion' is, indeed, a refined and elevated work, of consummate
finish in its parts, and breathing the lofty tenderness and all-embracing humanity of sentiment which characterises the philosophic
poetry of Wordsworth.  Henry Taylor has essayed, and with no
mean success, to revive, in a dramatic form, the picturesque and
stormy life of the fourteenth  century, in his noble work on the
subject of'Philip van Artevelde,' the brewer-king of Ghent.  The
picture (a vast and animated one).of the struggle between the
infant liberties of the burgess class in Flanders and the oppressive
and haughty feudalism, is delineated with no ordinary power; and
the central figure of this vast panorama is a grand and idea[ conception, whose chief fault is its want of accordance with the conceivable
existence of such a character in so rude and fierce an age.  But' Artevelde' is not a drama, but a dramatic poem-full of power and
beauty, it is true, but totally incapable of representation; and though'Ion' is interesting and successful on the stage, it is by no means a
work addressed (as every real drama must infallibly be) to the tastes,
sympathies, and comprehension of the multitude.
Political disquisition, whether spoken or written, has in England
a very striking peculiarity of tone: it differs from the mode of discussion adopted in other countries at least as markedly as the popular
and national character of Great Britain differs from that of any
civii;zed state in ancient or modern history.  The German dreams
of everything, the Frenchman talks of everything, the Englishman?reasonls of everything.  The Frenchman acts often without thinkin-. the German is too occupied with his theories either to reason or
to act, the Englishman thinks deliberately and acts decidedly.  In
France we find in general strong attachment to what is so exp:-essly
designated by the English term "claptrap." There is no country
which has so long retained a taste for those worn-out topics of schoolboy declamation, that shallow classicism of allusion, which swells
the period with the names of Brutus, of Aristides, and of Themis.
tocles-none where the threadbare pedantry of personification and
prosopopoeia has become so engi:tined, as it were, into the national
style.  This was of course a consequence of the Revolution of 1789,
a period of carnival masquing, when
"L ars, Bacchus, Apollo, virorum,"
danced through speeches, pamphlets, and proclamations, "in all the
mazes of metaphorical confusion."  English public speaking, at the
bar or in parliament, is eminently and essentially practical; and a
British audience, whether in a public mneetingf, in the Houses af lords
and Commons, or a jury in a court of justice, while it will listen




4C; t          OETLTES OF GENETIAL LITERATURtE.   [CIAP. XX.
with patiennce to a cogent and practical reasoninfg, however inelegantly
expressed, thas no imercy upon mlere flowery rhetoric or vain general
declaImation.  Nothing is mlore fatal to eloquence, in its higliest
sernse than thle air of being eloquent; and tihe object of all public
speaking and writing being solely and simply to convince or persuade,
it is self-evident that that orator or writer mnust be the best who
produces the  greatest practical result.   The Greeks thoroughly
understood this, as the English have done; and there is, consequently,
in the oratory of both nations a singular resemblance in point of
tdiretness, mulscularitly  of expression, and  practical application.
The speeches of Chatham, Pitt, Fox, and WTyndham are perhaps the
finest monuments of our parliamentary  eloquence, and  those of
Erskine of forensic oratory; and when in reading them, imperfectly
reported as they often are, we are sometimes at a loss to explain the
fact how they could have produced such effect as they really did, we
forget that tile very simplicity and absence of parade, which strikes
us as meagre and colourless, must have been, at the time when they
were delivered, a main source of their resistless power.  In general
it will be found that those speeches which read best are by no means
those which were most effective when spoken.  Our forensic oratory
is generally marked by a singular sobriety and a careful exclusion of
all rapturous and rhetorical enthusiasm; aund therefore the pathetic
passages, so rarely and sparingly introduced, have all the power over
our sympathies derivable  fromn  the  impressiveness of  subdued,
restrained, involuntary passion.  Chatham, Pitt, and Fox, imneasurably superior as they were, as parliamentary speakers, to their illustrious contemporary, Edmund Burke, were undoubtedly inferior to
him  in vastness of mind and in grandeur of genius; and yet the
latter was seldom  listened to with even moderate patience in the
House of Commons: and the reason'is, that the former were consumlate debaters, practical speakers; while the latter was tle eloquent expounder of a philosophy too ethereal, too abstract, too sublime, for that practical and common sense atmosphere.  As a political
theorist, as a speculator on the history, character, and tendency of
the British  constitution, as the analyser of its principles, as the
historian of its past and the prophet of its filture, IBurke occupies a
place in the political and literary history of England which is quite
peculiar.  I-is speeches and pamphlets on the destinies of the first
French ilevolution, and of the then infant liberties of the Unit-ed
States, are perhaps as wonderful fori their sagacity, their penetration,
and for that intensity of predictive po-wer —
"the vision and the faculty divine"as th!ey are admirifable for the splendid eloquence ofn tlieii expression.
Trhey -will form for ever the favorite models of style to the student
nf historical literature, to the orator; to the thinker; and are aimong




CITAP. XX.]              THIEOLOGI I.NS.                     405
the most signal examples of that power by which, under the magic
influence of Genius,
"Old Experience doth attain
To something like prophetic strain."
But the most remarkable figure in the political drama of this
period is that mysterious personage, the "Iron Mask" of modern
history, the admirable writer who launched his fierce diatribes undei
the name of " Junius."  The authorship of these letters is one of
the few enigmas which time and investigation have not perfectly
solved. Internal and circumstantial evidence points so clearly to
Sir Philip Francis as the writer of these compositions, that moral
certainty is undoubtedly arrived at.  Perhaps the literature of no
country in the world can offer a finer example of intense, unscrupulous, yet always elegant and dignified invective.  Every sentence is
weighty with meaning, and pointed with the sharpest and most
polished sarcasm; and the air of honest indignant patriotism, which
the author has so studiously and carefully preserved, makes us forget,
as we read, the atrocious venom of party-spirit, and he unjustifiable
attacks on private character, which abound throughout this able but
flagitious collection of letters.
We have devoted a short chapter to those great divines whose
eloquence and learning have made them the fathers of the Anglican
church; who are our Chrysostoms and Angustines, or rather our
F6ndelons, Pascals, and Bossuets.  The epoch which we are now
treating was fertile in illustrious men, whose writings, consecrated,
like those of Barrow, Taylor, South, and Fuller, to the service of
Protestantism, were marked with differences proportioned to the age
in which they wrote. They are not rich treasuries of faith, eloquence,
enthusiasm, and boundless erudition-they are demonstrations of
evidence, and answers to objections; they are not the production of
the imagination, but of the reason.  Among these writers the
names of Paley and Butler are the most prominent.  The former,
in an extensive cycle of works, has investigated, first, the grounds and
principles of moral philosophy generally, he has then advanced to the
great outlines of morality and government, thence to the consideration,
of the probabilities for and against the truth of the Christian history,
land lastly he has given us a detailed examination of the writings of
St. Paul.  In these works, the' Moral Philosophy,' the'Evidences
of Christianity' (chiefly intended as a refutation of Hume's plausible
objections to the truth of the evangelic history), and the'Horae
Paulinoe,' we remark an acuteness of reasoning which has rarely
been equalled, combined with a style so easy, familiar, and natural,
that we are sometimes blinded to the sophistry which the author's
inimitable air of bonhommie and good faith is occasionally employed
to mask.  His theory of moral sentiment is based upon the doctrine
of self-interest; a doctrine to which, however reluctantly, all spec



406           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CHAP. XX.
lators must sooner or later recur: and in his'Natural Theology,'
when he traces, through the whole creation, and particularly in the
constitution of organized bodies, the proofs of a presiding wisdom,
benevolence, and power in the Creator, it is impossible not to admire
the extent of his knowledge of nature (particularly of physiology),
the familiar appropriateness of the illustrations he selects, and above
all the complete absence of all pedantry and scientific terminology.
Butler, Bishop of Lichfield (who was born in 1692 and died in
1752), confined himself to the investigation of the degree of anteriorl
probability which would lead us to assign to such a revelation as that
of Christianity such a character as we find it to possess.  Given the
phenomenon of a natural religion, he demands what might be
expected to be the moral character of a revelation from the nature
of the case; and he shows it to coincide exactly with the revelation
which we do possess.  This great work is entitled' The Analogy of
Natural and Revealed Religion;' and is one of the finest examples
which literature can produce of close, clear, candid, and almost
mathematical demonstration.  Of course Butler's work treats only
of the preliminary probabilities of the question; and does not enter
into the examination, on historical, critical, and philological grounds,
of that mass of evidence which the New Testament contains, and
which forms the basis of our belief in the facts of the Christian
miracles. That task is executed partly by Paley, and partly by that
vast cloud of commentators, such as Clarke, Prideaux, Lardner, &c.,
whose learning, industry, and candour do such honour to the reformed
church of England.
Though perhaps they may be considered as scarcely entering into
the plan of our work, we think it our duty not to omit altogether
the names of Blackstone, Adam  Smith, Stewart, and Bentham;
Blackstone having been the first to treat in a popular and untechnical
manner of the history and nature of the laws of England; Smith,
the first systematic investigator of the science of political economy;
Stewart, the most distinguished of modern British metaphysicians;
and Bentham, the profound searcher into the theory of government
and legislation.
Judge Blackstone was the first of our lawyers who possessed a
sufficiently strong tincture' of letters to be able to give an elegant
and readable epitome of the history of English law, rejecting the
dry and repulsive technicality which characterises the profound and
admirable Institutes of our great legists, Coke, Fortescue, Littleton,
and Selden.  The enormous mass of information buried, far out of
the reach of any but the unwearied professional student, in the
ponderous tomes of our old judges and reporters, Blackstone prebented, in 1765, in- a form elegant, accessible, and interesting: and
when we reflect upon the vastness and complication of our legislative.and executive system, and the thousand elements, Roman, medireval,




CHAP. &X.1  STEWART —V-ENTHAM —ADA.M SMITH.                 407
municipal, feudal and parliamentary, which combine to formn that
wonderful compound, the British constitution, it is impossible to
express too warmly the gratitude which not only every Englishman,
but every civilized man, should feel towards Blackstone for having
placed, in an intelligible and accessible form, the history of what can
never be devoid either of philosophical interest, or influence upon
the destinies of human liberty.
A lam Smith's famous' Wealth of Nations' was the first attempt
towards laying down, on a great scale, the principles of political
economy.  He was the first to demonstrate the fundamental axioms
of commerce, manufactures, and the division of labour.  This great
work has been justly reproached with want of systematic order and
completeness of arrangement: but it is distinguished for the soundness of its views in many points exceedingly important in themselves,
and which, before Smith's time, had never been satisfactorily investigated: as, for example, the division of labour, the theory of rent,
and the principles of advantageous international commerce.  It is,
also, admirable for the singular clearness and appropriateness of the
illustrations employed to exemplify the various parts of the argument; and though more recent labourers in the great field of statisties and political economy-such as Malthus, Ricardo, Mill, Senior,
MacCulloch-have profitably cultivated many portions of the field,
fSmith deserves the credit of having first broken up the surface, and
shown the extent and fertility of the ground.
In metaphysical science it is, we fear, incontrovertible that Great
Britain is less distinguished than in most other branches of human
knowledge; at least that she is incontestably inferior to Germany.
It is singular enough that metaphysics have been more cultivated in
Scotland than in England-nay, that the Scottish intellect appears
to possess a peculiar tendency and aptitude to this kind of disquisition.  In the present age, at least, it is Edinburgh which has produced the most distinguished of the metaphysicians of Great Britain;
though Scotland has no names to show in any degree comparable, we
will not say to Leibnitz and Kant, but even to Fichte, Schelling, or
IJegel.  Perhaps it will not be unjust to take Dugald Stewart as the
miost marked name among our modern school of metaphysicians-at
Ieast since the date of Chillinigworth, Hobbes, Locke, and Berineley.
There remains another and most important branch of knowledge. —onlr the more important from its very difficulty, which has deter led
ymen of adequate powers from concentrating upon it their systematic
attention.  This is the science of legislation, and the theory  of
reward] and punishment. Jeremy Bentham was undoubtedly the
first among us to enter upon this new and unexplored career.  The
eccentricity of his manners, his simple and unworldly enthusiasm,
the boldness and novelty of his theories, —all this, combined with
the odlity or his style, the grotesque pedantry of his language, the
34




108,        OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. XX.
strange uncouth terminology which he thought it necessary to invent
for his science, and, above all, the repulsive dryness and complexity
of a multitude of definitions, limitations, divisions, and subdivisions,
-all these things tended to blind his countrymen to the importance
of his political and juridicial theories and reasonings. England is
eminently the country of the practical; and the most fatal character
which a philosophical investigator can acquire is that of a visionary
or an enthusiast. Bentham's writings were distinguished by so
much novelty in the matter, and such fantastic oddity in the manncr,
that they were received by the general public of England with considerable distrust, and even hostility; and his reputation, now
deservedly high and every day rising still higher, has met with very
curious vicissitudes.  His theories, having gradually obtained a
great reputation on the Continent, and particularly.in France, have
been divested of the strange and repulsive peculiarities of their
author's manner, and have come back to us embodied in clear and
philosophical language.  Thus Bentham's fame had made the toui
of Europe before it was firmly established in the country of its
birth.  His deductions are often made with almost geometrical
severity: and if men were pieces of mechanism, and subject to no
disturbances in their conduct from causes too capricious and irregular
to be appreciated by science, his principles would be not only applicable, but would produce the effect which he hoped would result
fiom them, in the annihilation of crime, poverty, and oppression.
But we do not calculate so logically as Bentham supposes; and the
greater part of our actions are dictated, in the first instance, not by
pure reason, or a balancing of the good and evil that will accrue
from a particular line of conduct in given circumstances, but rather
by passion, prejudice, or an indistinct interest, which we afterwards
endeavour to harmonise with the deductions of moral logic.  Benltham's life was very long, active, and benevolent: he was born in
1748, and lived to the great age of ninety-four. The'Popular
Fallacies,' the'Essay on Codification,' the'Defence of Usury,' are
deservedly held to be monuments of admirably-combined industry,
acuteness, and originality.
Journalism-that remarkable and distinctive feature of modern
literature-has been cultivated in England with all the activity that
might have been predicted from the general intelligence and civiliza.
tion of the country, from the perfect freedom of discussion which
our nation has so long enjoyed, and also from the popular nature of
our government, which gives every citizen a strong personal interest
in all political questions.  Our journals, of every kind, have been
generally distinguished from those of other countries by two or thre6
striking peculiarities.  Till recently, every journal, whether newspaper, magazine, or review, was perfectly miscellaneous in its con
tents, discussing political questions, giving criticisms on books ox




CHAP. XX.]                JOURNALISM.                         409
works of art, reporting the progress of science,- in short, reflecting
the multiform interests of society.  Our journals were, indeed, what
Hamlet tells us actors are-" the abstract and brief chronicles of the
time."  This was owing in some measure to the expense of books
and publications in England, which has always been enormous as
compared with other countries, and which rendered it impossible for
ordinary readers to subscribe to many periodicals; so that each was
obliged to be in some measure encyclopedic. But as the field of
curiosity has enlarged, special journals, each devoted to some particular class of information, have become more numerous, and naturally at the same time much cheaper. Another peculiarity of English
journalism is the strict incognito which it has always been the fashion
for the contributors to preserve.  This proceeds, perhaps, from the
reserve of the English character; or from the fear of personal interest;ntcrfering with the impartiality of the writer: and all the attempts
that have been made (with what possible hope of advantage is not
4uito clear) to introduce among us the practice, so universal in France
and Germany, of the writer signing his name at the foot of his composition, have been uniformly unsuccessful. This itneorgnito, however,
applies only to criticism and political disquisition; for the writers
who contribute poetry and fiction to our journals do not think it
necessary to preserve their incognito.
By the word NJ\ewspaper we understand, in England, a gazette of
politics, general information, and advertisements, appearing in a
sheet or sheets at intervals, in general not greater than a week. The
JMagazine (a term peculiar to England) is a miscellaneous periodical,
published for the most part monthly, containing original disquisitions,
prose fiction, or poetry, and generally of an amusing and varied
character. The Review is a publication of a much more grave and
ambitious cast: it contains no admixture of original narrative or
poetical matter, but is a series of essays, or articles, ostensibly criticisms of the works whose titles are placed at the head of the disquisition. But these articles are by no means, necessarily, mere critiques
of the works apropos of which they purport to be written. The
latter are frequently quite insignificant in themselves; but are taken
merely as the peg upon which is hung a general, and often admirablywritten, disquisition on the subject in question.
The history of journalism in England coincides, in the date of its
origin, in its general characteristics and vicissitudes, and in the causes
which have contributed, at particular periods, to advance or retard
its development, with the annals of this important branch of activity
in other countries of Europe.  All the great political parties have
their special organs in the periodical press; and perhaps the best
way of giving an idea of this kind of writing in England will be by
classing the most eminent and popular journals under the respective
oCinions advocated in their pages.  In a constitutional government,




4 LO[0       OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.    [CHAP. RX.
C.omposed, like that of England, of three distinct elements, there
will naturally be three principal shades of party feeling;-the Tories.
or advocates for the status in quo of the constitution, who dread thle
encroachments of popular opinion, and are enthusiastic maintainers
of monarchism and aristocracy-Conservatives, in short. The chief
organs of this powerful, wealthy, and intelligent party (which, however, is generally deficient in activity, and acts mainly by its weight
— its vis inertice) are, among the reviews,'The Quarterly,' and,
among the magazines,'Blackwood's' and'Fraser's.' The first-mentioned work is undoubtedly one of great influence and importance;
the contributions are admirably written, and are generally by the
most distinguished men of the day. This journal was established at
the very agitated period'of 1809, to counteract the danger of those
liberal opinions which were at that time almost menacing the integrity of the Constitution; and it was for a long time conducted by
William  Gifford, the translator of Juvenal, and the author of the'Baviad' and' Maeviad,' two of the most bitter, powerful, and resistless literary satires which modern days have produced.  Gifford was
a self-taught man, who raised himself, by dint of almost superhuman
exertions and admirable integrity, to a high place among the literary
men of his age. Distinguished as a satirist, as a translator of sarires,
and as the editor of several of the illustrious but somewhat neglected
dramatists of the Elizabethan age, his writings, admirable for sincerity, good sense, and learning, were also strongly tinged with
bitterness and personality.  3Many other distinguished supporters of
Conservative doctrines were contributors to'The Quarterly,' — Croker; the witty, brilliant, sarcastic Canning; and, more recently,
Southey. This journal is at present conducted by Lockhart, WValter
Scott's son-in-law and literary executor.
Advocating the same doctrines, though in language less solemn
and dictatorial,' Blackwood's Magazine' must be considered as having
played, and as long likely to play, a very prominent part.  It is
exceedingly miscellaneous in its contents; and in its pages some of
the most distinguished writers of poetry and fiction have made their
debuts.'Blackwood' must be held to have done good service to
pure taste by the publication of a rich and masterly series of translations (chiefly by HIay, MIerivale, &c.) of the Greek epigrams-a very
peculiar and exquisite class of productions.  It was in'Blackwood,'
too, that Warren made his first appearance before the public, as the
anonymous author of the'Passages from the Diary of a late Plhysician' and the novel of'Ten Thousand a-Year.'  The sketches of
sea-life and West-Indian scenery, mentioned by us in a preceding
chapter with very high commendation, first appeared in this periodical
under the titles of'Tom  Cringle's Log' and'The Cruize c(f the
1Midge.' It would be tedious were we to attempt to enumerate all
the powerful, splendid, or humorous narratives, all the genial and




CHAP. xx.]    THE EDINBURGH-NEW  MONTHLY.                   411
eloquent political biographies (such as those of Pitt mn.d Earke),
or all the penetrating and animated reviews of books and systems,
which have appeared in' Blackwood' since its establishmenc in 1814.
We will only advert to a series of contributions so truly original in
form, and so happy in execution, that they may be considered as
constituting an absolute and peculiar species.  We allude to the
exquisitely humorous and eloquent'Noctes Ambrosianae,i a collection of imaginary conversations between the supposed editor and
contributors (real persons under fictitious and exaggerated masks),
in which all the topics of the day are passed in review with a singular
union of profound speculation, fervid eloquence, and the broadest
and most extravagant gaiety.  These are supposed to be chiefly the
composition of John Wilson, long the editor of the.journal, a man
of almost universal accomplishment, and celebrated as a moral
philosopher, as a poet, a critic, a publicist, a humorist, and a sportsman.  In his'Isle of Palms,' and'City of the Plague,' Wilson
shows himself to be a poet of no mean order, following the peculiar
school of Wordsworth: in his'Margaret Lyndsay,' and'Lights and
Shadows of Scottish Life,' he has given a beautiful and eloquent
picture of the peasant existence of his native country; and under
his character of " Christopher North" (his pseudonym as editor of
I Blackwood') he has performed the same office for the scenery'of
Scotland, as in the prose tales, just mentioned, he had done for the
joys and woes, the virtues and sufferings, of its inhabitants.
The second great subdivision of public opinion, or what may be
called the Constitutional Liberal party, is represented by'The
Edinburgh Review,' established in 1802 by a small party of young
men, obscure at that time, but ambitious and enterprising, who were
all destined to attain a high degree of distinction.'The Edinburgh'
founded its claim to success upon the boldness and vivacity of its
tone, its total rejection of all precedent and authority, and the
audacity with which it discussed questions previously held to be
" hedged in" with the "divinity" of prescription.'The Edinburgh'
was an absolute literary Fronde; and its founders —Brougham,
Jeffrey, Sidney Smith, Hallam, &c. —were soon convinced that they
had not erred in calculating upon an extraordinary degree of success.
The criticisms (many of which were retrospective, that is, discussing
the merits of past eras in the history and literature of England and
other countries) were marked by a singular boldness and pungency
and in contemporary and local subjects the'Review' exhibited
power and extent of view which made its appearance, in some
sense, an era in journalism. The critical articles are supposed to
have been chiefly contributed by Jeffrey, many by Scott (though the
total variance of his political sentiments with those advocated in the
work may make us more surprised that he should have contributed
at all than that he should have confined his labour. to merely
34 *




4.12          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CHAP. XX.
literary subjects), whilst Smith and Brougham, and more recently
AIacaulay, have united history, politics, and literature.  The latter
has produced many noble articles on these subjects (for example,
those on Machiavelli, on Cromwell, &c.), and Smith treated political
questions with a richness of comic humour, and irresistible dry
sarcasm, employed generally in exhaustive reasoning-in the reductio
-d absurdum —which is not only exquisitely amusing, but is full of
olid truth as well as pleasantry.
With reference to the Liberal party, (The New Monthly Magazine' occupied at one time a similar position to that which' Blackwood'
does in relation to the Tory opinions. This journal (the continuan
tion of one of the earliest of English periodicals) is exceedingly
inferior in general literary talent to any of those which we have
mentioned: it is pitched altogether in a lower key, both as regards
politics and belles-lettres; but at the same time it cannot be accused
of gross partiality and misrepresentation; a charge from wnich none
of the journals above described can be said to have been always free.
Its strength consists in the novels which have from time to time
appeared, in its pages, in the manner of the feuilletou, and in the
gay pleasantry which is generally to be found in its articles. It has
been conducted by a succession of distinguished humorists and
novel-writers -Theodore Hook, Thomas Campbell, CGpt. MIarryat,
and Thomas Hood-and contains a large mass of excellent fiction.
The two great parties of Tory and Whig, monarchical and popular,
which we have been speaking of, are strictly constitutional.  The
remaining one, the youngest in point of origin, but which is rapidly
gaining strength and consistency, by no means scruples to advocate
what are called organic changes in our form of government.  This
party-the ultra-liberal, the democratic, the Radical, as it has beear
nicknamed — is possessed rather of intelligence, restlessness, ald
ambition than, as yet at least, of influence or weight; but it has its
organ like its great rivals.  This is'The Westminster Review,' a
journal sustained with very considerable power and energy: but it is
rather in certain departments of antiquarian and artistic literature
that'The Westminster has created itself a section of admirers: the
educated classes in England sympathise too little with the doctrines
advocated in this journal for it to obtain a very general circulation.
The'Quarterly,''Edinburgh,' and' Westminster' (like the generality of reviews) appear every three months: the magazines, in
almost all cases, are monthly.
Besides these, there are of course innumerable publications of- a
local or special kind, devoted to the furtherance of some particular
interest or of some science of art. Thus theology, law, history,
medicine, physics and their separate branches, commerce, colonies,
agriculture, manufactures, and even the most apparently limited
sciences, geology, paleontology, numismatology, even railroads, mines




CHAP. XXI.] WORDSWO~SV H  AND THE LAKE SCHOOL               413
and the art of galvano-metallurgy, have each their separate journal
or journals.  Each art, each pursuit, each whim or amusement is
represented by some periodical, generally of merit and possessing a
considerable circulation.
But we have, also, a large and increasing mass of information
given to us in a variety of other periodical works, many of which
are sold at a price inconceivably small, if we consider the ordinary
costliness of books in England: such, for example, as the publications
by Constable and Chambers in Scotland, and the prolific brood of'Family Libraries,''Cabinet Cyclopsedias,' and penny journals.
These works, by which a great extent of useful, if not very profound,
knowledge is placed at the disposal of the labouring classes,'have in
rmost cases been exceedingly successful, and are calculated to give a
foreigner a high idea of the intellectual activity and enterprise of
the English people;-an impression which will become still stronger
when he finds the contents of these collections to be, in almost every
case, well selected, well arranged, decorous and moral, written
always with respectable and often with extraordinary ability.
CHAPTER XXI.
WORDSWORTH, COLERIDGE1 AND THE NEW POETRY.
Wordsworth and the Lake School-Philosophical and Poetical Theories-The
Lyrical Ballads - The Excursion - Sonnets-Coleridge-Poems and Criti
cisrns-Conversational Eloquence-Charles Lamb-'lThe Essays of EliaLeigh Hunt-Keats —The Living Poets-Conclusion.
THE throne of English poetry, left vacant by the early death of
Byron, is now  unquestionably filled by Wordsworth.  It was a
species of revolution which seated the author of'Childe Harold'
upon that throne: it is a counter-revolution which has deposed " the
grand Napoleon of the realms of rhyme."  The'English Bards'
was Byron's 18th Fructidor; the publication of'The Excursion'
was his Waterloo.  But in the fluctuation of popular taste, in the
setting of that current, which, flowing from the old classicism, has
carried us insensibly, but irresistibly, first through Romanticism, and
has now brought us to a species of metaphysical quietism, there have
been many temporary changes of direction; nay, some apparent
stoppLages.  Despite the effort and impulsion of the Byronian poetry
-the poetry of passion-there were writers who not only retained




{14          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CIHAP. XXI.
many (haracteristics of the forms that had to appearance been
exploded, but even something of the old tone of sentiment; modified,
of course, by the mesthetic principles which were afterwards to be
completely embodied in such a cycle of great works as constitutes a
scehool of literature. Thus Crabbe, with his singular versification (a
kind of mezzo-termine between the smart antithetic manner of Pope
and the somewhat languid melody of Goldsmith), combined a gloomy
analysis of crime and weakness with pictures of common life delineated
with a Flemish minuteness of detail; and the traditions of the purely
classic school survived in the diction of Rogers and the exquisite
finish of Campbell. These poets are the connecting links between
the two systems so opposite and apparently so incompatible: and it
is not surprising that these writers, both of whom have deservedly
become classics in our language, should exhibit, in the difference of
feeling and treatment perceptible when we compare their first works
with their last, a perfect image of the gradual transition of public
taste from the one style of writing to the other. They both began,
the former in'The Pleasures of Memory,' and the latter in'The
Pleasures of Hope,' as imitators of Akenside (himself an imitator
of Milton) and of Goldsmith; while in their later works we trace a
gradually increasing tendency towards the more passionate and lyric
tone of modern poetry.  In Rogers's exquisite poem  of'Human
Life,' in his'Italy,' in his charming songs and fugitive pieces, we
find him gradually receding farther and farther from his first models:
and in examining the works of Thomas Campbell we perceive a still
stronger proof of the same transition.'The Pleasures of Hope,'
published at the very early age of twenty-four, was absolutely a
reproduction of the tone and feeling of'The Traveller:' but if we
follow Campbell through his tender and pathetic narrative poem of'Gertrude of Wyoming' and his admirable lyrics -national and
patriotic, and among the finest in any language -we shall see that
in him, as in the general state of literary feeling reflected in his
works, a complete and vast change had taken place.  In literature
nothing can ever be perfectly destroyed or obliterated, nothing can
exist without producing an influence on remote times; and poetry
therefore will ever bear something of an eclectic character.
It is the philosophy of Wordsworth-his theory, religious, social,
an.d moral-that has most deeply coloured the poetry of the present
day in England.  He has exercised upon the literature of his country an influence far more permanent and powerful than that which
wat, communicated to the mind of Europe by the splendid innovations of Byron, although it was not so intense and rapid in its first
development.  The Lake School (so called because its founders resided chiefly among the picturesque scenery of the lakes of Cumberland and Westmoreland, and have described with enthusiastic fondness not only that beautiful mountain region, but also the simple




CHAP. xxI.]            THIE LAKE SCHOOL.                       415
virtues and pastoral innocence of its inhabitants) was founded by
Wordsworth, Coleridge, and Southey; of whom the former must be
considered as the most industrious apostle and expounder of its
doctrines.  These doctrines are not of a mere aesthetic character: so
far from it, indeed, that their asthetic deductions are simply an
application to art, of principles of faith and reasoning of the most
elevated and all-embracing character.  Their poetry is, in short,
nothing but an embodiment, in a particular form, of a theory which,
whether true or false, involves the highest concernments of man in
his relation to God, to nature, to his fellow-creatures, and to himself.
These writers are in some sense the Quietists, the Mystics, the Quakers of the poetic fraternity.  As critics, the chief object of their
attacks was the conventional language, so long considered as inseparable from poetry.  They considered that the ordinary speech of the
common people, being founded on the most general and universal
feelings of the mind, and expressive of the most extensive class of
wants and ideas, was a more faithful, philosophical, and durable
vehicle for thought than the ornamented and ambitious phraseology
heretofore deemed essential to poetry, although subject, as it was, to
every caprice of fashion and taste.  Nor were their ethical doctrines
less bold.  Strong passions, splendid and striking actions, revenge,
ambition, unbridled love, all that had hitherto been considered as
the very stuff and material of poetical impressions, they held to be
wanting in the higher attribute of dignity and fitness for the artist's
purposes.  All in our nature, that either indicates, generates, or
proceeds from a selfish motive, they held to be demonstrably less
sublime than the tranquil virtues, the development of the affections,
and the incessant effort of the soul to unite itself by meditation and
reverent aspiration with God himself.  Thus, casting down, at the
feet of the Divinity, the passions of our nature, they of course were
the iconoclasts also of the idols of human reason.  For the acute
speculator, the pryer into the material creation, the philosophaster,
the quack and empiric of science, they express the most intense
contempt; being too apt to confound the legitimate exercise of our
intellect and curiosity with the petty, unfeeling, irreverent spirit of
the
"Philosopher, a fingering slave,
One that would peep, and pry, and botanise
Upon his mother's grave."
In proportion as the world becomes more civilized, the splendidlh
ritia will, so to say, sink in value in our moral exchange; and the
day may come when courage and military energy, for example, will
be considered as the necessary barbarism of a savage state, and the
exploits of a Charles XII. and a Napoleon will be looked back upon
with a half-pitying, half-incredulous wonder.  That the human race
is yet arrived at this point of philosophy and civilization does not




416          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CHAP. XXI.
very evidently appear; but the doctrines of Wordsworth's school
are an attempt to anticipate this millennium of innocence and virtue.
In the same way as the ordinary sentiments of poetry are rejected
by the Lake School, the ordinary subjects of it have no less been
changed. The materials of many of their works, particularly of
the earlier ones, are the adventures and sentiments of the very humblest class of human life, and such as, in themselves, would appear
to defy any power of rendering them interesting and attractive.
Thus the heroes of'Peter Bell' are a cruel carrier and his ass; an
idiot boy forms the whole subject of another poem; and an old
pedlar is the chief personage in the noble fragment of'The Excursion.'  The diction is, of course, characterized by similar singularities. Peculiarly awake to the defects of that brilliant and ingenious
poetry which was introduced into England from  France at the
Restoration, and whose chief representatives are Prior, MWaller, and
Pope, the Lakists appear to have shut their eyes to its incontestable
merits; or, if they allow the existence of those merits, they consider
them as of so low an order, and purchased so dearly, that they prefer
the simple pathos, the rude picturesqueness,- of the old English
ballads to all the sparkle and ingenuity of the Poets of the Intellect.
Wordsworth's earlier diction was marked by a humility and even
meannes. of phrase; and the ballads, published in 1798, excited an
universal uproar of ridicule.  Both the system, and the ridicule it
gave birth to, were naturally somewhat exaggerated: it is not, therefore, surprising that those very journals, such as'The Quarterly,''The Edinburgh,' and' Blackwood's Magazine,' which overwhelmed
the' Lyrical Ballads' on their first appearance with ridicule, should
have gradually become admirers, if not warm supporters, of Wordsworth's poetical and moral opinions. There can, however, be no
question that, in his first publications, he carried his system  much
too far; and the Lake School, in their eagerness to escape the Idols
of the Theatre, have sometimes manifestly fallen under the influence
of the Idols of the Den. One thing, however, is incontestable; the
new school of poetry draws its inspiration from a truly elevated
source.  With these writers, poetry is but an embodiment and
expression of faith.  Their works are not the productions of mere
intellectual dexterity; but are monuments of the profoundest conviction, of the sublimest aspirations after what is good and beautiful
and true. Poetry, with them, is a religion; and they, like the bards
of the heroic age, are not artists only, but priests and hierophants.
In Wordsworth, poetry, which is but another name for the reverent
study of nature, embraces all knowledge, all sanctity, all truth.
With him it is
"The anchor of my purest thoughts, the nurse,
The guide, the guardian of my heart; and soul
Of all my moral being."




McAl'. xxI.]             WORDSWORTH.                        417
The prominent feature in Wordsworth's system, cf mingled wsthe
tics and ethics, is the belief that external nature is not the mert
lifeless echo of the voice of God, but the voice itself: and that th(
stream, the cloud, the leaf are not altogether inanimate and feeling
less; but that they have a consciousness and a language of their own,
audible and intelligible to all who will reverently listen; but most
audible, most intelligible to the poet; whose only difference from
other men consists in his greater fineness of ear for that universal
hymn of nature.  This leading idea will be found, also, in the more
lofty meditations of the Platonic dialogues.  These ideas Plato obtained, we know, from his master Socrates; and they came originally,
in all probability, from the East; for Oriental poetry bears much of
this peculiar stamp of mysticism.  A great deal of this platonism is
to be found embodied in the poetry of the Elizabethan era; not
only in the great work of Spenser, where it is indeed peculiarly
perceptible; but even in the productions of men whose reputation,
then very great, has not been able to resist the destroying power of
time -in the poems, for instance, of Sir John Davies, of Phineas
Fletcher, and of Silvester.  In the Indian poetry this diffusion,
through all nature, of consciousness and of feeling, tends directly to
a species of sublime pantheism: in Wordsworth, the same dogmas.
made subservient to the doctrines of the Christian revelation, acquire
a still more pure and ethereal character.  If we examine the whole
collection of Wordsworth's poems, we shall find that, while he has
remained faithful to the ethical part of his theory, he has involuntarily been obliged to renounce a great deal of what was peculiar in
his art; that is, its peculiar language. That extreme simplicity of
diction and imagery, which he formerly seenled to consider the only
true vehicle of poetical impressions, was obviously too little in
accordance with his elevated and abstract doctrines to be retained, for
any length of time, as his poetical language. Thus, while an un,
learned peasant would have found nothing in Wordsworth's early
narratives and songs which he would not have perfectly understood,
as far as the words were concerned, the deductions, the drift, the
moral results would have remained, and ever will remain, as unintelligible to such a reader as if they were couched in the most artificial and ornamented rhetoric.   Many of Wordsworth's finest
productions-as, for example, the admirable'Laodamia,' his Sonnets,
and nearly all'The Excursion'-are, as far as the diction and versification are concerned, written in strong discordance with the poet's
own theory of poetical expression: and are so far from exemplifying
an extreme simplicity, and the use of the most popular or even
rustic phraseology, that they are absolutely among the most highl3
finished and elaborate specimens of artificial diction which the Eng
lish language can show.  Milton, Spenser, Akenside, Thomson, are
undoubtedly among the most scholastic of our poets; and yet we do




418          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. XXI.
not think it too much to say that the language of these learned
writers is more intelligible to the great body of readers than the
contemplative style of'The Excursion:' and hence it is that the
poets we have just mentioned are really more popular-that is, read
by a greater number of persons, particularly of the humbler classes
— than Wordsworth is now, or is ever likely to be. The really great
benefit which he has conferred upon his art, is that of showing future
writers the necessity of thinking, and seeing, and describing for
themselves; and not accepting at second-hand, from any model how.
ever admirable, any set of words or images to which a conventional
idea of beauty is attached, and hoping that thereby any strong impressions can be excited.
Many of the smaller detached poems to be found in the' Lyrical
Ballads' are absolutely unequalled. What renders them so remarkable is the pure and lofty tone of philosophical morality, which gives
a weight and dignity to apparently the most trivial subjects. Nothing
seems inserted in them for the sake of the mere words; and the
result is that the diction has that exquisite directness, simplicity, and
grace which forms the indefinable charm  of the Greek epigrams.
The Odes have, perhaps, something in them rather too mystical;
and may be censured for a certain want of clearness and intelligibleness: but there is not one of them  which does not contain some
passage, some phrase, such as no poet but Wordsworth could have
produced. The smaller poems in the ballad measure are those which
are perhaps most universally known.  Who has not read'The
Fountain,''Matthew,'' We are Seven'?
But Wordsworth's great work is indubitably'The Excursion.'
This is a fragment of a projected great moral epic, discussing and
solving the mightiest questions concerning God, nature, and man,
our moral constitution, our duties, and our hopes.  Its dramatic
interest is exceedingly small; its structure is very inartificial; and
the characters represented in it are devoid of life and probability.
That an old Scottish pedlar, a country clergyman, and a disappointed
visionary should reason so continuously and so sublimely on the
destinies of man, is in itself a gross want of verisimilitude; and the
purely speculative nature of their interminable arguments
"on knowledge, will, and fate,"
are not relieved from their monotony even by the abundant and
beautiful descriptions and the pathetic episodes so thickly interspersed.
It is Wordsworth, too, who is speaking always and alone; there is
no variety of language, none of the shock and vivacity of intellectual
wrestling: but, on the other hand, so sublime are the subjects on
which they reason, so lofty and seraphic is their tone, and so deep a
glow of humanity is perceptible throughout, that no reader, but such
as seek in poetry for mere food for the curiosity and imagination,




CHAP. XXI.]              WORDSWORTH.                          419
can study this grand composition without ever-increasing reverence
and delight.  Christianity is here exhibited under its most divine
aspect; and the oracles of truth are pronounced in words of more
than mortal sweetness.
In 1815 appeared'The White Doe of Rylstone,' the only narrative poem of any length which Wordsworth has ever written. The
incidents are of a simple and exceedingly mournful kind, turning
chiefly on the complete ruin of a north-country family in the civil
wars: but the atmosphere of mystical and supernatural influences in
which the personages move, the superhuman purity and unearthliness of the characters, and above all the part played in the action
by the white doe, which gives name to the work,-all these things
contribute to communicate to the production a fantastic, unreal, and
somewhat affected air.  In a narrative, clearness, directness, simplicity are, above all things, necessary; and no beauty of imagery and
versification, no purity of ideas will suffice to please us where these
are wanting.  In some of his shorter narratives,' Hartleap Well,'
the beautiful tale of'The Boy of Egremont,' and above all the
unsurpassable'Laodamia,' Wordsworth has amply shown his power
of uniting, to his unequalled grandeur of meditation, all the charms
of a rapid and natural narrative. Perhaps the last of these is the
finest tale of the kind in any language: and in many other little
works -  as'Michael,''Ruth,' and'The Female Vagrant' —the
diffuseness of the manner is more than compensated oy the beauty
and verity of the matter.
A very large proportion of this author's more recent works (he
has been all his life a most industrious author, and has now reached
his seventy-sixth year) consists of sonnets.  Of this difficult, and,
at first sight, ungrateful species of composition, apparently so little
suited to the peculiar genius of our language, we have in English
literature many admirable examples.  Its merits are thus insisted
upon by Wordsworth himself in the following beautiful lines:"Scorn not the Sonnet: Critic! you have frown'd,
Mindless of its just honours: with this key
Shakspeare unlock'd his heart; the melody
Of this small lute gave -ease to Petrarch's wound;
A thousand times this pipe did Tasso sound;
Camiens sooth'd with it an exile's grief:
The Sonnet glitter'd a gay myrtle-leaf
Amid the cypress with which Dante bound
His visionary brow: a glowworm Jamp,
It cheer'd mild Spenser, call'd from Fairy-land
To struggle through dark ways; and when a damp
Fell round the path of Milton, in his hand
The thing became a trumpet, whence he blew
Soul-aniniating strains —alas! too few,"
The sonnets of Wordsworth are in no sense inferior to the finest
examples, we will not say of Shakspeare, Sidney, and Milton only,
but of Petrarch or Filicaja.  He has perfectly appreciated the true
35




420          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CHAP. XXI
aim and rule of this kind of writing. Whether the prevailing
emotion be patriotic enthusiasm, religious fervour, or the tenderer
influences of beautiful scenery, historic spots of national interest, or
the impressions of art, he never fails to give that unity of feeling,
that gradual swell of gentle harmony — rising, like a summer wave,
till it softly breaks into melody in the last line-which is the peculiar
charm and merit of this most difficult kind of composition.  Many
of his sonnets are connected together by a predominant tone or key.
note; and thus form complete works-a treasury of every charm of
thought and grace of execution.
The literary character of Samuel Taylor Coleridge resembles some
vast but unfinished palace: all is gigantic, beautiful, and rich; but
nothing is complete, nothing compact.  He was all his days, from
his youth to his death in 1834, labouring, meditating, projecting: and
yet all that he has left us bears a painful character of fragmentariness and imperfection.  His mind was eminently dreamy; he was
deeply tinged with that incapacity of acting which forms the
characteristic of the German intellect: his genius was multiform,
many-sided; and for this reason, perhaps, could not at once seize
upon the right point of view.  No man, probably, ever existed who
thought more, and more intensely, than Coleridge; few ever possessed
a vaster treasury of learning and knowledge; -and yet how little has
he given us! or rather how few of his works are in any way worthy
of the undoubted majesty of his genius!.Materials, indeed, he has
left us in enormous quantity-a store of thoughts and principles,
particularly in the department of msthetic science-golden masses
of reason, either painfully sifted from the rubbish of obscure and
forgotten authors, or dug up from the rich depths of his own mind;
but these are still in the state of raw materials, or only partially
worked.  Of complete and substantive productions, all that we have
of Coleridge are the following.-A small number of odes and lyrics,
doubtless of extraordinary splendour and brilliancy, but still too
much marked by a perceptible straining after grandeur and energy,
as if the poet were lashing up his indolent enthusiasm by convulsive
efforts; an admirable translation, or rather paraphrase, of the
I Piccolomini' and' Death of Wallenstein,' executed under Schiller's
own eye; a volume of miscellaneous prose essays, entitled'The
Friend;' the tragedy of'Remorse' and'Zapolya;' the'Lectures
on Shakspeare;' and two or three lyrical poems, of which we shall
give a somewhat more detailed criticism. During the greater part
of his life, too, he was exceedingly poor: and his perpetual struggles
to obtain bread by his pen obliged him, in many instances, to engage
in tasks for which his peculiar mental constitution was completely
unfit; —as, for example, the occupation of a political journalist.
Hle began life as an Unitarian and republican; his intellectual
powers were chiefly formed in the transcendental schools of Germany;




C0.AP. XXI.]               COLERIDGE.                         421
but he ultimately became from conviction a moat sincere adherent
to the doctrines of the Anglican church, and an enthusiastic defender
of our monarchical constitution.  Though the lyrics to which we
have alluded (the finest of which are the odes'On the Departing
Year,' and that supposed to be written " at sunrise in the Valley of
Chamouni") are somewhat injured by their air of effort, they are
indubitably works of singular richness, and exquisitely melodised
language.  The translations of the two members of Schiller's
Trilogy of'IWallenstein' are so admirable that they are worthy of
being compared with original poems of no mean order.  Nothing
can be more free from stiffness, coldness, or any sign of the ideas
being those of another poet.  It is true that Coleridge's mind was
in no degree dramatic; and therefore the variations (which are
exceedingly numerous, and often exquisitely happy) which he has
made from  the text of the German, are generally rather beautiful
developments of some train of reflection, only hinted at in the
original, than any new strokes of character or increased vivacity of
action.  Coleridge's variations from his original are all of augmentation, or of evolution, never of condensation; for he was great rather
as an observer, a describer, and a meditator, than as an embodier.
No reader can fail to remark, as an example of this, the beautiful
verses in which he describes the ancient popular mythologies and
superstitions. This lovely passage is the expansion of a mere hint of
Schiller's, conveyed in a couple of lines.
That Coleridge had no power of true dramatic creation is strongly
proved by his tragedy of' The Remorse;' in which, in spite of very
striking features of character (as in Ordonio), and a multitude of
incidents of the most violent kind, he has not produced a drama
which either excites curiosity or moves any strong degree of pity.
What is most beautiful in the work is all pure description, and in no
sense advances the action or exhibits human passions.  It is strange,
perhaps, but yet by no means unintelligible, that a man who was so
unsuccessful in creating emotions of a theatrical kind should have
been a most consummate critic of the dramatic productions of others.
Till he wrote, deep and universal as had been the admiring lovealmost the adoration -of the English for Shakspeare, there still
remained, in their judgments, something of that de haut en bus
tone which characterises all the criticisms anterior to Coleridge's'Lectures on Shakspeare.'  Coleridge first showed that the creator
of'Hamlet' and'Othello' was not only the greatest genius, but
also the most consummate artist, who ever existed.  Nothing can
give us a higher opinion of the nobility of Coleridge's mind than
that he was the first to make some approach to the discovery of those
laws which, expressly or intuitively, governed the evolutions of tho
Shakspearian drama- that he possessed a soul vast enough, deep
enough, multiform enough, to give us some faint idea if the dimen



422          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CIIAP. XXI.
sions, the length, and breadth, and depth, of that huge sea of truth
and beauty.
Of the poems by which Coleridge is best known, both in England
and abroad, the most universally read is undoubtedly'The Rime of
the Auncient Marinere,' a wild, mystical, phantasmagoric narrative,
most picturesquely related in the old English, ballad measure, and
in language to which is skilfully given an air of antiquity in admirable
harmony with the spectral character of the events.  The whole
poem is a splendid dream, filling the ear with the strange and floating
melodies of sleep, and the eye with a shifting vaporous succession
of fantastic images, gloomy or radiant. The wedding-party stopped
on their way to the feast by the "bright-eyed marinere," the awful
fascination by which the guest is obliged to hear and thq wanderer
to tell his tale, the skeleton ships and the phantoms which play at
dice for the soul of the mariner, the punishment and repentance of
the man who " shot the albatross," -all this is wound up into one
splendid tissue of cloudy phantoms. We read on, with that kind
of consciousness of half-reality, that sensation of indistinct surprise,
with which we are carried onward in our dreams. Extravagant and
unreal as it all is, that important quality of harmony of tone is
scrupulously kept up; and hence the pleasure we experience: we
are placed in a new unearthly atmosphere, and all glimpses of the
real world are carefully avoided.
The poem of' Christabel,' and the fragment called' Kubla Khan,'
are of the same mystic, unreal character: indeed, Coleridge asserted
that the latter was actually composed in a dream - an affirmation
which may well be believed, for it is a thousand times more unintelligible than the general run of dreams.  It is a dream, perhaps;
but it is an opium-dream —   " egri somnium"- without so much as
that faint coherency which even a dream must have to give pleasure.
in a picture or in a poem.  Like'The Mariner,' like the odes, like
everything that Coleridge ever wrote, it is exquisitely versified.  In
the hands of a great sculptor marble and bronze seem to become as
soft and as elastic as living flesh; and Coleridge seems to possess a
similar dominion over his language. It puts on every form, it
expresses every sound: he almost writes to the eye and to the ear
our rough, pithy English, in his verse, breathes all sounds, all melodies:
"And now'tis like all instruments,
Now like a lonely flute;
And now it is an angel's song,
T'hat makes the heavens be mute."
But in'Christabel,' which has some slight pretensions to be an
intelligible narrative, or, at least, part of an intelligible narrativefor we have a maiden who meets in a forest with a fiend disguised as
anr earthly damsel, and who apparently defeats the evil spirit's




crAP. xxI.]               COLERIDGE.                        423
machinations- the mixture of two realities (both dreamn-realities,
but one as it were within the other, ike a tragedy within a trageiy,
as in' Hamlet,' or as the picture of a picture in a picture) is not
harmoniously subordinated; and the effect is, of course, fatal to the
poem as a work of art.
In point of completeness, exquisite harmony of feeling, and
unsurpassable grace of imagery and language, Coleridge has left
nothing superior to the charming little poem  entitled'Love, or
Genevieve.'  Perhaps the English language contains nothing more
perfect: the very gentleness, ardour, and timidity of youthful passion -the "purple light of love "-is breathed throughout.
Coleridge's chief reputation, during his life, was founded less upon
his writings than upon his conversation; or rather, what may be
called his conversational oratory.  Possessing, in a degree very
unusual in modern society, and particularly rare in England (where
this kind of display is little in accordance with the laconism, the
reserve, the positivisme, and the extreme bashfulness of the national
character), a most inexhaustible fow of eloquent imagery, and a
ready command of the harmony of speech, Coleridge's conversation
-if it could be called conversation, where he had all the talk to
himself —  must have resembled those disquisitions of the Greek
philosophers of which the dialogues of Plato are merely a literary
embodiment.  Starting from a casual observation on any subject,
Coleridge would wander on through the whole infinitude of lnowledge with a profuseness of illustration, a profoundness of theory,
and a rich and soothing melody of language, which those who knew
him describe as having produced a kind of fascination in his hearers;
and would scatter, as he went, such stores of reading, such new and
sublime ideas on art, literature, and history, that, although his hearers
often found themselves, at the end of the disquisition, enormously
far from the point of departure, their journey had been so delightful,
had given them such glimpses into the sunny realms of the ideal and
the pure heaven of truth, and had enriched them with such treasures
of thought and sentiment, that they felt neither weariness nor surprise.  They were carried, like the knight of Ariosto on his hippogriff, upon the sublime wings of Coleridge's imagination; and gave
free way to the magic of the hour. Of this wonderful discourser
might be said what Homer tells us of Nestor, that "From his tongue
his speech streamed on, like silent flakes of ever-falling snow."
It is in his innumerable fragments, in his rich but desultory remains (published posthumously under the title of' Table-Talk')-in
casual remarks scribbled like Sibylline leaves, often on the margins
of borrowed books, and in imperfectly reported conversations, that
we must look for proofs of Coleridge's immense but incompletely
recorded powers; it is from  these alone -hat we can gather the
disjecta membra poetce; and reconstruct, however imperfectly,) the
35*




424           OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. XXI.
inlage of this great thinker and imaginer.  From a careful study of
these we shall conceive a high admiration of his genius; and a deep
regret at the fragmentary and desultory manifestation of his powers.
We shall, also, appreciate the vastness and multiform character of a
mind to which nothing was too difficult, or too obscure; a noble
tone of moral dignity "softened into beauty" by the largest sympafhy; and, above all, an admirable catholicity of taste, which could
unerringly pitch upon what was beautiful and true, and find its
pabulum in all schools, all writers; perceiving, as it were intuitively,
the value and the charm of the most unpromising books and
systems.
Charles Lamb is one of the most admirable of those humorists
who form  the peculiar feature of the literature, as the ideas they
express are the peculiar distinction of the character, of the English
people.  He was born in 1775, and died in 1835; and forms a
bright light in that intellectual galaxy of which Wordsworth is the
centre. He was essentially a Londoner: London life supplied him
with his richest materials; and yet his mind was so imbued, so saturated with our older writers, that he is original by the mere force of
self-tranformation into the spirit of the elder literature: he was, in
short, an old writer, who lived by accident a century or two after his
real time. Wordsworth is peculiarly the poet of solitary rural nature;
Lamb drew an inspiration as true, as delicate, as profound, from the
city life in which he lived; and from which he never was for a
moment removed but with pain and a yearning to come back.  In
him the organ of locality must have been enormously developed:
"' his household gods planted a terribly fixed foot; and were not to
be rooted up without blood." During the early and greater part of
his life, Lamb, poor and unfriended, was drudging as a clerk in the
India House; and it was not till late in life that he was unchained
from the desk. Yet in this, the most monotonous and unideal of all
employments, he found means to fill his mind with the finest aromta
of our older authors; particularly of the prose writers and dramnatists of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries: and in his earliest
compositions, such as the play of'John Woodvil,' and the'Essays
of Elia,' although the world at first perceived a mere imitation of
their quaintness of expression, there was, in reality, a revival of
their very spirit.  The essays, contributed by him at different times
to one of the magazines, are the finest things, for humour, taste,
penetration, and vivacity, which had appeared since the days of
MIontaigne. Where shall we find such intense delicacy of feeling,
such unimaginable happiness of expression, such a searching into the
very body of truth, as in these unpretending compositions?  A
chance word, dropped half by accident, a parenthesis, an exclamntion, often lets us into the very mechanism of the sentiment-admits
is, as it, were, behind the scenes. The style has a peculiar and most




CHAP. XXI.]             CHARLES LAIBM.                        42 5
subtle charm; not the result of labour, for it s foind in as great
perfection in his familiar letters-a certain quaintness and antiquity,
not affected in Lamb, but the natural garb of his thoughts.  This
arises partly from the saturation of his mind with the rich and solid
reading in which he delighted; and partly, but in a much higher
degree, from  the sensibility of his mind.  The manure was abundant, but the soil was also of a "Sicilian fruitfulness."  As in all
the true humorists, his pleasantry was inseparably allied with the
finest pathos: the merry quip on the tongue was but the commentary
on the tear which trembled in the eye.  He possessed the power,
which is seen in Shakspeare's Fools, of conveying a deep philosophical verity in a jest -of uniting the wildest merriment with the
truest pathos and the deepest wisdom. It is not only the easy laugh
of Touchstone in the forest of Arden, but the heart-rending pleasantry of Lear's Fool in the storm. The inspiration that other poets
find in the mountains, in the forest, in the sea, Lamb could draw
from the crowd of Fleet-street, from the remembrances of an old
actor, from the benchers of the Temple.  In his poems, alsd, so few
in number, and so admirable in originality, we have the quintessence
of familiar sentiment, expressed in the diction of Herbert, Wither,
and the great dramatists.
Lamb was the school-fellow, the devoted admirer and friend of
Coleridge; and perhaps there never was an individual so loved by
all his contemporaries, by men of every opinion, of every shade of
literary, political, and religious sentiment, as this truly great wit and
amiable man. The passionate enemy of everything like cant, cornmon-place, or conventionality, his writings derive a singular charm.
a kind of fresh and wild flavour, from his delight in paradox.  The
man himself was full of paradox: and his punning repartees, delivered with all the pangs of stuttering, often contained a decisive and
unanswerable settlement of the question.  In his drama of'John
Woodvil' he endeavoured, though of course unsuccessfully, to revive
the forms of the Elizabethan drama; and the work might be mistaken for some woodland play of Heywood or Shirley.  But it was
his' Specimens of the Old English Dramatists' which showed what
treasures of the richest poetry lay concealed in the unpublished, and
in modern times unknown, writers of that wonderful age, whose
fame has been eclipsed by the glory of some two or three names of
the same period.  In the few lines, often only the few words, of
criticism in which Lamb sketched the characters of the dramatists
(with whose writings, from the greatest to the least, from Shakspeare
down to Broome or Tourneur, no man was ever more familiar), we
see perpetual examples of the delicacy and penetration of his critical
faculty.
Lamb's mind, in its sensitiveness, in its mixture cf wit and pathos,
was eminently Shakspearian; and his intense and reverent study of




426          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE. [CIHAP. XXL
the works of Shakspeare doubtless gave a tendency to this: the glow
of his humour was too pure and steady not to have been reflected
from the sun.  In his poems, as for instance the'Farewell to Tobacco,' the'Old Familiar Faces,' and his few but beautiful sonnets,
we find the very essence and spirit of this quaint tenderness of fancy,
the naivete of the child mingled with the learning of the scholar:
they are lihke "that piece of song" in'As You Like It,'-"old and
plain,"'"And daily with the innocehce of love
Like the old age."
Among the'Essays of Elia' are several little narratives, generally
visions and parables, inexpressibly simple and beautiful. That named'Dre am-Children,' and that other' The Child-Angel' are worthy of
Jean Paul himself: while the little tale'Rosamond Gray' is perhaps one of the most inimitable gems ever produced in that difficult
style.
Leigh Hunt and John Keats are two of the most distinguished
names among the modern minor poets. The former, however, wrote
rather under the inspiration of Lord Byron, and the latter under
that of Shelley.  Hunt endeavoured to revive something of the
freshness, fluency, and vivacity of the old English and old Italian
poets; while Keats carried to excess the peculiar manner of his
model.  Both wrote "upon a system," as Byron remarked upon the
former; and, therefore, both of them will descend to posterity with
an imperfect and unsatisfactory reputation. Hunt's best production,
of any length, is the poem entitled'A Story of Rimini;' an expansion, into a pretty narrative, of the tale of' Francesca da Rimini'
condensed by Dante, with such intensity of pathos, into a few lines
of his' Inferno.' This work, which is written in the rhymed couplet
founded upon Dryden's admirable modernizations of Chaucer and
the old Italian novelists, is full of a delicate and refined fancy: but
the diction is often deformed by a peculiar and intolerable coxcombry
of language, to which has beep given the significant appellation of
coukneyism.  It is a mixture of the concetti of second-rate Italian
poetry with the smug arcadianism of a London citizen masquerading
as a shepherd.  Hunt, like his friend and contemporary Hazlitt, ha~
done good service to his country as a miscellaneous critic and essayist
on various detached: portions of our literature, particularly that of
the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries; and in the'Indicator' of
the former there is much agreeable chat on literature and art; seldoml very profound perhaps, but always sparkling with a singular
effervescence of animal spirits, and filled (the greatest charm in
writing of this nature) with a sincere and lively admiration for the
beauties under examination.  The more ambitious tone of Hazlitt's
writings, and the more scientific exposition and investigation of
m.sthetic principles, may seem to claim for him a place rather nearer




CHAP. xxI.]                 KEATS.                          427
to that occupied by Coleridge: but we are not sure that Hunt's easy,
pleasant, good-humoured chat has not done more than Hazlitt's
graver tone to disseminate a taste for rich and healthy literature.
Keats, whose short life was embittered by the contemptuous
reception his first poems met with from the critics, was born in 1796,
and died at the age of 24.  What is most remarkable in his works
is the wonderful profusion of figurative language, often exquisitely
beautiful and luxuriant, but sometimes purely fantastical and far.
fetched. The peculiarity of Shelley's style, to which we gave the
name of incatenation, Keats carries to extravagance-one word, one
image, one rhyme suggests another, till we quite lose sight of the
original idea; which is smothered in its own sweet luxuriance, like a bee
stifled in honey. Shakspeare and his school, upon whose manner
Keats undoubtedly endeavoured to form his way of writing, have, it
is true, this peculiarity of language: but in them the images never
run away with the thought; the guiding master-idea is ever present.
These poets never throw the reins on the mane of their Pegasus,
even when soaring to " the brightest heaven of invention."  With
them, the images are produced by a force acting ab intra; like wild
flowers springing from the very richness of the ground. In Keats
the force acts ab extra; the flowers are forcibly fixed in the earth,
as in the garden of a child, who cannot wait till they grow there of
themselves.  Keats deserves high praise for one very peculiar and
original merit: he has treated the classical mythology in a way
absolutely new; representing the pagan deities not as mere abstractions of art, nor as mere creatures of popular belief; but giving
them  passions and affections like our own, highly purified and
idealised, however, and in exquisite accordance with the lovely
scenery of ancient Greece and Italy, and with the golden atmosphere
of primeval existence.  This treatment of a subject, which ordinary
readers would consider hopelessly outworn and threadbare, is certainly
not Homeric; nor is it Miltonic; nor is it in the manner of any of
the great poets who have employed the mythologic imagery of antiquity: but it is productive of very exquisite pleasure; and must,
therefore, be in accordance with true principles of art. In' Hyperion,'
in the'Ode to Pan,' in the verses on a'Grecian Urn,' we find a
noble and airy strain of beautiful classic imagery, combined with a
perception of natural loveliness so luxuriant, so rich, so delicate, that
the rosy dawn of Greek poetry seems combined with all that is most
tenderly pensive in the calm sunset twilight of romance. Such of
Keats's poems as are founded on more modern subjects —' The Eve
of St. Agnes,' for example, or'The Pot of Basil,' a beautiful
anecdote versified from Boccaccio-are to our taste inferior to those
of his productions in which the scenery and personages are mythologic.
It would seem as if the severity of ancient art, which in the last,
mentioned works acted as an involuntary check upon a too luxuriant




428          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.   [CIIAP. XXI.?ancy, deserted him when he left the antique world; and the absence
of true, deep, intense passion (his prevailing defect) becomes necessarily more painfully apparent; as well as the discordant mingling
of the prettinesses of modern poetry with the directness, and the
unaffected simplicity, of Chaucer and Boccaccio.
Depth and intensity of feeling, which we have denied to Keats,
form the great secret of the power of Thomas Hood; an author long
known chiefly as an admirable punster, and a writer of the most
broadly comic character; but whose reputation, as an admirable poet
and profound humourist, is growing day by day.  For several years
he published a volume called' The Comic Annual,' a species of
burlesque upon the gift-books then so popular in England; and the
droll prose and verse, illustrated by still droller woodcuts executed by
himself, supplied Christmas parties with a never-failing annuity of
laughter. He also produced, principally as contributions to'The
New Monthly Magazine,' of which he was for some time editor, a
large number of tales, generally turning upon some minute but
grotesque incident, and treated in a manner so perfectly original,
that Hood must absolutely be considered as constituting an era in
the history of comic literature. Like Lamb, he was a consummate
punster; and, like Lamb's, his puns and wildest friskings of humour
not only excite a momentary laugh, but frequently contain an inner
and esoteric sense, often wonderfully beautiful and profound.  Like
Lamb, too, Hood possessed a sort of intuitive perception of truth
and beauty: and, like him, his heart was warm and his sympathy
boundless.  In the little prose tales, where he talks to his reader in
a strain at once wonderfully imaginative, profound, and ludicrousin his admirable imaginary correspondences, generally between
servants, or peasants, who distort the English language so as to produce truly Rabelcsian double and triple meanings —in his comic
poems, as the story of Miss Kielmansegf —in his graver letters on
the rights of the literary profession, and on the condition of the
poor, he shows an inexhaustible richness of invention, a power ove:
words and combinations, which never fails not only to gratify oul
curiosity and sense of the ludicrous, but even to supply us with
ideas new, tender, and sometimes sublime.  But Hood is also a
great original poet of a serious and romantic cast.' His' Dream of
Eugene Aram,' his'Elm Tree,' are works of powerful conception
and permanent interest; his'Plea of the Midsummer Fairies,' his'Two Swans,' and'Lycus the Centaur,' are exquisite pieces of airy
uand fantastic imagery, nothing inferior to Keats's happiest productions; while he must be considered as the originator of a very
peculiar and powerful species of songs, equally admirable for the
force and simplicity of their diction, the harmony and novelty of
their metrical construction, and above all for the fervid and vigorous
spirit of humanity which they breathe.  The beautiful stanzas called




CHAP. XXI.]              CONCLUSION.                       429'The Bridge of Sighs,' and the painfully touching'Song of the
Shirt,' were the means of exciting for an unhappy and neglected
class of his countrywomen the pity, the interest, and even the active
benevolence of the nation.  Such things are not only good works,
but good actions; and the triumph of having made genius a minister
to philanthropy is a glory worthy of the friend of Lamb and the
first humorlous writer of his age.
It now remains to pass rapidly over a few names of contemporary
writers; less remarkable, in general, for originality of genius than
for elegance. of taste, happy selection of subject, or novelty of treatment. In the department of poetry women have shown as great an
activity as in most other fields of modern literature.  The rich and
fervid tone of Mrs. IIemans would deserve a more detailed mention
than our space will afford; and Mrs. Norton, L. E. L., and other
ladies have shown no mean mastery over the tenderer moods of the
modern lyre. Of the distinguished but less important men —our
Dii minorum  gentium-it will suffice to specify Mr. Barham, who
has written, under the pseudonym of Thomas Ingoldsby, a series of
comic tales in easy verse; —wild and wondrous legends of chivalry,
witchcraft, and diablerie, related in singularly rich and flexible
metre; and in language in which the intermixture of the modern
cant phrase of society with antiquarian pedantry produces a truly
comic effect.  Tennyson, Alford, and Milnes may be considered as
the poetical disciples of Wordsworth. Thomas Babington Macaulay,
celebrated as a brilliant critic and essayist in' The Edinlburgh Review,'
having been struck with Niebuhr's theory, that the early history of
Rome was compiled by Livy and other historians from  popular
metrical legends since lost, conceived the bold and happy idea of
reconstructing some of these vanished ballads in rough picturesque
plebeian metre; and producing in English some such fierce republican
lays as might have been sung by the peasant heroes of ancient Rome.
He has executed in this manner the stories of' Horatius Cocles,''The Battle of Lake Regillus,''The Death of Virginia,' with a fire
and animation which eclipsed even his own powerful ballads on events
in the History of France; and has shown himself to be not merely
a master of all the strength and muscular power of our early
language, but also intimately penetrated by the spirit of antiquity
and the rugged independence of old Rome.
In thus investigating, however cursorily, the course of English
iterature from its remote origin in Chaucer-himself an emblem of
the confluence, so to say, of three different streams of art and
nationality-the original Saxonism, the Italian spirit of the Renaissance, and the free spirit of the Reformation-no one can fail to be
struck with one singular and noble peculiarity;-a peculiarity which
it has in common with the nationality it reflects; and one which,
though perceptible in the character of every branch of the Teutonio




430          OUTLINES OF GENERAL LITERATURE.  [CHAP. XX.
race, was never possessed so completely as by the English nation.
We mean that intense and ever-present sap and vitality, which
allowed no interval to interfere between the most gigantic and
dissimilar exertions of creative energy.  No sooner does any class
of composition, any school of literature, decline from its period of
highest fertility, than another springs up, as rich, as living, and as
energetic as the former. The English intellect, thanks to the happy
freedom of our institutions, and the strong virility of the national
character, has no dull, dead, periods of feeble imitation and languid
servility. The moment it has duly developed itself in one direction,
it instantly takes and steadily maintains another: and our literature
-essentially the literature of a nation of men-rich in the finest
and most unequalled models of every kind and class of excellence
-is in every sense worthy of the greatest, freest, and most thoughtful people that the world has ever seen.  So glorious a past can
promise nothing but a future as illustrious.  The same powers
and influences which have enabled England to produce more and
greater things than any other community can boast, are still at work;
and will enable her to produce others, different in kind perhaps, but
&s durable, as splendid, as sublime.




A SKETCH
OF
AMERICAN., LITERATUR En
e6                (431)








A SKETCH
OF
AMERICAN LITERATURE 
CHAPTER I.
Literature in the Colonies imitative-Relation o! American to English Lltera
ture-Gradual Advancement of the United States in Letters-Their first
Development theological-Writers in this Department-Jonathan Edwards
-Religious Controversy-William E. Channing-Writings of the ClergyNewspapers and School Books-Domestic Literature-Female WritersOratory-Revolutionary Eloquence-American Orators-Alexander Hamill.ton-Daniel Webster and others-Edward Everett-American History anid
Historians-Jared Sparks — David Ramsay —George Bancroft-HildrethElliot Lossing —William H. Prescott-Irving-Wheaton-Cooper-Parkman.
LITERATURE is a positive element of civilized life; but in different countries and epochs it exists sometimes as a passive taste or
means of culture, and at others as a development of productive tendencies.  The first is the usual form in colonial societies, where the
habit of looking to the fatherland for intellectual nutriment as well
as political authority is the natural result even of patriotic feeling.
The circumstances, too, of young communities, like those of the individual, are unfavourable to original literary production. Life is
too absorbing to be recorded otherwise than in statistics. The wants
of the hour and the exigencies of practical responsibility wholly
engage the mind.  Half a century ago, it was usual to sneer in
England at the literary pretensions of America; but the ridicule
was quite as unphilosophical as unjust, for it was to be expected
that the new settlements would find their chiief mental subsistence
in the rich heritage of British literature, endeared to them by a
community of language, political sentiment, and historical association. And when a few of the busy denizens of a new republic
ventured to give expression to their thoughts, it was equally natural
that the spirit and the principles of their ancestral literature should
reappear.  Scenery, border-life, the vicinity of the aborigines, and a
great political experiment were the only novel features in the new
(433)




434         A SKETCH OF AIERICAN LITERATURE.    [CHlAP. I.
world upon which to found anticipations of originality; in academic
culture, habitual reading, moral and domestic tastes, and cast of
mind, the Americans were identified with the mother country; and
in all essential particulars, would naturally follow the style thus inherent in their natures and confirmed by habit and study.  At first,
therefore, the literary development of the United States was imita.
tive; but with the progress of the country, and her increased leisure
and means of education, the writings of the people became more and
more characteristic; theological and political occasions gradually
ceased to be the exclusive moulds of thought; and didactic, romantic, and picturesque compositions appeared from  time to time.
Irving peopled'Sleepy Hollow' with fanciful creations; Bryant described not only with truth and grace, but with devotional sentiment,
the characteristic scenes of his native land; Cooper introduced Europeans to the wonders of her forest and sea-coast; Bancroft made hei
story eloquent; and Webster proved that the race of orators who
once roused her children to freedom, was not extinct. The names of
Edwards and Franklin were echoed abroad; the bonds of mental
dependence were gradually loosened-the inherited tastes remained,
but they were freshened with a more native zest,-and although
Brockden Brown is still compared to Godwin, Irving to Addison,
Cooper to Scott, Hoffman to Moore, Emerson to Carlyle, and Holmer
to Pope, a characteristic vein, an individuality of thought, and a local
significance is now generally recognised in the emanations of the
American mind; and the best of them  rank favourably and harmoniously with similar examplars in British literature; while, in a few
instances, the nationality is so marked, and so sanctioned by true
genius as to challenge the recognition of all impartial and able critics.
The major:ty, however, of our authors are men of talent rather than
of genius; the greater part of the literature of the country has sprung
fiom New England, and is therefore, as a general rule, too unimpassioned and coldly elegant for popular effect.  There has been a
lamentable want of self-reliance, and an obstinate blindness to the
worth of native material, both scenic, historical, and social.  The
great defect of our literature has been a lack of independence, and
too exclusive a deference to hackneyed models; there has been and
is no deficiency of intellectual life; it has thus far, however, often
proved too diffusive and conventional for great results.
The intellect of the country first developed in a theological form.'This was a natural consequence of emigration, induced by difference
of religious opinion, the free scope which the new colonies afforded
for discussion, and the variety of creeds represented by the different
races who thus met on a common soil, including every diversity of
sentiment, from Puritanism to Episcopacy, each extreme modified by
shades of doctrine and individual speculation. The clergy, also, were
the best educated and most influential class; in political and social




CHAP. I.]    A SKETCH OF A3IERICAN LITERATURE.              435
as well as religious affairs, their voice had a controlling power; and,
for a considerable period, they alone enjoyed that frequent immunity
from physical labor which is requisite to mental productiveness. The
colonial era, therefore, boasted only a theological literature, for the
most part fugitive and controversial; yet sometimes taking a more
permanent shape, as in the Biblical Concordance of Newman, and some
of the writings of Roger Williams, Increase and Cotton Mather, Mayhew, Cooper, Stiles, Dwight, Elliot, Johnson, Chauncey, Witherspoon,
and Hopkins.  There is no want of learning or reasoning power in
many of the tracts of'those once formidable disputants; and such reading accorded with the stern tastes of our ancestors; but, as a general
rule, the specimens which yet remain in print, are now only referred to
by the curious student of divinity or the antiquarian. One enduring
relic, howeer, of this epoch survives, and is held in great estimation
by metaphysicians for its subtlety of argument, its originality and
vigor, and masterly treatment of a profound subject. I allude to the
celebrated Treatise on the Will, by Dr. Edwards, a work originally
undertaken to furnish a philosophical basis for the Calvinistic dogmas;
and, in its sagacious hardihood of thought, forming a characteristic.ntroduction to the literary history of New England.
Jonathan Edwards was the only son of a Connecticut minister
)f good acquirements and sincere piety.  He was born in 1703 in
the town of IWindsor; he entered Yale College at the age of thirteen,
and at nineteen became a settled preacher in New York. In 1723,
tbe was elected a tutor in the college at New Haven; and after dis-*harging its duties with eminent success for two years, he became the
colleague of his grandfather, in the ministry, at the beautiful village of Northampton, in Massachusetts.  Relieved from all material
ares by the affection of his wife, his time was entirely given to professional occupations and study.  An ancient elm is yet designated
in the town where he passed so many years, in the crotch of which
was his favorite seat, where he was accustomed to read and think
for hours together.  His sermons began to attract attention, and
several were republished in England. As a writer, he first gained
celebrity by a treatise on'Original Sin.' IIe was inaugurated President of Princeton College, N. J., on the 16th of Februaly 1785;
and on the 22d of the ensuing March died of small-pox, which then
ravaged the vicinity.
" This remarkable man," says Sir James Mackintosh, "' the metaphysician of America, was formed among the Calvinists of New
England, when their stern doctrine retained its vigorous authoiity.
His power of subtle argument, perhaps unmatched, certainly unsurpassed among men, was joined, as in some of the ancien* mystics,
with a character which raised his piety to fervor.  I-Ie embraced
their doctrine, probably without knowing it to be theirs.  Had he
suffered this noble principle to take the right road to all its fair con36 *




436          A SKETCH OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.    [chAP. r.
sequences, he would have entirely concurred with Plato, with Shafti(sbury and Malebranche, in devotion to'the first good, first perfect,
and first fair.'  But he thought it necessary afterwards to limit his
doctrine to his own persuasion, by denying that such moral excellence
could be discovered in divine things by those Christians who did not
take the same view with him of their religion." *
Although so meagre a result, as far as regards permanent literature, sprang from the early theological writings in America, they had
a certain strength and earnestness which tended to invigorate and
exercise the minds of the people; sometimes, indeed, conducive to
bigotry, but often inciting reflective habits.  The mental life of the
colonists seemed, for a long time, identical with religious discussion;
and the names of Anne Hutchinson, Roger Williams, George Fox,
Whitfield, the early held-preacher, and subsequently those of Dr.
Hopkins, and Murray the father of Universalism in America, were
rallying words for logical warfare; the struggle between the advocates of quakerism, baptism by immersion, and other of the minority
against those of the old Presbyterian and Church of England doctrine, gave birth to a multitude of tracts, sermons, and oral debates
which elicited no little acumen, rhetoric, and learning.  The originality and productiveness of the American mind in this department
has, indeed, always been a characteristic feature in its development.
Scholars and orators of distinguished ability have never been wanting
to the clerical profession among us; and every sect in the land has
its illustrious interpreters, who have bequeathed, or still contribute,
written memorials of their ability.  Davies, Bellamy, Robinson,
Stuart, Tappan, Williams, Bishop White, Dr. Jarvis, Dr. lHawkes,
Hooker, Cheever, and others, have materially adorned the literature
of the church; the diversity of sects is one of the most curious and
striking facts in our social history, and is fully illustrated by the literary organs of each denomination, from the spiritual commentaries
of Bush to the ardent Catholicism  of Brownson.t  About the commencement of the present century, a memorable conflict took place
between the liberal and orthodox party; and among the writings of
the former may be found more finished specimens of composition than
had previously appeared on ethics and religion. Independent of their
opinions, the high morality and beautiful sentiment, as well as chaste
and graceful diction, of the leaders of that school, gave a literary
zalue and interest to pulpit eloquence which soon exercised a marked
* Progress of Ethical Philosophy.
t The clergy have been among the prominent laborers in the field of useful
literature. Tlhe names of Dehon, Payson, Potter, Abbott, Bedeli, Knox, Todd,
Woods, Sprague, Baird, Barnes, Alexander, Tyng, Bacon, Stewart, of the
Orthodox and the Episcopal denomination; and of Bu.lkninster, William aind
Henry Ware, Dewey, Whitman, Osgood, Greenwood, Frothingham, Brooks,
Furness, Peabody, Stetson, and many others of the Unitarian, are identified
fwith current educational and religious literature.




CHAP. I.]    A SKETCHI OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.                 437
influence on the literary taste of the community.  Religious and
moral writings now derived from style a new interest.  At the head
of this class, who achieved a world-wide reputation for genius in
ethical literature, is William Ellery Channing.
"Half a century ago, there might have been seen threading the
streets of Richmond, a diminutive figure, with a pale attenuated
face, eyes of spiritual brightness, an expansive and calm brow, and
movements of nervous alacrity.  An abstraction of manner and intentness of expression denoted the scholar, while the scrupulously
neat, yet worn attire, as clearly evidenced restricted means and habits
of self-denial. The youth was one of those children of New England braced by her discipline, and early sent forth to earn a position
in the world, by force of character and activity of intellect.  He was
baptized into the fraternity of Nature by the grandeur and beauty
of the sea as it breaks along the craggy shore of Rhode Island; the
domestic influences of a Puritan household had initiated him into the
moral convictions; and the teachings of Harvard yielded him  the
requisite attainments to discharge the office of private tutor in a
wealthy Virginian family. Then and there, far from the companions
of his studies and the home of his childhood, through secret conflicts,
devoted application to books, and meditation, amid privations, coinparative isolation, and premature responsibility, he resolved to consecrate himself to the Christian ministry.  Illness had subdued his
elasticity, care shadowed his dreams, and retirement solemnized his
desires.  Thence he went to Boston, and for more than forty years
pursued the consistent tenor of his way as an eloquent divine and
powerful writer, achieving a wide renown, bequeathing a venerated
memory, and a series of discourses, reviews and essays, which, with
remarkable perspicuity and earnestness, vindicate the cause of free.
dolm, the original endowments and eternal destiny of human nature,
the sanctions of religion and'the ways of God to man.'  Sectarian
controversy, tne duties of the pastoral office, journeys abroad and at
hoine, inter-ourse with superior minds and the seclusion made necessary by diseuse,-the quiet of home, the refining influence of literary taste, arct the vocations of citizen, father and philanthropist,
occupied those intervening years.  He died, one beautiful October
evening, at Bennington, Vermont, while on a summer exctision, and
was buried at Mount Auburn.  A  monument commemorates the
gratitude of his parishioners and the exalted estimation he had
acquired in the world.  A biography prepared by his nephew, recounts the few incidents of his career, and gracefully unfolds the
process of his growth and mental history.
"It is seldom that ethical writings interest the multitude.  The
abstract nature of the topics they discuss, and the formal style in
which they are usually embodied, are equally destitute of that pop'alar
aharm  that wins the common heart.  A  remarkable exception is




438          A SKETCHI OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.    [CHAP. I.
presented in the literary remains of Channing.  The simple yet
comprehensive ideas upon which he dwells, the tranquil gravity of
his utterance, and the winning clearness of his style, render many
of his productions universally attractive as examples of quiet and
persuasive eloquence.  And this result is entirely independent of any
sympathy with his theological opinions, or experience of his pulpit
oratory.  Indeed, the genuine interest of Dr. Channing's writings is
ethical.  As the champion of a sect, his labours have but a temporary
value; as the exponent of a doctrinal system, he will not long be remnembered with gratitude, because the world is daily better appreciating the religious sentiment as of infinitely more value than any
dogmla; but as a moral essayist, some of the more finished writings
of Channing will have a permanent hold upon reflective and tasteful
minds. His nephew has compiled his biography with singular judgment. He has followed the method of Lockhart in the Life of Scott.
As far as possible, the narrative is woven from letters and diaries,the subject speaks for himself, and only such intermediate observations of the editor are given as are necessary to form a connected
whole.  Uneventful as these memoirs are, they are interesting as
revelations of the process of culture, the means and purposes of one
whose words have winged their way, bearing emphatic messages, over
both hemlisphercs,-who, for many years, successfully advocated important truths; and whose memory is one of the imost honored of
New England's gifted divines.
" To Dr. Channing's style is, in a great degree, ascribable the popularity of his writings; and we are struck with its remarkable
identity from the earliest to the latest period of his career.  A petition to Congress, penned while a student at the University, which
appears in these volumes, has all its prominent characteristics -its
brief sentences, occasionally lengthened where the idea requires itits emphasis, its simplicity, directness, and transparent dictiOn.  This
is a curious evidence of the purely meditative existence hlie must have
passed; for it is by attrition with other minds and subjection to varied
influences, that the style of writing as well as the tone of manners
undergoes those striking modifications which we perceive in men less
intent upon a few thoughts.  His character is, therefore, justly dezcribed as more indebted to'the influences of solitary thought than
of companionship.'  Such is the process by which all truth becomes
clearly impressed and richly developed to consciousness; on the same
principle that, according to Mary Wollstonecraft, reflection is necessary to the realization even of a great passion.'I derive my sentiments from  the nature of man,' says one of Channing's letters.
Perhaps it would have been more strictly true if he had said one
man; for an inference we long ago derived froom his writings, we find
amply confirmed in his memoirs —that he was a very inadequate
observer.  Some of his attempts to portray character are as complete




CHAP. I.]    A SKETCH OF AMERICAN  LITERATURE.                 439
fancy sketches as we ever perused.  They show an utter blindness to
the real traits even of familiar persons.  Beautiful in themselves, it
is usually from  the graceful drapery of his imagination that the
charm is derived.  Indeed, Dr. Channing hardly came near enough
to see the features in their literal significance.  He drew almost exclusively from within.  EHis subjects were what the lay-figure is to
the artist —frames for his thoughts to deck with effective costume.
When he reasoned of a truth or an idea, he was more at home; for
in the abstract he was at liberty to expatiate, without keeping in view
the actual relations of things - the stern facts and bare realities of
life and character.  Indeed, nothing can be more delightful to a refined and thoughtful mind, thau to follow Channing in his exposition
of a striking idea or truth-so clearly and dispassionately stated, then
gradually unfolded to its ultimate significance, with, here and there,
a striking illustration; and then wound up, like a fine strain of
music, which seems to raise us more and more into light and tranquillity on invisible pinions 1" *
Of all the foreign commentators on our political institutions and
national character, De Tocqueville is the most distinguished for phi.
losophical insight;t and although many of his speculations are visionary, not a few are pregnant with reflective wisdom.  IIe says in
regard to the literary development of such a republic as our own,
that its early fruits " will bear marks of an untutored and rude vigor
of thought, frequently of great variety and singular fecundity."
WVhat may be termed the casual writing and speaking of the country,
confirms this prophecy. The two most prolific branches of literature
in America, are journalism and educational works. The aim in both
is to supply that immediate demand which, according to the French
philosopher, is more imperative and prevailing than in monarchial
lands. Newspapers and school-books are, therefore, the characteristic
form of literature in the United States.  The greatest scholars of the
country have not deemed the production of the latter an unworthy
labor, nor the most active, enterprising, and ambitious failed to exercise their best powers in theformersphere.  An intelligent foreigner,
therefore, who observed the predominance of these two departments,
would arrive at the just conclusion, that the great mental distinction
of the nation is two-fold-the universality of education and a general,
though superficial intellectual activity in the mass of the people. There
is, however, still another phase of our literary condition equally significant -and that is the popularity of what may be termed domestic
reading: a species of books intended foir the family, and designed to
teach science, religion, miorality, the love of nature, anld other desirable
acquisiticns.  These works range fiom a juvenile to a mature scop.
and interest, both in form and spirit; but a*.  equally fiee of all ex* Characteristics of Literature. First Series.




440          A SKETCh OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.    [CHAP. 1
travaganec-except it be purely imaginative — and are unexceptionable, often elevated, in moral tone.  They constitute the literature of
the fireside, and give to the young their primary ideas of the world
and of life. HIence their moral importance can scarcely be overrated.
Accordingly, children's books have not been thought unworthy the
care of the best minds: philosophers like Guizot, poets like Hans
Andersen, popular novelists like Scott and Dickens, have not scorned
this apparently humble but most influential service.  The reform in
books for the young was commenced in England by Maria Edgeworth
and Mrs. Barbauld; when the'Parent's Assistant,' and'Original
Poems for Infant Minds,' superseded' Mother Goose' and'Jack the
Giant-Killer;' and with the instinct of domestic utility, so prevalent
on this side of the water, this impulse was caught up and prolonged
here, and resulted in a class of books and writers, not marked by high
genius or striking originality, yet honorable to the good sense and
moral feeling of the country.   These have supplied the countless
homes scattered over the western continent, with innocent, instructive, and often refined reading, sometimes instinct not only with a
domestic but a national spirit; often abounding with the most fresh
and true pictures of scenery, customs, and local traits, and usually conceived in a tone of gentleness and purity fitted to chasten and improve the taste.  These writers have usually adapted themselves
equally to the youngest and to the most advanced of the family
circle -extended their labor of love from the child's story-book to
the domestic novel.*
Oratory is eminently the literature of republics. Political freedom
gives both occasion and impulse to thought on public interests; and
its expression is a requisite accomplishment to every intelligent and
patriotic citizen. American eloquence, although not unknown in the
professional spheres of colonial life, developed with originality and
richness at the epoch of the revolution.  Indeed, the questions that
agitated the country naturally induced popular discussions, and as a
sense of wrong and a resolve to maintain the rights of freemen, took
the place of remonstrance and argument, a race of orators seems to
have sprung to life, whose chief traits continue evident in a long and
illustrious roll of names, identified with our statesmen, legislators and
* It is creditable to the sex that this sphere has been filled, in our country,
chiefly by female writers; the list of whom includes a long array of endeared
and honoured names, at the head of' which stands Hannah Adams, with her
once popular histories, Catharine M. Sedgwick, with her moral and graphic
illustrations of New England life, and Lydia M. Child, with her poetic and
generous suggestiveness.  Among others may be mentioned Mrs. Lydia H.
Sigourney, Miss Leslie, sister of the artist, Eliza Robbins, Mrs. Gilman, of
Charleston, S. C., Mrs. Lee, of Boston, Ars. E. Oakes Smith, Miss Beecher,
Mrs. Kirkland. Mrs. Ellett, Mrs. S. J. Hale, and such noms de plume as
Fanny Forrester and Grace Greenwood; also Mrs. Embury, of Brooklyn, L.
I., Miss McIntosh, Mrs. Neal, Alice Carey, Mrs. Farrar, Mrs. Willard, Mrs.
Hall, and Miss Wetherel,




CIAP. I.]    A SKETCH OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.                441
divines.  From  the stripling Hamilton, who, in July 1774, held a
vast concourse in breathless excitement, in the fields near New York,
while he demonstrated the right and necessity of resistance to British
oppression, to the mature Webster, who, in December 1829, defended
the union of the States with an argumentative and rhetorical power
ever memorable in the annals of legislation, there has been a series
of remarkable public speakers who have nobly illustrated this branch
of literature in the United States. The fame of American eloquence
is in part traditionary.  Warren, Adams, and Otis in Boston, and
Patrick Henry in Virginia, by their spirit-stirring appeals, roused the
land to the assertion and defence of its just rights; and Alexander
Hamilton, Governeur Morris, Pinkney, Jay, Rutledge, and other firm
and gifted men gave wise and effective direction to the power thus
evoked, by their logical and earnest appeals.
" At the time the contest began," says Guizot, " there were in each
colony some men already honored by their fellow-citizens, already well
known in the defence of public liberty, influential by their property,
talent, or character; faithful to ancient virtues, yet friendly to modern
improvement; sensible to the splendid advantages of civilization, and
yet attached to simplicity of manners; high-toned in their feelings,
but of modest minds, at the same time ambitious and prudent in their
patriotic impulses."  Foremost among these remarkable men was
Alexander Hamilton; by birth a West Indian, by descent uniting
the Scottish vigor and sagacity of character with the accomplishment
of the French.  While a collegian in New York, his talents, at once
versatile and brilliant, were apparent in the insight' and poetry of his
debates, the solemn beauty of his devotion, the serious argument of
his ambitious labors, and the readiness of his humorous sallies; with
genuine religious sentiment, born perhaps of his Huguenot blood, he
united a zest for pleasure, a mercurial temperament, and grave aspirations.  In his first youth the gentleman, the pietist, the hero, and
the statesman alternately exhibited, sometimes dazzled, at others impressed, and always won the hearts of his comrades.  His first public
demonstration was as an orator, when but seventeen; and notwithstanding his slender figure and extreme youth, he took captive both
the reason and feeling of a popular assembly.  Shortly after he be.
came involved in the controversy then raging between whigs and
tories; and his pamphlets and newspaper essays were read with
mingled admiration and incredulity at the rare powers of expression
and mature judgment thus displayed by the juvenile antagonist of
bishops and statesmen. But his arm not less than his tongue was
dedicated to the cause he thus espoused with equal ardor and intelligence.  He studied the military art, gained Washington's notice in
the retreat of the American forces through New Jersey; and from
that moment became his intimate coadjutor.  His next intellectual
labor was devoted to explaining and enforcing the principles of finance




442           A SKETCH OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.    [CHAP. 1.
-a subject of which his countrymen were practically ignorant.  To
his zeal and sagacity in this department, combined with the noble
efforts of Robert Morris, the country was indebted for the pecuniary
means of carrying on the war of the revolution, and finally for a regulated currency and established credit.
As first secretary of the treasury, Hamilton may be said to have
laid the foundation of our national prosperity.  His mind, even at a
period most burdened with official cares, was given to the successful
advocacy of a neutral course in regard to France; after honorable
service attaining the rank of lieutenant-general, when the army disbanded, Hamilton resumed the legal profession. The idol of the
Federal party, and a candidate for the Chief Magistracy, he became
entangled in a duel planned by political animosity, and fell at Weehawken, opposite the city of New York, by the hand of Aaron Buir,
on the eleventh of June, 1804. The impression caused by his
untimely death was unprecedented in this country; for no public
man ever stood forth "so clear in his great office," more essentially
useful in affairs, courageous in battle, loyal in attachment, gifted in
mind, or graceful in manner.  During a life of such varied and absorbing occupation, he found time to put on record his principles as
a statesman; not always highly finished, his writings are full of
sense and energy; their tone is noble, their insight often deep, and
the wisdom they display remarkable.  His letters are finely characteristic; his state-papers valuable, and the'Federalist' a significant
illustration both of his genius and the age.*
The historical and literary anniversaries of such frequent occurrence
in this country, and the exigencies of political life, give occasion for
the exercise of oratory to educated citizens of all professions - from
the statesman who fills the gaze of the world, to the village pastor
and country advocate. Accordingly a large and, on the whole,
remarkably creditable body of discourses, emanating from  the best
minds of the country, have been published in collected editions, to
such an extent as to constitute a decided feature of American literature.  They are characteristic also as indicating the popular shape,into which intellectual labors naturally run in a young and free
country, and the fugitive and occasional literary efforts which alone
are practicable for the majority even of scholars.  The most solid
* No small part of the political writing of the United States is fugitive in
Its character; but the State papers, including the correspondence of the chief
actors in the revolutionary war, and the adoption of the Constitution, form a
mine of political ideas and principles. After these, the speeches of the leading
statesmen contain, in themselves, a history of the political opinions and crises
of the nation; and an armory of logical weapons, of more or less value, may
easily be drawn from the works of Franklin, Hamilton, Morris, Jay, Quincy,
Dickinson, Paine, Jefferson, Madison, Livingston, Ames, Freneau, Noah
Webster, Rawle, William  Sullivan, Leggett, and other political essayists.
The'Federalist,' the joint production of' Hamilton, MIadison, and Jay, is a
trandard book of this class.




CHAP. I.]    A SKETCH OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.                443
of this class of writings are the productions of statesmen; and of
these, three are conspicuous, although singularly diverse both in style
and cast of thought -Webster, Calhoun, and Clay.  The former's
oration at Plymouth in 1820; his address at the laying of the cornerstone of the Bunker Hill Monument, half a century after the battle;
his discourse on the deaths of Adams and Jefferson, the following
year; and his reply to Hayne, in the U. S. Senate, in 1829, arc
memorable specimens of oratory, and recognised everywhere as
among the greatest instances of genius in this branch of letters in
modern times. These are, however, but a very small part of his
speeches and forensic arguments, which constitute a permanent and
characteristic, as well as intrinsically valuable and interesting portion
of our native literature.
Daniel Webster is the son of a New Hampshire farmer. He was
born in 1782, graduated at Dartmouth College, and began the practice of law at a village near Salisbury, his birth-place, but removed
to Portsmouth in 1807.  He soon distinguished himself at the bar,
and as a member of the House of Representatives; retired from
Congress and removed to Boston in 1817; and, by his able arguments in the Supreme Court, as well as his unrivalled eloquence on
special occasions, was very soon acknowledged to be one of the great.
est men America had produced. His career as a senator, a foreign
minister, and secretary of state, has been no less illustrious than his
professional triumphs; but, as far as literature is concerned, he will
be remembered by his state-papers and speeches.  His style is remarkable for great clearness of statement. It is singularly emphatic.
It is impressive rather than brilliant, and occasionally rises to absolute
grandeur. It is evidently formed on the highest English models;
and the reader conjectures his love of Milton, from the noble sim.
plicity of his language, and fondness for sublime rather than apt
figures. Clearness of statement, vigor of reasoning, and a faculty of
making a question plain to the understanding, by the mere terms in
which it is presented, are the traits which uniformly distinguish his
writings, evident alike in a diplomatic note, a legislative debate, and
an historical discourse. His dignity of expression, breadth of view,
and force of thought, realize the ideal of a republican statesman, in
regard, at least to natural endowments; and his presence and manner,
in the prime of his life, were analogous. Independent of their logica.
and rhetorical merit, these writings may be deemed invaluable from
the nationality of their tone and spirit. They awaken patriotic re.
flection and sentiment, and are better adapted to warn, to enlighten,
and to cheer the consciousness of the citizen, than any American
works, if a didactic kind, yet produced.
In the speeches of Clay there is a chivalric freshness, which readily explains his,great popularity as a man; not so profound as
Webster, he is far more rhetorical, and equally patriotic. Calhoun
37




444         A SKETCH OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.    [CHAP T.
is eminently individual; his mind has that precise energy which is
so effectual in debate; his style of argument is concise; and in
personal aspect he was quite as remarkable-the incarnation of intense
purpose and keen perception, These and many other eminent men
have admirably illustrated that department of oratory which belongs
to statesmen.
Fisher Ames, William  Wirt, John  Quincy Adams, Hugh  S
Legare, and others, famed as debaters, have united to this distinction
the renown of able rhetoricians on literary and historical occasions;
and to these we may add the names of Verplanck, Chief Justice
Story, Chancellor Kent, Rufus  Choate, Randolph, Winthrop
Burgess, Preston, Benton, Prentiss, Bethune, Bushnell, Dewey,
Birney, Hillhouse, Sprague, Wayland, A. H. Everett, Horace
Binney, Dr. Francis, Sumner, Whipple, Hillard, and other authors
of occasional addresses, having by their scope of thought or beauty
of style, a permanent literary value.  The most voluminous writer
in this department, however, is Edward Everett. His two large and
elegant volumes not only exhibit the finest specimens of rhetorical
writing, but they more truly represent the cultivated American mind
in literature, than any single work with which we are acquainted.
Oratory has always flourished in republics; it is a form of intellectual development to which free political institutions give both scope
and inspiration; and we hesitate not to declare that Edward Everett s
Orations are as pure in style, as able in statement, and as authentic
as expressions of popular history, feeling and opinion in a finished
and elegant shape, as were those of Demosthenes and Cicero in their
day. Let not the frequency of public addresses, and the ephemeral
character they so often possess, blind our countrymen to the permanent and intrinsic merits of these Orations.  They embody the
results of long and faithful research into the most important facts
of our history; they give "a local habitation and a name" to the
most patriotic associations; their subjects, not less than their sentiments, are thoroughly national; not a page but glows with the most
intelligent love of country, nor a figure, description, or appeal but
what bears evidence of scholarship, taste, and just sentiment.  If a
highly-cultivated foreigner were to ask us to point him to any single
work which would justly inform him of the spirit of our institutions
and history, and, at the same time, afford an adequate idea of our
present degree of culture, we should confidently designate these
Orations.  The. great battles of the Revolution, the sufferings and
principles of the early colonists, the characters of our leading statesmen, the progress of arts, sciences, and education among us —all
those great interests which are characteristic to the philosopher - of
a nation's life-are here expounded, now by important facts, now by
eloquent illustrations, and again in the form of impressive and graceful comments.  History, essays, descriptive sketches, biographical




CHAP. i.]    A SKETCH OF AMERICAN LITERAXURE.               4,45
data, picturesque detail, and general principles, ar~ all blent together
with a tact, a distinctness, a felicity of expression, and a unity of
style, unexampled in this species of writing.  Mr. Everett has made
the art of oratory his peculiar study; again and again his beautiful
elocution has charmed audiences composed of the most intelligent
and fairest of our citizens.  Many of these occasions have a traditional renown. Indeed, whoever has heard one of these addresses
delivered, has enjoyed a memorable gratification; not one of them
but has to every true American heart and mind a sterling value, as
well as an enduring fascination. They include the most salient points
in our annals; they consecrate the memories of some of the noblest
spirits who have blessed our country; they celebrate events hallowed
by results which, at this hour, are agitating the world; and all these
attractions are independent of -the rare and invaluable literary merit
which distinguishes them. No public or private library should be
without them; the old should -grow familiar with their pages to keep
alive the glow of enlightened patriotism; and the young, to learn
a wise love of country and the graces of refined scholarship.
There is no branch of literature that can be cultivated in a republic
with more advantage to the reader, and satisfaction to the author,
than History.  Untrammelled by proscription, and unawed by political authority, the annalist may trace the events of the past, and
connect them, by philosophical analogy, with Ithe tendencies of the
present, free to impart the glow of honest conviction to his record,
to analyse the conduct of leaders, the theory of parties, and the
significance of events.  The facts, too, of our history are comparatively recent. It is not requisite to conjure up fabulous traditions or
explore the dim regions of antiquity.  From  har origin the nation
was civilized. A backward glance at the state of Europe, the causes
of emigration, and the standard of political and social advancement
at the epoch of the first colonies in North America, is all that we
need to start intelligently upon the track of our country's marvellous
growth, and brief, though eventful career.  There are relations,
however, both to the past and future, which render American history
the most suggestive episode in the annals of the world; and give it
a universal as well as special dignity.  To those who chiefly value
facts as illustrative of principles, and see in the course of events the
grand problem of humanity, the occurrences in the New World fionm
its discovery to the present hour, offer a comprehensive interest unrecognised by those who only regard details.  Justly interpreted, the
liberty and progress of mankind, illustrated by the history of the
United States, is but the practical demonstration of principles which
the noblest spirits of England advocated with their pens, and often
sealed with their blood.  It is as lineal descendants in the love of
freedom and humanity, of Milton, Locke, and Sidney, that the intelligent votaries of American liberty should be considered.  It is easy




446          A SKETCH OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.    [CHAP. I.
to trace in the municipal regulations, the tone of society, and in the
press of the colonists, a recognition of and familiarity with the responsibilities and progressive tendency of liberal institutions.  Their
minds were fed upon the manly nutriment of English letters; they
knew by heart the bold sentiments of those intellectual benefactors
who adorned the age of Elizabeth, and the times of Cromwell; they
gloried in the best triumphs of the Commonwealth; and with the
earnest reflection and generous knowledge thus derived from their
ancestral country, they united the adventurous spirit of the pioneer,
and the enthusiasm of the colonist having a new and open field for
experiment both of thought and action; accustomed to the elective
franchise, imbued with attachment to freedom, and enlightened by
sympathy with those who had nobly pleaded and bravely suffered in
her cause at home, we cannot but perceive that the colonists achieved
a revolution in the manner, rather than in the spirit, of their institutions; they carried out what had long existed in idea; and, as it
were, actualised the views of Algernon Sydney and his illustrious
coinpeers.  It is through this intimate and direct relation with the
past of the Old World, and as initiative to her ultimate self-enfranchisement, that our history daily grows in value and interest, unfolds
new meaning, and becomes endeared to all thinking men.  It is a
link between two great cycles of human progress; the ark that,
floating safely on the ocean-tide of humanity, preserves those elements of national freedom which are the vital hope of the world.
Glorious, however, as is the theme, it is only within the last quarter
of a century that it has found any adequate illustration.  The labors
of American historians have been, for the most part, confined to the
acquisition of materials, the unadorned record of facts; their subjects
have been chiefly local; and, in very few cases, have their labors derived any charm from the graces of style, or tile resources of philosophy: they are usually crude memoranda of events, not always
reliable, though often curious.  In a few instances care and scholarship render such contributions to American history intrinsically valuable; but, taken together, they are rather materials for the annalist
than complete works, and as such will prove of considerable value.
It is to collect and preserve these and other records, that historical
societies have been formed in so many of the states.  A storehouse
of data is thus formed, to which the future historian can resort; and
probably the greater part of the local narratives are destined either
to be re-written with all the amenities of literary tact and refinement,
or, cast in the mould of genius, become identified with the future
triumphs of the American novelist and poet.  In the meantime, all
honor is due to those who have assiduously labored to record the
great events which have here occurred, and to preserve the memo.
ries of our patriots.  Jared Sparks, now president of Harvard University, has labored most effectually in this sphere.  In a series of




Ct(.P. a ]     A SKETCH  OF AMERICAN  LITERATURE.                      447
well written biographies, and in the collected letters of Washington
and Franklin, which he has edited, we have a rich funct of national
material.*
Among the earliest and most indefatigable laborers in the field of
history was Ra msay.  His " Historical View of the World, from the
earliest Record to the Nineteenth Century, with a particular Refer.
ence to the  state of Society, Literature, Religion, and  Form  of
Government of the United States of America," was published in
1819; a previous work early in 1817; and more than forty years
during intervals of leisure in an active life, were thus occupied by a
man not more remarkable for mental assiduity than for all the social
graces and solid excellencies of human character.
* Among the local and special histories, all more or less valuable as books
of reference, and some having both literary and authentic merit, are'Belknap's
New  Hampshire,''Sullivan's Maine,'' Morton's New  England Memorial,'' Trurnbull's Connecticut,'' Smith's New York,'' Watson's Annals of Pennsylvania,'' Williams's Vermont,'' Stephens's Georgia,'' Minot's Massachusetts,'' Stithe's Virginia,''Winthrop's Journal,''T hatcher's Journal,''Flint's
Western States,''Gayerre's Louisiana,''O'Callahan's New York,'' Proud's
Pennsylvania,''Moultrie's Revolution in North and South Carolina and
Georgia,''Bishop White's History of the Episcopal Church,''Jefferson's
Notes on Virginia,''Barton's Florida,''Young's Chronicles of' the First
Planters of Massachusetts Bay' and' Chronicles of the Pilgrim Fathers of
New Plymouth,' in N. E. Cheever's'Journal of the Pilgrims,' Frothinghamnl''History of the Siege of Boston,''Hammond's Political History of New
York,'' Holmes's Annals,''Kip's Early Jesuit Missions in North America,'' Upham's History of the Salem Witchcraft,'' Mayer's History of the Mexican War,''Miner's History of Wyoming,'' Marnlette's History of the Valley
of the Mississippi,'' Newell's History of the Revolution in tl'exas,'' Smiih's
Virginia,'' Sprague's History of the Florida War,' J.'I. Irving's' Conquest
of Florida,'' Thomas's Historical Account of Pennsylvania,'' Thompson's
Long Island,''Buckingham's Reminiscences,''Upham's History of the Salemn
Witchcraft,'' Whittier's Supernaturalism  in New England,'' Pickett's Alabama,'' Thornas's History of Printing,'' Morton's Louisiana,'' Macy's Nantucket,'' Sewell's Quakers,'' Drake's Indians,'' Camther's Cavaliers of' Virginia,'' Alden's Collections,'' Francis Baylies' Colony of Plymouth," Bradford's History,' and' Green's HIistorical Studies.'
There -are also many interesting volumes of American biography. Those
of revolutionary and colonial times are embodied in the series edited by Sparks;
and among other pleasing and valuable works in this department, are the fol.
lowing:-' Marshall's Life of Washington,'' Tudor's Otis,''Austin's Gerry,'
Wirt's Patrick Henry,'' Wheaton's Pinckney,' the'Life of Josiah Quincy'
by his son,' Colden's Fulton,' the' Life of John Adams,' by his grandson,''Tucker's Jefferson,''Knapp's American Biographies,''Biddle's Cabot,' the
* Life of Alexander Hamilton,' by his son, the'Life of Washington,'' FrankLn,'' John Jay,'' Governeur Morris,' by Sparks,' Gibbs's Life of Wolcotr,'' Kennedy's Life of Wirt,'' Life of Judge Story,' by his son,' Life of William
E. Chauncey,' by his nephew,' Life of MAlargaret Fuller Ossoli,''Dunlap's
American'Theatre and History of the Arts of Design,'' Lives of Generals
Putnam, Greene, Marion, and Captain Smith,' by W. Gilmore Simms, Col
Stone's' Life of Brant and Red-Jacket,''Davis's Life of Aaron Burr,'' Iitf.
of Reed,'' Life of Stirling,'' Sabine's American Loyalists,'' Wynne's Lives
of Eminent Americans,''Osgood's Studies in Christian Biography,''Mrs.
Lee's Huguenots,'' Mrs. Ellett's Women of the Revolution,''Shelburne's
Paul Jones,' and'MacKenzie's Decatur and Perry.'
37 *




448          A SKETCH OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.    [CHEAP. ]
Dr. David Ramsay, a native of Lancaster county, Pennsylvania,
was the son of an Irish emigrant.  After graduating at Princeton
College, and, according to the custom  of the period, devoting two
years to private tuition, he studied medicine, and removed to Charleston, South Carolina, where he soon became a distinguished patriotic
writer. He was a surgeon in the American arrmiy, and active in the
louncils of the land, suffering, with other votaries of independence,
he penalty of several months' banishment to St. Augustine.  He
earnestly opposed, in the legislature of the state, the confiscation of
loyalist property. In 1782, he became a member of the Continental
Congre.ss; he three years after represented the Charleston district;
and for a year was president of that body, in the absence of Hancock. He died in 1815, in consequence of wounds received from the
pistol of a maniac.  Remarkable for a conciliatory disposition and
ardent patriotism, he was a fluent speaker, and a man of great literary industry. Besides a history of the revolution in South Carolina,
which was translated and published in France, a history of the American revolution, which reached a second edition, a life of Washington, and a history of South Carolina, he left a history of the United
Statesr from their first settlement to the year 1808,-afterwards continued, by other hands, to the Treaty of Ghent, and published in
three octavo volumes,-a monument of his unwearied and zealous
research, and patient labor for the good Qf the public and the honor
of his country.
The most successful attempt yet made to reduce the chaotic but
rich materials of American history to order, beauty, and moral significance, is the work of George Bancroft.*  The inadequate history
of Judge Marshall, and the careful one relating to the colonial period,
by Grahame, were previously the only works devoted to the subject.
Our revolution, in its most interesting details, was known in Europe
chiefly through  the attractive pages of Carlo Botta.  With the
ground thus unoccupied, Mr. Bancroft commenced his labors. He
was prepared for them not only by culture and talent, but by an
earnest sympathy with the spirit of the age he was to illustrate.
Having passed through the discipline of a brilliant scholastic career
at the best university in the country, studied theology, and engaged
in the classical education of youth, he had also visited Europe, and
become imbued with the love of German literature; he was for two
* George Bancroft was born in Worcester, Massachusetts, in the year 1800;
he is the son of Rev. Aaron Bancroft, for more thanr half a century minister
of that town, a man highly venerated, and devoted to historical research, par.
ticularly as regards his native country. Thus under the paternal roof, and fromt
his earliest age, the sympathies and taste of the son were awakened to the
subject of American history. He graduated in the first rank of Harvard College in 1817. In 1834 appeared the first volume of his History of the Coltnization of the United States; in 1837 the second, in 1840 the third, and in
1859 the fourth, being the introductory History of the Revolution.




CHAP. I.]    A SKETCIH OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.                 449
years a pupil of Heeren, at Gottingen, and mingled freely with the
learned coteries of Berlin and Heidelberg.  His two first published
works, after his return to the United States, are remarkably suggestive of his traits of mind, and indicate that versatility which is so
desirable in an historian.  These were a small volume of metrical
pieces, mainly expressive of his individual feelings and experience;
and a translation of Professor Heeren's " Reflections on the Politics
of Ancient Greece;" thus early both the poetic and the philosophic
element were developed; and although, soon after, Mr. Bancroft
entered actively into political life, and held several high offices under
the general government, including that of Minister to Great Britain,
he continued. to prosecute his historical researches, under the most
favourable auspices, both at home and abroad, and from time to time
put forth the successive volumes of his "History of the United
States."  To this noble task he brought great and patient industry,
an eloquent style, and a capacity to array the theme in the garb of
philosophy. Throughout he is the advocate of democratic institutions; and in the early volumes, where, by the nature of the subject,
there is little scope for attractive detail, by infusing a reflective tone,
he rescues the narrative from dryness and monotony.  Instead of a
series of facts arranged without any unity of sentiment, we have the
idea and principle of civic advancement towards freedom, as a thread
of gold upon which the incidents are strung.  He is remarkably
assiduous in unfolding the experience of the first discoverers, and the
political creeds of the early settlers; many curious and authentic
details of aboriginal habits are also given; there are everywhere signs
of careful research and genuine enthusiasm. Owing, perhaps, to the
unequal interest of the subject, the same glow and finish are not
uniformly perceptible in the style, in which we occasionally discern
an obvious strain after rhetorical effect; and sometimes the influence
of the author's political opinions is too apparent; but these are incidental defects; the general spirit, execution, anu' effect of the work is
elevated, genial, and highly instructive.  Mr. Bancroft has, at least,
vindicated his right to compose the annals of his country, by giving
to the record that vitality, both of description and of thought, which
distinguishes a genius for history from  the mere ability to collate
facts.  His manner and reflection rise, too, with his subject; the
outline becomes firmer, and the inferences clearer, as he emerges
from  the colonial and enters the revolutionary era.  Combining
apparently in his own mind, the traits of his two-fold culture, we
have the speculative tendency of the German, and the graphic deli.
neation of the English writers; in a word, he gives us pictures like
the one, and arguments and suggestions like the other; carefully
stating the fact, and earnestly deducing from it the idea; he is more
comprehensive as a philosopher than a limner; and yet no tyro in
the latter's art, for here and there we encounter a character as tersely




tt5O        A SKET3CH OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.    [CIIAP. I,
drawn, and a scene as vividly painted as any of those which have
rendered the best modern historians popular.  But it is the undercurrent of thought, rather than the brilliant surface of description
which gives intellectual value to Bancroft's History, and has secured
for it so high and extensive a reputation.  In sentiment and principles, it is thoroughly American; but in its style and philosophy, it
has that broad and eclectic spirit appropriate both to the general
interest of the subject, and the enlightened sympathies of the age.
Perhaps the best way to appreciate the literary merits of Bancroft's
History is to compare it with the cold and formal annals, familiar to
our childhood. Unwearied and patient in research, discriminating
in the choice of authorities, and judicious in estimating testimony,
Bancroft has the art and the ardour, the intelligence and the tact
required to fuse into a vital unity the narrative thus carefully gleaned.
He knows how to condense language, evolve thought from fact, and
make incident and characterization illustrate the progress of events.
This bold, active, concentrated manner is what is needed to give
permanent and living interest to history. Portraits of individuals,
scenes pregnant with momentous results and philosophic inferences,
alternate in his pages. The character of Pitt, the death of Montcalm,
and the rationale of Puritanism, are very diverse subjects, yet they
are each related to the development of the principle of freedom on
this continent; and accordingly received both the artistic and analytical treatment of the American historian.
Hildreth's "History of the United States" will probably become
a standard book of reference.  Rhetorical grace and effect, pic.
turesqueness and the impress of individual opinion, are traits which
the author either rejects or keeps in abeyance. His narrative is plain
and straightforward, confined to facts which he seems to have gleaned
with great care and conscientiousness. The special merit of his work
consists in the absence of whatever can possibly be deemed either
irrelevant or ostentatious. A " History of Liberty" by S. A. Elliot,
is the work of scholarship and taste, but not of poetic inspiration or
philosophy; it is, however, an elegant addition to our native writings
in this sphere. In a popular form, the most creditable performance
is the "Field-Book of the Revolution," by Benson J. Lossing, a
wood-engraver by profession, who has visited all the scenes of that
memorable war, and, with pen and pencil, delineated each incident
of importance, and every object of local interest.  His work is one
which is destined to find its way to every farmer's hearth, and to all
the school libraries of our country.
The freshness of his subjects, the beauty of his style, and the vast
difficulties he bravely surmounted, gained for William  H. Prescott*
* William H. Prescott is the grandson of Colonel William Prescott, who
commanded the Americans at the battle of Bunker Hill. He was born in Saletn, Massachusetts, on the 4th of May, 1796. Educated in boyhood by Dr.




CHAP I.]    A SKETCH OF AMERICAN LITER kTURE.                  451
not only an extensive but a remarkably speedy reputation, after the
appearance of his first history.  Many years of study, travel, and
occasional practice in writing, preceded the long-cherished design of
achieving an historical fame.  Although greatly impeded at the outset by a vision so imperfect as to threaten absolute blindness, in other
respects he was singularly fortunate.  Unlike the majority of intellectual aspirants, he had at his command the means to procure the
needful but expensive materials for illustrating a subject more prolific,
at once of romantic charms and great elements of human destiny,
than any unappropriated theme offered by the whole range of history. It included the momentous voyage of Columbus, the fall of
the Moorish empire in Spain, and the many and eventful consequences
thence resulting. Aided by the researches of our minister at Madrid.*
himself an enthusiast in letters, Mr. Prescott soon possessed himself
of ample documents and printed authorities.  These he caused to be
read to him, and during the process dictated notes, which were afterwards so frequently'repeated orally that his mind gradually possessed
itself of all the important details; and these he clothed in his own
language, arranged them with discrimination, and made out a consecutive and harmonious narrative.  Tedious as such a course must
be, and laborious in the highest degree as it proved, I am disposed
to attribute to it, in a measure at least, some of Mr. Prescott's greatest
charms as an historian: the remarkable evenness and sustained harmony, the unity of conception and ease of manner as rare as it is
delightful. The' History of Ferdinand and Isabella' is a work that
unites the fascination of romantic fiction with the grave interest of
authentic events. Its author makes no pretension to analytical power,
except in the arrangement of his materials; he is content to describe,
and his talents are more artistic than philosophical; neither is any
cherished theory or principle obvious; his ambition is apparently
limited to skilful narration.  Indefatigable in research,-sagacious in
the choice and comparison of authorities, serene in temper, graceful
in style, and pleasing in sentiment, he possesses all the requisites for
an agreeable writer; while his subjects have yielded so much of picturesque material and romantic interest, as to atone for the lack of
any more original or brilliant qualities in the author.    Ferdinand
and Isabella' was followed by' ha "e Conquest of Mexico,' and' The
Conquest of Peru.'  The scenic descriptions and the portraits of the
Spanish leaders, and of Montezuma and Gautimozin, in the former work,
give to it all the charm of an effective romance.  Few works of imagination have more power to win the fancy and touch the heart. The
Gardiner, a fine classical teacher, he entered Harvard College in ]11 I   He
studied law, and passed two years in Europe.  In 1838 was publishea his' History of Ferdinand and Isabella,' which met with almost iimmediate and unprecedented success. It was soon translated into all the modern Eurotieai
languages.
* Alexander H. Everett.




4M52         A SKETCH OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.    [CHAP. L
insight afforded into Aztec civilization, is another source of interest.
The moral qualities of considerate reflection and frankness are memo.
rable characteristics of Prescott.  He has added to the standard literature of the age, and to the literary fame of his country, by his
graceful, judicious, and attractive labors in a field comparatively new,
and abounding in artistic material.
Prescott is said to be engaged on a history of'Philip of Spain.'
In his previous efforts, he had the advantage-of subjects not identified
with the prejudices and passions of the present age; and not demanding for their just display any great reach of thought.  Iis wellbalanced periods, quiet and sustained tone, and agreeable manner,
therefore, had their full effect.  Perhaps, had he thus discussed historical themes nearer the sympathies of the hour, this absence of
earnestness and reflection would have been more consciously felt by
his many delighted readers.
Another of the few standard works in this department, of native
origin, is the'Life and Voyages of Columbus,' by Washington
Irving.  Ostensibly a biography, it partakes largely of the historical
character.  As in the case of Prescott, the friendly suggestions of
our minister at Madrid greatly promnoted the enterprise.  The work
is based on the researches of Navarette; and it is a highly fortunate
circumstance that the crude, though invaluable data thus gathered,
was first put in shape and adorned with the elegances of a polished
diction, by an American writer at once so popular and so capable as
Irving.  The resulh is a life of Columbus authentic, clear, and animated in narration, graphic in its descriptive episodes, and sustained
and finished in style.  It is a permanent contribution to English as
well as American lite'ature;-one which was greatly needed, and most
appropriately supplied.
Henry Wheaton, long our minister at Berlin, is chiefly known to
literary fame by his able'Treatise on International Law;' but, while
Charge d'Affaires in Denmark, he engaged with zeal in historical
studies, and published in London, in 1831, a'History of the Northmen;' a most curious, valuable, and suggestive, though limited work.
Cooper's'Naval History of the United States,' although not so
complete as is -desirable, is a most interesting work, abounding in
scenes of generous valor.and rare excitement, recounted with the tact
and spirit which the author's taste and practice so admirably fitted
him to exhibit on such a theme.  Some of the descriptions of naval
warfare are picturesque and thrilling in the highest degree. The
work, too, is an eloquent appeal to patriotic sentiment and national
pride.  It is one of the most characteristic histories, both in regard
to subject and style, yet produced in America.
One of the most satisfactory of recent historical works is'The
Conspiracy of Pontiac,' by Francis Parkman, of Boston.  During a
tour in the Far Westx, where he hunted the buffalo and fraternized




CHAP. II.]   A SKETCH OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.                453
with the Indians, the author gained that practical knowledge of aboriginal habits and character, which enabled him to delineate the sub.
ject chosen with singular truth and effect. Having faithfully-explored
the annals of the French and Indian war, he applied to its elucida.
tion the vivid impressions derived froni his sojourn in forest and
prairie, his observation of Indian life, and his thorough knowledge
of the history of the Red-men.  The result is not only a reliable and
admirably planned narrative, but one of the most picturesque and
romantic yet produced in America.  Few subjects are more dramatic
and rich in local associations; and the previous discipline and excellent style of the author, have imparted to it a permanent attraction.
CHAPTER II.
Belles Lettres —lnfluence of British Essayists-Franklin-Dennie-Signs of
Literary Improvement- Jonathan Oldstyle - Washington Irving-His
Knickerbocker-Sketch-Book-His other Works-Popularity-Tour on the
Prairies —Character as an Author-Dana-Wilde-Hudson-GriswoldLowell - Whipple - Ticknor - Walker-Wayland - James - Emerson-'Iranscendentalists-Madame Ossoli-Emerson's Essays-Orville Dewey —
Humorous Writers-Belles Lettres-Tudor-Wirt-Sands-Fay-WalshMitchell-Kimball-American Travellers-Causes of their Success as Wri.
ters - Fiction - Charles Brockden Brown-His Novels-James Fenimor6
Cooper —His Novels —their Popularity and Characteristics — Nathaniei
Hawthorne-His Works and Genius-Other American Writers of Fiction.
THE colloquial and observant character given to English literature
by the'wits, politicians, and essayists of Queen Anne's time — the
social and agreeable phase which the art of writing exhibited in the
form of the'Spectator,''Guardian,''Tattler,' and other popular
works of the kind, naturally found imitators in the American Colonies.  The earliest indication of a taste for belles-lettres is the
republication in the newspapers of New England, of some of the
fresh lucubrations of Steele and Addison.'The Lay-Preacher,' by
Dennie, was the first successful imitation of this fashionable species
of literature; more characteristic, however, of the sound common
sense and utilitarian instincts of the people,'were the essays of
Franklin, commenced in his brother's journal, then newly-established
at Boston. Taste for the amenities of intellectual life, however, at
this period, was chiefly gratified by recourse to the emanations of
the British press; and it is some years after that we perceive signs
of that native impulse in this sphere which proved the germ of
American literature.  "If we are not mistaken in the signs of the
times," says Buckminster (in an oration delivered at Cambridge and
published in the'Anthology,' a Boston magazine, which, with the




454         A SKETCH OF AIMERICAN LITERATURE.   rCHIAP. IL
Port Folio issued at Philadelphia, were the first literary journals of
high aims in America) " the genius of our literature begins to show
symptoms of vigor, and to meditate a bolder flight.  The spirit of
criticism begins to plume itself, and education, as it assumes a more
learned form, will take a higher aim. If we are not misled by our
hopes, the dream of ignorance is at least broken, and there are signs
that the period is approaching when we may say of our country, tuus
jam regnat AIpollo."  This prophecy had received some confirmation
in the grace and local observation manifest in a series of letters which
appeared in the New York Chronicle, signed Jonathan Oldstyle,
Gent.-the first productions of Washington Irving, the Goldsmith of
America, who was born in New York, April 6, 1783.  Symptoms
of alarming disease soon after induced a voyage to Europe; and he
returned to the island of Manhattan, the scene of his boyish rambles
and youthful reveries, with a mind expanded by new scenes, and his
natural love of travel and elegant literature deepened. Although
ostensibly a law-student in the office of Judge Hoffman, his time was
devoted to social intercourse with his kindred, who were established
in business in New York, and a few genial companions, to meditative
loiterings in the vicinity of the picturesque river so dear to his heart,
and to writing magazine papers. The happy idea of a humorous
description of his native town, under the old Dutch governors, was
no sooner conceived than executed with inimitable wit and originality. Not then contemplating the profession of letters, he did not
take advantage of the remarkable success that attended this work,
of which Sir Walter Scott thus speaks, in one of his letters to an
American friend: "I beg you to accept my best thanks for the
uncommon degree of entertainment which I have received from the
most excellently jocose history of New York. I am sensible that as
a stranger to American parties and politics, I must lose much of the
concealed satire of the piece, but I must own that, looking at the
simple and obvious meaning only, I have never read anything so
closely resembling the style of Dean Swift as the annals of Diedrich
Knickerbocker. I have been employed these few evenings in reading them aloud to Mrs. S. and two ladies, who are our guests, and
our sides have been absolutely sore with laughing. I think, too,
there are passages which indicate that the author possesses power of
a different kind, and has some touches which remind me much of
Sterne."'Salmagundi,' which Mr. Irving had previously under.
taken, in conjunction with Paulding, proved a hit, and established
the fame of its authors; it was in form and method of publication
imitated from tne'Spectator,' but in details, spirit, and aim, so exquisitely adapted to the latitude of New York, that its appearance
was hailed with a delight hitherto unknown; it was, in fact, a complete triumph of local genius.  From  these pursuits, the author
turned tc commercial toil, in connection with which, he embarked




CHAP. II.]   A SKETCH OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.               455
for England in 1815, and while there, a reverse of fortune led to his
resumingthe pen as a means of subsistence. In his next work, the' Sketch-Book,' Sir Walter's opinion of his pathetic vein was fully
realized;' The Wife,''The Pride of the Village,' and' The Broken
Heart,' at once took their places as gems of English sentiment and
description. Nor were the associations of home inoperative; and
the'Legend of Sleepy Hollow' first gave "a local habitation," in
our fresh land, to native fancy.  His impressions of domestic life in
Great Britain, were soon after given to the public in'Bracebridge
Hall,' and some of his continental experiences embodied in the'Tales of a Traveller.'  Soon after, Mr. Irving visited Spain to
write the'Life of Columbus,' to which we have before alluded.
His sojourn at the Alhambra, and at Abbotsford and Newstead
Abbey, are the subjects of other graceful and charming volumes;
while'Astoria, or Anecdotes of an Enterprise beyond the Rocky
Mountains,' and the'Life of Mohammed,' proved solid as well as
elegant contributions to our standard literature.
There are writers who have so ministered to our enjoyment as to
become associated with our happiest literary recollections.  The companionship of their works has been to us as that of an entertaining
and cherished friend, whose converse cheers the hours of languor,
and brightens the period of recreative pleasure.  We are wont to
think and to speak of them with quite a different sentiment from
that which prompts us to speculate upon less familiar and less endeared productions.  There is ever within us a sense of obligation,
an identification of our individual partiality with the author, when
the fruits of his labors are alluded to, his merits discussed, or his
very name mentioned. The sensitiveness appropriate to the writer's
self seems, in a manner, transferred to our own bosoms; his faults are
scarcely recognised, and we guard his laurels as if our own efforts had
aided in their winning, and our own happiness was involved in their
preservation.  Such feelings obtain, indeed, to a greater or less extent,
with reference to all the imiaster spirits in literature, whose labors have
been devoted, with signial success, to the gratification and elevation
of humanity. But the degree of permanency for such tributary sentiment in the general mind, depends very much upon the field of
effort selected by the favorite author, and his own peculiar circumstances and character.  Subjects of temporary interest, however admirably treated, and with whatever applause received, are obviously
ill calculated to retain, for any considerable length of time, a strong
hold upon human regard; and, notwithstanding the alleged inconsistency between an author's personal character and history and the
influence of his works, the motives adduced by Addison for prefacing
the Spectator with an account of himself, are deeply founded in
human nature.  Not merely contemporary sentiment, but after
opinion in relation to literary productions, will be materially affected




456          A SKETCH OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.   [CHIAP. I1.
by what is known of the author.  The present prevailing tendency
to inquire, often with a truly reprehensible minuteness, into whatever
in the most distant manner relates to the leading literary men of the
age, affords ample evidence of this truth. Indeed, we may justly
anticipate that literary, if not general biography, will, ere long, from
the very interest manifested in regard to it, attain an importance, and
ultimately a philosophical dignity, such as shall engage in its behalf
the sedulous labors of the best endowed and most accomplished
minds.
The occasion which first induced Geoffrey Crayon to delineate, and
those which have suggested his subsequent pencillings, were singularly happy; and the circumstances under which these masterly
sketches were produced, nay, the whole history of the man, are signally fitted to deepen the interest which his literary merits necessarily
excited.  In saying this, we are not unmindful of the prejudices so
ungenerously forced upon the attention of the absentee, and so affectingly alluded to in the opening of his first work after returning from
Europe; but do we err in deeming those prejudices as unchargeable
upon the mass of his countrymen, as they were essentially unjust
and partial? Nay, are we not, in this volume, with our author's
characteristic genuineness of feeling and simplicity, assured of his
own settled and happy sense of the high place he occupies in the estimation and love of Americans?
The'Tour on the Prairies' appeared in 1836. It is an unpretending account, comprehending a period of about four weeks, of
travelling and hunting excursions upon the vast western plains. The
local features of this interesting region have been displayed to us in
several works of fiction, of which it has formed the scene; and more
formal illustrations of the extensive domain denominated The West,
and its denizens, have been repeatedly presented to the public. But
in this volume one of the most extraordinary and attractive portions
of the great subject is discussed, not as the subsidiary part of a romantic story, nor yet in the desultory style of epistolary composition,
but in the deliberate, connected form of a retrospective narration.
When we say that the'Tour on the Prairies' is rife with the characteristics of its author, no ordinary eulogium is bestowed.  His graphic
power is manifest throughout.  The boundless prairies stretch out
illimitably to the fancy, as the eye scans his descriptions.  The ath..
letic figures of the riflemen, the gaily arrayed Indians, the heavy
buffalo and the graceful deer, pass in strong relief and startling contrast before us.  We are stirred by the bustle of the camp at dawn,
and soothed by its quiet, or delighted with its picturesque aspect
under the shadow of night. The imagination revels amid the green
oak clumps and verdant pea vines, the expanded plains and the
glancing river, the forest aisles and the silent stars.  Nor is this all.
Our hearts thrill at the vivid representations of a primitive and ex



CHAP. II.]    & SKETCH OF AIERICAN LITERATURE.               457
cursive existence; we involuntarily yearn, as we read, for.he genial
activity and the perfect exposure to the influences of nature in all her
free magnificence, of a woodland and adventurous life; the morning
strain of the bugle, the excitement of the chase, the delicious repast,
the forest gossiping, the sweet repose beneath the canopy of heaven
— how inviting, as depicted by such a pencil!
Nor has the author failed to invigorate and render doubly attractive these descriptive drawings, with the peculiar light and shade of
his own rich humor, and the mellow softness of his ready sympathy.  A less skilful draftsman would, perhaps, in the account of
the preparations for departure (Chapter III.), have spoken of the
hunters, the fires, and the steeds-but who, except Geoffrey Crayon,
would have been so quaintly mindful of the little dog, and the
manner in which he regarded the operations of the farrier? How
inimitably the Bee Hunt is portrayed; and what have we of the kind
so racy, as the account of the Republic of Prairie Dogs, unless it
be that of the Rookery in Bracebridge Hall?   What expressive
portraits are the delineations of our rover's companions.  How
consistently drawn throughout, and in what fine contrast, are the
reserved and saturnine Beatte, and the vain-glorious, sprightly, and
versatile Tonish. A golden vein of vivacious, yet chaste comparison
-that beautiful, yet rarely well-managed species of wit; and a
wholesome and pleasing sprinkling of moral comment-that delicate
and often most efficacious medium of useful impressions-intertwine
and vivify the main narrative! Something, too, of that fine pathos
which enriches his earlier productions, enhances the value of the
present.  He tells us, indeed, with commendable honesty, of his
new appetite for destruction, which the game of the prairie excited;
but we cannot fear for the tenderness of a heart that sympathises so
readily with suffering, and yields so gracefully to kindly impulses.
He gazes upon the noble courser of the wilds, and wishes that his
freedom may be perpetuated; he recognises the touching instinct
which leads the wounded elk to turn aside and die in retiracy; he
reciprocates the attachment of the beast which sustains him, and
more than all, can minister even to the foibles of a fellow-being,
rather than mar the transient reign of human pleasure.
It has been said that Mr. Irving, at one period of his life, seriously
proposed to himself the profession of an artist.  The idea was a legitimate result of his intellectual constitution; and although he denied
its development in one form, in another it has fully vindicated itself
Many of his volumes are a collection of sketches, embodied happily
in language, since thereby their more general enjoyment is insured,
but susceptible of immediate transfer to the canvas of the painter.
These are like a fine gallery of pictures, wherein all his countrymen
delight in many a morning lounge and evening reverie.
Until within the last half century, not only the standard ];tcrature




458         A SKETCH OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.   [CHAP. II.
but the critical opinions of America were almost exclusively of transatlantic origin. But within that period a number of writers, endowed
with acute perceptions and eloquent expression, as well as the requisite knowledge, have arisen to elucidate the tendencies, define the
traits, and advocate the merits of modern writers. By faithful translations, able reviews, lectures and essays, the best characteristics of
men of literary genius, schools of philosophy, poetry, and science
have been rendered familiar to the cultivated minds of the nation.
Thus Richard H. Dana has explored and interpreted, with a rare
sympathetic intelligence, the old English drama; Andrews Norton,
the Authenticity of the Gospels; Richard H. Wilde, the Love and
Madness of Tasso; Alexander II. Everett, the range of contemporary
French and German literature; Professor Reed, the Poetry of Wordsworth; Norman H. Hudson, the Plays of Shakspeare; John S.
Hart, the Faery Queen; Russell Lowell, the Older British Poets;
and Edwin P. Whipple, the Best Authors of Great Britain and
America.  W. A. Jones, Hoffman, Duykinck, and others, have also
illustrated our critical literature.
For the chief critical and biographical history of literature in the
United States, we are indebted to Rufus W. Griswold, whose two
copious and interesting volumes, so popular at home and useful
abroad, give an elaborate account of what has been done by American writers from the foundation of the country to the present hour.
These works are the fruit of great research, and an enthusiasm for
native literature as rare as it is patriotic.  Our numerous'" Female
Prose Writers" have also found an intelligent and genial historian
and critic in Professor Hart.
The philosophic acuteness, animated and fluent diction, and thorough
knowledge of the subjects discussed, render Mr. Whipple's critical
essays among the most agreeable reading of the kind.  His reputation as an eloquent and sagacious critic is now firmly established.
Both in style and thought these critical essays are worthy of the
times; bold without extravagance, refined yet free of dilletantism,
manly and philosophic in sentiment, and attractive in manner. The
most elaborate single work, however, in this department, is George
Ticknor's History of Spanish Literature, the result of many years'
research, and so complete and satisfactory, that the best European
critics have recognised it a permanent authority; it is both authentic
and tasteful; the translations are excellent, the arrangement judicious,
and the whole performance a work of genuine scholarship.  It sup.
plies a desideratum, and is an interesting and thorough exposition of
a subject at once curious, attractive and of general literary utility.
James Walker and Francis Wayland, although of widely diverse
theological opinions, are both expositors of moral philosophy, to
which they have made valuable contributions.  Henry James, of
Albany, is the most argumentative and eloquent advocate of new




CHAP. I.]   A SKETCHI OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.               459
social principles in the country; and WValdo Emerson, by a certain
quaintness of diction and boldly speculative turn of mind, has achieved
a wide popularity. It is, however, to a peculiar verbal facility rather
than to any philosophic genius that he owes the impression he creates.
He is regarded as the leader of a sect, who, some years since, from
the reaction of minds oppressed and narrowed by New England conventionalism and bigotry, and, in some instances, kindled by the
speculations of German literature, broke away from the ultra rational
and sought freedom in the transcendental school. In the Memoir
of Margaret Fuller Ossoli, recently published, the movement is described and the principles of its disciples hinted rather than explained.
"' The rise of this enthusiasm," says her biographer, " was as mysterious as that of any form of revival; and only they who were of
the faith could comprehend how bright was this morning-time of a
new hope. Transcendentalism was an assertion of the inalienable
integrity of man, of the ordinances of Divinity in instinct.  In part
it was a reaction against Puritan orthodoxy; in part an effect of renewed study of the ancients, of Oriental Pantheists, of Plato, and
the Alexandrians, of Plutarch's Morals, Seneca and Epictetus; in
part the natural product of the place and time.  On the somewhat
stunted stock of Unitarianism —whose characteristic dogma was trust
in individual reason as correlative to Supreme Wisdom, —had been
grafted German idealism as taught by masters of most various
schools."
Whoever turns to Emerson's' Essays,' or to the writings of this
transcendental sibyl (whose remarkable acquirements, moral courage,
and tragic fate, render her name prominent among our female authors) for a system, a code, or even a set of definite principles, will
be disappointed. The chief good thus far achieved by this class of
thinkers has been negative; they have emancipated many minds from
the thraldom of local prejudices and prescriptive opinion, but have
failed to reveal any positive and satisfactory truth unknown before.
Emerson has an inventive fancy; he knows how to clothe truisms in
startling costume; he evolves beautiful or apt figures and apothegms
that strike at first, but when contemplated, prove, as has been said,
usually either true and not new, or new and not true. His volumes,
however, are suggestive, tersely and often gracefully written; they
are thoughtful, observant, and speculative, and indicate a philosophic
taste rather than power. As contributions to American literature
they have the merit of a spirit, beauty, and reflective tone previously
almost undiscoverable in the didactic writings of the country.  A
writer of more consistency in ethics, and a sympathy with man more
human, is Orville Dewey, whose discourses abound in earnest appeals
to consciousness, in a noble vindication of human nature, and a faith
in progressive ideas, often arrayed in touching and  impressive
rhetoric.
28*




460          A SKETCH OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.   [CHAP. IL
We have not been wanting in excellent translators, especially of
German literature; our scholars and poets have admirably used their
knowledge of the language in this regard. The first experiment was
Bancroft's translation of Heeren already referred to; and since then,
some of the choicest lyrics and best philosophy of Germany have
been given to the American public by Professor Longfellow, George
Ripley, R. W. Emerson, John S. Dwight, S. M. Fuller, George H.
Calvert, Rev. C. T. Brooks, W. H. Channing, F. H. Hedge, Samuel
Osgood, and others. Dr. Mitchell, of New York, translated Sanna.
zario's Italian poems, Mrs. Nichols the'Promessi Sposi' of Manzoni,
and Dr. Parsons, of Boston, has made the best metrical translations
into English of Dante's great poem.
The most elaborate piece of humor in our literature has been
already mentioned-as Irving's facetious history of his native town.
The sketch entitled'The Stout Gentleman,' by the same genial
author, is another inimitable attempt in miniature, as well as some
of the papers in'Salmagundi.'  The letters of'Jack Downing'
may be considered an indigenous specimen in this department; and
also the'Charcoal Sketches' of Joseph C. Neal, the'Ollapodiana'
of Willis G. Clarke, the'Puffer Hopkins' of Cornelius Matthews,
and many scenes by Thorpe, and in Mrs. Kirkland's' New Home.'
The original aspects of life in the West and South, as well as those
of Yankee Land, have also found several apt and graphic delineators:
although the coarseness of the subjects, or the carelessness of the
style, will seldom allow them a literary rank.
That delightful species of literature which is neither criticism nor
fiction -neither oratory nor history —but partakes somewhat of all
these, and owes its charm to a felicitous blending of fact and fancy,
of sentiment and thought-the Belles-Lettres writing of our country,
has gradually increased as the ornamental has encroached on the
once arbitrary domain of the useful.  Among the earliest specimens
were the'Letters of a British Spy,' and the'Old Bachelor' of
William  Wirt, and Tudor's'Letters on New England;' in New
York, this sphere was gracefully illustrated by Robert C. Sands and
Theodore S. Fay, by tale, novelette, and essay; in Philadelphia, by
Robert Walsh, who gleaned two volumes from  his newspaper articles; and at present, by the'Reveries of a Bachelor' of Mlitchell,
and in a more vigorous manner in the'St. Leger Papers' of Kimball.  Professors Frisbie, Caldwell, Henry, and others, have contri.
buted to the taste and culture of the Belles Lettres in America.*
* There are a few American books which cannot be strictly classified under
either of these divisions; which not only have a sterling value, but a wide ana'established reputation; such as the'Legal Commentaries of Chancellor Kent,'
the'Dictionary' of Noah Webster, Dr. Rush's''Treatise on the Philosophy
of the Human Voice,''Lectures on Art,' by Washington Allston; the:Classical Manuals' of Professor Anthon; Dr. Bowditch's translation of the




CHAP. II.]    A SKETCH OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.                    461
The literature of no country is more rich in books of travel.  From
Carter's' Letters from Europe,' Dwight's'Travels in New England,'
and Lewis and Clark's' Expedition to the Rocky Mountains,' to the'Yucatan' of Stephens, and the'Two Years before the Mast' of
Dana, American writers have put forth a succession of animated,
intelligent, and most agreeable records of their explorations:. every
part of the globe. In many instances, their researches have been
directed to a special object, and resulted in positive contributions to
natural science; thus Audubon's travels are associated With his discoveries in ornithology, and those of Schoolcraft with his Indian lore.
Stephens revealed to our gaze the singular and magnificent ruins of
Central America; Sanderson unfolded the hygiene of life in Paris;
Flint guided our steps through the fertile valleys of the West, and
Irving and lIoffman brought its scenic wonders home to the coldest
fancy.*
" Americans are thought by foreign critics to excel as writers of
travels; and the opinion is confirmed by the remarkable success
which- has so often attended their works.  Indeed, in scarcely any
other field of literature has the talent of this country been so generally recognised abroad; and this superiority appears to be a natural
result of American life and  character.  With few  time-honoured
customs or strong local associations to bind him to the soil, with little
hereditary dignity of name or position to sustain, and accustomed,
from  infancy, to witness frequent changes of position and fortune,
the inhabitant of no civilized land has so little restraint upon his'Mecanique Celeste' of La Place; the'Ornitliology' of Wilson and Audubon;
Catlin's and Schoolcraft's works on the Indians. The ethnological contributions of Squier, Pickering's philological Researches, and the'Essays on
Political Economy' by Albert Gallatin, Raguet, Dr. Cooper, Tucker, Colton,
Wayland, Middleton, Raymond, A. H. Everett, and Henry C. Carey. Francis
Bowen has published able lectures on metaphysical subjects. James D. Nourse,
of Kentucky, has published a clever little treatise, the' Philosophy of History;' Dr. Palfrey, of Massachusetts, a series of erudite lectures on' Jewish
Antiquities;' J. Q. Adams a course on'Rhetoric;' Judge Buel and Henry
Colman valuable works on'Agriculture,' and A. J. Doxwning, on' Rural
Architecture and Horticulture.'
* It is difficult to enumnerate the works in this department; but among thent
may be justly commended, either for graces of style, effective description, or
interesting narrative-and, in some instances, for all these qualities combined
-the'Year in Spain' of Mackenzie, the'Winter in the West' of C. F. Hoff'.
nan, the' Oregon Trail' of Francis Parkman, the' Pencillings by the Way'
f Willis, the'Scenes and Thoughts in Europe' of George H. Calvert, Longfellow's'Outre-mer,' the'Typee' of Melville, the'Views A-Foot' of Taylor,'Fresh Gleanings' by Mitchell,'Nile-Notes' by George Curtis, Squier's'Nicaragua,' and the writings of this kind by Robinson, Long, Melville,
Jewett, Spencer, Grcgg, Townsend, Fremont, Lanman, Bryant,,Thorpe,
Kendall, Wilson, Webber, Colton, Gillespie, Headley, Dewey, Kip, Silliman,
Bigelow, Cushing, Wise, Warren, Mitchell, Cheever, Catlill, Norman,
Wallis, Shaler, Ruschenberger, King, Breckenridge. Kidder, Brown, Fisk,
Lyman, the Exploring Expedition by Wilkes, the Dead Sea Expedition b-v
Lynch, and the voyages of Delano, Cleveland, Coggeshall, and oth'2rs.




162         A SKETCHI OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.   [CHAP. II,
vagrant hurrah as a native of the United States. The American
is by nature locomotive; he believes in change of air for health,
change of residence for success, change of society fo)r improvement.
Pioneer enterprise is a staple of our history.  Not only do the economy of life and the extent of territory in the New World, train
her citizens, as it were, to travel; their temperament and taste also
combine to make them tourists.  Their existence favors quickness
of perception, however inimical it may be to contemplative energy.
Self-reliance leads to adventure.  The freedom from prejudice incident to a new country, gives more ample scope to observation; and
the very freshness of life renders impressions from new scenes more
vivid.  Thus free and inspired, it is not surprising that things often
wear a more clear and impressive aspect to his mind, than they do to
the jaded senses and the conventional views of more learned and
reserved, but less flexible and genial travellers. The sympathetic
grace of Irving, the impersonal fidelity of Stephens, the Flemish
details of Slidell Mackenzie, the picturesque and spirited description
of Hoffman, and the De Foe-like narratives of Melville and Dana,
are qualities that have gained them more readers than fall to the lot
of the herd of travellers, who have lavished on pictures of the same
scenes more learning and finish, perhaps, but less of integrity of
statement and naturalness of feeling."*
Romantic fiction, in the United States, took its rise with the publication of'Wieland' by Charles Brockden Brown, in 1798; attained
its most complete and characteristic development in the long and
brilliant career, as a novelist, of James Fenimore Cooper; and is now
represented, in its artistic excellence, by Nathaniel Hawthorne. The
parents of Brown were Philadelphia Quakers, and he was born in
that city on the 17th of January, 1771. An invalid from infancy,
he had the dreamy moods and roaming propensity incident to poetical
sympathies; after vainly attempting to interest his mind in the law,
except in a speculative manner, he became an author, at a period
and under circumstances which affobrd the best evidence that the
vocation was ordained by his idiosyncrasy. With chiefly the encouragement of a few cultivated friends in New York to sustain him,
with narrow means and feeble health, he earnestly pursued his lonely
career, inspired by the enthusiasm of genius.  His literary toil was
varied, erudite, and indefatigable.  He edited magazines and annual
registers, wrote political essays, a geography, and a treatise on architecture, translated Volney's'Travels in the United States,' debated
at clubs, journalized, corresponded, made excursions, and entered
ardently into the quiet duties of the fire-side and the family.  His
character was singularly gentle and pure; and he was beloved, even
when not appreciated.  It is by his novels, however, that Brown
* Characteristics of Literature, 2d series.




CIIAP. II.]   A SKETCII OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.              463
achieved renown. They are remarkable for intensity and supernatu
ralism.  His genius was eminently psychological; Godwin is his
English prototype. To the reader of the present day, these writings
appear somewhat limited and sketch-like;. but when we consider the
period of their composition, and the disadvantages under which they
appeared, they certainly deserve to be ranked among the wonderful
productions of the human mind. Brown delighted to analyse the
phenomena of consciousness, to bring human nature under mystic
or extraordinary influences, and mark the consequences.  In'Ormond,''Arthur Mervyn,''Jane Talbot,'' Edgar Huntley,' and'Wieland,' we have such agencies as pestilence, somnambulism, rare
coincidence, and ventriloquism, brought to act upon individuals of
excitable or introspective character, and the result is often thrilling.
The descriptions are terse and suggestive, the analysis thorough, and
the feeling high-strung and reflective. The pioneer of American
fiction was endowed with rare energy of conception, and a style attractive from its restrained earnestness and minute delineation.  He
died at the close of his thirty-ninth year.  Had his works been as
artistically constructed as they were profoundly conceived and ingeniously executed, they would have become standard. As it is, we
recognise the rare insight and keen sensibility of the man, acknowledge his power to "awaken terror and pity;" and lament the want
of high finish and effective shape visible in these early and remarkable fruits of native genius.
The first successful novel by an American author was the' Spy.'
A previous work by the same author, entitled' Precaution,' had made
comparatively little impression.  It was strongly tinctured with an
English flavor, in many respects imitative, and, as it afterwards appeared, written and printed under circumstances which gave little
range to Cooper's real genius. In 1823, he published'The Pioneers.'  In this and the novel immediately preceding it, a vein of
national association was opened, an original source of romantic and
picturesque interest revealed, and an epoch- in our literature created.
What Cooper had the bold invention to undertake, he had the firmness of purpose and the elasticity of spirit to pursue with unflinching
zeal.  Indeed his most characteristic trait was self-reliance.  He
commenced the arduous career of an author in a new country, and
with fresh materials; at first, the tone of criticism was somewhat
discouraging; but his appeal had been to the popular mind, and not
to a literary clique, and the response was universal and sincere,
From this time, he gave to the press a series of prose romances conceived with so much spirit and truth, and executed with such fidelity
and vital power that they instantly took captive the reader.  His faculty of description, and his sense of the adventurous, were the great
sources of his triumph.  Refinement of style, poetic sensibility, and
railo-dramatic intensity, were elements that he ignored; but when he




464         A SKETCH OP AMERICAN LITERATURE.   [CRAP. 11
pictured the scenes of the forest and prairie, the incidents of Indian
warfare, the vicissitudes of border life, and the phenomena of the
ocean and nautical experience, he displayed a familiarity with the
subjects, a keen sympathy-with the characters, and a thorough reality
in the delineation, which at once stamped him as a writer of original
and great capacity.  It is true that in some of the requisites of the
novelist, he was inferior to many subsequent authors in the same department.  His female characters want individuality and interest
and his dialogue is sometimes forced and ineffective; but, on th
other hand, he seized with a bold grasp the tangible and characteristic in his own land; and not only stirred the hearts of his countrymen with vivid pictures of colonial, revolutionary, and emigrant life,
with the vast ocean and forest for its scenes; but opened to the gaze
of.Europe, phases of human existence at once novel and exciting.
The fisherman of Norway, the merchant of Bordeaux, the scholar at
Frankfort, and the countess of Florence, in a brief period, all hung
with delight over Cooper's daguerreotypes of the New World, transferred to their respective languages.  This was no ordinary triumph.
It was a rich and legitimate fruit of American genius in letters.  To
appreciate it we must look back upon the period when the Spy, the
Pioneers, the Last of the Mohicans, the Pilot, the Red Rover, the
Wept-of-the-Wish-ton-Wish, the Water Witch, and the Prairie, were
new creations; and remember that they first revealed America to
Europe through a literary medium. In the opinion of some critics.,
the unity and completeness of Cooper's fame has been marred by
those novels drawn from foreign subjects and induced by a- long residence in Europe; by his honest but injudicious attempts to reform
his countrymen in some of their particular habits and modes of
thought or action; and also by his persistency in issuing volume
after volume of fiction, less directly inspired by observation, and
comparatively devoid of interest. Whatever truth may exist in such
a view of his course, it is to be considered that all temporary defects
are soon forgotten in those memorials of individual genius which
have the stamp of the author's best powers, and the recognition of
the world.  Leather-Stocking and Long Tom  Coffin are standard
characters;. the woodland landscapes, the sailing matches of men-ofwar, the sea-fight, wrecks, and aboriginal heroes, depicted, as they
are, by Cooper to the very life, and in enduring colors, will be identified both with his name and country; and ever vindicate his claims
to remembrance. His youth was passed in a manner admirably fitted
to develope his special talent, and provide the resources of his subsequent labors. Born in Burlington, N. J., on the 15th of September,
1789, he was early removed to the borders of Otsego Lake, where
his father, Judge Cooper, erected a homestead, afterwards inhabited
and long occupied by the novelist.  He was prepared for college by
tale Rector of St. Poetcr's Church, in Albany, and entered Yale in




CHAP. II.]   A SKETCH OF AMERICAN LITERAVURE.                46.5
1802. Three years after, having proved an excellent classical student,
and enjoyed the intimacy of several. youth afterwards eminent in the
land, he left New Haven and joined the United States Navy as a
midshipman.  After passing six years in the service, he resigned,
married, and soon after established himself on his paternal domain,
situated amid some of the finest scenery and rural attraction of his
native state. Thus Cooper was early initiated into the scenes of a
newly-settled country and a maritime life, with the benefit of academical training, and the best social privileges. All these means of
culture and development his active mind fully appreciated; his
observation never slumbered; and its fruits were industriously
garnered.
His nautical and Indian tales form, perhaps, the most characteristic portion of our literature.'The Bravo' is the best of his European novels; and his'Naval History' is valuable and interesting.
He was one of the most industrious of authors; his books of travel
and biographical sketches are numerous, and possess great fidelity
of detail, although not free from  prejudice.  Cooper represents
the American mind in its adventurous character; he glories in delineating the " monarch of the deck,"-paints the movements of a
ship at sea as if she were, indeed, "a thing of life;" follows an Indian trail with the sagacity of a forest-king; and leads us through
storms, conflagration, and war with the firm, clear-sighted, and allobservant guidance of a master-spirit. His best scenes and characters
are indelibly engraven on the memory. His best creations are instinct
with nature and truth. His tone is uniformly manly, friesh, and
vigorous.  He is always thoroughly American.  His style is national; and when he died in the autumn of 1851, a voice -of praise
and regret seemed to rise all over the land, and a large and distinguished assembly convened soon after, in New York, to listen to his
eulogy-pronounced by the poet Bryant.
Hawthorne is distinguished for the finish of his style, and the delicacy of his psychological insight. He combines the metaphysical
talent of Brown with the refined diction of Irving. For a period of
more than twenty years he contributed, at intervals, to annuals and
magazines, the most exquisite fancy sketches and historical narratives,
the merit of which was scarcely recognised by the public at large,
although cordially praised by the discriminating few. These papers
have been recently collected under the title of'Twice-told Tales,'
and'Mosses from an Old Manse;' and, seen by the light of the
author's present reputation, their grace, wisdom, and originality are
now generally acknowledged.  But it is through the two romances
entitled'The Scarlet Letter,' and'The House of the Seven Gables,'
that Hawthorne's eminence has been reached.  They are remarkable
at once for a highly finished and beautiful style, the most charming
artistic skill, and intense characterization.  To these intrinsie, and




466,         A SKETCII OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.   [CHAP. II.
universal claims, they add that of native scenes and subjects. Imagine
such an anatomiser of the human heart as Balzac, transported to a
provincial town of New England, and giving to its houses, streets,
and history, the analytical power of his genius, and we realize the
triumph of Hawthorne. Bravely adopting familiar materials, he has
thrown over them the light and shadow of his thoughtful mind, eliciting a deep significance and a prolific beauty; if we may use the
expression, he is ideally true to the real.  His invention is felicitous;
his tone magnetic; his sphere borders on the supernatural, and yet a
chaste expression and a refined sentiment underlies his most earnest
utterance; he is more suggestive than dramatic.  The early history
of New England has found no such genial and vivid illustration as
his pages afford.  At all points his genius touches the interests of
human life, now overflowing with a love of external nature as gentle
as that of Thomson, now intent upon the quaint or characteristic in life
with a humor as zestful as that of Lamb, now developing the horrible
or pathetic with something of John Webster's dramatic terror, and
again buoyant with a fantasy as aerial as Shelley's conceptions. And,
in each instance, the staple of charming invention is adorned with the
purest graces of style.  Hawthorne was born in Salem, Massachusetts,
educated at Bowdoin College, and after having filled an office in the
Boston custom-housej and the post-office of his native town, and lived
a year on a community farm, is now settled in a pleasant country
town and become an author by profession; and one who has already
proved his ability to create standard exemplars of American romantic
fiction.
"What we admire in this writer's genius is his felicity in the use
of common materials.  It is very difficult to give an imaginative scope
to a scene or a topic which familiarity has robbed of illusion.  It is
by the association of ideas, by the halo of remembrance and the magic
of love, that an object usually presents itself to the mind under fanFiful relations.  From  a foreign country our native spot becomes
picturesque; and from the hill of manhood the valley of youth appears romantic; but that is a peculiar and rare mental alchemy which
can transmute the dross of the common and the immediate into gold.
Yet so doth Hawthorne.  His'Old Apple Dealer' yet sits by the
old South Church, and' The Willey House' is inscribed every summer-day by the penknives of ambitious cits.  He is able to illustrate,
by his rich invention, places and themes that are before our very eyes
and in our daily speech.  His fancy is as free of wing at the north
end of Boston, or on Salem turnpike, as that of other poets in the
Vale of Cashmere or amid the Isles of Greece.  I-Ie does not seem
to feel the necessity of distance either of time or space to realize his
enchantments.  He has succeeded in attaching an ethereal interest
to home subjects, which is no small triumph. Somewhat of that
poetic charm  which Wilson has thrown over Scottish life in his




CHAP. II.]   A SKETCH OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.               467'Lights and Shadows,' and Irving over English, in his'Sketch
Book,' and Lamb over metropolitan in his'Elim,' has Hawthorne
cast around New England, and his tales here and there blend, as it
were, the traits which endear -these authors.  His best efforts are
those in which the human predominates. Ingenuity and moral significancy are finely displayed, it is true, in his allegories; but sometimes they are coldly fanciful, and do not win the sympathies as in
those instances where the play of the heart relieves the dim workings
of the abstract and supernatural. Hawthorne, like all individualities,
must be read in the appropriate mood. This secret of appreciation
is now understood as regards Wordsworth.  It is due to all genuine
authors. To many whose mental aliment has been exciting and
coarse, the delicacy, meek beauties and calm spirit of these writings
will but gradually unfold themselves; but those capable of placing
themselves in relation with Hawthorne, will discover a native genius
for which to be grateful and proud, and a brother whom to know is
to love. He certainly has done much to obviate the reproach which
a philosophical writer, not without reason has cast upon our authors,
when he asserts their object to be to astonish rather than please."*
There is a host of intermediate authors between the three already
described in this sphere of literature, of various and high degrees,
both of merit and reputation, but whose traits are chiefly analogous
to those of the prominent writers we have surveyed. Some of them
hlave ably illustrated local themes, others excelled in scenic limning,
and a few  evinced genius for characterization.  Paulding, for
instance, in'Westward Ho,' and'The Dutchman's Fireside,' has
given admirable pictures of colonial life: Richard H. Dana, in the'Idle Man,' has two or three  remarkable  psychological tales;
Timothy Flint, James Hall, Thomas, and more recently M'Connell
of Illinois, have written very graphic and spirited novels of Western
Life; John P. Kennedy of Baltimore, has embalmed Virginia life
in the olden time in'Swallow Barn,' and Fay that of modern New
York; Gilmore Simms, a prolific and vigorous novelist, in a similar
form has embodied the traits of Southern Character and Scenery;
Hoffman the early history of his native State; Dr. Robert Bird of
Philadelphia, those of Mexico; William  Ware has rivalled Lockhart's classical romance in his'Letters from Palmyra' and  Probus;'
Allston's artist-genius is luminous in' Monaldi;' Judd in' Mlargaret' has related a tragic story arrayed in the very best hues and
outlines of New England life; and Edgar A. Poe, in his'Tales of
the Grotesque and Arabesque,' evinces a genius in which a love ot
the marvellous and an intensity of conception are united with the
wildest sympathies, as if the endowments of Mrs. Radcliffe and
Coleridge were partially united in one mind.  In adventurous and
descriptive narration we have Melville and Mayo. John Neal struck
* Leaves from the Diary of a Dreamer.
39




468         A SKETCH OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.  [CHAP. III.
off at a heat some half-score of novels that, at least, illustrate a
facility quite remarkable; and, indeed, from the days of the'Algerine Captive' and'The Foresters' the first attempts at such
writing in this country, to the present day, there has been no lack
of native fictions.  The minor specimens which possess the highest
literary excellence are by Irving, Willis, and Longfellow; but their
claims rest entirely on style and sentiment; they are brief and
-olished, but more graceful than impressive.
CHAPTER III.
POETRY.
its essential Conditions-Freneau and the early Metrical Writers-Mumford
-Cliffton-Allston, and others - Pierpont-Dana-Hillhoue —SpraguePercival - Halleck - Drake - Hoffman -Willis - Longfellow —  olmesLowell-Boker - Favorite Single Poems - Descriptive Poetiy - StreetWhittier, and others - Brainard - Son- Writers - Other Poets - Female
Poets-Bryant.'IT has been well observed by an English critic, that poetry is not
a branch of authorship.  The vain endeavor to pervert its divine
and spontaneous agency into a literary craft, is the great secret of
its decline.  Poetry is the overflowing of the soul.  It is the record
of what is best in the world. No product of the human mind is
more disinterested.  Hence comparatively few keep the poetic element alive beyond the period of youth. All that is genuine in the
art springs from vivid experience, and life seldom retains any novel
aspect to those who have long mingled in its scenes, and staked upon
its chances.  A celebrated artist of our day, when asked the process
by which his delineations were rendered so effective, replied that he
drew them altogether from memory. Natural objects were portrayed,
not as they impressed him at the moment, but according to the
lively and feeling phases in which they struck his senses in boyhood.
For this reason it has been truly observed, that remembrance makes
the poet; and, according to Wordsworth, "emotions recollected in
tranquillity," form the true source of inspiration.  A species of
literature depending upon conditions so delicate, is obviously not to
be successfully cultivated by those who hold it in no reverence.
The great distinction between verse-writers and poets is, that the
former seek and the latter receive; the one attempt to command,
the other meekly obey the higher impulses of their being.'*
* Thoughts on the Poets.




CHAP. III.]  A SKETCH OF AMERICAN LITERATURE., 469
The first metrical compositions in this country, recognised by
popular sympathy, were the effusions of Philip Freneau, a political
writer befriended by Jefferson.  He wrote many songs and ballads
in a patriotic and historical vein, which attracted and somewhat
reflected the feelings of his contemporaries, and were not destitute
of merit. Their success was owing, in part, to the immediate
interest of the subjects; and in part to musical versification and
pathetic sentiment.  One of his Indian ballads has survived the
general neglect to which more artistic skill and deeper significance
in poetry, has banished the mass of his verses; to thte curious in
metrical writings, however, they yet afford a characteristic illustration of the taste and spirit of the times.  Freneau was born in
1752, and died in 1832.  The antecedent specimens of verse in
America, were, for the most part, the occasional work of the clergy,
and are remarkable chiefly for a quaint and monotonous strain, grotesque rhymed versions of the Psalms, and tolerable attempts at
descriptive poems.  The writings of Mrs. Bradstreet, Governor
Bradford, Roger Williams, Cotton Mather, and the witty Dr. Byles,
in this department, are now only familiar to the antiquarian.
iranklin's friend Ralph, and Thomas Godfrey of Philadelphia,
indicate the dawn of a more liberal era, illustrated by Trumbull,
Dwight, Humphreys, Alsop, and Honeywood; passages from whose
poems show a marked improvement in diction, a more refined
scholarship, and genuine sympathy with nature; but, although in a
literary point of view they are respectable performances, and for the
period and locality of their composition, suggestive of a rare degree
of taste, there are too few salient points, and too little of an original
spirit, to justify any claim to high poetical genius. One of the
most remarkable efforts in this branch of letters, at the epoch in
question, was doubtless William Mumford's translation of the Iliad
-a work that, when published, elicited some authentic critical
praise.  He was a native of Virginia, and his great undertaking
was only finished a short period before his death, which occurred in
1825.  The verses which have the earliest touch of true sensibility
and that melody of rhythm which seems intuitive, are the few
bequeathed by William Cliffton of Philadelphia, born in 1772.
After him we trace the American muse in the patriotic songs of
iR. T. Paine, and the scenic descriptions of Paulding, until she began
a loftier though brief flight in the fanciful poems of Allston.
"In the moral economy of life, sensibility to the beautiful must
have a great purpose. If the Platonic doctrine of pre-existence be
true, perhaps ideality is the surviving element of our primal life.
Some individuals seem born to minister to this influence, which,
under the name of beauty, sentiment, or poetry, is the source of
what is most exalting in our inmost experience and redeeming in
our outward life   Does not a benign Providence watch over these




470.        A SKETCH OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.  [CHAP. III.
priests of nature?  They are not necessarily renowned.  Their
agency may be wholly social and private, yet none the less efficient.
Wie confess that, to us, few arguments for the benevolent and infinite
design of existence are more impressive than the fact that such
beings actually live, and wholly unfitted as they are to excel in or
even conform to the Practical, bear evidence, not to be disputed, of
the sanctity, the tranquil progress and the serene faith that dwell
in the Ideal.  WaVshington Allston was such a man.  He was born
in South Carolina in 1779, and died at Cambridge, Mass., in 1843.
By profession he was a painter, and his works overflow with genius;
still it would be difficult to say whether his pen, his pencil, or his
tongue chiefly made known that he was a prophet of the true and
beautiful. He believed not in any exclusive development. It was
the spirit of a man, and not his dexterity or success, by which he
tested character. In painting, reading, or writing, his mornings
were occupied, and at night he was at the service of his friends.
Beneath his humble roof, in his latter years, there was often a flow
of wit, a community of mind, and a generous exercise of sympathy
which kings might envy. To the eye of the multitude his life
glided away in secluded contentment, yet a prevailing idea was the
star of his being —the idea of beauty.  For the high, the lovely,
the perfect, he strove all his days.  He sought them  in the scenes
of nature, in the master-pieces of literature and art, in habits of
life, in social relations, and in love.  Without pretence, without
elation, in all meekness, his youthful enthusiasm chastened by
suffering, he lived above the world. Gentleness he deemed true
wisdom, renunciation of all the trappings of life, a duty. He was
calm, patient, occasionally sad, but for the most part happy in the
free exercise and guardianship of his varied powers.  His sonnets
are interesting as records of personal feeling.  They eloquently
breathe sentiments of intelligent admiration or sincere friendship;
while the'Styles of the Season' and other longer poems show a
great command of language and an exuberant fancy.
On his return to America, the life of our illustrious painter was
one of comparative seclusion. The state of his health, devotion to
his art, and a distaste for promiscuous society and the bustle of the
world, rendered this course the most judicious he could have
pursued.  His humble  retirement was occasionally invaded by
foreigners of distinction, to whom his name had become precious;
and sometimes a votary of letters or art entered his dwelling, t~
gratify admiration or seek counsel and encouragement.  To such,
an unaffected and sincere welcome was always given, and they left
his presence refreshed and happy. The instances of timely sympathy which he afforded young and baffled aspirants, are innumerable.
Allston's appearance and manners accorded perfectly with his
character.  His form was slight and his movements quietly active.




CHAP. III.]  A SKETCH OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.               471
The lines of his countenance, the breadth of the brow, the large
and speaking eye, and the long white hair, made him an immediate
object of interest. If not engaged in conversation, there was a
serene abstraction in his air.  When death so tranquilly overtook
him, for many hours it was difficult to believe that he was not
sleeping, so perfectly did the usual expression remain. His torch.
light burial harmonized, in its beautiful solemnity, with the bright
and thoughtful tenor of his life."*
John Pierpont, a Unitarian clergyman of Massachusetts, has
written numerous hymns and odes for religious and national occasions, remarkable for their variety of difficult metres, and for the
felicity both of the rhythm, sentiment, and expression. His'Airs
of Palestine,' a long poem in heroic verse, has many eloquent passages; and several of his minor pieces, especially those entitled'Passing Away,' and'My Child,' are striking examples of effective
versification. The most popular of his occasional poems is'The
Pilgrim Fathers,' an ode written for the anniversary of -the landing
at Plymouth, and embodying in truly musical verse the sentiment
of the memorable day.
Richard H. Dana is the most psychological of American poets.
His'Buccaneer' has several descriptive passages of singular terseness and beauty; although there is a certain abruptness in the metre
chosen. The scenery and phenomena of the ocean are evidently
familiar to his observation; the tragic and remorseful elements in
humanity exert'a powerful influence over his imagination; while the
mysteries and aspirations of the human soul fill and elevate his mind.
The result is an introspective tone, a solemnity of mood lightened
occasionally by touches of pathos or beautiful pictures.  There is a
compactness, a pointed truth to the actual, in many of his rhymed
pieces, and a.high music in some of his blank verse, which suggest
greater poetical genius than is actually exhibited.  His taste evidently inclines to Shakspeare, Milton, and the old English dramatists,
his deep appreciation of whom he has manifested in the most subtle
and profound criticisms.  Of his minor pieces, the'Intimations of
Immortality' and'The Little Beach-Bird,' are perhaps the most
characteristic of his two phases of expression.
James A. Hillhouse excelled in a species of poetic literature,
which, within a few years, has attained eminence from the fine illus
trations of Taylor, Browning, Horne, Talfourd, and other men of
genius in England.  It may be called the written drama; and however unfit for representation, is unsurpassed for bold, noble, and
exquisite sentiment and imagery. The name of Hillhouse is associated
with the beautiful elms of New Haven, beneath whose majestic
boughs he so often walked. His home in the neighborhood of this
~* Artist-Life, or Sketches of American Painters.
39 *




472         A SKETCH OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.  [CHAP. III
rural cityT was consecrated by elevated tastes, and domestic virtue.
He thcre, in the intervals of business, led the life of a true scholar;
and the memorials of this existence are his poems'Hadad,''The
Judgment,''Percy's Masque,''Demetria,' and others.  In the two
former, his scriptural erudition and deep perceptions of the Jewish
character, and his sense of religious truth, are evinced in the most
carefully finished, and nobly-conceived writings. Their tone is lofty,
often sublime; the language is finely chosen, and there is about them
evidence of gradual and patient labor rare in American literature.
On every page we recognise the Christian scholar and gentleman,
the secluded bard, and the chivalric student of the past.'Percy's
Masque' re-produces the features of an era more impressed with
knightly character than any in the annals of England.  Hillhouse
moves in that atmosphere quite as gracefully as among the solemn
and venerable traditions of the Hebrew faith.  His dramatic and
other pieces are the first instances, in this country, of artistic skill
in the higher and more elaborate spheres of poetic writing.  He
possessed the scholarship, the leisure, the dignity of taste, and the
noble sympathy requisite thus to " build the lofty rhyme;" and his
volumes, though unattractive to the mass of readers, have a permanent interest and value to the refined, the aspiring, and the disciplined mind.
Charles Sprague has been called the Rogers of America; and
there is an analogy between them in two respects,-the careful finish
of their verses, and their financial occupation.  The American poet
first attracted notice by two or three theatrical prize addresses; and
his success, in this regard, attained its climax in a'Shakspeare Ode'
which grouped the characters of the great poet with an effect so
striking and happy, and in a rhythm so appropriate and impressive,
as to recall the best efforts of Collins and Dryden united. A similar
composition, more elaborate, is his ode delivered on the second centennial anniversary of the settlement of Boston, his native city.  A
few domestic pieces, remarkable for their simplicity of expression
and truth of feeling, soon became endeared to a large circle; but the
performance which has rendered Sprague best known to the country
as a poet, is his. metrical essay on'Curiosity,' delivered in 1829
before the literary societies of Harvard University.  It is written in
heroic measure, and recalls the couplets of Pope.  The choice of a
theme was singularly fortunate.  He traces the passion which
"tempted Eve to sin" through its loftiest and most vulgar manifestations; at one moment, rivalling Crabbe in the lowliness of his
details, and at another, Campbell in the aspiration of his song The
serious and the comic alternate on every page. Good sense is the
basis of the work; fancy, wit, and feeling, warm and vivify it, and a
nervous tone and finished versification, as well as excellent choice of
words, impart a glow, polish, and grace, that at once. gratify the ear,
and captivate the mind.




CHAP. III.]  A SKETCH OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.               473
James G. Percival has been a copious writer of verses, some of
which, from their even and sweet flow, their aptness of epithet and
natural sentiment, have become household and school treasures;
such as'The Coral Grove,'' New  England,' and'Seneca Lake.'
His command both of language and metre is remarkable; his acquirements have been very extensive and various, and his life eccentric.  Perhaps a remarkable power of expression has tended to limit
his poetic fame, by inducing a diffuse, careless, and unindividual
method; although choice pieces enough may easily be gleaned from
his voluminous writings, to constitute a just and rare claim to renown
and sympathy.
The poems of Fitz-Greene Halleck, although limited in quantity,
are perhaps the best known and most cherished, especially in the
latitude of New York, of all American verses. This is owing, in
no small degree, to their spirited, direct, and intelligible character;
the absence of all vagueness and mysticism, and the heartfelt or
humorous glow of real inspiration; and in a measure, perhaps, it can
be traced to the prestige of his youthful fame, when, associated with
his friend Drake, he used to charm the town with the admirable local
verses that appeared in the journals of the day, under the signature
of Croaker and Co.  His theory of poetic expression is that of the
most popular masters of English verse -manly, clear, vivid, warm
with genuine emotion, or sparkling with true wit. The more recent
style of metrical writing, suggestive rather than emphatic, undefined
and involved, and borrowed mainly from German idealism, he utterly
repudiates.  All his verses have a vital meaning, and the clear ring
of pure metal.  They are few but memorable.  The school-boy, and
the old Knickerbocker, both know them  by heart.  In his serious
poems, he belongs to the same school as Campbell; and in his lighter
pieces reminds us of Beppo and the best parts of Don Juan.' Fanny,' conceived in the latter vein, has the point of a fine local
satire gracefully executed.'Burns' and the lines on the death of
Drake, have the beautiful impressiveness of the highest elegiac verse.'Marco Bozzaris' is perhaps the best martial lyric in the language;'Red Jacket' the most effective Indian portrait; and'Twilight' ai,
apt piece of contemplative verse; while'Alnwick Castle' combines
his grave and gay style with inimitable art and admirable effect.  As
a versifier, he is an adept in that relation of sound to sense which
embalms thought in deathless melody.  An unusual blending of the
animal and intellectual with that full proportion essential to manhood,
enables him to utter appeals that wake responses in the universal
heart.  An almost provoking mixture of irony and sentiment is
characteristic of his genius.  Born in Connecticut, his life has been
chiefly passed in the city of New York, and occupied in mercantile
affairs.  He is a conservative in taste and opinions, but his feelings
are chivalric, and his sympathies ardent and loyal; and these, alter



17"4         A SKETCH OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.  [CHAP. II.
nating withl humor, glow and sparkle in the most spirited and har,
monioas lyrical compositions of the American muse.
"'Centuries hence, perchance, some lover of'The Old American
Writers' will speculate as ardently as Monkbarns himself, about the
site of Sleepy Hollow. Then the HIudson will possess a classic
interest, and the associations of genius and patriotism may furnish
themes to illustrate its matchless scenery.'The Culprit Fay' will
then be quoted with enthusiasm. Imagination is a perverse faculty.
Why should the ruins of a feudal castle add enchantment to a knoll
of the Catskills? Are not the Palisades more ancient than the
aqueducts of the Roman Campagna? Can bloody tradition or
superstitious legends really enhance the picturesque impression derived from  West Point?   The heart for ever asserts its claim.
Primeval nature is often coldly grand in the view of one who loves
and honors his race; and the outward world is only brought near to
his spirit when linked with human love and suffering, or consecrated
by heroism and faith. Yet, if there ever was a stream romantic in
itself, superior from its own wild beauty, to all extraneous charms,
it is the Hudson.  Who ever sailed between its banks and scanned
its jutting headlands,- the perpendicular cliffs,-the meadows over
which alternate sunshine and cloud,-umbrageous woods, masses of
grey rock, dark cedar groves, bright grain-fields, tasteful cottages,
and fairy-like sails; who, after thus feasting both sense and soul,
through a summer day, has, from a secluded nook of those beautiful
shores, watched the moon rise and tip the crystal ripples with light,
and not echoed the appeal of the bard?'Tell me-where'er thy silver bark be steering,
By bright Italian or soft Persian lands,
Or o'er those island-studded seas careering,
Whose pearl-charged waves dissolve on coral strands:
Tell if thou visitest, thou heavenly rover,
A lovelier scene than this the wide world over?'""It was where'The moon looks down on old Cro'nest,
And mellows the shade on his shaggy breast,'
that Drake laid the scene of his poem.  The story is of simple con.
struction. The fairies are called together, at this chosen hour, not
to join in dance or revel, but to sit in judgment on one of their
number who has broken his vestalvow.  Evil sprites, both of the
air and water, oppose the Fay in his mission of penance.  He is
sadly baffled and tempted, but at length conquers all difficulties, and
his triumphant return is hailed with'dance and song, and lute and
lyre.'
" It is in the imagery of the poem that Drake's genius is pre-eml.' Hoffman's " Mo.,nlight cin the Hudson."




CHAP. III.]  A SKETCH OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.               475
nent.  What, for instance, can be more ingenious than the ordeals
prescribed had any   spot or taint' in his ladye-love deepened the
Fay's sacrilege? Most appropriate tortures, these, for a fairy inqcuisition!  Even without the metrical accompaniment, how daintily
conceived are all the appointments of the fairies! Their lanterns
were owlet's eyes.  Some of them  repose in cobweb hammocks,
swinging, perhaps, on tufted spears of grass, and rocked by the
zephyrs of a midsummer night. Others make their beds of lichengreen, pillowed by the breast-plumes of the humming-bird. A few,
whose taste for upholstery is quite magnificent, find a couch in the
purple shade of the four-o'clock, or the little niches of rock lined
with dazzling mica. The table of these minnikin epicureans is a
mushroom, whose velvet surface and quaker hue make it a very
respectable festal board at which to drink dew from buttercups. The
king's throne is of sassafras and spice-wood, with tortoise-shell pillars,
and crimson tulip-leaves for drapery. But the quaint shifts and
beautiful outfit of the Culprit himself, comprise the most delectable
imagery of the poem. He is worn out with fatigue and chagrin at
the very commencement of his journey, and therefore makes captive
of a spotted toad, by way of a steed.  Having bridled her with silkweed twist, his progress is rapid by dint of lashing her sides with an
osier thong.  Arrived at the beach, he launches fearlessly upon the
tide, for among his other accomplishments, the Fay is a graceful
swimmer; but his tender limbs are so bruised by leeches, star-fish,
and other watery enemies, that he is soon driven back.
"The materia medica of Fairy-land is always accessible; and cobweb lint, and balsam dew of sorrel and henbane, speedily relieve the
little penitent's wounds.  Having refreshed himself with the juice
of the calamus root, he returns to the shore, and selects a neatlyshaped muscle shell, brightly painted without, and tinged with pearl
within.  Nature seemed to have formed it expressly for a fairy-boat
Having notched the stern, and gathered a colen bell to bale with, he
sculls into the midst of the river, laughing at his old foes as they
grin and chatter around his way. There, in the sweet moon-light,
he sits until a sturgeon comes by, and leaps, all glistening, into the
silvery atmosphere; then balancing his delicate frame upon one foot,
like a Lilliputian Mercury, he lits the flowery cup, and catches the
one sparkling drop that is to wash the stain from his wing.  Gay is
his return voyage.  Sweet nymphs clasp the boat's side with their
tiny hands, and cheerily urge it onward.  His next enterprise is of
a more knightly species; and he proceeds to array himself accordingly, as becomes a fairy cavalier. His acorn helmnet is plumed with
thistle-down, a bee's nest forms his corselet, and his cloak is of butterflies' wings.  With a lady-bug's shell for a shield, and wasp-sting
lance, spurs of cockle-seed, a bow  ncmade of vine-twig, strung with
maize-silk, and well supplied with nettle-shafts, he mounts his fir —fly




476          A SKETCH OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.  [CHAP. III.
Bucephalus, an I waving his blade of blue grass, speeds upward to
catch a'glimmrering spark' from  some flying meteor.  Again the
spirits of evil are let loose upon him, and the upper elements are not
more friendly than those below.  Fays are as hardly beset, it seems,
as we of coarser clay, by temptations in a feminine shape. A sylphid
queen of the skies,'the loveliest of the forms of light,' enchants
the wanderer by her beauty and kindness. But though she played
very archly with the butterfly cloak, and handled the tassel of his
blade while he revealed to her pitying ear'the dangers he had
passed,' the memory of his first love and the object of pilgrimage
kept his heart free. Escorted with great honor by the sylph's lovely
train, his career is resumed, and his flame-wood lamp at length rekindled, and before the'sentry elf' proclaims'a  streak in the
eastern sky,' the Culprit has been welcomed to all his original glory.
"It will be observed that the materials-the costume, as it wereof this fairy tale, are of native and familiar origin.  The effect is
certainly quite as felicitous as that of many similar productions where
the countless flowers and rich legends of the East, furnish the poet
with an exhaustless mine of pleasing images. It has been remarked
that the dolphin and flying-fish are the only poetical members of the
finny tribes; but who, after reading the Culprit Fay, will ever hear
the plash of a sturgeon in the moon-lit water, without recalling the
genius of Drake? Indeed, the poem which we have thus cursorily
examined, is one of those happy inventions of fancy, superinduced
upon fact, which afford unalloyed delight.  There are various tastes
as regard the style and spirit of different bards; but no one, having
the slightest perception, will fail to realize at once that the Culprit
Fay is a genuine poem.  This is, perhaps, the highest of praise.
The mass of versified compositions are not strictly poems. Here and
there only the purely ideal is apparent.  A series of poetical fragments are linked by rhymes to other and larger portions of commonplace and prosaic ideas.  It is with the former as with moon-beams
falling through dense foliage-they only chequer our path with light.'Poetry,' says Campbell,'should come to us in masses of ore, that
require little sifting.' The poem before us obeys this important
rule.  It is'of imagination all compact.'  It takes us completely
away from the dull level of ordinary associations.  As the portieo of
some beautiful temple, through it we are introduced into a scene of
calm delight, where Fancy asserts her joyous supremacy, and woos
us to forgetfulness of all outward evil, and to fresh recognition of the
lovely in Nature, and the graceful and gifted in humanity."*
For some of the best convivial, amatory, and descriptive poetry of
native origin, w. are indebted to Charles Fenno Hoffman.  The
woods and streams, the feast and the vigil, are reflected in his verse.
with a graphic truth and sentiment that evidence an eye for the pie*'Ihoughts on the Poeta




CHAP. JII.]  A SKETCH OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.                477
turesque, a sense of the adventurous, and a zest for pleasure   He
has written many admirable scenic pieces that evince not only a careful,
but a loving observation of nature; some touches of this kind in the' Vigil of Faith' are worthy of the most celebrated poets. TIany of his
songs, from their graceful flow and tender feeling, are highly popular,
although some of the metres are too like those of Moore not to provoke a comparison.  They are, however, less tinctured with artifice;
and many of them have a spontaneous and natural vitality.
The Scripture pieces of N. P. Willis, although the productions of
his youth, have an individual beauty that renders them  choice and
valuable exemplars of American genius. In his other poems& there
is apparent a sense of the beautiful and a grace of utterance, often an
exquisite imagery, and rich tone of feeling that emphatically announce
the poet; but in the chastened and sweet, as well as picturesque elaboration of the miracles of Christ, and some of the incidents recorded
in the Bible, Willis succeeded in an experiment at once bold, delicate,
and profoundly interesting.' Melanie' is a narrative in verse, full
of imaginative beauty and expressive music. The high finish, rare
metaphors, verbal felicity, and graceful sentiment of his poems are
sometimes marred by a doubtful taste that seems affectation; but
where he obeys the inspiration of nature and religious sentiment, the
result is truly beautiful. A native of Maine, he has been an extensive traveller, and has gathered his illustrations from a wide range of
observation and experience.
Henry W. Longfellow has achieved an extended reputation as a
poet, for which he is chiefly indebted to his philological aptitudes and
his refined taste. Trained as a verbal artist by the discipline of a
poetical translator, he acquired a tact and facility in the use of words,
which great natural fluency and extreme fastidiousness enabled him
to use to the utmost advantage.  His poems are chiefly meditative,
and have that legendary significance peculiar to the German ballad.
They also often embody and illustrate a moral truth.  There is little
or no evidence of inspiration in his verse, as that term is used to
suggest the power of an overmastering passion; but there is a thoughtful, subdued feeling that seems to overflow in quiet beauty.  It is,
however, the manner in which this sentiment is expressed, the appositeness of the figures, the harmony of the numbers, and the inimitable choice of words that gives effect to the composition.  Hie often
reminds us of an excellent mosaic worker, with his smooth table of
polished marble indented to receive the precious stones that are lying
at hand, which he calmly, patiently, and with exquisite art, inserts
in the shape of flowers and fruit. Almost all Longfellow's poems
are gems set with consummate taste.  His'Evangeline' is a beau
tiful picture of rural life and love, which, from the charm of its pie
tures and the gentle harmony of its sentiment, became popular
although written in hexameters.  His'Skeleton in Armor' is the
most novel and characteristic of his shorter poems; and his' Psalms




478          A SKETCH OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.  [CIAP. III.
of Life' and'Excelsior' are the most familiar and endeared.  Ite is
the artistic, as Halleck is the lyrical and Bryant the picturesque and
philosophic, of American poets.'
The most concise, apt, and effective poet of the school of Pope, this
country has produced, is Oliver Wendell Holmes, a Boston physician
and son of the excellent author of the'Annals,' long a minister of the
parish of Cambridge, at which. venerable seat of learning this accomplished writer was born.  His best lines are a series of rhymed
pictures, witticisms, or sentiments, let off with the precision and brilliancy of the scintillations that sometimes illumine the northern
horizon. The significant terms, the perfect construction and acute
choice of syllables and emphasis, render some passages of Holmes
absolute models of versification, especially in the heroic measure.
Besides these artistic merits, his poetry abounds with fine satire,
beautiful delineations of nature, and amusing caricatures of manners.
The long poems are metrical essays more pointed, musical, and judicious, as well as witty, than any that have appeared, of the same
species, since the' Essay on Man' and' The Dunciad.'  His description of the art in which he excels, is inimitable, and illustrates all
that it defines. His' Old Ironsides' —an indignant protest against
the destruction of the frigate Constitution -created a public sentiment that prevented the fulfilment of that ungracious design. IHis
verses on' Lending an old Punch Bowl' are in the happiest vein of that
form of writing.  About his.occasional pieces, there is an easy and
vigorous tone like that of Praed; and some of them  are the liveliest
specimens of finished verse yet written among us. His command of
language, his ready wit, his concise and pointed style, the nervous,
bright, and wise scope of his muse, now and then softened by a pathetic touch, or animated by a living picture, are qualities that have
firmly established the reputation of Dr. Holmes as a poet; while, in
professional character and success, he has been equally recognised.
James R. Lowell, also the son of a clergyman and a native of Cambridge, unites, in his most effective poems, the dreamy, suggestive
character of the transcendental bards with the philosophic simplicity
of Wordsworth.  He has written clever satires, good sonnets, and
some long poems with fine descriptive passages.  He reminds us
often of Tennyson, in the sentiment and the construction of his verse.
Imagination and philanthropy are the dominant elements in his
writings; some of which are marked by a graceful flow and earnest
tone, and many unite with these attractions that of high finish.
George H. Boker, the author of'Calaynos,''Anne Boleyn,' and
other dramatic pieces, is a native and resident of Philadelphia. "The
glow of his images is chastened by a noble simplicity, keeping them
within the line of human sympathy and natural expression. He has
followed the masters of dramatic writing with rare judgment.  He
also excels many gifted poets of his class in a quality essential to an




CIAP. 111.]  A SKETCH OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.                4`9
acted play —spirit.  To the tragic ability he unites aptitude for easy,
colloquial, and jocose dialogue, such as must intervene in the genuine
Shakspearian drama, to give relief and additional effect to high emotion.
His language, also, rises often to the highest point of energy, pathos,
and beauty."*
A casual dalliance with the muses is. characteristic of our busy
citizens, in all professions; some of these poetical estrays have a pertuanent hold upon the popular taste and sympathy. Among them
may be mentioned Frisbie's' Castle in the Air,' Norton's'Scene after
a Summer Shower,' Henry Ware's'Address to the Ursa Major,'
Pinkney's verses entitled'A Health,' Palmer's ode to' Light,' Poe's' Raven' and' The Bells,' Cooke's' Florence Vane,' Parson's' Lines
to a Bust of Dante,' Wilde's'My Life is like a Summer Rose,'
Albert G. Greene's'Old Grimes,' and Woodworth's'Old Oaken
Bucket.'
Extensive circulation is seldom to be hoped for works which
appeal so faintly to the practical spirit of our times and people, as
the class we have thus cursorily examined. Yet, did space allow,
we should be tempted into a somewhat elaborate argument, to prove
that the cordial reception of such books agrees perfectly with
genuine utilitarianism.  As a people, it is generally conceded that
we lack nationality of feeling. Narrow reasoners may think that
this spirit is best promoted by absurd sensitiveness to foreign comments or testy alertness in regard to what is called national honor.
We incline to the opinion founded on well established facts, both of
history and human nature, that the best way to make an individual
true to his political obligations, is to promote his love of country;
and experience shows that this is mainly induced by cherishing
high and interesting associations in relation to his native land.
Every well-recorded act, honorable to the state, every noble deed
consecrated by the effective pen of the historian, or illustrated in
the glowing page of the novelist, tends wonderfully to such a result.
Have not the hearts of the Scotch nurtured a deeper patriotism since
Sir Walter east into the furrows of time his peerless romances?  No
light part in this elevated mission is accorded to the poet.  Dante
and Petrarch have done much to render Italy beloved. Beranger
has given no inadequate expression to those feelings which bind
soldier, artisan and peasant to the soil of France.  Here the bard
can draw only upon brief chronicles, but God has arrayed this
continent with a sublime -and characteristic beauty, that should
endear its mountains and streams to the American heart; and whoever ably depicts the natural glory of the country, touches a chord
which should yield responses of admiration and loyalty. In this
point of view alone, then, we deem the minstrel who ardently sings
* Characteristics of Literature. Second Series.
40




480         A SKETCH OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.  [CHAP. I.
of forest and sky, river and highland, as eminently worthy of recognition. This merit may be claimed for Alfred B. Street, of
Albany, who was born and reared amid the most picturesque scenery
of the state of New York.  That he is deficient occasionally in
high finish —that there is repetition and monotony in his strainthat there are redundant epithets, and a lack of variety in his
effusions, is undeniable; and having frankly granted all this to the
critics, we feel at liberty to utter his just praise with equal sincerity.
Street has an eye for Nature in all her moods.  He has not roamed
the woodlands in vain, nor have the changeful seasons passed him
by without leaving vivid and lasting impressions.  These his verse
records with unusual fidelity and genuine emotion. I have wandered
with him on a summer's afternoon, in the neighbourhood of his
present residence, and, stretched upon the greensward, listened to his
woodland talk, and can therefore testify that he observes con amore
the play of shadows, the twinkle of swaying herbage in the sunshine, and all the phenomena that makes the outward world so ionh
in meaning to the attentive gaze.  He is a true Flemish painter,
seizing upon objects in all their verisimilitude. As we read him,
wild flowers peer up from among the brown leaves; the drum of the
partridge, the ripple of waters, the flickering of autumn light, the
sting of sleety snow, the cry of the panther, the roar of the winds,
the melody of birds, and the odor of crushed pine boughs, are
present to our senses.  In a foreign land his poems would transport
us at once to home.  He is no second-hand limner, content ta
furnish insipid copies, but draws from reality.  His pictures have
the freshness of originals.  They are graphic, detailed, never untrue,
and often vigorou3.  He is essentially an American poet.  His
range is limited, and he has had the good sense not to wander from
his sphere, candidly acknowledging that the heart of man has not
furnished him the food for meditation, which inspires a higher class
of poets. He is emphatically an observer. In England we notice
that these qualities have been recognised. His' Lost Hunter' has
been finely illustrated there, thus affording the best evidence of the
picturesque fertility of his muse.  Many of his pieces also glow
with patriotism.  His' Grey Forest Eagle' is a noble lyric, full of
spirit; his'1Forest Scenes' are minutely, and at the same time,
elaborately true.  His Indian  legends and descriptions of the
seasons have a native vest we have rarely encountered.  Without
the classic refinement of Thomson, he excels him in, graphic power,
There is nothing metaphysical in his tone of mind, or highly
artistic in his style. But there is an honest directness and cordial
faithfulness about him that strikes us as remarkably appropriate and
manly. Delicacy, sentiment, ideal'enthusiasm, are not his by nature,
but clear, bold, genial insight and feeling he possesses in a rare
degree, and his poems worthily depict the phases of nature, as she




CHAP  III.]  A SKETCH OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.                    481
displays herself in this land, in all her picturesque wildness, solemn
magnificence, and serene beauty.
To the descriptive talent as related to natural scenery, which we
have noted as the gift of our best poets, John G. Whittier unites
the enthusiasm of a reformer and the sympathies of the patriot
There is a prophetic anathema and a bard-like invocation in some of
his pieces. He is a true son of New England, and, beneath the
calm, fraternal bearing of the quaker, nurses the imaginative ardor
of a devotee both of nature and humanity. The early promise of
Brainard, his fine poetic observation and sensibility, enshrined in
several pleasing lyrics, and his premature death, are analogous to
the career of Henry Kirke White. John Neal has written some
odes, carelessly put together, but having memorable passages.
Emerson has published a small volume of quaint rhymes; Croswell
wrote several short but impressive church poems, in which he has
been ably followed by Cleveland Cox; Bayard Taylor's California
ballads are full of truth, spirit, and melody; Albert Pike of
Arkansas, is the author of a series of hymns to the gods, after the
manner of Keats, which have justly commanded favorable notice;
Willis G. Clarke is remembered for his few  but touching and
finished elegiac pieces. Epes Sargent's'Poems of the Sea,' are
worthy of the subject, both in sentiment and style. F. S. Key of
Baltimore was the author of the' Star-Spangled Banner,' and Judge
Hopkinson of Philadelphia, wrote'Hail Columbia.'  George P.
Morris, among the honored contributors to American poetry,* whose
pieces are more or less familiar, is recognised as the song-writer of
America.
A large number of graceful versifiers, and a few writers of
poetical genius, have arisen among the women of America
Southey has recorded, in no measured terms, his estimation of Mrs.
Brooks, the author of'Zophiel.' The sentiment and melody of
Mrs. Welby have made the name of'Amelia' precious in the west.
Mrs. Sigourney's metrical writings are cherished by a large portion
of the New England religious public. The'Sinless Child of Mrs.
Oakes Smith is a melodious and imaginative poem, with many verses
of graphic and metaphysical significance. The occasional pieces of
Mrs. Embury, Mrs. Whitman, Mrs. Hewitt, and Miss Lynch, are
* Among them are Hill, Godwin, Mellen, Griffin, Ware, Dioane, Colton,
Rockwell, Sanford, Ward, Gallagher, Aldrich, J. F. Clark, Hormer, Burleigh
Noble, Hirst, Read, Matthews, Lord, Wallace, Legar6, Miller, Walter, East
burn,' Barker, Schoolcraft, Tappan, Jackson, Meek, Seba Smith, Thacher,
Peabody, Ellery, Channing, Snelling, Murray, Fay, C. C. Moore, J. G.
Brooks, A. G. Greene, Bethune, Carlos Wilcox, Frisbie, Goodrich, Clason.
Leggett, Fairfield, Dawes, Bright, Conrad, Prentice, Simms, John H. Bryant,
Lawrence, Benjamin, Vesy, Cutter, Cranch, Peabodie, Matthews, Huntington, Saxe, Dewey, Fields, Hoyt, Stoddard. For biographical notices and a
critical estimate of these metrical writers, with specimens of their verse, the
reader is referred to Griswold's' Poets and Poetry of America,' last edition.




482          A SKETCH OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.   [CHAP. III.
thoughtful, earnest, and  artistic.  The facility, playfulness, and
ingenious conception of Mrs. Osgood rendered her a truly gifted
improvisatrice.  Miss Gould  has written several pretty  fanciful
little poems, and Miss Sara Clark's'Ariadne' is worthy of Mrs.
Norton.  The Davidsons are instances of rare, though melancholy
precocity in the art.  The moral purity, love of nature, domestic
affection, and graceful expression which characterize the writings of
our female poets, are remarkable. Many of them enjoy a high
local reputation, and their effusions are quoted with zeal at the fireside.  Taste rather than profound sympathies, sentiment rather than
passion, and fancy more than imagination, are evident in these spontaneous, gentle, and often picturesque poems. They usually are
more creditable to the refinement and pure feelings, than to the
creative power or original style of the authors. Among a reading
people, however, like our own, these beautiful native flowers,
scattered by loving hands, are sweet mementoes and tokens of ideal
culture and gentle enthusiasm, in delightful contrast to the prevailing
hardihood and materialism of character.*
In the felicitous use of native materials, as well as in the religious
sentiment and love of freedom, united with skill as an artist, William
Cullen Bryant is recognised as the best representative of American
poetry; and we cannot better close this brief survey of native literature than by an examination of his poems; in which the traits of our
scenery, the spirit of our institutions, and the devotional faith that
proved the conservative element in our history, are all consecrated by
poetic art.
"The first thought which suggests itself in regard to Bryant, is
his respect for the art which he has so nobly illustrated.  This is not
less commendable than rare. Such an impatient spirit of utility prevails in our country, that even men of ideal pursuits are often infected
by it.  It is a leading article in the Yankee creed, to turn every
* For a very complete and interesting survey of this class of writings, the
reader is referred to' Griswold's Female Poets of America.' His list comprises nearly a hundred names; the biographical sketches afford a good insight
Into the domestic culture of the nation; and the specimens are various, and
often beautiful, including, besides the writers of colonial and revolutionary
times, and those already mentioned, the names of Miss Townsend, Mrs.
Gilman, Mrs. Hale, Mrs. Wells, Mlss James, Mrs. Ward, Mrs. Ware, Mrs.
Gray, Mrs. Little, Mrs. Child, Mrs. Hall, Mrs. Follen, Mrs. Green, Miss
Taggart, Mrs. C.anfield, Miss Rogart, Mrs. Mlary E. Brooks, Mrs. Loud,
Mrs. Chandler, Mrs. Barnes, Mrs. Kinney, Mrs. Ellett, Mrs. Scott, Mrs.
Dinnies, Mrs. Stephens, Mrs. St. John, Mrs. L. P. Smith, Mrs. Oliver, Miss
Mary E. Lee, Mrs. Esling, Mrs. Sawyer, Mrs. Bailey, Mrs. Thurston. Miss
Day, Mrs. Dodd, Mrs. Judson, Mrs. Eames, Mrs. Emeline Smith, Miss
Fuller, Mrs. Pierson, Mrs. Worthington, Mrs. Lewis, Mrs. Mowatt, Mrs.
M'Donald, Lucy Hooper., Mrs. Mayo, Miss Jacobs, Mrs. Case, Mrs. Bolton,
Miss Woodman, IMrs. Nichols, Mrs. Wakefield, Miss E. Lee, Miss Susan
Pindar, Caroline May, Mrs. Neal, Mrs. Sproat, Mrs. Winslow, Miss Campbell, Miss Bavard, Mrs. Lascom, Edith May, Alice and Phcebe Carey, Miss
Uawron, Mrs. Lowell, and Miss Phillips.




CHAP. III.]  A SKETCH OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.                483
endowment to account: and although a poet is generallyleft'to
chew the cud of sweet and bitter fancies,' as he lists, occasions
are not infrequent when even his services are available.  Caliban's
1owly toil will not supply all needs.  The more'gentle spiriting' of
Ariel is sometimes desired.  To subserve the objects of party, to
acquire a reputation upon which office may be sought, and to gratify
personal ambition, the American poet is often tempted to sacrificl
his true fame and the dignity of Art to the demands of Occasion
To this weakness Bryant has been almost invariably superior. He
has preserved the elevation which he so early acquired.   He has
been loyal to the Muses. At their shrine his ministry seems ever free
and sacred, wholly apart from the ordinary associations of life. With
a pure heart and a lofty purpose, has he hymned the glory of Nature
and the praise of Freedom.  To this we cannot but, in a great degree, ascribe the serene beauty of his verse.  The mists of worldly
motives dim the clearest vision, and the sweetest voice falters amid
the strife of passion.  As the patriarch went forth alone to muse at
eventide, the reveries of genius have been to Bryant, holy and private
seasons.  They are as unstained by the passing clouds of this troubled
existence, as the skies of his own'Prairies' by village smoke.
"Thus it should be, indeed, with all poets; but we deem it singularly happy when it is so with our own. The tendency of all action
and feeling with us, is so much the reverse of poetical, that only the
high, sustained, and consistent development of the imagination, would
command attention or exert influence. The poet in this republic,
does not address ignorance.  In truth, the great obstacle with which
he has to deal, so to speak, is intelligence.  It is not the love of gain
and physical comfort alone, that deadens the finer perceptions of our
people.  Among the highly educated there is less real enjoyment of
poetry than is discovered by those to whom reading is almost a solitary luxury. No conformity to fashion or affectation of taste influences the latter. They seek the world of imagination and sentiment,
with the greater delight from the limited satisfaction realized in their
actual lot.  To them  Poetry is a great teacher of self-respect.  It
unfolds to them emotions familiar to their own bosoms. It celebrates
scenes of beauty amid which they also are free to wander. It vindicates capacities and a destiny of which they partake.  Intimations
like these are seldom found in their experience, and for this reason,cherished and hallowed associations endear an art which consoles
while it brings innocent pleasure to their hearts. It is, therefore, in
what is termed society, that the greatest barriers to poetic sympathy
exist, and it is precisely here that it is most desirable the bard should
be heard.  But the idea of culture with this class lies almost exclusively in knowledge. They aim at understanding every question, are
pertinacious on the score of opinion, and would blush to be thought
unacquainted with a hundred subjects with which they have not a
40*




484         A SKETCH OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.  [CHAP. III.
particle of sympathy. The wisdom of loving, even without comprehending; the revelations obtained only through feeling; the veneration that awes curiosity by exalted sentiment-all this is to them
unknown. Life never seems miraculous to their`nds, Nature wears
a monotonous aspect, and routine gradually congeals their sensibilities.
To invade this vegetative existence is the poet's vocation.  Hazlitt
says all that is worth remembering in life is the poetry of it.  If so,
habits wholly prosaic are as alien to wisdom as to enjoyment; and
the elevated manner in which Bryant has uniformly presented the
claims of poetry, the tranquil eloquence with which his chaste and
serious muse appeals to the heart, deserves the most grateful recognition. There is something accordant with the genius of our country,
in the mingled clearness,and depth of his poetry. The glow of unbridled passion seems peculiarly to belong to southern lands where
despotism blights personal effort, and makes the ardent pursuit of
pleasure almost a necessity.  The ancient communities of northern
latitudes have rich literatures from whence to draw materials for their
verse. But here, where Nature is so magnificent, and civil institutions so fresh, where the experiment of republicanism is going on,
and each individual must think, if he do not work, Poetry, to illustrate the age and reach its sympathies, should be thoughtful and vigorous.  It should minister to no weak sentiment, but foster high,
manly and serious views.  It should identify itself with the domestic
affections, and tend to solemnize rather than merely adorn existence.
Such are the natural echoes of American life, and they characterize
the poetry of Bryant.
Bryant's love of Nature gives the prevailing spirit to his poetry.
The feeling with him seems quite instinctive.  It is not sustained
by a metaphysical theory as in the case of Wordsworth, while it is
imbued with more depth of pathos than is often discernible in Thomson. The feeling with which he looks upon the wonders of Creation
is remarkably appropriate to the scenery of the New World.  His
poems convey, to an extraordinary degree, the actual impression
which is awakened by our lakes, mountains, and forests. There is
in the landscape of every country something characteristic and pe;uliar. The individual objects may be the same, but their combination
is widely different. The lucent atmosphere of Switzerland, the
grouping of her mountains, the effect of glacier and water-fall, of
peaks clad in eternal snow, impending over valleys whose emerald
herbage and peaceful flocks realize our sweetest dreams of primeval
life -all strike the eye and affect the mind in a manner somewhat
different from similar scenes in other lands. The long, pencilled
clouds of an Italian sunset - glowing above plains covered with
brightly-tinted vegetation, seem altogether more placid and luxuriant
than the gorgeous masse; of golden vapour, towering in our western
sky at the close of an autumnal day. These and innumerable other




CHAP. III.]  A SKETCH OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.               485
minute features are not only perceived, but intimately felt by the
genuine poet.  We esteem it one of Bryant's great merits that he
has not only faithfully pictured the beauties, but caught the very
spirit of our scenery. His best poems have an anthem-like cadence,
which accords with the vast scenes they celebrate. He approaches
the mighty forests, whose shadowy haunts only the footsteps of the
Indian has penetrated, deeply conscious of its virgin grandeur.  His
harp is strung in harmony with the wild moan of the ancient boughs.
Every moss-covered trunk breathes to him of the mysteries of Time,
and each wild flower which lifts its pale buds above the brown and
withered leaves, whispers some thought of gentleness. We feel,
when musing with him amid the solitary woods, as if blessed with a
companion peculiarly fitted to interpret their teachings; and while
intent in our retirement upon his page, we are sensible as it were,
of the presence of those sylvan monarchs that crown the hill-tops
and grace the valleys of our native land.  No English park formalised by the hand of Art, no legendary spot like the pine grove of
Ravenna, surrounds us. It is not the gloomy German forest with
its phantoms and banditti, but one of those primal, dense woodlands
of America, where the oak spreads its enormous branches, and the
frost-kindled leaves of the maple glow like flame in the sunshine;
where the tap of the woodpecker, and the whirring of the partridge,
alone breaks the silence that broods, like the spirit of prayer, amid
the interminable aisles of the verdant sanctuary.  Any reader of
Bryant, on the other side of the ocean, gifted with a small degree
of sensibility and imagination, may derive from his poems the very
awe and delight with which the first view of one of our majestic
forests would strike his mind.
The kind of interest with which Bryant regards Nature is common
to the majority of minds in which a love of beauty is blended with
reverence. This in some measure accounts for his popularity. XMany
readers, even of poetical taste, are repelled by the very vehemence
and intensity of Byron. They cannot abandon themselves so utterly
to the influences of the outward world, as to feel the waves bound
beneath them "like a steed that kfnows his rider;" nor will their
enthusiasm so far annihilate consciousness as to make them " a portion of the tempest."  Another order of imaginative spirits do not
greatly affect the author of the Excursion, from the frequent baldness
of his conceptions; and not a few are unable to see the Universe
through the spectacles of his philosophy. To such individuals, the
tranquil delight with which the American poet expatiates upon the
beauties of Creation is perfectly genial.  There is no mystical lore
in the tributes of his muse.  All is clear, earnest, and thoughtful.
Indeed, the same difference that exists between true-hearted, natural
affection, and the metaphysical love of the Platonists, may be traed
between the manly and sincere lays 3f Bryant, and the vague and




486         A SKETCB OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.  [CIIAP. IIl.
artificial effusions of transcendental bards.  The former realize th6
definition of a poet which describes him as superior to the multitude
only in degree, not in kind. He is the priest of a universal religion;
and clothes in appropriate and harmonious language sentiments,
warmly felt and cherished. He requires no interpreter. There is
nothing eccentric in his vision. Like all human beings, the burden
of daily toil sometimes weighs heavily on his soul; the noisy activity
of common life becomes hopeless; scenes of inhumanity, error, and
suffering grow oppressive, or more personal causes of despondency
make " the grasshopper a burden." Then he turns to the quietude
and beauty of Nature for refreshment.  There he loves to read the
fresh tokens of creative beneficence. The scented air of the meadows
cools his fevered brow. The umbrageous foliage sways benignly
around him. Vast prospects expand his thoughts beyond the narrow
circle of worldly anxieties. The limpid stream upon whose banks
he wandered in childhood, reflects each fleecy cloud and soothes his
heart as the emblem  of eternal peace.  Thus faith is revived; the
soul acquires renewed vitality, and the spirit of love is kindled again
at the altar of God.  Such views of Nature are perfectly accordant
with the better impulses of the heart. There is nothing in them
strained, unintelligible, or morbid.  They are more or less familiar
to all, and are as healthful overflowings of our nature as the prayer
of repentance, or the song of thanksgiving. They distinguish the
poetry of Bryant, and form one of its dominant charms.
Nothing quickens the perceptions like genuine love. From the
humblest professional attachment to the most chivalric devotion, what
keenness of observation is born under the influence of that feeling
which drives away the obscuring clouds of selfishness, as the sun
consumes the vapour of the morning! I never knew what varied
associations could environ a shell-fish, until I heard an old oystermerchant discourse of its qualities; and a landsman can have no
conception of the fondness a ship may inspire, before he listens, on a
moon-light night, amid the lonely sea, to the details of her build and
workings, unfolded by a complacent tar. Mere instinct or habit will
thus make the rude and illiterate see with better eyes than their
fellows.  When a human object commands such interest, how
quickly does affection detect every change of mood and incipient
want —reading the countenance as if it were the very chart of destiny! And it is so with the lover of Nature. By virtue of his love
comes the vision, if not "the faculty divine."  Objects and simili.
tudes seen heedlessly by others, or passed unnoticed, are stamped
upon his memory. Bryant is a graphic poet, in the best sense of the
word. He has little of the excessive detail of Street, or the homely
exactitude of Crabbe.  His touches, like his themes, are usually on
a grander scale, yet the minute is by no means neglected.  It is his
peculiar merit to deal with it wisely. Enough is suggested to convey




CHAP. III.]  A SKETCH OF AMERICAN LITERAT[RE.               487
a strong impression, and often by the introduction of a single circuinstance, the mind is instantly enabled to complete the picture.
It is difficult to select examples of his power in this regard.  The
opening scene from' A Winter Piece' is as picturesque as it is true
to fact.
Bryant is eminently a contemplative poet.  His thoughts are not
less impressive than his imagery.  Sentiment, except that which
springs from benevolence and veneration, seldom lends a glow to his
pages.  Indeed, there is a remarkable absence of those spontaneous
bursts of tenderness and passion, which constitute the very essence
of a large portion of modern verse.  He has none of the spirit of
Campbell, or the narrative sprightliness of Scott. The few humorous
attempts he has published are unworthy of his genius.  Love is
merely recognised in his poems; it rarely forms the staple of any
composition. His strength obviously consists in description and
philosophy. It is one advantage of this species of poetry that it
survives youth, and is, by nature, progressive. Bryant's recent
poems are fully equal if not superior to any he has written. With
is inimitable pictures there is ever blended high speculation, or a
reflective strain of moral command.  Some elevating inference or
cheering truth is elicited from every scene consecrated by his muse.
A noble simplicity of language, combined with these traits, often
leads to the most genuine sublimity of expression. Some of his
lines are unsurpassed in this respect. They so quietly unfold a great
thought or magnificent image, that we are often taken by surprise.
What a striking sense of mortality is afforded by the idea,-' The oak
Shall send his roots abroad and pierce thy mould."
How grand the figure which represents the evening air, as
"God's blessing breathed upon the fainting earth."
In the same poem he compares
"The gentle souls that passed away,
to the twilight breezes sweeping over a churchyard," Sent forth from heaven among the sons of men,"
And gone into the boundless heaven again."
And what can be more suggestive of the power of the wixn
than the figure by which they are said to
"Scoop the ocean to its briny springs"?He would make us feel the hoary age of the mossy and gigantic
forest-trees, and not only alludes to their annual decay and renewal,
but significantly adds,
" The century-living crow
Whose birth was in their tops, grew old and died."




488          A SKETCH OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.  [CIIAP. II.
To those who have never seen a Prairie, how vividly does one
spread before the imagination, in the very opening of the poem
devoted to those "verdant wastes."
The progress of Science is admirably hinted in a line of'The
Ages,' when man is said to
" Unwind the eternal dances of the sky."
Instances like these might be multiplied at pleasure, to illustrat
She efficacy of simple diction, and to prove that the elements of real
poetry consist in truly grand ideas, uttered without affectation, and
in a reverent and earnest spirit.
A beautiful calm like that which rests on the noble works of the
sculptor, breathes from  the harp of Bryant.  He traces a natural
phenomenon, or writes in melodious numbers, the history of some
familiar scene, and then, with almost prophetic emphasis, utters to
the charmed ear a high lesson or sublime truth. In that pensive
hymn in which he contrasts Man's transitory being, with Nature's
perennial life, solemn and affecting as are the images, they but serve
to deepen the simple monition at the close.
In'The Fountain,' after a descriptive sketch that brings its limpid
flow and flowery banks almost palpably before us, how exquisite is
the chronicle that follows! Guided by the poet, we behold that
gushing stream, ages past, in the solitude of the old woods, when
canopied by the hickory and plane, the humming-bird playing amid
its spray, and visited only by the wolf, who comes to "lap its
waters," the deer who leaves her " delicate foot-print" on its marge,
and the " slow-paced bear that stopt and drank, and leaped across."
Then the savage war-cry drowns its murmur, and the wounded foeman creeps slowly to its brink to "slake his death-thirst."  Ere
long a hunter's lodge is built, "with poles and boughs, beside the
crystal well," and at length the lonely place is surrounded with the
tokens of civilization.
Thus the minstrel, even
" From the gushing of a simple fount,
Has reasoned to the mighty universe."
The very rhythm of the stanzas'" to a Waterfowl," gives the im.
pression of its flight. Like the bird's sweeping wing, they float with
a calm and majestic cadence to the ear. We see that solitary wanderer of the "cold thin atmosphere;" we watch, almost with awe, its
serene course, until " the abyss of heaven has swallowed up its form,"
and then gratefully echo the bard's consoling inference.
But it is unnecessary to cite from pages so familiar; or we might
allude to the grand description of Freedom, and the beautiful " Hymn
to Death,"      a among the noblest specimens of modern verse.  The
great principle of Bryant's faith is that




CHAP. III.]  A SKETCH OF AMERICAN LITERATURE.                 48]
" Eternal Love doth keep
In his complacent arms, the earth, the air, the deep."
To set forth in strains the most attractive and lofty, this glorious
sentiment, is the constant aim of his poetry. Gifted must, be the
man who is loyal to so high a vocation.  From  the din of outward
activity, the vain turmoil of mechanical life, it is delightful and ennobling to turn to a true poet, —one who scatters flowers along our
path, and lifts our gaze to the stars, —breaking, by a word, the spell
of blind custom, so that we recognize once more the original glory
of the Universe, and hear again the latent music of our own souls.
This high service has Bryant fulfilled.  It will identify his memory
with the loveliest scenes of his native land, and endear it to her
children for ever."*
* Thoughts on the Poets.
THE a IND.